Questionable transactions as grounds for legalization: Immigration, illegality, and law

By differentiating between legal and illegal movements, transactions, andpersons, legal prohibitions and law enforcement practices create boundaries between legitimate and illegitimate social spheres. Individuals who are located in an illegitimate domain survive at least in part through unauthorized and quasi-illegal practices. The boundaries between legitimate and illegitimate social domains are, however, permeable, making it possible for individuals who have at one time been deemed illegal to at another time claim legitimacy. This paper examines one context in which such claims are made: deportation hearings in a U.S. immigration court. During deportation hearings, undocumented immigrants' prior involvement in questionable transactions can be deemed an indication of poor moral character or of non-credibility. At the same time, such involvement can be overlooked or reinterpreted in ways that permit an undocumented immigrant to pass from illegality to legality. Close attention to such ``readings' or interpretations reveals that there is a sense in which the proceedings that award and deny legal status are as questionable as other immigration-related transactions.