# Explain to an Englishman: why is the Arizona immigration law so controversial? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 24, 2010, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185 "2010-04-24T06:33:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![tumbleddown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@tumbleddown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tumbleddown)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/121 "2010-04-27T14:53:19Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Because the U.S. is a sovereign nation. I’m really having a hard time understanding your point. The point is really quite clear. If immigration from Mexico is bad/wrong because it’s illegal, then the illegality should be justified by something other than “the U.S. is a sovereign nation and we can keep out whoever we want.” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/122 "2010-04-27T15:16:10Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Because the U.S. is a sovereign nation. I’m really having a hard time understanding your point. You didn’t answer my question, which would be helpful: do you or do you not make a distinction between legal and illegal immigration. > > Additionally, do you think a nation has a right to control its borders? **Little Nemo’s** question was not, “Does the U.S. government have the authority to control immigration?” but “Why **should** it be illegal for Mexicans to immigrate to the America?” A public-policy question, not a legal/constitutional question. Can you answer it on those terms? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/123 "2010-04-27T15:21:53Z")
[AZ State Capitol smeared with refried-bean swastikas.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDusSbk8nF8&playnext_from=TL&videos=ImAhi5VdKrw) ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/124 "2010-04-27T15:54:13Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > [AZ State Capitol smeared with refried-bean swastikas.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDusSbk8nF8&playnext_from=TL&videos=ImAhi5VdKrw) As one who is YouTube-deprived at the moment and will be for the foreseeable rest-of-the-afternoon, what’s going on there? Was it a real protest? By who, AZ Latinos or AZ anti-immigrationists? Is it a parody? Is it an Onion video? Something off of SNL’s Weekend Update? My curiosity isn’t going to allow me to wait until 5:30 this afternoon to find out. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/125 "2010-04-27T16:30:24Z")
> [@](#): > > Because the U.S. is a sovereign nation. I’m really having a hard time understanding your point. You didn’t answer my question, which would be helpful: do you or do you not make a distinction between legal and illegal immigration. > > Additionally, do you think a nation has a right to control its borders? Yes, I understand the difference between legal and illegal immigration. And yes I think that a nation has a right to control its borders. Now answer my question. Why should it be illegal for Mexicans to immigrate to the United States? “Because the U.S. is a sovereign nation” is not a good answer. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/126 "2010-04-27T17:06:32Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > As one who is YouTube-deprived at the moment and will be for the foreseeable rest-of-the-afternoon, what’s going on there? Was it a real protest? By who, AZ Latinos or AZ anti-immigrationists? Is it a parody? Is it an Onion video? Something off of SNL’s Weekend Update? My curiosity isn’t going to allow me to wait until 5:30 this afternoon to find out. We don’t know who did it yet, although it’s almost certainly anti-bill protestors. > **[Arizona News](https://www.azfamily.com/news/Swastikas-painted-with-beans-found-on-Capitol-grounds-92091314.html)** > > Arizona Breaking news, local stories, and On Your Side investigations from the state’s largest television newsroom. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/127 "2010-04-27T17:41:30Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Now answer my question. Why should it be illegal for Mexicans to immigrate to the United States? > > “Because the U.S. is a sovereign nation” is not a good answer. It is not illegal for them to immigrate if they do it legally. It is illegal for them to immigrate illegally. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/128 "2010-04-27T18:01:22Z")
Wow, I didn’t think this would be such a difficult question to understand. ---
**Author:** ![llcoolbj77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/eb9ed0/32.png) [@llcoolbj77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/llcoolbj77)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/129 "2010-04-27T18:19:42Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > What, with no money? _Only citizens are guaranteed public defenders_, and since their citizenship is what’s in question do you _really_ think they’ll be assigned one? > > I think it far more likely that anyone underprivileged swept up by this law will NOT have a lawyer and will be railroaded through the system. I represent illegal aliens all the time. (Public Defender in NoVA). Again we get to the state/fed issue. If the state is attempting to enforce state laws against an indigent person, said person is entitled to representation by a public defender. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/130 "2010-04-27T18:21:06Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > We don’t know who did it yet, although it’s almost certainly anti-bill protestors. > > [Arizona News](http://www.azfamily.com/news/Swastikas-painted-with-beans-found-on-Capitol-grounds-92091314.html) Sorry about the barrage of questions. You have to admit, from the title alone, it sounded like it could very well have been a comedy skit. ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/131 "2010-04-27T18:22:04Z")
The problem is that an 1800’s North America could use anyone who arrived and wanted to take free land at the frontier and farm, or work in any of a vast number of unskilled jobs. In a modern industrial society, the workers should be literate at least, if not well educated. Today almost every part of our life requires the ability to read at a minimum. Most jobs require skills. Society is not geared to support an underclass of people to do menial tasks. The few jobs there are - do we need to import people to do that? We produce plenty of home-grown losers. Do we really need to import our taxi drivers, for example? The other problem is that allowing an oversupply of menial workers discourages employers from raising the quality of that work. Restaurants that can line up 4 people at sinks to wash dishes don’t buy industrial diskwashers for example. What is better for the economy, people making machines at industrial wage or washing dishes at less than minimum wage? The trouble with enforcing the law “don’t hire illegals” is that then you have to define the proper test for “who is illegal?” that does not discriminate against people less able to round up documentation. Canada’s SI Number system is pretty good for that - between birth records, employment income, etc. it quickly finds people with duplicate or multiple SIN’s. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/132 "2010-04-27T18:35:22Z")
Unskilled jobs can be done by any “loser”? Which jobs are unskilled jobs? I can think of at least two skills that driving a taxi requires. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/133 "2010-04-27T19:09:14Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > As one who is YouTube-deprived at the moment and will be for the foreseeable rest-of-the-afternoon, what’s going on there? Was it a real protest? By who, AZ Latinos or AZ anti-immigrationists? Is it a parody? Is it an Onion video? Something off of SNL’s Weekend Update? My curiosity isn’t going to allow me to wait until 5:30 this afternoon to find out. [It really happened.](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/26/refried-beans-swastika-arizona_n_552201.html) Who did it is not clear. I would guess, protestors against the new law. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/134 "2010-04-27T21:52:30Z")
> [@](#): > > It is not illegal for them to immigrate if they do it legally. It is illegal for them to immigrate illegally. There is no legal way for the average Mexican to immigrate to the United States. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/135 "2010-04-27T22:00:18Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > There is no legal way for the average Mexican to immigrate to the United States. Sure there is, if you have a relative legally here already. (Maybe it shouldn’t be that way, but that’s another debate.) ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/136 "2010-04-27T22:04:29Z")
I’m wondering whether the OP feels like his question has been addressed. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/137 "2010-04-27T22:08:38Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Sure there is, if you have a relative legally here already. (Maybe it shouldn’t be that way, but that’s another debate.) And depending on the relationship between you and your relative, this process might take several years. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/138 "2010-04-27T22:10:23Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Sure there is, if you have a relative legally here already. (Maybe it shouldn’t be that way, but that’s another debate.) Except the relative has to be a US citizen or permanent resident spouse, US citizen child over 21, US citizen or permanent resident parent, or sibling. And waits for all categories except spouses or parents of adult US citizens are measured in years, or in the case of siblings, decades. Take a look [here](http://www.travel.state.gov/visa/frvi/bulletin/bulletin_4747.html) for details. It reamins the case that most Mexicans have no way to immigrate legally, and even if they do, they are likely facing a wait of anywhere from several years to multiple decades. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2010, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/139 "2010-04-27T23:22:10Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > That’s what gets me about it. The same people who are applauding this law so loudly are the same people who will scream to high heaven if a National ID card bill is even mentioned. A National ID card could legitimize spics, right? Gotta be bad. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2010, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185/140 "2010-04-28T00:12:03Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > I’m wondering whether the OP feels like his question has been addressed. Well . . . One thing that has not yet been sufficiently stressed in this thread is that the Minutemen, etc., almost certainly would not exist if the illegal-immigration pressure were coming from Canada instead of Mexico. For racial reasons, in case that was not entirely clear to an Englishman. From [_Blood, Class and Nostalgia: Anglo-American Ironies,_](http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Class-Nostalgia-Anglo-American-Ironies/dp/0374114439) by Christopher Hitchens, discussing the “official English” movement of 1988: > [@](#): > > U.S. English, it emerged, was a project of “U.S. Inc.,” a tax-exempt body which underwrote a number of other groups, such as the Center for Immigration Studies, Americans for Border Control, and Californians for Population Stabilization. There was no mistaking the timbre of this joint output, which had little to do with the teaching of “the Queen’s English” except as this bore upon the connection between that English and certain inherited conceptions of race and tribal security. Dr. John Tanton, the originating author of this cluster of groups and initiatives, was himself in no doubt that “the question of bilingualism grows out of U.S. immigration policy.” > > So much might have seemed obvious, at least until Dr. Tanton wrote a paper which, phrased in the poor and affected English which is often found among the language’s more ostentatious upholders, created a crisis for his hitherto blue-chip WASP and Jewish campaign. As he coarsely put it: > > > [@](#): > > > > \*“Gobernar es poblar”\*translates as “to govern is to populate.” In this society, will the present majority peaceably hand over its political power to a group that is simply more fertile? Can _homo contraceptivus_ compete with _homo progenitiva_ if borders aren’t controlled? > > Having rather clumsily Latinized or Romanized his argument, Tanton moved to a more demotic style. He warned sternly of such alarming cultural imports as "the tradition of the mordida (bribe), the lack of involvement in public affairs, and Roman Catholicism with its tendency to “pitch out the separation of church and state.” He continued to skirt around these aspects of the problem – the most conspicuous opponents of church-state separation in the 1980s have been fundamentalist Protestants – making an excursion through allegedly low “educability” before returning with relish to his main theme, which was, as ever, sex and fertility: > > > [@](#): > > > > Perhaps this is the first instance in which those with their pants up are going to get caught by those with their pants down. As whites see their power and control over their lives declining, will they simply go quietly into the night? Or will there be an explosion? > > This piece of inadvertence – the shift to “white” as the key word speaks volumes in the extract above, as well as showing the secondary significance of ideas like “culture” and “language” – led to the resignation of many of the U.S. English board members, among them Walter Cronkite and the neoconservative Hispanic Linda Chavez. It also led to closer scrutiny of the network of which Dr. Tanton was the convenor. The chairman of the Florida English campaign, for example, had advocated the elimination of emergency telephone services in Spanish in order to supply what he called an “incentive” to the learning of the tongue of Shakespeare and Dickens. His Dade County equivalent had warned that “the United States is not a mongrel nation.” Rusty Butler, an aide to Senator Steven Symms of Idaho, had forwarded the senator’s call for an English-language amendment to the Constitution by saying that “the language issue could feed and guide terrorism in the U.S.” Finally, it was discovered that among the donors to Dr. Tanton’s network was the Pioneer Fund, established in the unpropitious year of 1937 to proselytize for what it then called “applied genetics in present-day Germany.” [Pioneer Fund](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_Fund) [John Tanton](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Tanton) And that is **one** reason why all this is so controversial. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/explain-to-an-englishman-why-is-the-arizona-immigration-law-so-controversial/537185.md?page=8)