Saturday, July 31, 2010

Another Modest Proposal, By Me

I understand why everyone with a brain is in an uproar about the new Arizona anti-immigration law. It violates one of the oldest precepts of common law, since enshrined into our Constitution, to wit: people are supposed to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, but this law requires people to be able to prove their "innocence," i.e., that they are in this country legally.

I wish someone besides me would frame the argument in such basic terms. Perhaps that would force people who favor the law to rethink their priorities--do they value their bigotry more than their alleged devotion to the Constitution? I know, it will never work, because asking someone who has taken an irrational position to think rationally is like tilting at windmills. So call me Don Quixote.

In any event, I have a very modest proposal that as a practical matter will get around the most odious provision of the law, which is that the police are REQUIRED to confirm the immigration status of anyone they've stopped (for other reasons, if memory serves) when they have a "reasonable suspicion" that the person is not in this country legally. The answer? NEVER suspect anyone of being here illegally. That will restore the proper constitutional balance. People are presumed to be here legally, period. It will save the local and state police lots of time, money, and hassles; it will, as a matter of fact, preserve the federal government's power over immigration law and enforcement, and it will let the bigots think they won one.

Then again, it's probably not a good idea to encourage the bigots. Besides, preserving the federal government's proper supremacy in this area as a matter of fact though not technically as a matter of law probably isn't good enough. Other states with bigots in office will still be tempted to pass similar legislation.

Still, it's a perfectly good stopgap until the court system sorts it out once and for all. Unless the courts wind up saying the law as it stands is legal . . . in which case, America has stopped being the America I grew up knowing about, and I will have to throw my arms in the air in frustration and doom. And wish I were healthy enough to move.