Editorial: Minority majority coming

Sunday, March 12, 2006 | 7:22 a.m.

A new report shows America's face is changing. An analysis of U.S. Census Bureau data released earlier this week shows the nation's white population remained stable - and shrank in some metropolitan areas - from 2000 to 2004, while the Hispanic and Asian populations grew.

And these minority populations are expanding into communities and regions long dominated by non-Hispanic whites, according to a Newhouse News Service report on the findings released Tuesday by the Brookings Institution in Washington. William Frey, a demographer and the study's author, told Newhouse News Service that, "Many parts of America are getting a small taste of diversity for the first time, and in many places the new presence of minorities is being met with some backlash and culture clashes."

The backlash can come from longtime residents who suspect, unfairly, that these newcomers could be in the United States illegally. A recent report by the nonpartisan Pew Hispanic Center estimates that about 12 million undocumented immigrants live in this country. And they account for about 5 percent of the U.S. workforce.

Echoes of the culture clashes can be heard in Congress, where House and Senate members continue haggling over immigration and border security bills. President Bush proposed a program last year that would have given temporary worker status to illegal immigrants who already are here. The catch was that workers had to return home after six years and stay there for at least one year before returning to the United States.

Undocumented workers who had started families here would have had to leave them. The plan not only lacked compassion, but it also wasn't realistic. It is hard to imagine anyone would sign up to leave his or her family behind.

The House rejected Bush's plan and has instead passed a border security bill that calls for, among other things, erecting 700 miles of fence along the U.S.-Mexico border. The Senate is in the throes of hammering out a bill that addresses both immigration plans and border security. We support a bill proposed by Sens. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., and John McCain, R-Ariz., that allows undocumented workers to remain in the United States if they apply for residency and make good-faith efforts to learn English.

As long as America holds its reputation as the land of opportunity - the same promise that brought European immigrants here by the shipload 300 years ago - the nation's face will continue to change. It is a shift Americans should embrace. Diversity and tolerance are our birthrights.