SAN FRANCISCO -- Last week the Water Works -- in the ironically named community of Allgood, Ala. -- informed local residents that they must now present a valid driver's license or ID. Otherwise, the notice threatened, "You may lose water service."
The warning stems from part of Alabama's drastic new immigration law stipulating that no one can qualify for a driver's license or any other government service in the state unless they can prove citizenship or are otherwise authorized to be in the United States -- especially those who are brown or have a Spanish accent.
Water as a Racial Divide
The official notice from the Allgood Alabama Water Works was not the first time the good citizens of the Cotton State have used water as a racial divide.
Similar images flowed through my mind during a long bus ride 46 years ago. I was on my way to join the 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery. That was a time of shocking black-and-white TV pictures of police blasting demonstrators off their feet with water canons, a time of separate toilets and water fountains -- legislated by other laws -- for blacks and whites.
Today, Jim Crow has become Juan Crow.
Last week's eager decision on the Water Works by the Allgood mayor streamed from the unexpected ruling by U.S. District Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn in Birmingham. Although she nullified much of Alabama's new anti-immigrant law, she left intact clauses that authorize police to demand "papers" showing citizenship or immigration status, such as during traffic stops, and denying the parched but undocumented so much as a tap of water.
Frightened by Judge Blackburn's decision, Alabama's growing Latino population is now fleeing that state in huge numbers.
One small town, Albertville, lost a substantial part of its Hispanic population -- including those with documentation to be in the United States -- practically overnight.
While local farmers and contractors complain that the exodus leaves them without enough labor to harvest crops and complete their jobs, I wonder how many of those in flight from the prospect of police harassment are fully established U.S. citizens, born and bred here -- like me, and maybe you, too.
Judge Blackburn also preserved a requirement compelling public schools to verify the immigration status of children and their parents. That, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center is "a provision that will have a chilling effect on children's access to public schools."
Of course, outrage and condemnation over the immigration law will continue to flare in the coming weeks, and the Obama administration has asked for a federal court injunction to stop implementation of the law until it can work its way through the federal judiciary.
Rolling Toward Selma
But the Alabama decision -- coming the same week that witnessed the death of Fred Shuttelsworth, who co-founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference with Martin Luther King, Jr., and Derrick Bell, the Harvard law civil rights advocate -- sent my mind rolling back through Birmingham on a chartered bus full of college students almost a half-century ago.
I was 19 and one of about 20,000 people wheeling in from around the country following Bloody Sunday. That was the police riot that left protesters like John Lewis -- now a member of Congress -- bloodied as they tried peacefully to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the first leg of a march to the state capital in Montgomery.
Decades before Twitter feeds existed, and long before anyone called us baby boomers, calls had gone out for student support. Organizers at the University of Minnesota, where I was a sophomore, mustered enough of us to fill two, maybe three buses.
In the ensuing days after the attack on the marchers, U.S. Attorney General Bobby Kennedy called out the National Guard to protect marchers from the likes of the Klan and police thugs, such as Selma Sheriff Jim Clark and Birmingham's Commissioner of Public Safety, one Eugene "Bull" Connor.
As our Minnesota bus traveled south through the afternoon and night, I hunched sleepily against a bus window. In the aisle seat next to me was my college roommate, Teferi, a fellow journalism student from Ethiopia.
In the early morning light, I felt the bus pull into a gas station. Drowsy at first, I took in the station's homespun blue-and-white paint job. Then I found myself wide awake at a sight I'd only read about until that moment.
Two water fountains were marked "For Whites" and "Colored."
I was not prepared for the jarring emotional impact that sight had on me. As I glanced over at my ebony friend and idol, Teddy (whom we on the Minnesota Daily staff all called the coolest, most worldly guy), I felt tears moisten my eyes and anger tighten my chest.
There it was, right in front of us, in all of its banal, institutionalized expression of fear and hatred. The prosaic sight now before me was somehow even more unsettling than the televised images of police dogs, Billy clubs and flailing limbs in water.
By Alabama law, Teddy and I simply could not share the same spout for a drink of water because -- because why?
The gas-station stop was quick, and only those with a morning urge got off the bus; we were trying to get to Selma and the Brown AME Church as soon as possible before heading out to join march.
The decades have rolled by like so many state "Welcome To ..." signs, and the years have sped along fueled by many causes, loves and regrets, among the latter a falling out with Teddy -- all my fault -- that remains unrepaired.
But in the miles toward Selma that morning -- and again now -- I couldn't help but think of the folk-music inquiry of those days, "When will they ever learn?" Sad to say, even after this "long time passing," the answer remains, not yet...
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A balanced approach to immigration reform
Obviously, regardless of what legislation is passed, some people will be happy and others will be sad. I'm just not sure that I understand why so many want to find a way to appease these illegals. They've already shown that they will not obey our laws when it does not suit them and many blatantly violate our laws; their very existence in our country is a crime. Many use the excuse that illegal immigrants just want a better life for their children. Well, there are many American parents that want a better life for their children. How many of them would you excuse for committing a federal crime?
The boomers were the "me" generation. They were the most selfish and egotistical generation we have had. My generation gets to pay off their Medicare, their wars of choice, and their debt. We also get to pay this debt while being burdened with excess labor they imported during the good times. They have royally done us in.
In Alabama, as the rest of the country, brown citizens have the same civil rights as everyone else.
White citizens, black citizens, yellow citizens, red citizens, even green citizens all have the same rights as any American. The defining word in all is "citizen".
On some violations of law, there is a statute of limitations which means after a certain amount of time they can no longer be prosecuted for the crime.
Such is not the case with unlawful entry into America. Two days or twenty years make no difference. They are still citizens of their own countries, whether they choose to be here or not.
In those countries they have their own civil rights. Their governments control those rights and they're not given to people from other nations.
We have given quite enough to foreigners who saw registering or getting permission from our government to be here as an unnecessary bother.
They came on their own without being asked.
They made the money they wanted.
They have been told they are not welcome in no uncertain terms.
They can either go to another state that will accept them being unregistered, or they can return to their nations of origin.
We don't "owe" them our civil rights for having shown up on their own.
They are foreign citizens. They have countries they come from that they are legal citizens of.
Those countries give their citizens rights that Americans do not share.
Ergo, in exchange for giving their citizens amnesty, American citizenship and civil rights, the same should be given to any American citizen who wants to go to their countries anytime.
The civil rights struggles of Alabama's past were for the rights of American citizens who were being denied their due as citizens. They had no countries or consulates or embassies. No foreign sovereign stood up for their rights.
The situation now is in no way similar. There are no rights given to anyone in any country for illegally crossing the border. They don't have the right to stay, work or raise a family no matter how long they may have gotten away with it. And they certainly don't have the same rights as citizens for having broken the law, nor do they deserve them. We take away our own citizens rights when they break the law.
"Jim Crow Laws" usually refer to the right to vote which was denied people of color. Foreigners, and especially those here illegally, do not have any right to have any say in OUR local, state or national elections. Why?
BECAUSE THEY HAVE A RIGHT TO VOTE IN THEIR OWN NATIONS!!!
The bigger question is why did the district court judge in AL allow this more extreme law to pass when the AZ law got struck down.
Jim Crow goes way beyond right-to-vote issues, by the way. It's about institutional racism.
If a person hides a criminal being sought, they become part of the crime and their rights become irrelevant.
As for the judge in Alabama, she held back some parts of the law but saw no reason why it violates foreigner's rights to ask for their drivers licence or immigration documents which federal law says they have to carry at all times.
I'll buy the racist argument when you can tell me exactly what race they are referring to when they say "unregistered foreign national".or "illegally present in the US."
A demographic of illegal aliens does not make the law "racist", just inconvenient for a particular nation's people.
Unless you think that ALL people in the world have the right to come to the US and work, and that we Americans have NO RIGHTS at all, then you cannot support illegals being here. If you are for open borders, then it means that we must allow all the criminals and smugglers to come here and avoid prosecution for their crimes too. Making it harder to track and apprehend illegals means that legitimate law enforcement is impossible.
The illegals create a low wages labor pool that hurts the most vulnerable Americans, who are mostly black and brown. It is outrageous that any black leader could not care for their lower class workers. Rep Barbara Jordan headed the commission on immigration and gave her name to it, and her recommendations were similar to most of what the AL law does. I suggest that you should read her recommendations and especially her statements to Congress as she reported them. Try calling her a racist and segregationist!
Friendly hint: when you resort to spelling 'illegal' in all caps that's a sure sign you might be going stark crazy - what does that mean anyway, are you yelling?
I've got to point out to you that no one here believes in open borders; anyone that does is on the fringe. Can you point to any evidence of the existence of people here, or anywhere, who think that "ALL people in the world have a right to come to the US and work and that American have NO RIGHTS at all"? I know of no such people and therefore you're arguing against an invented foe... that's also a sign that you might be going crazy.
Let me give you a fact: the Arizona law [most parts thereof] was struck down by a district court judge that ruled the law was flawed because "it would violate the rights of legal citizens that would be unduly detained" (so far that ruling has been upheld by the Appeals Court). So as a "civil rights northern student" you should recognize that we too are opposed to laws that violate the rights of legal American citizens. Now do you see the link between this article and Jim Crow?
The only real question is why did the Alabama judge allow the law to pass unscathed?
Prediction (remember you heard it from me first): this law will be declared unconstitutional.
When the first iteration of the AZ was passed I was opposed to it for that exact reason. THEN they modified it so that it only pertained to those who the cops arrested. The Federal Court made a major mistake and its ruling was absurd on its face. The Ninth Circuit is so far out in left field that it is the most reversed court in the country. So both of those courts are not a good legal basis for much. I can tell you now that the SCOTUS will uphold the AZ law with at least a 5-4 or 6-3 decision.
In fact, the AZ law would cut down on illegal or bogus detentions. Just before the law was passed, and American truck driver who is Hispanic was stopped at a weight station and a cop arrested him because he thought he was an illegal because he had a slight accent to his English! The driver had a AZ drivers license, his company ID, medical, etc.. and STILL got pulled in. His wife had to go home to get both their birth certificates and take them to the ICE facility to get him out. The AZ law would have prevented such a thing because it specified the acceptable documents and his drivers license would have let him off. You have to READ the law first as I have.
Illegal is not a race.
United States
2] 81% of 11.2 million illegal aliens (9 million) are from Latin America; 2010 (Page 12; 11 of the report http://pewhispanic.org/files/reports/133.pdf)
3] "When asked to identify their race, most Hispanics—62.5% in 2008—say they are white only. A small share—just 1.9%—self-identify as black only" http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=120
4] "41% of Latinos say only some of the undocumented migrants should be allowed to stay in the country"
(PDF pagina 20 or 15 of the report http://pewhispanic.org/files/reports/68.pdf)
Or
59% to 60% of Latinos in the USA say undocumented migrants should not be allowed to stay in the USA
5] 53.1% of 38.5 million foreign-born (20 million) are from Latin America; 2009
(Page 2 http://www.census.gov/prod/2010pubs/acsbr09-15.pdf)
Among 20 million foreign-born Latinos in the USA, it is supposed to be illegal for more than 9 million foreign born Latinos to vote because they are illegal aliens. However, 40% of foreign-born Latinos believe illegal immigrants should not be permitted to stay in the USA (SEE: the following)
"Among foreign-born Latinos, for example, 61% said all illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay permanently and be given a chance at citizenship, while only 42% of native-born Hispanics agreed." (PDF pagina 24 or 19 of the report) http://pewhispanic.org/files/reports/68.pdf
Do the math
What percentage of foreign-born Latinos are illegal aliens in USA?
ANSWER: 45%
45% of the above “61%” that say “all illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay permanently” are illegal aliens.
Or
55% of Latino foreign-born, excluding illegal aliens, say illegal immigrants should not be allowed to stay permanently
Look i support alot of liberals beliefs and equality but their is nothing wrong about this law. if your not a citizen or someone authorized to be in the country than you shouldn't receive any money from tax payers.
http://drummajorinstitute.org/library/report.php?ID=104
Look, if the law has had unintended consequences that resulted in the withdrawal of children from school and have led to shortages of labor at harvest time, then there is a lot wrong with the law.
This progressive liberal is fine with addressing the illegal immigration problem head on; in fact, I would support the comprehensive immigration reform that was once co-sponsored by Republicans like McCain, Lindsey Graham and Orin Hatch. The problem with conservatives is that once Obama came out in favor of that bipartisan approach, those same GOP lawmakers turned out to be against the very legislation that they themselves helped write. There's something very fishy about that move...
You declaring that it was because of the Alabama law is premature and may have been better supported if what you are concluding occurred in May or June, AND if Alabama had a healthy growing season, in contrast to this year's record drought.