"The exit strategy is not enough, without final status," he said.

"You understand," he said, "people in the United States without legal status don't want to cause too much trouble."

Those passengers without status often must stand in lines that seem to be getting longer and longer.

What can "family values" mean when our immigration system puts children without permanent status in such a state?

At the same time, a few young people, without much social status, saw opportunity in the economic and legal confusion of the transition.

This is not to say that aristocrats were without social status.

Among groups without tax-exempt status, only 28 percent attained it within the first two years.

Indeed, without status, human social life would barely be worth living.

But in a world without status, we would literally be lost.

More than 330 000 people in Latvia remain without status.