ABSTRACT
Immigration law and policy are frequently discussed in political terms. In the United States debate focuses on concepts of rights and membership in the American polity. Far too often this debate ignores the invisible workers who reside in our country without formal immigration status. One of the enduring difficulties of forging immigration policy is gathering accurate or reliable empirical evidence of the numbers of foreign people in the United States. Even when people can be counted, accurately characterizing their status requires legal sophistication. In 2000, the Department of Agriculture prepared a detailed report and announced that fifty-two percent of all agricultural workers in the United States were present without legal status. Undocumented agricultural workers must be easy to see and easy to find and their impact on the economics of agriculture surely must be understood.
