In the southeast corner of Arizona, surrounded by the beautifully wild, mile high Sonoran Desert, lies the town of Douglas. I am writing from a booth in the coffee shop of the Gadsden Hotel, an ornate hotel rebuilt in the 1920’s with a gilded roof supported by smooth marble pillars. Thornton Wilder stayed here for a year while working on The Eighth Day; today, a gentle but headless ghost stalks the basement.

Across the Mexican border in Agua Prieta, factories built into the hills no more than ten miles distant spout their disdain for American sensibilities in the form of smoke that casually drifts across the border into Douglas when the wind is right. The factory effluent rains down on Douglas as thickly as the bullets did when Pancho Villa’s revolution came to Agua Prieta.

Seeing this smoke crawling into our national airspace makes me wonder just how wise it is to open up trade with a country which does not impose the kind of environmental regulations on its industries that an American factory must obey. Driving north from the border up Sixth Avenue, one finds parts of Douglas filling with newer shops that have moved into older buildings. These stores proudly advertise “el precia mejor” and are packed with relatively wealthy Mexicans wearing Nike and Adidas jogging outfits and carrying their bundled purchases. This is the pleasant side of free trade across the border. A short trip down US 92 to the west, however, quickly reveals the converse view: the well-worn footpaths heading north through the arid desert brush. This less pleasant view of free trade, in this case trade in labor, is even more noticeable in the washes following a rain, when thousands of footprints mysteriously appear overnight. The eyes on the other side of the border fence shine in the headlights of the Border Patrol vehicle, patiently waiting for it to pass so numerous shadowy figures can sprint across the dust)’ control road into the Sonoran Desert in the hope of reaching Albuquerque or Denver—and jobs. Frequently mixed in with the honest laborers looking for work are violent drug smugglers and other criminals. Ranchers and landowners around Douglas are beginning to respond violently to this nightly invasion, which leaves behind cut fences, wandering livestock, and threatened, fearful families. NAFTA, we were told, would end this second, less desirable form of free trade by creating more Mexican jobs. No one who visits Agua Prieta, Nogales, or Juarez will doubt that jobs have been created over the last few years. So why does this undesired labor trade still occur?

Why do men—1,000 per night, by some estimates—continue to cross this dangerous border? The laborers attracted to the jobs created in Mexico’s border cities are overwhelmingly young females who will work for less than one U.S. dollar per hour. The girls who flow into these Mexican factories, or maquiladoras, usually come from poorer rural areas in the interior of Mexico and are happy to band together in cardboard huts without electricity or running water for the illusory freedom and poor wages that the maquiladoras provide. Girls as young as 12 or 13 lie about their ages to gain employment in the factories. This, of course, drives down labor costs which, in the absence of a tariff, results in a cheaper product than even Asia can provide and a demand for more low-paying jobs. Side effects that should not surprise those familiar with the American welfare experiment are a rise in single motherhood, increased violence against women, and the collapse of the culture of the working Mexican poor. This is not a good labor market for a man supporting a family. The prospect of making three or more times as much money in U.S. cities may well seem worth the hazards associated with the border crossing.

Is it wise to implement free trade with Mexico without insisting on economic controls similar to those under which American industry operates? Without enforcing at least some minimal controls, we are likely doing irreparable harm not only to our environment and workers, but also to the Mexican environment, culture, and family. The “bullets” that now rain down on Douglas might seem blanks to outsiders, but they could prove far more harmful than the lead that came from Villa’s revolution.