What 'minuteman' vigil accomplished

Retired pilot Joe McCutchen spent three weeks, $6,000, and put 4,600 miles on his car driving round trip from Fort Smith, Ark., to the Arizona border. In between, he spent 14 days in a folding chair, buffeted by wind storms, face- cutting sand, freezing cold, and scorching sun.

He says he'll be back to do it again in October.

"The terrain and weather were utterly brutal," says Mr. McCutchen, who spent eight hours a day manning lookout posts. "I have a new sense of compassion for the illegals who are being exploited by both countries ... and the Border Patrol that is not being given what it needs to do the job properly."

The volunteer Minuteman Project finished its month-long vigil on a 20-mile strip of the Arizona-Mexico border this weekend, claiming success in its two-fold mission of highlighting the issue of illegal immigration in the US and showing that the border could be effectively closed with proper manpower.

In the end, the civilian patrols proved not to be the disruption that many critics had predicted - even the Border Patrol, which had been skeptical, said there were few mishaps between illegal immigrants and the citizen volunteers. But neither did it offer conclusive evidence that a human dragnet, no matter how large, could shut down the entire US-Mexican border.

For one thing, some 900 volunteers were involved in watching just a 20-mile stretch of desert. To extend the same manpower to the entire 1,400-mile border would require more than 60,000 people - and probably a permanent presence, experts note. Moreover, reports indicate that some Mexicans and other would-be immigrants were avoiding this stretch of Arizona while the lookout was going on.

Nonetheless, organizers of the initiative believe it laid the foundation for a much broader vigil from California to Texas in October. Some 14,000 have already signed up for it. Future plans might include monitoring the northern border as well - in Vermont, Michigan, North Dakota, and Idaho.

"We established a beachhead in Arizona and now we are going to conquer the whole island," says James Gilchrist, cofounder of the project. "We did in 190 days of planning what all of the lobbyists couldn't do in 10 years and Congress couldn't do in 40 years - effectively protect the border from incoming illegals, terrorists, and drug traffickers."

Gilchrist and cofounder Chris Simcox say an additional tier of activism will now focus on boycotting US businesses who knowingly use illegal labor - what organizers claim is the main magnet attracting undocumented workers across the border. Both boycotts and border-watching will require the building of a permanent, national organization, they say.

"We found we need a much larger organizational structure that can deal with the numbers of citizens across the country whose imaginations have been sparked by this," says Mr. Simcox. "The time has come for a civil defense type movement in the absence of a government which can meet the basic needs of citizens."

One question from here is how a broader initiative would impact the Border Patrol and what the political repercussions might be. Organizers say they have gotten support from many Americans for their effort to dramatize the problem of illegal immigration, and the group could - wittingly or not - embolden a larger backlash to illegal immigration on other issues.

But backlashes can beget backlashes and, already, some officials in border towns are concerned about what a slowdown in migration could mean for local economies. Moreover, civil-rights groups remain concerned about the motivations of some of the activists.

"I don't think these guys are all evil racists or anything. I just think the fact they see every migrant coming across as an object and as something to fear that is going to ruin our society is scary," says Ray Ybarra, a spokesman for the ACLU who spent 28 days monitoring the project.

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