Despite strong objections from many politicians following the attacks in Paris, Obama announced he would continue with his plan to allow 10,000 refugees to enter the United States, a decision I believe was the right one.

The crisis in Syria is not a new one, and goes back far further than Paris. You could blame Bush for intervening in Iraq and creating instability in the region, you could blame Obama for pulling out of the region creating a power vacuum or for failing to get rid of Syrian ruler Bashar Al-Assad. Whomever you might think caused the problem, the key is, we caused the problem. And as the old adage goes, “You break it, you own it.” We, as Americans, have an ethical and moral responsibility to help those whose country we have helped break. We did it following the Vietnam war, we did it following the Iraq war, and we should do it now.

The biggest concern with Syrian refugees following Paris is the possibility of extremists entering our country under false pretenses. Let’s examine the situation in Paris then. Of the six identified attackers, 5 are European Nationalists, not refugees. Only one, “Ahmad Almohammad”, arrived with a wave of refugees on the shores of Europe with a fake Syrian passport. He managed to slip in because thousands of migrants are arriving in waves directly into Europe. Now, that’s not exactly feasible in the U.S. because, well, the Atlantic. It’s not a comparable situation, and should not be treated as such.

The only way refugees are entering the country is through legal means, and that requires a screening process. A senior official at the U.N. called the screening process “the single most heavily screened and vetted.” It includes interviews, references with home country records, and biometric data including fingerprints and iris scans. On top of that, Syrian refugees are placed under additional scrutiny. This involves vetting between the State Department, FBI, the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland security. The Department of Homeland security conducts in person interviews with every single applicant and past data is analyzed to ensure the refugee is consistent between applications. If no data is available, the request is frequently denied. This entire process takes up a year or possibly two. What’s been the result of this? Since the September 11th attacks, 750,000 refugees have entered the United States. None have been arrested for domestic terrorism.

Thirty one states are now attempting to block the flow of refugees into their borders. That power though, rests solely with the federal government. In Hines v. Davidowitz the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government, and not the states, has “power over immigration, naturalization and deportation.” Other key legislation is the Refugee Act of 1980. This law says “the historic policy of the United States to respond to the urgent needs of persons subject to persecution in their homelands.” Including a clause for “unforeseen emergency refugee situation,” involving “grave humanitarian concerns.” Governors could attempt to defund programs involving refugee placement, but that could lead to multitude of issues. If they decided to not fund those programs, they would defund them for all refugees, not just Syrians, as singling out of one group would be discrimination and would be in line for suit under 14th Amendment grounds. The states are swatting at phantoms, as they have no authority to block refugees and to defund all refugees would be a betrayal of American values.

Ensuring better lives for refugees has never been an easy task, but it has always been one Americans have stood for. We should not let ourselves succumb to fear and betray our values. We have done it before, in 1939, when America was surveyed on their feeling involving Jewish immigrants, in which two thirds expressed negative feelings towards their immigration. Although the times and situation are vastly different, it’s a good historical example to look back on. Citing economic concerns following the great depression and seeing as many Jewish immigrants were feared of harboring hostile ideologies, and were rejected for that fear. Now, I’m not saying Syria is another holocaust, but we should not sit idly by as civilians are murdered by the same crimes we fear here.

Security is always a priority of the American people, but the past has shown that we can safely accept refugees from war torn countries. We should not allow fear to dictate our actions, and nothing can show this more poignantly than France’s insistence that it will still take 30,000 Syrian refugees. “Our country has the duty to respect this commitment,” said French President François Hollande. Or perhaps the inscription on the Statue of Liberty:

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!

This country stands for a lot of things, and we should not betray them out of an unfounded fear of an attack on our shores, an unlikely event made even more unlikely by the enhanced screening in place. We can not condemn thousands to a life plagued by fear because we fear them ourselves.