4 ms·

You mean all the things just as hard to get as a passport, some invented specifically to be used for this new program? Sure, I guess you could get one of those

You mean all the things just as hard to get as a passport, some invented specifically to be used for this new program? Sure, I guess you could get one of those instead. But there's no reason to get one of them rather than a passport except as a fig leaf for people to say a passport "isn't mandatory". Or, and bear with me for a second, we could have kept freedoms we had on September 10th, 2001.

mynameisvlad 4y ago
It’s far easier to get an EDL than to get a passport, what are you talking about? We never had Schengen. Almost every other country has similar entry requirements, why should the US and Canada be any different? They’re not in a far-reaching political alliance, there’s no incentive to have open borders or provide exceptions to rules. 9/11 changed things. It’s absurd to expect things to always be the same and just because it was open before doesn’t mean that was ever intended or expected to be permanent.
- schoen 4y ago
  > It’s absurd to expect things to always be the same and just because it was open before doesn’t mean that was ever intended or expected to be permanent. On the flip side, there's also an interpretation under which passports (and possibly visas) were not intended or expected to be permanent: https://fee.org/articles/passports-were-a-temporary-war-measure/ https://fee.org/articles/passports-were-a-temporary-war-meas... This article quotes various delegates to international conventions apparently taking for granted that it would be desirable to return to a pre-WWI default of people not usually needing travel documents or being subject to border formalities¹. (I've seen this article several times, but haven't seen if there's a contrary interpretation under which the diplomats or politicians did not, in fact, have the intuition or consensus that it describes. Obviously improvements in transportation technology mean that there are orders of magnitude more international trips than there were in the pre-WWI era, so one could imagine that most migration -- and tourism -- was seen as a relatively marginal activity in the past and that it no longer looks that way when so many more people can afford to do it.) ¹ not quite sure how to reconcile this with inspections of migrants around the turn of the 20th century, even if those were more focused on public health and stuff
  - TMWNN 4y ago
    >not quite sure how to reconcile this with inspections of migrants around the turn of the 20th century, even if those were more focused on public health and stuff More than public health. Every single migrant who came through Ellis Island and other US border stations had to * Pass said public health examinations * Prove, to the satisfaction of inspectors, of disaffiliation with a variety of subversive organizations/ideologies (Communism and polygamy being two prominent examples) * Provide proof of financial support in the US, whether by oneself or from a US financial sponsor Don't pass any of these tests? You're on the next ship out of the US. Shipping companies were responsible for return passage (just as airlines are responsible for paying the way of those who do not pass US border entry today), so had incentive to make sure that their passengers would pass scrutiny. I am a migrant to the US. I am very much in favor of restoring and enforcing such rules today.
    - schoen 4y ago
      So I'm kind of confused about who was and wasn't inspected. Was the inspection only for people intending to remain permanently or intending to start a naturalization process? Was this based on what travelers said their intentions were, or the kind of transportation they used, or something else? My intuition is that someone coming as a tourist, for instance, wouldn't have been subject to this level of inspection. But I also suppose that was much rarer at the beginning of the 20th century than today. (I also don't know what happened at the land borders in prior centuries.)
- FpUser 4y ago
  >"9/11 changed things. It changed too many things that should not have been changed. >"It’s absurd to expect things to always be the same" Exactly. We should expect them to get better and more free. Otherwise we are moving in wrong direction.
- nhooyr 4y ago
  At least in BC, EDLs have been phased out :(
ShroudedNight 4y ago
NEXUS is genuinely faster than a passport
- mgbmtl 4y ago
  The paperwork isn't, alas.

mynameisvlad 4y ago

It’s far easier to get an EDL than to get a passport, what are you talking about? We never had Schengen. Almost every other country has similar entry requirements, why should the US and Canada be any different? They’re not in a far-reaching political alliance, there’s no incentive to have open borders or provide exceptions to rules. 9/11 changed things. It’s absurd to expect things to always be the same and just because it was open before doesn’t mean that was ever intended or expected to be permanent.

schoen 4y ago
> It’s absurd to expect things to always be the same and just because it was open before doesn’t mean that was ever intended or expected to be permanent. On the flip side, there's also an interpretation under which passports (and possibly visas) were not intended or expected to be permanent: https://fee.org/articles/passports-were-a-temporary-war-measure/ https://fee.org/articles/passports-were-a-temporary-war-meas... This article quotes various delegates to international conventions apparently taking for granted that it would be desirable to return to a pre-WWI default of people not usually needing travel documents or being subject to border formalities¹. (I've seen this article several times, but haven't seen if there's a contrary interpretation under which the diplomats or politicians did not, in fact, have the intuition or consensus that it describes. Obviously improvements in transportation technology mean that there are orders of magnitude more international trips than there were in the pre-WWI era, so one could imagine that most migration -- and tourism -- was seen as a relatively marginal activity in the past and that it no longer looks that way when so many more people can afford to do it.) ¹ not quite sure how to reconcile this with inspections of migrants around the turn of the 20th century, even if those were more focused on public health and stuff
- TMWNN 4y ago
  >not quite sure how to reconcile this with inspections of migrants around the turn of the 20th century, even if those were more focused on public health and stuff More than public health. Every single migrant who came through Ellis Island and other US border stations had to * Pass said public health examinations * Prove, to the satisfaction of inspectors, of disaffiliation with a variety of subversive organizations/ideologies (Communism and polygamy being two prominent examples) * Provide proof of financial support in the US, whether by oneself or from a US financial sponsor Don't pass any of these tests? You're on the next ship out of the US. Shipping companies were responsible for return passage (just as airlines are responsible for paying the way of those who do not pass US border entry today), so had incentive to make sure that their passengers would pass scrutiny. I am a migrant to the US. I am very much in favor of restoring and enforcing such rules today.
  - schoen 4y ago
    So I'm kind of confused about who was and wasn't inspected. Was the inspection only for people intending to remain permanently or intending to start a naturalization process? Was this based on what travelers said their intentions were, or the kind of transportation they used, or something else? My intuition is that someone coming as a tourist, for instance, wouldn't have been subject to this level of inspection. But I also suppose that was much rarer at the beginning of the 20th century than today. (I also don't know what happened at the land borders in prior centuries.)
FpUser 4y ago
>"9/11 changed things. It changed too many things that should not have been changed. >"It’s absurd to expect things to always be the same" Exactly. We should expect them to get better and more free. Otherwise we are moving in wrong direction.
nhooyr 4y ago
At least in BC, EDLs have been phased out :(

ShroudedNight 4y ago

NEXUS is genuinely faster than a passport

mgbmtl 4y ago
The paperwork isn't, alas.