Salmon Mommas
Ten years ago, there was an old documentary named Glaciers -- Alaska’s Rivers of Ice which gave us a brief view of salmon. Salmon are a very famous anadromous migratory fish, which spawn in freshwater rivers, postpartum back in the ocean of fattening. The young fish will live in fresh water for 2 or 3 years, and then they swim into the sea, where staying a year or years until sexual maturity. After that, they return to the original birthplace to spawn. After ten years, now, just as salmon migrate to give birth to their offspring, so too are many Chinese mothers traveling great distances to America to give birth. They are known as “salmon mommas”. They produce Americans in order to let their children enjoy more than 180 countries visa-free entry, free compulsory education for 13 years and every kind of perfect social service.
It seems like they have plenty of reasonable explanations for giving birth in the United States. First, the one-child policy must be the very primary reason for that behavior. Most Chinese families will plan to conceive again, resulting from the tradition preference for sons over daughters. But because of the banning of policy, those couples who can afford the high price choose to give birth abroad, which also create a new industry. Second, another attractive reason must be the citizenship in United States. According to the law of the United States, every person born within the dominions and allegiance of the United Stated, whatever the situation of his parents, is a natural born citizen. (Stock, Margaret) As we all know, it takes at least 6 to 7 years to become a citizen of America, and the older the longer. So, Chinese parents produce American children in the view of helping their kids enjoy the rights of every American, as well as be hopeful of getting citizenships for themselves someday. (Graglia, Lino)
Unfortunately, things are not as beautiful as they think; and actually, both of the twoaforementioned reasons are easily to argue against. First, the behavior that changing the connection point of birthplace of a childin order to become a permanent resident of the United States is a violation of Chinese law. Second, born in USA just means the child has a choice to become an American; it depends on his or her decision at 18. So, it’s hard to find valid reasons to be bullish on traveling to America to give birth.This illegal practice is immoral and has to be changed for the following reasons.
First off, even if 30 percent of salmon mommas have the experiences of living abroad and 20 percent can speak English, they select to give birth in America through procreation agencies.During the time abroad, some expectant mothers have to live in basements, and all of them must have prepared for mess. According to some information provided by agencies, gravidas will generally live in villas which can accommodate from 3 to 10 persons. They have to share living rooms and kitchens, what’s worse; they have to endure sharing bathrooms. Almost every confinement centers are struggling to expand their scales, look for new sites in order to add empty rooms; but the pace of expansion lags far behind the eager demands of expectant mothers. For mothers’ close to labor, they have to be arranged in basements, wait until the month of confinement after giving birth, and then fight for an opportunity to change to bigger rooms. For the sake of having American offspring, pregnant women not only tolerate living in basements, but also have to get used to food prepared in a large canteen cauldron. In addition, disclosed by an insider, cooks in a lot of centers are not star chef hired from hotels, but proprietors’ relatives who are here seeking a livelihood. When it comes to the differences between meals before and after delivery, intermediaries mostly emphasize just quantity, rather than quality. Postpartum diets are just upgraded from the original three meals a day into five meals, but the dishes do not have any changes of pertinence. Improper nutrition aftercare, not only cannot restore body and mind, in the future will also cause many problems.(Wei Chen)
Running a confinement is seemed as a lucrative business. However, if a confinement center wants to be legalized, it has to register in the name of a children’s hospital. But these centers are big houses bought by local Chinese, it breaks the law to use civilian houses for commercial, so that it is difficult for legalization. Illegal buildings and running unlicensed, risks attached are oblivious, and one of the biggest question marks will play on the babysitters. Because of the extremely high labor costs in the United States, small centers cannot afford the wages of professional nurses; the only way is hiring babysitters to take care of the children and mothers. Those babysitters are local Chinese; there are no certifications for their qualification but only oral guarantees. (Yao Chang)
Even if “salmon mommas” can successfully bring their American babies back to China, there are still many potential risks at home. Children born in the United States will get three important documents or files: birth certificate, U.S. Passport and a China’s travel permit.Instruction on the website of the Chinese Embassy in the U.S. says “Children born in the United States whose parents are both Chinese citizens and all did not get the American green card, the children go to China should apply for China's travel permits.”(Embassy Website) Well after returning home, parents can use American’s birth certificate for registering their child’s residence. Of course, parents can also use the child's U.S. passport as identity documents through customs, but in this way, the child will be a "foreigner" and probably encounter a lot of inconvenience in schools. Both a U.S. passport and China’s travel permit need renewal, once they are expired, the American babies will not be allowed to immigrate or emigrate.
However, when the children grow up to the age of 18, the U.S. government will require the children’s oath to become an American citizen, and at the same time to give up other nationality, since then, the children travelling between China and the United States can only adopt an American identity. Since neither China nor the United States recognize dual nationalities, plus nationality issues are related to national sovereignty; so in principle, it is necessary to remove them immediately after found, and in actual operation, the public security organs will generally cancel the ID number of who has “dual citizenships” directly, and make correspondingly changes on the household registration books.
Moreover, intermediaries repeatedly stress the "ultimate goal" that American children can accept solid basic education in China and enjoy the rich resources of higher education abroad, wait until they are 21 years old, parents can get U.S. green cards and enjoy the local benefits. However the possible problems before achieving the goal are understatements and the waiting period can be 18 years or longer. In fact, even the first child born in America through an agency is only 4 or 5 years old, no one has actual experiences of enrolling in schools, studying as a foreigner, and some other practical problems. The intermediaries also admit that they can only answer such issues under the existing policy; there is no instance for reference. And according to the agreements, the cooperation relations terminate as soon as mothers go back to China; so problems encountered subsequently can only be resolved by the families themselves. In addition, the American government also has noticed the entry of foreign pregnant women giving birth to obtain the nationality, in order to stop foreign women to have children in the United States; members of Congress also have had several appeals or proposals to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act. Child born in the United States can automatically receive U.S. citizenship is written in the U.S. Constitution and cannot be changed, but the parents are likely to encounter new obstacles in applying for a green card.
In addition, this practice is also threatened America. Potential expends can be predictable in spite of the fact the industry brings America more customs and incomes. One possible expends may be, for instance, free medical treatment for children whose parents did not pay a penny in tax.In regard to the fact that there are many confinement centers in California, especially in San Francisco and Los Angeles. As a result, it has been estimated that over two-thirds of all births in Los Angeles public hospitals,'' more than one-half of all births in Los Angeles, and nearly 10% of all births in the nation in recent years were to illegal immigrant mothers. (Elton Gallegly) Many of these mothers frankly admitted that the reason they entered illegally was to give birth to an American citizen.
People may say that the behavior of providing such kind of services is suspected violating the regulations. The fact is there are no prohibitive industry access to rules and no specific regulations which can point out its illegality. However, theformulationoflaws should haveitspreciseness, loopholes found should be filled. From the national level, the two countries consign a relevant judicial agreement for exchanging information about Chinese mothers giving birth in the United States. To say the least, a sworn statement made by a child's parents while returning home: the child has abandoned any other nationality except China, or is willing to bear the corresponding responsibility may well be a solution to meet the urgent needs. Change should come to both China and America.

Works cited
Stock, Margaret, “Is Birthright Citizenship Good for America.” CATO Journal;Winter2012, Vol. 32 Issue 1, p139-157, 19p
Graglia, Lino. “Birthright Citizenship for Children of Illegal Aliens: An Irrational Public Policy.”Texas Review of Law & Politics; Fall2009, Vol. 14 Issue 1, p1-14, 14p
Wei Chen,“Give Birth to America: Survey on Offspring Industry Chain.” China Newsweek, 1 September, 2010
Yao Chang, “Risks on giving birth in the United States: no one knows how the policy changes” The East, 15 March, 2012
Embassy of the People’s Republic of China in the United States of America
<http://www.china-embassy.org/chn/ >
Elton Gallegly, “Societal and Legal Issues Surrounding Children Born in the United States to Illegal Alien Parents: J. Hearing Before the Subcomm.”the Judiciary, 104th Cong. 22 (1995)