While the constitutionality of Arizona's anti-immigrant legalisation, SB 1070, is being challenged in court, opponents of the law are intensifying efforts to convince Bud Selig, the Commissioner of Major League Baseball (MLB), to relocate the 20011 All Star game.
Several prominent baseball players including the Brewers all star pitcher, Yovanni Gallardo, Adrian Gonzalez (San Diego) and Albert Pujols (St. Louis) have announced they will not participate in the 2001 All Star game as long as the law that institutionalizes racial profiling remains on the books.
Presente, a Los Angeles based organization, has collected over 100,000 signatures on petitions urging Selig to "move the game."
There is precedent for such action.
In the early 1990s the National Football League moved the Super Bowl out of Phoenix after the Arizona Legislature refused to honor Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday as a national holiday. Apartheid South Africa was also the target of successful athletic boycotts in the 1980s.
Commissioner Selig can't have it both ways, celebrating MLB for signing Jackie Robinson and leading the fight against racial segregation while keeping the 2011 All Star game in Arizona, a state that persecutes Latinos.
Showing posts with label Arizona. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Arizona. Show all posts
Saturday, July 17, 2010
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Another bad idea from Arizona
New York Times editorial
June 18, 2010
Not satisfied with a shameful new law that invites, indeed demands, racial profiling, some Arizona politicians are now pushing for a law that would deny citizenship to babies born in Arizona whose parents cannot prove they are legal immigrants.
The 14th Amendment, adopted after the Civil War, states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.” It could not be clearer.
The Constitution apparently does not matter to these politicians. They also do not seem to care that Arizona is earning a national reputation for intolerance and racism — and if it continues this way will pay an economic price in boycotts of its lucrative tourism industry.
When State Senator Russell Pearce first started pushing for a law that requires police forces to stop and check anyone who appears to be an illegal immigrant, he was dismissed as a crackpot. The legislation passed both houses of the Republican-controlled Legislature with distressingly large majorities. Gov. Jan Brewer then proudly signed it into law.
Now Mr. Pearce is at it again with this new proposal, meant to end what he calls the “inadvertent and unforeseen” consequences of the 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause. He pins it all on the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” arguing that the babies of illegal immigrants — like the children of foreign diplomats — do not have full allegiance to this country, and thus do not deserve automatic citizenship. It is a spurious argument.
Mr. Pearce’s bill, we fear, is likely to get a sympathetic hearing in Arizona’s Legislature. Governor Brewer told interviewers this month that illegal immigrants should leave and take their citizen children with them.
President Obama, who has criticized the first Arizona law, has so far failed to use his power to block it, though his administration is preparing a lawsuit to do so. He needs to reassert sole federal authority over a rational and humane immigration system, and stop Arizona and other states from creating a crazy quilt of harsh statutes, some crazier than others.
Until the president and all people of conscience stand up to these bullies, they will keep pushing. The Constitution and the civil rights of thousands of people must not be violated this way.
June 18, 2010
Not satisfied with a shameful new law that invites, indeed demands, racial profiling, some Arizona politicians are now pushing for a law that would deny citizenship to babies born in Arizona whose parents cannot prove they are legal immigrants.
The 14th Amendment, adopted after the Civil War, states: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.” It could not be clearer.
The Constitution apparently does not matter to these politicians. They also do not seem to care that Arizona is earning a national reputation for intolerance and racism — and if it continues this way will pay an economic price in boycotts of its lucrative tourism industry.
When State Senator Russell Pearce first started pushing for a law that requires police forces to stop and check anyone who appears to be an illegal immigrant, he was dismissed as a crackpot. The legislation passed both houses of the Republican-controlled Legislature with distressingly large majorities. Gov. Jan Brewer then proudly signed it into law.
Now Mr. Pearce is at it again with this new proposal, meant to end what he calls the “inadvertent and unforeseen” consequences of the 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause. He pins it all on the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” arguing that the babies of illegal immigrants — like the children of foreign diplomats — do not have full allegiance to this country, and thus do not deserve automatic citizenship. It is a spurious argument.
Mr. Pearce’s bill, we fear, is likely to get a sympathetic hearing in Arizona’s Legislature. Governor Brewer told interviewers this month that illegal immigrants should leave and take their citizen children with them.
President Obama, who has criticized the first Arizona law, has so far failed to use his power to block it, though his administration is preparing a lawsuit to do so. He needs to reassert sole federal authority over a rational and humane immigration system, and stop Arizona and other states from creating a crazy quilt of harsh statutes, some crazier than others.
Until the president and all people of conscience stand up to these bullies, they will keep pushing. The Constitution and the civil rights of thousands of people must not be violated this way.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Lunatic fringe in control of Arizona
Timothy Eagan writes:
While the fringe that controls (Arizona) state government goes after the fastest-growing ethnic group in the country with a law that makes a mockery of American values, Arizona crumbles. Its state parks are orphans, left to volunteers. Its university system is being slashed and picked to death. They even considered a plan to sell the House and Senate buildings. What business will want to relocate to such a place?
It will cost these hot-heads running the state. Probably not this year. But soon enough, because Americans have always considered the West a place that looks to tomorrow through a lens of hope, instead of hiding in the past, in fear.
The column is linked.
While the fringe that controls (Arizona) state government goes after the fastest-growing ethnic group in the country with a law that makes a mockery of American values, Arizona crumbles. Its state parks are orphans, left to volunteers. Its university system is being slashed and picked to death. They even considered a plan to sell the House and Senate buildings. What business will want to relocate to such a place?
It will cost these hot-heads running the state. Probably not this year. But soon enough, because Americans have always considered the West a place that looks to tomorrow through a lens of hope, instead of hiding in the past, in fear.
The column is linked.
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