Pres­i­dent Obama gave immi­gra­tion reform only one vague sen­tence in his State of the Union address. Despite that, and the poi­so­nous stale­mate on Capi­tol Hill, the White House and Demo­c­ra­tic Con­gres­sional lead­ers insist that they are still com­mit­ted to pre­sent­ing a com­pre­hen­sive reform bill this year — one that would clamp down on the bor­der and work­place, stream­line legal immi­gra­tion and bring 12 mil­lion ille­gal immi­grants out of the shadows.

The coun­try needs to con­front the issue, to lift the fear that per­vades immi­grant com­mu­ni­ties, to bet­ter har­ness the energy of immi­grant work­ers, to pro­tect Amer­i­can work­ers from off-the-books com­pe­ti­tion. What’s been hap­pen­ing as the end­less wait for reform drags on has been ugly.

The admin­is­tra­tion has dou­bled down on the Bush-era enforce­ment strat­egy, unleash­ing the Bor­der Patrol, Immi­gra­tion and Cus­toms Enforce­ment and local law enforce­ment agen­cies and set­ting loose an epi­demic of mis­ery, racial pro­fil­ing and need­less arrests. The intense cam­paign of raids and depor­ta­tions has so clogged the immi­gra­tion courts that the Amer­i­can Bar Asso­ci­a­tion has pro­posed cre­at­ing an inde­pen­dent court sys­tem that pre­sum­ably would be bet­ter able to com­mand ade­quate resources.

Ten­sions and anger in immi­grant com­mu­ni­ties are ris­ing. Reli­gious and busi­ness groups are urg­ing change — for moral rea­sons and because they believe that bring­ing immi­grants out from the shad­ows would help the econ­omy. Young stu­dents who have patiently waited for the Dream Act — a bill to legal­ize immi­grant chil­dren who bear no blame for their sta­tus — are frus­trated. Groups across the coun­try are plan­ning to march on Wash­ing­ton this month, demand­ing action on reform.

At least one advo­cacy group, the Irish Lobby for Immi­gra­tion Reform, has declared the dream of com­pre­hen­sive reform dead. It is urg­ing incre­men­tal change, with mod­est reforms like the Dream Act. Other groups may fol­low. It is too soon to give up.

Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Luis Gutier­rez has sub­mit­ted leg­is­la­tion in the House that con­tains the right ele­ments of com­pre­hen­sive reform. Sen­a­tors Charles Schumer and Lind­sey Gra­ham are work­ing on a Sen­ate ver­sion. Let’s hope Con­gress and Mr. Obama are pay­ing atten­tion and will find the spine to fash­ion a fair, com­pre­hen­sive bill and then fight for it.

Mr. Obama should remem­ber the promise he made often dur­ing the cam­paign but left out of his State of the Union: that the undoc­u­mented deserve a chance to make Amer­i­cans of themselves.