The Glade 4.0

The recent immigration law in Arizona is controversial to be sure. To that end there have been protests. Some people got out of hand as you can see in the video. Rocks, bottles and debris are thrown, riot police. Arrests made. Will they be tagged as violent and dangerous? You know the answer, dont you.

[youtube]2HvqRWqClSc[/youtube]

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Yeah - its hilarious. Some people are frothing at the mouth over this. All they're doing is showing their ignorance. They haven't read the law and they have no idea what the law empowers law enforcement to do as opposed to what they already could do. I've engaged a few people on it. Every one of them is reacting to media hype.

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The Dude abides.

From what I've read, the law requires immigrants to carry their immigration documents on their person at all times. First of all, where the hell are all the hypocritical conservatives who complain so loud about stuff like the Real ID Act, any kind of government database, and throw hissy fits when a police officer dares to ask them for ID? "Papers, please" is a massive insult to them, and "goes against the spirit of the country" or some other such bullshit, but apparently this is perfectly ok. Second, this provision is making huge targets out of these people. The "green card" is worth several hundred dollars on the secondary market for use in making forgeries. Because of this law, a lot of people will have to hide the fact that they're immigrants, because if you let it slip that you are one every criminal now knows you're required to carry the equivalent of several hundred dollars on you at all times. Third, the provision is based on exactly the same ridiculous principles that gun control is based on. All it does is make the honest more honest. The criminals will just ignore it.

Should people traveling abroad be required to carry passports? Same same.

Only difference is the form of ID and the length of stay.

REALID is a strawman in this case, and this is coming from somebody who hates REALID.

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“The duty of a patriot is to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine

How many Western countries require you to carry the passport on your actual person at all times? I sure can't think of any, there might be one or two, but it's not common. This law is a nightmare because of this provision, not just because it makes them targets of criminals, but the nightmare that will result for every immigrant when they lose their wallet or whatever. Those documents are non-trivial to replace, there's an expensive fee and you have to go to an official interview where they grill you on what happened and you have to swear in writing that you don't really know where it is, didn't sell it, etc.

Furthermore, how can it even possibly be enforced without massively expanding police powers? The cop stops someone and they don't have their papers. They claim they're not am immigrant. Is "I suspected he was an immigrant" enough cause now for them to arrest anyone they want? Yeah, that's not going to get abused. Or if they're not allowed to arrest just for that, then the criminals will just walk away laughing, while other, legal immigrants who went through the process and are stupid enough to be honest about forgetting it at home or whatever get ****.

Yeah i dunno about any of that X. You may be required to show a drivers license, and that's about it. Same as you would on an airplane or checking into a hotel.

Police would need to have stopped you for doing something illegal to question it first.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

The law specifically allows the police to stop anyone they suspect of being an illegal immigrant purely on that basis. It was one of the major provisions of the law, before they could only check for immigration status after detaining them for some other crime. I don't know if they can actually arrest just based on that suspicion, (I haven't read the actual bill, just CNN's outline of all the major provisions) but either way it's atrocious. Either they're just giving a huge middle finger to all the honest immigrants or implementing a mass expansion of police power that any conservative should be ashamed of not opposing.

Not to my knowledge it doesnt. There is a lot of confusing and misleading (deliberately or not) information on this.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Well, according to CNN they can.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/04/26/arizona.governor.immigration/?hpt=Sbin



http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/04/23/immigration.faq/index.html



Now, as I said, I don't know if they can actually arrest based on mere suspicion. But they can certainly detain you and question you based on that simple suspicion, in fact they're obligated to.

X,
Have you read the law?

http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/files/sb1070s.pdf

I don't have time to copy and quote, but please note the "during legal contact" They have to be stopping them for another violation. They cannot walk up to a person with a fumbling knowledge the english language and ask them for their so called papers

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Carrying your immigration papers is already federal law dating back to FDR in 1940:

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin ... &TYPE=TEXT

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Its funny in an odd sort of way... states already require you to carry certain information. It is illegal to not have proof of insurance in SC while driving, not to mention illegal to not have your license.

Knowing now that there is already existing Federal law on this, re-read the CNN bit:



Funny how they omit it. It's not a lie, but it's almost like it's being presented in a certain way to achieve a certain effect.

and this part:



Not previously, is my understanding. Currently. The new law would make a status check legal if the person is suspected in another crime for which they were lawfully stopped.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

This is bullcrap. It does not allow that. You have not read the law. The law does not empower law enforcement to stop somebody for the sole reason that the cop suspects they may be here illegally. The cop has to catch somebody breaking the law or have reasonable suspicion of them breaking a law (like their vehicle matches a drug-runner's description). Once they are pulled over for all the same reasons a cop already had to have prior to this law, then the cop has to verify legal status if he suspects they're here illegally. Again, if he doesn't suspect it, he doesn't have to.

Edit: For the record: Yes, I've read the law.

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The Dude abides.

Just to echo what others are saying, but the law does not allow police to stop someone just because they think they might be here illegally, it's basically a secondary offense. So you can be asked about it if they stopped you for something else, but they can't stop you specifically for that.

The uproar over this law is hilarious. The federal government refuses to address the issue of illegal immigration, and so some states are starting to take it upon themselves to deal with the issue. I'd imagine you'll see Texas follow suit with a similar bill soon. It will never fly in California of course, and I'm not really sure how NM leans currently, though I'd imagine they will also come out with some immigration bill now that someone else has broken the ice.

The problem with this law is the breadth of the phrase "lawful contact." I don't know if "lawful contact" has been specifically interpreted under prior AZ precedent, but as a general matter, there are so many minor violations out there in our over-regulated society that the cops can initiate a lawful contact with virtually anyone on any given day. Forget to signal prior to changing lanes...lawful contact, little light over your license plate burned out...lawful contact, jaywalk across an empty street...lawful contact, neighbor who hates you calls in a bogus noise complaint...lawful contact, etc., etc.

Combine that with the fact that pretextual stops are already perfectly legal, and the cops can easily find some excuse to stop any Hispanic-looking person and then demand proof of immigration status because they have a heavy accent or don't dress sufficiently "American".

Yeah that's the conflict I'm hearing. "lawful contact". I think that's valid to question, but I also think that most of the people in the media making it dont really care so much about the language, they just hate the policy and wouldnt be happy regardless.

I'd also say this wouldnt need to be done if the current laws were enforced. So for people to ***** about Arizona, is pretty absurd.

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“Strong people are harder to kill than weak people, and more useful in general”. - Mark Rippetoe

Probably true to some extent, though I do think there would be considerably less outrage if the law were limited to contacts based on reasonable suspicion that the person has committed a serious crime rather than any lawful contact. The nightmare scenario here is that regular Hispanic citizens and legal immigrants going about their everyday business will all be one pretextual stop away from having a cop say, "Show me your papers, comrade."

This argument is it applies to just about everything else. This places even more scrutiny on the reasons they establish lawful contact. It also means the cop better have valid reasons because if he abuses it, he probably should be reprimanded at least if not lose his job.

Edit: The above paragraph is to point out that the problem isn't the checking immigration status, its abuse of lawful contact or reasonable suspicion.

I'd like to hear DE's opinion on this since he was a cop.

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The Dude abides.

I partially agree. I have no objection to state cops checking federal immigration status in certain instances. However, I don't think the problem is limited to abuse of lawful contact, but rather that the term itself is so broad that Hispanic Americans and legal immigrants will inevitably be subject to frequent demands for proof of status, even if the cops are all scrupulously unbiased.

RD,

So you have issues with the concept of "lawful contact", which is a readily used "condition" for a wide range of requests allowed enforcement officers, from seat belt violations on up?

You are objecting to this law, it appears, based solely because you don't like the state governments enforcing a legal requirement mandated at the federal level, and using the notion of "over regulated" as a defense for why this law shouldn't be tolerated?

If the Federal law already has this requirement, and already has provisions for enforcement and consequences, what keeps the state from having its officers enforce a state law that mirrors the federal?

And where is the media pointing out the hypocrisy of those that claim this is not the purview of the lower than Federal level governments to dictate terms of immigration, while at same time supporting the "safe haven" laws in other areas of the country?

I do actually. I think the plethora of minor violations combined with the admissibility of evidence obtained from pretextual stops and the erosion of Fourth Amendment protections that resulted from the Drug War hysteria of the 80s and 90s has seriously tilted the legal balance toward arbitrary state power. This law is just another step in that direction, but one I object to in particular for reasons I'll discuss below.



On the contrary, I have no problem with state governments enforcing federal laws. My general objection is to the snowball effect of using any minor lawful contact as a pretext for unrelated and much more intrusive questioning. In addition, I find this law particularly problematic because (i) "papers, please" is a classic hallmark of police states, and (ii) it will, by its very nature, be applied unequally based on racial and linguistic characteristics.



*shrug* I don't deny that the media narrative on immigration issues is biased and almost completely lacking in coherent legal context. I'm just expressing my views, not defending those of Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann.

I've gone back and forth on this as I've found out more info. First, I was against it based on gut reaction. Then I was for it based on the I.D. check coming from "lawful contact". Now, I'm torn because, i my mind, it's always been a case of "if they want to get you, they'll find a reason to stop you". So, no I don't like the fact that they can pull just about anyone over, but my hope is that this law will spur discussion such as what RD has presented. I really don't see that the real issue is the new AZ law, but the continual erosion of the Fourth, which could lead to abuses of the AZ law.

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"Dress cops up as soldiers, give them military equipment, train them in military tactics, tell them they’re fighting a ‘war,’ and the consequences are predictable." —Radley Balko

I'm actually in complete agreement with RD on this one. The idea behind this law is 100% solid, but "lawful contact" needs to be clearly defined for the purposes of it's use here. I'm against giving broader powers of search and seizure to police in general, and this is no exception. Where there is unclear law, there will always be abuse. I prefer to err on the side of freedom.

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 

And



While I agree with your concerns regarding constitutionality and the intrusion of government powers, etc. I can't help but think this is a prime example of selective outrage, falling back to a position that in other cases you would disregard, because in doing so, it gives you an out to support your real position.

Or are you of the opinion that police cannot request proof on suspicion of illegal activity at all? Because anything that you allow to qualify is an erosion of the Fourth, to include I might add, the recent Healthcare bill. Yet I saw no objection there.