No doubt, recent allegations that the kosher meatpacking plant in Iowa raided by immigration agents in May treated its workers shabbily will be seized upon as an "Aha!" moment by immigration foes — proof positive of the need to end illegal immigration.

Yup. They'd be right.

The raid on Agriprocessors Inc. in Postville, Iowa, demonstrates the need for immigration reform that brings out into the open the employment practices and workplace conditions under which immigrants toil. The current system, with a patchy verification system and the knowledge that anyone caught with a false Social Security number can be quickly replaced ad infinitum, breeds abuse.

Needed: A system of legal immigration that allows for an adequate number of workers to do jobs that Americans won't.

Advocates of an enforcement-only approach have said the answer is the federal government's E-Verify system or local ordinances that threaten employers with the loss of business licenses for knowingly hiring illegal immigrants. This, however, fails to take into account E-Verify's spotty performance and the fact that U.S. employers have jobs that Americans don't want. Raise the pay so Americans will want those jobs? That next sound would be businesses shutting doors.

If Agriprocessors is found to have done what is alleged in affidavits, its owners and managers should be made to pay. Shifts of 12 hours or more, six days a week and workers as young as 13 on the meatpacking floors all speak to horrible working conditions.

It's good that employees alone are not made the villains here. Still, how the workers were treated after the raid was unconscionable. Nearly 400 were arrested and charged criminally, a departure from the previous practice of administrative holds followed by deportation.

The criminal charges against the immigrants come because authorities pretend that there isn't a vast difference between criminals who assume a person's identity to steal money and immigrants who buy a fake Social Security card so that they might work to feed themselves and their families.

They got legal counsel in groups and were tried in groups, with ample evidence that many did not understand the charges against them, much less the process.

This isn't working. Whether the issue is criminalization of illegal immigration or employers who provide substandard working conditions, Postville is the poster child for the need for change.

REPRINTED FROM THE MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL