Episode Details

Friends,

Texas has sued the Biden administration over its order to immigration agents to prioritize undocumented immigrants convicted of felonies rather than deport all undocumented immigrants.

Texas argues that federal immigration law requires the government to deport every undocumented immigrant. The Biden administration says it doesn’t have the resources to deport the country’s estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants, so it must develop priorities.

The controversy reminds me of something that happened thirty years ago, soon after I became secretary of labor.

Child labor laws bar fourteen-year-olds from working past 7 pm on school nights. Weeks before I became secretary of labor, a vigilant Labor Department investigator discovered that the Savannah Cardinals, a Class A farm team of the Atlanta Braves, had hired 14-year-old Tommy McCoy to be their batboy. On balmy evenings extending beyond sunset, Tommy selected each player’s favorite bat and proudly delivered it to him in the batter’s box. Next morning, Tommy went to school.

The investigator threatened the team with a stiff fine. The team did what it had to do: It fired little Tommy.

Tommy liked being a batboy. His parents were proud of him. The team was fond of him. The fans loved him. As long as anyone could remember, every kid in Savannah had coveted the job. Tommy did well in school.

But now little Tommy was out of the best kid’s job in town.

Well, you can imagine the furor. It seemed as if the whole city of Savannah was up in arms. The Cardinals were about to stage a “Save Tommy’s Job Night” rally, featuring balloons, buttons, placards, and a petition signed by the fans demanding that Tommy be rehired.

ABC News was doing a story on the controversy — which was how I first heard about it. ABC wanted an on-camera interview with me that same evening, explaining why Tommy had been fired. They couldn’t wait to show America the stupidity of the government (and of its new secretary of labor).

What was I to do?

I tried to hold ABC off. They said they were running with the story with or without my interview.

I called an urgent meeting with the Labor Department’s top inspectors. I explained the situation to them, suggesting we let Tommy have his job back.

They wouldn’t hear of it. “It would look like you’re caving in to public opinion,” one of the chief inspectors said.

“But,” I asked, “isn’t it the public whom we’re here to serve?”

They said the law was clear: Children under 14 could not work past 7 pm on school nights. “The Savannah team broke the law and it was our responsibility to enforce the it.”

“But shouldn’t we have priorities?” I asked. “We have a limited number of inspectors. I can understand hitting a building contractor who’s hiring kids to lay roofing, but why go after batboys and girls?”

They said child labor was a serious problem. Children were getting injured working long hours.

“Exactly,” I said. “So let’s focus on the serious offenses and ignore the less serious.”

They warned that if I didn’t support the Department’s investigators, the staff would become demoralized.

“Good! If they become demoralized and stop enforcing the law nonsensically, so much the better,” I said.

They said that if I backed down, the Labor Department would lose credibility.

“We’ll lose even more credibility if we stick with this outrageous decision,” I said.

They said there was nothing we could do. The law was the law.

“Nonsense,” I said. “We can change the regulation to make an exception for kids at sporting events.”

But we’d invite all sorts of abuses, they argued. Vendors would exploit young kids on school nights to sell peanuts and popcorn. Stadiums would hire young children to clean the locker rooms. Parking lots would use children to collect mone