I like Bruce Fein‘s language:
The nation’s experiment with Prohibition underscores the limits of the law without moral consensus. The Prohibition Amendment was ratified as a type of homage that vice pays to virtue. Popular morality never celebrated abstinence. . . . Prohibition laws died in adolescence for lack of moral sustenance.
Immigration restrictions are even more problematic than their Prohibition counterparts. While alcohol consumption was not generally condemned, it was likewise not popularly acclaimed as a virtue. In contrast, the conduct and character of illegal aliens elicit accolades by at least half the population. . . .