May I see your papers, citizen?

@hawkeye10,

Did someone excise the Fourth Amendment while I wasn't paying attention?

@hawkeye10,

Quote:

I don't accept the premise that the right to walk around without the police asking you for your identity is a human right. It is a nicety, which can be and should be suspended if conditions call for doing so...and they certainly do.

If, in practice, the police stopped everyone and ask them for identity-- then this idea wouldn't be so racially offensive.

I suspect that if the police started stopping everyone in Arizona, this law wouldn't be so popular.

1 Reply

@engineer,

engineer wrote:

mysteryman wrote:

You continue to call every attempt to control the borders and to stop ILLEGAL immigration as being anti-immigrant.

I know you didn't address this to me, but my concern is about infringing on the rights of US citizens with brown skin because other people with brown skin are crossing illegally. We shouldn't tolerate police walking into a business and arresting US citizens because of their skin color without so much as asking for their ID.

There is nothing in the Arizona law that says they can, so this shouldn't be a problem.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

Hawkeye is correct. It was not always so, but since 1968 in the good old US of A....

Quote:

(Terry v. Ohio, 1968). Police can stop anyone if they have a "reasonable suspicion" That the person has, is currently, or is about to commit a crime. That suspicion can be based on behavior ("furtive movements," presence at a crime scene, intoxicated or overly emotional, etc.) or to an extent on appearance (not appropriate for the time or place, matching description of a wanted person, etc). "Racial profiling" would mean that none of those legal justifications are present but a person is stopped solely because of their race, which would not be allowed under Terry.

Once a legal stop has been made, the person can be frisked if an "experienced police officer" judges it necessary for his own safety or that of someone else. The search is only for weapons or contraband, and restricted under the "plain feel" doctrine, which essentially means that anything they find must be readily identifiable as a weapon or contraband.

====

Side note-- I was talking with friends the other evening about this Arizona law and our local (New York City) "Stop and Frisk" policy. The difference is while the cops stop and frisk people here, they do not, and are not required by law as the cops will be under the Arizona law, to ask for proof of citizenship, mostly because the NYPD is not the INS.

Last year, the NYPD stopped and frisked 531,159 New Yorkers. About 90% of those stopped are either black or Hispanic.

I don't know why, but 531,159 seemed like a lot, so I looked up the population of Tucson, Arizona. Just for comparison sake.
It's 541,811

Joe(531,159 would take a big bite out of Tucson's crime)Nation

0 Replies

@McGentrix,

McGentrix wrote:

engineer wrote:

mysteryman wrote:

You continue to call every attempt to control the borders and to stop ILLEGAL immigration as being anti-immigrant.

I know you didn't address this to me, but my concern is about infringing on the rights of US citizens with brown skin because other people with brown skin are crossing illegally. We shouldn't tolerate police walking into a business and arresting US citizens because of their skin color without so much as asking for their ID.

There is nothing in the Arizona law that says they can, so this shouldn't be a problem.

And yet they did earlier this year. See my post a couple of pages back.

1 Reply

@engineer,

The situations you posted happened before the law was passed. This may help rather than hurt the situation. Give it a chance. If a cop can demand to see my drivers lisc. for some legal reason why shouldent someone have to prove they are a citizen. Why is it OK for an illegal to not show his papers if caught breaking a law. I am not stupid enough to believe that some cops will take advantage of this but the majority will just do thier job. One of the biggest problems is mistrust of all government. Its how most dictators have come to power. Pitting one group against another.

2 Replies

@rabel22,

Quote:

Its how most dictators have come to power. Pitting one group against another

the illegals don't get a say, and the american citizens of Mexican descent for the most part want the illegals out just like everybody else.....I fail to see the problem. There are some liberals and conservatives who approve of allowing lots of illegals to walk around, but they have lost the argument. It is time to move on to getting the job done.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

Quote:

and the american citizens of Mexican descent for the most part want the illegals out just like everybody else.....I fail to see the problem.

This is simply untrue-- in fact, if it were true, we would have an anti-immigrant Congress. There is a great outcry against the Arizona law from American citizens of Mexican, and Colombian and Honduran and most Latin Americans as well as Asian Americans (and a good number of European Americans).

In fact, in any non-biased (polls from hate groups don't count) poll the majority of Americans support letting people here illegally stay.

Quote:

q74 If you had to choose, what do you think should happen to most ILLEGAL immigrants whohave lived and worked in the United States for at least two years: They should be given a chance to keep their jobs and apply for legal status, OR they should be deported back to their native country?
May07a
%
Offered a chance to keep their jobs 65 50 72 67 62
Deported 28 41 23 24 33
DK/NA 7 9 5 9 5

(columns are total Americans, Democrats, Republicans, Independents and total Americans in 2007)

www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/062807_immigration.pdf

I guarantee you (although I don't have time to get the numbers rights now) that among Hispanic and Asian Americans, the number is even more in favor of a pathway to citizenship.

2 Replies

@ebrown p,

Quote:

There is a great outcry against the Arizona law from American citizens of Mexican, and Colombian and Honduran and most Latin American.

I think that the outcry is mostly from the political pressure groups who have as their reason for being saving the immigrants...aka the victims. If you talk to actual American citizens of Mexican descent out of earshot of the bossy ones the majority want the illegals gone.

2 Replies

@hawkeye10,

You obviously don't talk to many Mexican Americans. But you can just look at the poll results for yourself.

0 Replies

@hawkeye10,

Here is an actual Mexican American....

http://www.mefeedia.com/news/31041199

1 Reply

@ebrown p,

you are using a two year old poll, from before the economy went to **** and the Mexican drug lords took over mexico and started to export violence across the border into the USA.....it is out of date.

American opinion has shifted a great deal towards the law and order solution.

2 Replies

@rabel22,

If you don't have your license, does that mean you get arrested? The issue is that we are asking one minority group of citizens to acquiesce to substantial extra police attention without asking the population as a whole to do so. If Arizona said that every person stopped by the police must prove their citizenship with all failing to do so being detained until they can and with no discretion on the part of police to let people go, then I would think the law was ridiculous, but fair. Immigrants already have to show documentation on request.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

You bring up an interesting point. Americans have fueled the demand for drugs and done very little to help Mexico with the resulting problems. The violence is fed with American money and Mexico has repeatedly asked for help, but has not received the necessary aid.
How does asking brown people for proof of citizenship stop this problem?
The mexican police and army have been left to deal with the carnage and death and the only option the USA has given them is by building bigger fences, ignoring the minute-mens activity and passing bigoted laws. It's rich american drug users fueling the problem, not the average poor illegal who work on farms or in menial labour jobs the average american won't do.

1 Reply

@Ceili,

Quote:

How does asking brown people for proof of citizenship stop this problem?

It is the demanding that all Mexicans get look from the spooks before we let them in, as well as a paper trail to their families, that helps us. The crooks will be discouraged from doing their drug work in America, and when they do anyways will be easier to find and easier to convince to cooperate with the law.

Also, if coming to America is a much a prize as some here say then staying on the right side of the law so that one can get the rest of their family here should be tool we can use to cut down on crime.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

Really?

0 Replies

@hawkeye10,

You didn't answer the question.

1 Reply

@engineer,

Damn right. And if I dont come up with it I will have to pay a fine. I havent read the law but I understand that the wording is much like the federal law. Are you saying a local policeman cant enforce a law of the nation? What we are talking about here is breaking the law. The fact that a segment of the population wants us to ignore the law dosent make illegal immagration any less illegal. What we have here is fear of the law enforcement untill someone brakes into your home or steals your car. Than you start screaming that they are not doing thier job. Its another case of lose lose no matter what they do.

0 Replies

@Ceili,

Quote:

You didn't answer the question.

sure I did, I answered as a American, who is concerned with America over mexico, and explained how dealing with the illegals will help insulate us from the breakdown of mexican society.

I'll say the same thing about Mexico as I said about Hati....it is not our problem, we can not fix it, and we can only help if they get their **** together and decide to do the work. Allowing MExico to use the funds America sends to them by way of illegal workers does nothing to fix the problems of Mexico, all it does is enable the Mexician to continue to fail to build their society. As a general rule aid is only helpful if it is given in the right spirit, at the right time, in small amounts, in the right way....something that bleeding heart liberals seem incapable of learning.

2 Replies

@ebrown p,

That's an actual American and the law is actually constitutional.

1 Reply

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