A week after J. Page Straley’s VDARE.com essay on Mecklenburg County N.C.’s anti-illegal alien initiative, the Washington Post has published what amounts to a follow-up.

States, Counties Begin to Enforce Immigration Law By Peter Whoriskey September 27, 2006

skips the technicalities of how Sheriff Jim Pendergraph is going about defending his county. But it places the story in the context of increasing independent action by local jurisdictions, and has a good ear for a phrase:

Mecklenburg County Sheriff Jim Pendergraph says there should be little sympathy for illegal immigrants caught by his program…”I’ve heard sad stories about folks wanting to come up here and have a better life and earn money for their family. I’ve arrested bank robbers who’ve had the same excuse.”
Philip Turtletaub, a Charlotte immigration lawyer…ventured no opinion on the program’s fairness, (but) said he thinks it could make life as an illegal immigrant in the region so uncomfortable that fewer illegal immigrants would choose to live there.

“They’re putting the pressure on these people. They’re scaring them. People say we can’t deport 10 million. But you don’t have to. If you deport enough of them, others will go back voluntarily because they don’t want to live in these conditions.”

Some striking statistics are supplied:

In Mecklenburg County, about 1,200 foreign-born people have been arrested since April, on charges ranging from traffic violations and trespassing to sex crimes, and nearly 600 have been found to be here illegally.

And the tragic catalyst is not overlooked:

Local support for broad enforcement coalesced in July 2005 after a truck driven by an illegal immigrant whose blood-alcohol level was nearly triple the legal limit, hit a car, killing a local teacher and leaving the teacher’s wife in a vegetative state.

Mecklenburg County claims to have issued the first Declaration of Independence. Reagan’s North Carolina Primary victory in ’76 was unquestionably a decisive event. Hopefully trend setting is a local habit.