Having lived in and spent considerable time in New England, and particularly in Boston, there is little that can be truly surprising anymore. However there are stories that can still amuse and perhaps dismay. A very recent news article details how dozens of immigrants, accused of illegal status and under detention from INS, were trucked to Gillette Stadium to clear snow before the NFL Playoff Game.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/01/08/detained_immigrants_were_set_to_clear_gillette_snow/
While the article spent considerable time bemoaning the fractured immigration agency operation and faulty immigration policies, little attention was focused on the obvious issue of the use of detainees for impromptu labor details for the convenience of the city’s professional sports franchise. In years gone by, it was common in the Southern States of the USA for local police to arrest people on charges of “vagrancy” and other pretextual justifications and turn them over to be used as slave labor to politically influential landowners or companies. Their labor was supposed to be part of their penalty, though frequently the impressments occurred prior to any presentment or judicial determination of guilt. Of course, the police officials received “gratuities” for assisting the local politicos in obtaining virtually free labor.
We do not know whether these detainees forced to shovel snow at Gillette Stadium were actually paid for their services. If they were, then there was a direct breach of law relating to employment of illegal aliens. Claims that the contractor did not know the workers' status seems flimsy, at best, when a truckload of workers arrive in a vehicle marked “INS.” If the workers were not paid for their services, then the problem of using work gangs as slave labor rears its ugly head.
Certainly, in light of weather problems, Boston and its beloved professional sports franchise and fans needed to have the snow cleared. And the practice of graft and questionable "under the table" schemes involving government officials and local bigwigs is all but endemic to life in Boston. Police and Fire employees on disability collecting more from off duty jobs than they did for regular service is fairly common. The current head of the Massachusetts National Guard is to be court-martialed for fraudulent creation and misuse of a “slush fund” of about $6 million. So it is not surprising that the event sparked little outrage in Boston. I suppose if the fruit of their labor were actually going to be put to use to pay for deportation transport, a thin rationalization could be constructed. But my experience in Boston causes me to seriously doubt that the money paid for the services will ever wind up in the pockets of the workers or public coffers.
However, the question begs asking whether it is appropriate, legal or ethical to force detainees to perform work in this manner. Many of the immigrants came to the USA to flee poverty and political instability in their home country. They would gladly have taken jobs performing the same kind of backbreaking work that they have been forced to do, legally, if that were possible. After all, in the current economy, if the work assignment paid a reasonable wage and there were plenty of legal workers who wanted the job, why was the impressment of detainees necessary? So, if these workers were performing manual labor no-one else wanted, why are they denied legal opportunity to do the much needed work? Seems to me more than a little hypocritical. And for a city that was once the center of the abolitionist movement, this corrupt use of slave labor seems especially unworthy.
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