Penalver on illegal immigration

Eduardo has an op-ed, "American Pioneers - - - Or 'Illegals'?", in today's Washington Post.  It starts with this:

A number of the politicians calling for the criminalization of illegal immigrants may not be aware that they and a good many of their constituents could themselves be direct descendants of people who did some illegal migrating of their own many years ago. Much of the territory of the United States was settled by people -- hundreds of thousands of them -- who disregarded the law by squatting on public lands.