| We've all heard about Arizona's new immigration law, Arizona SB 1070 (pdf), called, somewhat misleadingly, "Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act."
The New York Times:
The law, which proponents and critics alike said was the broadest and strictest immigration measure in generations, would make the failure to carry immigration documents a crime and give the police broad power to detain anyone suspected of being in the country illegally. Opponents have called it an open invitation for harassment and discrimination against Hispanics regardless of their citizenship status.
Doesn't this seem like a bad idea? If applied uniformly, the law would essentially require everyone to carry proof of citizenship with them at all times while in Arizona at risk of arrest. If applied only to Latinos, it's a case of racial profiling and a law that arbitrarily targets a group based on race.
The Arizona Republic's Dan Nowicki outlines the likely legal challenges the bill will face. For one, the Constitution "makes it clear" the federal government alone "has the responsibility to enact and enforce immigration laws." Opponent also claim the bill violates the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments and will lead to racial profiling.
Cardinal Roger Mahoney of Los Angeles: "The law is wrongly assuming that Arizona residents, including local law enforcement personnel, will now shift their total attention to guessing which Latino-looking or foreign-looking person may or may not have proper documents. That's also nonsense. American people are fair-minded and respectful. I can't imagine Arizonans now reverting to German Nazi and Russian Communist techniques whereby people are required to turn one another in to the authorities on any suspicion of documentation. Are children supposed to call 911 because one parent does not have proper papers? Are family members and neighbors now supposed to spy on one another, create total distrust across neighborhoods and communities, and report people because of suspicions based upon appearance?"
The New York Times: "The Arizona Legislature has just stepped off the deep end of the immigration debate, passing a harsh and mean-spirited bill that would do little to stop illegal immigration. What it would do is lead to more racial profiling, hobble local law enforcement, and open government agencies to frivolous, politically driven lawsuits."
It's not like Arizona governor Jan Brewer doesn't understand these concerns -- she apparently just doesn't care: "The governor listened patiently, Mr. Woods recalled, as he laid out his arguments against the bill: that it would give too much power to the local police to stop people merely suspected of being illegal immigrants and would lead to racial profiling; that some local police officers have been abusive toward immigrants; and that the law could lead to costly legal battles for the state.
"When he hung up, Mr. Woods knew he had lost the case. 'She really felt that the majority of Arizonans fall on the side of, Let's solve the problem and not worry about the Constitution,' he said."
Such a flagrant disregard of the Constitution should really fire up Tea Partiers, right? Right? Wrong.
Jamelle Bowie speculates why this is so: "This distinct lack of conservative outrage confirms something I've suspected for awhile. The conservative grassroots is genuinely concerned with creeping government power, but only when it affects their lives. Health care reform has a tangible impact on the Tea Party movement and its sympathizers, most of whom are well-off white men. By contrast, actual abrogations of freedom - indefinite detention, warrantless wiretapping, torture, anti-immigration police state laws - are completely acceptable, since they target people on the margins of society. And this holds even if the measures in question are illegal, or run counter to custom. If the goal is to 'stop Muslims' or send 'illegals back,' then anything and everything it takes to get there is justified. For a large number of conservatives, the exception is the rule, at least for people who don't look like them."
I'd go a step further than this analysis. It's not that liberal policies represent "creeping government power," but they often force entrenched groups to share funds and privileges and access to basic infrastructure with those that were hereto arbitrarily excluded, whether by race, gender, or sexual preference. Regressive conservative policies like Arizona's immigration law or Bush terror policies are essentially bulwarks against outside and marginal groups. They keep us "safe," goes the claim...
Obama: law "misguided" and "irresponsible," calls on Congress to take up immigration reform.
In the topsy-turvy world of Washington DC, Arizona's law has threatened federal climate change legislation. |
