It was a coincidence, but an appropriate one, that last weekend’s annual Ukrainian street festival in New York’s East Village began the day after Senate negotiators announced an ungainly compromise on immigration. Attacked by critics on the right as being too soft, and by critics on the left as being too harsh, the proposed legislation is an apt representation of America’s broader ambivalence towards immigration.

One of the sore points was embodied by the Ukrainian dancers and food vendors who took over East 7th Street the next day. Although they didn’t exactly arrive on the Mayflower, by New York standards, Ukrainians have been in the neighbourhood a long time – they celebrated their first Ukrainian rite liturgy on Avenue C in 1890. And ethnic street fairs of all stripes are a ubiquitous feature of Gotham life.