Here's the most striking observation about the pro-immigrant rallies that filled the streets of a dozen American cities this week: Most of the marchers reflected bedrock conservative virtues of family, faith and hard work.
If this is a revolution, and it sure looks and sounds like one, it is a revolution from the right not the left, a revolution in favor of stability and tradition, not turbulence and upheaval. And yet the conservative leaders who oppose immigration reform, who reject legal status and possible citizenship for undocumented workers, refuse to see what's right in front of them. They are blind to the triumph of their own values.
The anti-immigration forces have taken one principle, law and order (tinged with a rancid whiff of xenophobia), and elevated it over every other principle -- loyalty and patriotism, charity and courage. That was the calculation behind the noxious bill that passed the House last winter, which makes it a crime to live here illegally or even to help a paperless alien.
But listening to the marchers, it's obvious how shortsighted and self-defeating that approach really is. Many immigrant families are a mixture of legal and illegal residents. Often, the parents came without papers, but their American-born children are full citizens. So detaining and deporting illegals poses a direct threat to the health and unity of these families.
A 15-year-old marcher told The Washington Post that his parents were both illegal immigrants from El Salvador and he worries that they might be sent home. His mother works as a custodian at FBI headquarters and urges him to get good grades. "My mom works from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m.," the boy said. "She's like, 'Stay in school, you don't want to be like me. You're lucky to be born here.'"
Do conservatives really want to break up families like that one? And by the way, who will clean the FBI building if they do?
Yes, floods of newcomers can strain social services, and perhaps even depress wages. There are costs to illegal immigration that have to be addressed. But the marchers were not demanding government help or handouts. Exactly the opposite. They were pleading for the chance to support themselves.
Joshua Lopez, born here of Guatemalan parents, told the Post: "We are here to work, we are here to live. We are here to contribute to society. We are here to stay." Marcella Calderon, born in Mexico, added: "I want people to know that we're not criminals. We are coming here to make the American Dream."
When these rallies first began, organizers made a tactical mistake and permitted some marchers to wave Mexican flags, but by this week, the demonstrations presented an endless sea of red, white and blue -- on flags and faces, banners and bandanas.
A show for the cameras? Sure. But a sincere and heartfelt show. Instead of condemning people who burn the flag, conservatives would be better off embracing those who want to wave it.
Then there's the critical factor of faith. Many newcomers remain strongly tied to their religious traditions, so the anti-immigrant forces have managed to alienate pastors and churchgoers they count as allies in other conservative causes.
The Catholic Archbishop of Denver, Charles J. Chaput, called immigration reform "a boiling issue for a number of years (that) people don't want to talk about." But now he feels compelled to speak out: "This is a human rights issue for us. We want our country to reflect all that we've said we stand for since its foundation."
We have always believed that the great genius of America was drawing the most ambitious, most enterprising, most courageous seekers from other countries. Seekers like Cokie's ancestor, William Claiborne, the first surveyor of the Virginia colony; or Abe Rogow, Steve's grandfather, who escaped anti-Jewish pogroms and the czar's army to build a new life in New Jersey.
So we strongly share the moral imperative that America should "reflect all that we said we stand for." But there's more than morality at stake here, there's political self-interest. Latinos make up 14 percent of America, and while they don't vote in great numbers today, they will soon. One of the key slogans heard in the streets this week was, "Hoy marchamos; manana, votamos." Today, we march; tomorrow, we vote.
If conservatives don't understand that, if they turn their backs on people who share their values and their dreams, they deserve the political disaster about to engulf them.
Steve Roberts' latest book is "My Fathers' Houses: Memoir of a Family" (William Morrow, 2005). Steve and Cokie Roberts can be contacted by e-mail at stevecokie@gmail.com.