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Memo to L.A. Times Editors: Illegal Immigration Is Illegal
Patterico's Pontifications ^ | Feb. 22, 2008 | Staff

Posted on 02/22/2008 7:50:37 AM PST by jdm

Do the editors of the L.A. Times realize that illegal immigration is, you know, illegal? I wonder when I read editorials like this:

It’s getting ugly out there for illegal immigrants. States and cities are cracking down with harsh new ordinances, and the courts are upholding them. Not only are deportations at record highs, but immigrants are being detained at places previously understood to be off-limits, such as schools. The debate about illegal immigration, labor, social justice and international trade has devolved into open season on illegal immigrants.

Arizona penalizes employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants, suspending their business license for 10 days for the first offense, revoking it permanently for the second. Valley Park in Missouri fines businesses that hire illegal immigrants. Oklahoma not only forbids their hiring and bars them from receiving tax-supported services — except healthcare — it also makes it a felony for anyone to transport, shelter or conceal illegal immigrants.

Sounds reasonable to me. Not to the editors, who equate one court decision upholding such laws with the Dred Scott decision:

It’s nothing new for states and municipalities to try to regulate immigration. California pioneered that trail in 1994 with the passage of Proposition 187, which sought to discourage illegal immigration by denying noncitizens a range of public services. Last year, Hazleton, Pa., caught the nation’s attention when it tried to criminalize landlords who rent to illegal immigrants and deny business permits to companies that hire them. Until recently, however, the courts stood as a bulwark against this spate of angry — and often unconstitutional — ordinances, ruling that immigration is federal territory.

Not anymore. In Arizona, Missouri and Oklahoma, business groups or immigration advocates sued to block the new laws, and in each case federal judges upheld them. The Oklahoma ruling is particularly pernicious. With the spirit of Dred Scott hovering over his pen, Judge James H. Payne wrote that illegal immigrants do not have the right to sue: “An illegal alien, in willful violation of federal immigration law, is without standing to challenge the constitutionality of a state law, when compliance with federal law would absolve the illegal alien’s constitutional dilemma.”

Unfortunately, Payne’s dehumanizing tone echoes the callous treatment that too often is accorded illegal immigrants.

No, he simply recognizes that they are illegal. I’d like to think that maybe the spirit of Dred Scott really was hovering over his pen — whispering “I didn’t have a choice, but these people do” — when the judge wrote this:

[C]uriously absent from [the illegal alien plaintiffs’] voluminous complaint is any challenge to the federal laws rendering their presence in this country illegal. Instead, these Plaintiffs seemingly concede the validity of the federal immigration laws, and file this suit in order to remove any barriers the state of Oklahoma has erected to their continued violation of those federal laws. These illegal alien Plaintiffs seek nothing more than to use this Court as a vehicle for their continued unlawful presence in this country. To allow these Plaintiffs to do so would make this Court an “abetter of iniquity” and this Court finds that simply unpalatable.

Is the judge “callous” and “dehumanizing” here? Or is he demonstrating rare common sense?

You make the call!


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: aliens; illegalimmigration; illegals; immigrantlist; immigration; latimes; mexico

1 posted on 02/22/2008 7:50:39 AM PST by jdm
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To: jdm

Better send a copy of this to the Congress and the White House too ——


2 posted on 02/22/2008 7:53:11 AM PST by EagleUSA
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To: jdm

bttt


3 posted on 02/22/2008 7:53:20 AM PST by GOPJ (Do the editors of the L.A. Times realize that illegal immigration is, you know, illegal? Patterico)
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To: jdm

MEMO #2! I cant find this in todays La times, is there a blackout on hillary cases this week?
Hillary Defies Judge’s Mandate That She Must Testify in Paul v Clinton By Demanding A Process Server Must “Catch” and Serve Her In Person!
http://www.peterfpaul.com/


4 posted on 02/22/2008 7:54:17 AM PST by OPS4 (Ops4 God Bless America!)
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To: jdm

You know, I think I could tolerate illegal aliens, but only under the following conditions.

1. They receive NO public service
2. They receive NO health care that they don’t pay for themselves.
3. They learn the language
4. They pay taxes
5. They get paid the same wage everyone else is to be paid under the law.
6. They didn’t vote

But then if all of those conditions were met, they probably wouldn’t come here. With the exception of 3 and 5, there’s no draw.


5 posted on 02/22/2008 7:55:51 AM PST by tueffelhunden
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To: tueffelhunden
No anchor babies.
6 posted on 02/22/2008 8:02:28 AM PST by org.whodat (What's the difference between a Democrat and a republican????)
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To: org.whodat

Sorry, you’re right, missed that one.


7 posted on 02/22/2008 8:04:05 AM PST by tueffelhunden
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To: tueffelhunden

I hate to tell ya, tueffelhunden, they ALREADY vote! Just ask B-2 Bob Dornan. How does Loretta Sanchez leep getting elected? By Americans? Not!


8 posted on 02/22/2008 8:16:19 AM PST by levotb
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To: jdm

“It’s getting ugly out there for illegal immigrants.”....

It’s also getting ugly for taxpayers who are being asked by amnesty politicians to foot the bill for illegal immigrants healthcare, education and social security costs!


9 posted on 02/22/2008 8:18:16 AM PST by AngelesCrestHighway
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To: EagleUSA

Better send a copy of this to the Congress and the White House too ——...

send one personal & confidential to juan mccain!!!


10 posted on 02/22/2008 8:39:44 AM PST by nyyankeefan
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To: AngelesCrestHighway

The budget deficit in CA is also getting ugly. The state cannot afford to pay for all the services for the illegals and anchor babies. Schools, police, prisons, parole officers, counselors, social workers etc. It just isn’t possible and big taxpayers are leaving.
We have two friends who are now turning their CA homes into second vacation homes and moving their residence elsewhere.
Hence..no more income tax to CA. It is a growing trend among the retired..you can still spend 180 days a year in the sun. Some are doing it because their kids and grandkids have moved to greener pastures.


11 posted on 02/22/2008 8:40:34 AM PST by Oldexpat
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To: Oldexpat

with no thanks to Arnold. I thought he was going to “clean up Sacramento” instead, he jumped in the hot tub with them. Leaving California becomes more viable all the time. It’s a mess. I think Reno, Nevada is an option. You can get to a lot of great fishing spots and Lake Tahoe is near.


12 posted on 02/22/2008 8:53:37 AM PST by AngelesCrestHighway
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To: OPS4
I cant find this in todays La times,

Go here:

Too tough on illegal immigration (LA TIMES)
www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1974160/posts

13 posted on 02/22/2008 8:54:46 AM PST by DumpsterDiver
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To: jdm

Couldn’t stand that paper when I moved there in 1964. It hasn’t improved!!!!


14 posted on 02/22/2008 8:55:30 AM PST by ridesthemiles
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To: levotb

One can dream can’t one?


15 posted on 02/22/2008 10:19:11 AM PST by tueffelhunden
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To: jdm

The states doing the work the federal government refuses to do.


16 posted on 02/22/2008 10:29:47 AM PST by Know et al
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To: 1_Inch_Group; 2sheep; 2Trievers; 3AngelaD; 3pools; 3rdcanyon; 4Freedom; 4ourprogeny; 7.62 x 51mm; ..

ping


17 posted on 02/22/2008 12:33:15 PM PST by gubamyster
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