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OK has the right idea, IMO.Immigration battle shifting to states, cities
PATCHWORK OF LOCAL LAWS CALLED LIKELY
By Dave Montgomery
McClatchy Washington Bureau
San Jose Mercury News
Article Launched:06/30/2007 01:32:23 AM PDT
WASHINGTON - The collapse of congressional efforts to overhaul the nation's immigration laws is expected to dramatically accelerate an effort by state and local governments to take matters into their own hands to deal with the nation's 12 million illegal immigrants.
The result, advocates on both sides of the issue say, could be a patchwork of laws and ordinances with vastly different approaches, ranging from measures that harshly penalize illegal immigrants and their employers to the spread of "sanctuary cities" that prohibit police from questioning suspects about their immigration status.
"There's going to be a barrage of local laws dealing with immigration policy," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a leading sponsor of a White House-backed immigration bill that stalled in the Senate this week. "In some areas of the country, it will be sanctuary. In other areas of the country, if you look at someone who looks illegal, you can lose your business license."
Senate defeat
Senators voted 46-53 against a procedural motion Thursday to move toward a final vote on the bill, effectively killing - at least for now - a years-long push to repair what's long been assailed as a broken immigration system. The outcome dealt an embarrassing defeat to President Bush, who's made overhauling immigration law his top domestic priority.
Frustrated over what they perceive as federal foot-dragging, state and local governments already have been stepping up with remedies that range from punitive to protective, a trend that's almost certain to escalate in the void Congress left.
"If Congress is going to abdicate its responsibilities, then states and cities are going to jump in," said John Gay, the senior vice president of the National Restaurant Association and the leader of a business coalition that backed the failed Senate bill. "One of the arguments for opposing state and local proposals is that Congress is addressing it. We don't have that anymore."
As of April, state legislators in all 50 states had introduced at least 1,169 bills and resolutions on immigration this year, more than twice the number introduced last year, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Many fell by the wayside but others made their way into law, underscoring the public's growing intolerance of federal inaction.
Oklahoma lawmakers recently enacted a law that cuts off illegal immigrants' access to driver's licenses and many government benefits. A 6-month-old Colorado law prevents employers from hiring illegal immigrants and requires them to affirm the legal status of employees.
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Do you think that the regionalisation/localisation approach might actually be a move to the dismantling of the United States as we currently know it?
OK, Hazelton, you name it. Let the illegals flock to the blue areas so keen to have them, and let THEM PAY FOR IT. Hospital bankrupt because illegals flood it and skip out on bills? Why, I can think of a New York billionaire with a yen for illegals who could fix that problem. The rest of us will have to go without four drunk driving incidents per night. Shucks. Bigotry: it only leaves you poorer in experience.
