By Douglas V. Gibbs
In June of 2010 I wrote about an Arizona Immigration Law, S.B. 1070. The law was called at the time misguided, irresponsible, and racist. It was mischaracterized as one that used racial profiling, even though the law specifically had text that not only did not allow racial profiling, but required the police to provide evidence other than racial profiling to justify their reasonable suspicion regarding the legal status of the suspect.
California Congresswoman Linda Sanchez even went so far as to tell a Democratic Club that white supremacist groups were influencing lawmakers to adopt laws that will lead to discrimination, in reference to Arizona’s immigration law.
Note that the Democrats were using the White Supremacist argument even before the emergence of Donald J. Trump on the political scene.
President Barack Obama pursued a legal investigation into Arizona’s immigration law, and ultimately filed a lawsuit against the State for having its own immigration law – citing that Arizona was violating Article VI. of the U.S. Constitution stating that while federal immigration laws are on the books, and Arizona’s law mirrors those laws nearly perfectly, Arizona’s desire to enforce immigration law was contrary to the actions of the federal government and therefore were unconstitutional.
In Article II. of the United States Constitution the document calls for the President to faithfully execute the laws of the United States, therefore refusal to carry out those laws, much less go after a State for daring to do so themselves, would be unconstitutional.
In California protests against Arizona’s immigration law led Los Angeles and San Francisco to boycott Arizona. Thousands of Southern California activists headed to Arizona to protest against Arizona’s immigration law.
The Arizona law was simply the State’s attempt to ensure the laws the federal government refused to enforce were enforced for the purpose of protecting their own State against what they believed to be a dangerous invasion of a foreign force.
U.S. Code, sections 1324 and 1325 considers it a felony to conceal, harbor, or shelter illegal aliens. The Immigration and Naturalization Act sections 274 and 275 consider illegal entry into the United States to be a misdemeanor. Repeated illegal entry is a felony. In short, the federal government sought to sue Arizona for enforcing law that was on the books, calling Arizona misguided for acting upon the laws the federal government refused to enforce.
Opponents of Arizona’s law claimed it was unconstitutional because it is the federal government’s responsibility to enforce federal law. Robbing a bank is breaking federal law. Should the police wait for the FBI to show up before chasing the bank robbers? Alcohol is taxed federally, and a federal agency is set up regarding alcohol (ATF), so should the local police wait for a federal agent to show up before pulling over a drunk driver?
As for any argument that Arizona’s law might have been contrary to federal law, when one compared Arizona’s S.B. 1070 with the U.S. Code and the Immigration and Naturalization Act, and then compared those laws to California’s Penal Code Section 834b, there is one glaring difference. Arizona’s law was completely identical with one exception: the Arizona State law was the only one that did not allow racial profiling.
In other words, the Arizona law, from a strictly legal viewpoint, was tamer than federal law and California’s immigration law on the books, not harsher as argued by its opponents.
Fast forward to today, the Supreme Court on July 9 declined to overturn a lower court’s order blocking enforcement of a Florida law that makes it a state crime for an illegal immigrant to enter Florida.
The new decision in Uthmeier v. Florida Immigrant Coalition took the form of an unsigned order. The high court did not explain its decision. No justices dissented.
The justices turned away a June 17 emergency application by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier asking to overturn U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams’s order blocking state officials from enforcing the law while a legal challenge remains pending in the lower courts.
Williams had ruled that the state law, known as SB 4-C, was at odds with the federal government’s exclusive authority on the subject of immigration and was probably unconstitutional – a similar argument used by the Obama Administration back in 2010.
A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit declined to pause Williams’s ruling, finding the law was “likely” preempted, or overridden, by federal law.
The application said SB 4-C makes it a state-level criminal offense for someone who has entered the United States illegally to enter Florida and remain in the state. To respect federal authority, the law is silent on who should be admitted to or removed from U.S. territory. The law was “a measured effort by Florida” to safeguard state sovereignty, according to the application.
Florida argued that States are allowed to enact laws aimed at stemming the flow of illegal immigration into their territory. The Supreme Court, according to Florida’s application, has never held that the federal Immigration and Nationality Act “fully displaces the States from regulating in the field of alien movement, and nothing in SB 4-C poses a conflict with federal law.”
The lower court, argued proponents of Florida’s law, was wrong to find that the Florida law, which actually complements federal law, was preempted by federal law.
Article I, Section 8 and Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution provides authority to the Federal Government regarding naturalization and migration – ultimately the power to handle immigration law. However, immigration is one of those issues that is in part shared by both federal and State governments. A “concurrent” power. While immigration law is the responsibility of the federal government, States have the authority to protect themselves from the lawbreakers getting into their State, and once they are in their State.
The best way I can explain the dynamic is metaphorically.
Imagine a schoolyard. The Principal is tasked with campus security. The fence around the campus is designed to keep out people who are not supposed to be on campus. If anyone outside employees or students wish entry into the campus, or to go through the paperwork to become a new student or employee, the process would be taken care of by the Principal’s office.
Imagine, now, that a student from another school, a disciplinary problem on top of that, enters the school grounds without permission, and may be dangerous to the inhabitants of the school. While it would be the Principal’s job to apprehend, detain, and ultimately expel that invader from the school’s campus, that does not mean that the teachers cannot lock their doors to protect their classroom, and even detain the unwelcome encroacher, contact the Principal’s office, and hold the hoodlum until the school’s security arrives to take the detainee away and ultimately remove them from the school’s grounds.
The States are the same. While it is the ultimate responsibility of the Federal Government to apprehend, detain, and process out of the country (deport) migrants who have entered illegally, the States have every right and authority to lock their doors and police their territory regarding these unwanted illegal aliens.
In short, the court’s ideologically driven decisions are unconstitutional. Florida is constitutionally authorized, as was Arizona over a decade ago, to protect their State from illegal aliens.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
