It’s understandable that many Kansas legislators are, in the words of Rep. John Edmonds, R-Great Bend, “wrapped around the axle” on the issue of granting resident tuition status for undocumented immigrants who have graduated from high school or earned a General Educational Development certificate in Kansas.

A bill under consideration in the Kansas Legislature would repeal a 2004 law that offered the lower tuition rate to those students if they were seeking legal immigrant status. There are valid arguments on both sides of this issue and legislators’ difficulty in resolving the dilemma may reflect the need for federal reform of existing ambivalent U.S. immigration policies.

That ambivalence was illustrated in Tuesday’s State of the Union address, when President Bush noted, “We hear claims that immigrants are somehow bad for the economy, even though this economy could not function without them.” Later in his speech, Bush emphasized the need for increased immigration enforcement to ensure our nation’s borders are orderly and secure.

So, on one hand, America’s economy depends on immigrant workers, but on the other hand, it doesn’t have the right policies in place to allow essential workers to enter and work in the United States legally.

The tuition issue facing Kansas and other states is an extension of that dichotomy. Immigrant workers have come to Kansas, some of them probably illegally, to work in various industries. Some come here only temporarily, sending money home to their families whom they rejoin in a relatively short time. Others, however, bring their families with them or have children who are born in Kansas. Those children attend Kansas schools and some graduate from Kansas high schools.

The 2004 measure that allowed these students to pay resident tuition rates seemed to many Kansans like a reasonable way to allow talented high school graduates who might not otherwise be able to afford additional schooling to pursue a higher education. To some, however, it is seen as giving an unfair advantage to students whose families have broken the law simply by being here.

Going back to Bush’s point, we need immigrant labor, yet the only way immigrants can fill that demand under existing U.S. policy is for many to come here illegally. Because we need that labor, we turn our heads and don’t enforce laws that would send these workers home. Their labor helps support our economy and feed our tax base, but because they are undocumented, many Americans have reservations about educating their children and providing other benefits of legal residence or citizenship.

It’s no wonder Kansas legislators, as well as many Kansas residents, struggle to decide what is the fair and humane way to deal with the tuition situation, but hasty action to take educational opportunities away from Kansas students doesn’t seem warranted.

More to the point is for state officials to try to push the federal government to reform its immigration laws to allow orderly and legal avenues to help U.S. companies fill their employment needs.