Closing the door to progress

RALEIGH -- North Carolina endured two divisive ideological struggles in the second half of the 20th century -- public school desegregation after the Supreme Court's Brown decision in the mid-1950s and the Speaker Ban Act when lawmakers tried to block subversive speakers on college campuses in the '60s.

Now another struggle over discrimination is under way -- whether to block undocumented immigrant students from the state's community colleges and universities. If opponents of illegal immigrants get their way, North Carolina would become the first state to deny college enrollment at any price.

That would reverse a longtime tradition in this state of promoting universal access to higher education. It would turn the state away from its recent history of moderation and inclusion, carefully cultivated by such educational leaders as UNC President Emeritus Bill Friday and four-time Gov. Jim Hunt.

The difference of opinion on this issue reflects a sharp contrast among the state's leadership. On one side are Hunt, Friday, Gov. Mike Easley, former community college system President Martin Lancaster and UNC President Erskine Bowles.

Hunt and Friday have supported allowing undocumented students who have attended and graduated from North Carolina high schools to pay in-state tuition. Easley doesn't go that far, but like Lancaster and Bowles he supports allowing undocumented students to pay out-of-state tuition -- which more than covers the cost of instruction.

On the other side are the two nominees for governor in this fall's election, plus Attorney General Roy Cooper. Cooper hasn't specifically addressed the issue himself, but his office takes a different view from Easley, Cooper's predecessor as attorney general. Cooper's office recently concluded that a federal law denying public benefits to undocumented immigrants likely means that undocumented immigrants cannot enroll in public colleges.

Advocates for immigrants say that's a misinterpretation (Cooper's office is seeking a clarification). The ban on benefits means no welfare benefits such as food stamps, no public scholarships or grants and no in-state tuition, which taxpayers subsidize.

But out-of-state tuition, computed to more than cover the costs of college, does not carry a taxpayer subsidy. Advocates say no state denies enrollment if immigrants can pay the full cost. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement says nothing bans states from enrolling undocumented students.

New community college system President Scott Ralls says he'll follow the attorney general's advice on this matter.

Republican gubernatorial nominee Pat McCrory and Democratic nominee Bev Perdue also subscribe to views similar to Cooper's office, and thus would deny enrollment in public colleges to illegal immigrants. If they continue to hold that view, it means that North Carolina's next governor would promote a policy of exclusion and denial.

That probably will play well politically in a fairly conservative state where candidates for office prefer to avoid sticky ideological issues. But it would also put the governor in the position of opposing educational opportunities for certain residents -- a distinct change of policy in a state that has tried to promote education for all, not deny it.

"The effort to exclude these young people is punitive and makes no sense," says state Rep. Paul Luebke. Most of them, he notes, are in North Carolina because they were brought here as infants. Most of them have attended and graduated from North Carolina public schools.

This dispute is attributable in large measure to the failure of the federal government to address illegal immigration. That has left the states with the burden of trying to figure out whether they are better off with uneducated illegal immigrants, or training them for jobs they might one day be able to perform legally.

If the next governor gets his or her way, the door to higher education will close to students who don't have the right papers. So much for progress in the 21st century.

(Jack Betts is a Raleigh-based Charlotte Observer columnist and associate editor.)