Once more on Illegals
This is what happens when you protest against the protesters. This photo was taken in Portland, Me and shows Robert Gorman being led to an ambulance after being struck by what police believe to be a local high school student. Gorman and another man were holding up signs that read "Illegals go home", and Gorman's sign reading, "No rights for illegals, honk, no hate." Gorman was exercising his rights as a legal citizen, peacefully, and paid the price for doing so. As is becoming more and more prevalent, taking the side against liberals is proving to be dangerous. Mr Gorman was struck and left bleeding. Had he been on the other side of the issue there would have been a hue and cry throughout the media to bring those responsible to justice.The whole topic boils down to just one question; "How do you define ILLEGAL?" Most dictionaries define the word illegal as something prohibited by laws or official rules. What is going on now is a debate over whether to further criminalize an already illegal action. No one in Congress is advocating the deportation of LEGAL immigrants, but if you listen to the protesters and their liberal shills, you would almost believe that. By clouding the issue and making it about something else, they have swayed the mindless myrmidons against the real truth of the issue. They have effectively changed the topic to keep the masses from pondering the idea of making illegal actions legal. Unfortunately, it's a tactic that all too often works, right OJ?
The asshat Ed Schultz on his radio program yesterday pulled a statistic out of thin air stating that 40% of the illegals here now, entered the country legally. They merely stayed when their visa expired. Well guess what Ed, that makes them here illegally, and therefore reduces them to the state of criminal. The Senior Murderer from MA came out of his alcoholic stupor long enough to declare that 50% of the illegal males in the country have jobs. Well, isn't that special. Dahmer, Gacy, Bundy, they all had jobs too. And yet they are all still criminals.
But fear not my brethren, and falter not. The left shall not be allowed to distort and lie forever. There are people watching now, people such as you paying attention to the real underlying issues and how they will affect us and ours. People like Robert Gorman standing up for what he believes in. Bloggers writing and talk radio hosts talking, local papers becoming less and less liberal and actually reporting and editorializing right of center. With any luck the people will wake up and realize that illegal means illegal.
posted by Dockman at 9:25 PM
2 Comments:
American Pioneers -- or 'Illegals'?
By Eduardo Moisés Peñalver
Sunday, April 16, 2006; Page B07
A number of the politicians calling for the criminalization of illegal immigrants may not be aware that they and a good many of their constituents could themselves be direct descendants of people who did some illegal migrating of their own many years ago. Much of the territory of the United States was settled by people -- hundreds of thousands of them -- who disregarded the law by squatting on public lands.
Of course, they had a ready reason for doing so: Like today's immigrants, they were seeking a better life for themselves and their families. Indeed, many of the current residents of the states between the Appalachian and Rocky mountains can trace their roots directly to these onetime criminals -- whom we now call "pioneers."
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In the early decades of the 19th century, the federal government hoped to dispose of public land in its western territories by auctioning it to the highest bidder -- typically a northeastern land speculator. But this policy posed a serious obstacle to the settlers streaming west in hopes of acquiring cheap land to start a new life. Speculators often held land off the market for years, waiting for prices to increase so they could sell for a hefty profit.
Although federal law made it a crime to enter publicly owned land slated for auction, hundreds of thousands of squatters trespassed on this land, as well as on absentee-owned private holdings, and began to farm it illegally. The federal government tried at times to protect the land by sending the Army to clear squatters out, but the settlers would simply return once the soldiers had moved on.
Eastern politicians, many of whom dabbled in land speculation, condemned the squatters' defiance of federal law. They accused squatters of being "greedy, lawless land grabbers" who had no respect for law and order. In 1815 President James Madison issued a proclamation warning "uninformed or evil disposed persons . . . who have unlawfully taken possession of or made any settlement on the public lands . . . to remove therefrom" or face ejection by the Army and criminal prosecution. Henry Clay expressed a widely shared sentiment in 1838 when he dismissed the squatters as a "lawless rabble."
But once the squatters managed to put down roots, the federal government found it difficult, both politically and practically, to remove them. Accordingly, on 39 occasions before 1837, Congress enacted retroactive amnesties for squatters illegally occupying federal lands, despite the objection that these amounted to a reward for lawlessness. Ultimately the process of moving from occupation to ownership was fully legalized in the 1862 Homestead Act, which granted free title to settlers who met the statute's residency and improvement requirements. In one of the great ironies of American history, the lawless squatters underwent a dramatic image makeover in our collective memory to become noble pioneers.
The lesson for then -- and now? When the needs that drive large numbers of people to break the law are strong enough, it's unlikely that official repression will be able to stop them. This is not to say that the government isn't justified in attempting to regulate immigration. But efforts to get a handle on the problem must be undertaken with a proper respect for the dignity of illegal migrants and for the legitimate needs that push them to break the law.
Who knows? Perhaps in a hundred years, when the heated debate over illegal immigration has long since made way for some other controversy, our grandchildren will watch movies or television shows celebrating the heroism of today's illegal immigrants -- or "pioneers."
The writer is an associate professor at Fordham Law School, where he teaches courses on property and land use.
In the early decades of the 19th century, the federal government hoped to dispose of public land in its western territories by auctioning it to the highest bidder -- typically a northeastern land speculator. But this policy posed a serious obstacle to the settlers streaming west in hopes of acquiring cheap land to start a new life. Speculators often held land off the market for years, waiting for prices to increase so they could sell for a hefty profit.
Although federal law made it a crime to enter publicly owned land slated for auction, hundreds of thousands of squatters trespassed on this land, as well as on absentee-owned private holdings, and began to farm it illegally. The federal government tried at times to protect the land by sending the Army to clear squatters out, but the settlers would simply return once the soldiers had moved on.
Eastern politicians, many of whom dabbled in land speculation, condemned the squatters' defiance of federal law. They accused squatters of being "greedy, lawless land grabbers" who had no respect for law and order. In 1815 President James Madison issued a proclamation warning "uninformed or evil disposed persons . . . who have unlawfully taken possession of or made any settlement on the public lands . . . to remove therefrom" or face ejection by the Army and criminal prosecution. Henry Clay expressed a widely shared sentiment in 1838 when he dismissed the squatters as a "lawless rabble."
But once the squatters managed to put down roots, the federal government found it difficult, both politically and practically, to remove them. Accordingly, on 39 occasions before 1837, Congress enacted retroactive amnesties for squatters illegally occupying federal lands, despite the objection that these amounted to a reward for lawlessness. Ultimately the process of moving from occupation to ownership was fully legalized in the 1862 Homestead Act, which granted free title to settlers who met the statute's residency and improvement requirements. In one of the great ironies of American history, the lawless squatters underwent a dramatic image makeover in our collective memory to become noble pioneers.
The lesson for then -- and now? When the needs that drive large numbers of people to break the law are strong enough, it's unlikely that official repression will be able to stop them. This is not to say that the government isn't justified in attempting to regulate immigration. But efforts to get a handle on the problem must be undertaken with a proper respect for the dignity of illegal migrants and for the legitimate needs that push them to break the law.
Who knows? Perhaps in a hundred years, when the heated debate over illegal immigration has long since made way for some other controversy, our grandchildren will watch movies or television shows celebrating the heroism of today's illegal immigrants -- or "pioneers."
The writer is an associate professor at Fordham Law School, where he teaches courses on property and land use.
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