Immigration and Race
Here’s the transcript of a back and forth between Republican Kansas state legislator Connie O’Brien and a Democratic counterpart (Rep. Sean Gatewood) on a legislative committee discussing the payment of in-state tuition by the children of illegal immigrants.
REP. O’BRIEN: My son who’s a Kansas resident, born here, raised here, didn’t qualify for any financial aid. Yet this girl was going to get financial aid. My son was kinda upset about it because he works and pays for his own schooling and his books and everything and he didn’t think that was fair. We didn’t ask the girl what nationality she was, we didn’t think that was proper. But we could tell by looking at her that she was not originally from this country. [...]
REP. GATEWOOD: Can you expand on how you could tell that they were illegal?
REP. O’BRIEN: Well she wasn’t black, she wasn’t Asian, and she had the olive complexion.
Where to begin….
I note that the Catholic Social Ministries convention is currently going on in DC.
The consensus, according to reports, is the ned to “remythologize” all the stereotypes about poverty and its cures.
But then there’s this: the suggestion by some speakers that “immigants are the face of poverty” in the US today.
Where to begin?
Connie should begin by studying Kansas (and Missouri and U. S.) history. The immigrants who fled from Diaz in the early 20th century and settled in Kansas are great-great-grandparents now. A shame to know nothing about citizens who have contributed so much to her state.
And she should visit the Hispanic American World War II Veterans Memorial, St. Catherine’s Church, 205 S. Lawrence St., in Emporia. Maybe lay a wreath in memory of “the Mexican American veterans who fought and died in World War II.”
http://kansassampler.org/8wonders/customs.php?id=12
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sugexp=ldymls&xhr=t&q=mexican+immigrants+to+kansas+1925&cp=33&pf=p&sclient=psy&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=mexican+immigrants+to+kansas+1925&pbx=1&fp=e3445dae49f24ad1
And this is coming from someone whose grandparents probably experienced the same or worse idiocy on the part of those who had already landed on these shore.
She’s either woefully ignorant (that’s being polite) or in need of spiritual and moral counseling.
““immigants are the face of poverty” – maybe of financial poverty, but the likes of O’Brien are the face of intellectual and moral poverty.
Shame, shame, shame on her. (Do you think she goes to communion regularly with a clear conscience?)
Oh, this is my favorite part:
I hope she has an intern or someone who can explain this to her.
Recently Coadjutor Gomez of Los Angeles said the current immigration system is immoral depriving the weak of a voice.
He added the punshments of ilegals often leaves children withou tparents or wives withou ta husband to support a family.
Those who minister to the imigran tcomunity in the Church have much to tell the ignorant (such as O’Brien.)
It might be worthwhile to read the paragraph before the quoted text. Here’s the transcript:
http://www.kansasdems.org/files/OBRIENTESTIMONY.pdf
The transcript doesn’t seem to support Connie’s claim that the “girl was going to get financial aid”.
Connie is Director of Religious Education at her parish in Tonganoxie.
http://www.votesmart.org/bio.php?can_id=34895
“It might be worthwhile to read the paragraph before the quoted text. Here’s the transcript:”
It doesn’t help her case.
One question that might now be unanswerable: “Where was the girl born?”
A second unanswerable question: “How do you tell only by looking at somebody whether or not they are an American citizen?”
I wonder why Dorothy was so anxious to get back there?
FWIW: I don’t really have a problem with disqualifying non-citizens from government-funded college scholarships. (One can note that without siding with elected officials who say ignorant and offensive things, or implying that our current immigration policies are defensible.)
Where to begin? You should always begin at the beginning, Eduardo. What is the current Law on Immigration and what reforms would you like to see? How should we address the issue of illegal immigration in a comprehensive way that includes addressing the problem of criminal activity involving the exploitation of illegal immigrants, such as slave labor and human trafficking, or the criminal activity involved when an illegal immigrant breaks the law, such as driving without a license, or failing to report income which may determine one’s eligibility for certain aid such as scholarship aid, using a false social security number, or false identity, all of which are problematic.
Then there is the recent conference at rockhurts in the Kansas City area where tow Bishops called for immigration reform including a”path to citizenship”, betterdue process for illegals etc.
But Nancy wants to focus on illegals doing things that are criminal (what percentage of illegals do criminal actions?) and to focus on the curren tlaw which, i submit, most of us here think needs fixing.
Again, I submit, we have much to learn from those in ministry to Latinos in general and to those who work with illegals – if we would listen instead of harping on our own notions.
@ Nancy Danielson—without diminishing the complexity of immigration law and any proposed reforms, people who are in the US illegally end up breaking all sorts of other laws as well just in the course of performing otherwise legal, daily activities, e.g., driving—either without a license or with an illegally obtained license.
As Catholics, we presumably would have a different starting point than many others. Included in our starting point are laws regarding strangers and aliens in the first five books of the Bible, as well as the teachings and example of Jesus in the Gospels. It’s unclear to me that Rep. O’Brien’s statements are in any way formed by our “starting point”.
Eduardo, you really should do a post on immigration reform which would include a “path to citizenship” while encouraging future immigrants to enter our country legally.
More -The Woodstock Theological Center recently had a program on the undocumented.
Supose you were 14 and your parents sudden;ly taken away.
It’s been 9 months or so that Cardinal Mahony spoke at Fordham on Immigration policy and the transcrip is easy to find at the center on culture.
It strikes me that there is broad concern for the imigrant and yes the undocumented by those in ministry, while others kep coming back, Javier like, to the law.
It seems to me that there is an injustice involved in the immigrant problem, and it is imbedded in original story this thread is about.
There are many people who bitterly resent paying taxes for the education of immigrant children when their own children do not get the same assistance. Granted, the representative in the incident above was too quick to identify the status of the girl in line. But her complaint also reflects an injustice. What is the solution to it?
“There are many people who bitterly resent paying taxes for the education of immigrant children when their own children do not get the same assistance.”
Yes- state funding of the college education of undocumented/illegal immigrants.
As I said, I do think it seems sensible that citizens should get first crack at any state assistance. Let’s quickly note that the illegal immigrants’ children who are born in the United States are citizens.
I will also agree that it seems hard on illegal immigrant children, i.e. those who were born in a foreign country and immigrated here illegally when their parents immigrated here illegally, that they may have a higher bar to surmount in order to obtain a college education than their siblings who were born here. After all, I would assume that in the great majority of cases, the children didn’t freely choose to come here illegally; they were simply brought along by their parents.
Some questions that come to mind:
* I assume that most/all of us agree that the right to an education is a basic human right. But is a college education included in that right? In other words, when has human society fulfilled its obligation to provide an education?
* Does the state have an interest in educating illegal immigrants, e.g. do crime rates go down? Is paying for their education an investment that yields a positive return via lower state expenses and/or higher state revenues (perhaps via income taxes paid on higher incomes that college-educated illegal immigrants earn)?
* Is paying for the college education of illegal immigrants enabling our dysfunctional/broken current immigration system?
Jim, I agree we need to fix our broken immigration system.
What values from fith do we bring to that?
What do you think of the sttemants of bishops Gomez or Finn or Murray or cardinal Mahony?
And. to others here, do we view that through the eyes of political theo;ogy???
“I wonder why Dorothy was so anxious to get back there?”
Because she and Toto didn’t want to be in Kansas anymore?