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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsOn Immigration, Antonin Scalia Challenges Barack Obama
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia took swipes at President Barack Obamas immigration policies today and even questioned whether states would have joined the United States at all given todays ruling on Arizonas immigration law.
In his comments from the bench, which expanded on his written minority opinion, Scalia blasted Obamas decision to stop deporting many young illegal immigrants who were brought to the United States as children.
The issue is a stark one: Are the sovereign states at the mercy of the federal executives refusal to enforce the nations immigration laws? A good way of answering that question is to ask: Would the states conceivably have entered into the union if the Constitution itself contained the courts holding? Scalia asked. If securing its territory in this fashion is not within the power of Arizona, we should cease referring to it as a sovereign state.
Scalia effectively charged the administration with fibbing with its explanation for not deporting DREAM Act-eligible immigrants as one of discretion in handling scarce prosecutorial resources.
http://www.rollcall.com/news/on_immigration_antonin_scalia_challenges_barack_obama-215643-1.html
In dissent, Scalia attacks Obama ... and then he gets really crazy
By Jed Lewison
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/06/25/1102992/-In-dissent-Scalia-attacks-Obama-and-then-he-gets-really-crazy
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia (R) not only took a gratuitious shot at President Obama's new policy against deporting DREAM Act kids in his dissent on today's Supreme Court decision striking down much of Arizona's SB1070, he also laid bare his remarkable standard for judging the constitutionality of state laws:
But there has come to pass, and is with us today, the specter that Arizona and the States that support it predicted: A Federal Government that does not want to enforce the immigration laws as written, and leaves the States borders unprotected against immigrants whom those laws would exclude. So the issue is a stark one. Are the sovereign States at the mercy of the Federal Executives refusal to enforce the Nations immigration laws?
A good way of answering that question is to ask: Would the States conceivably have entered into the Union if the Constitution itself contained the Courts holding? Todays judgment surely fails that test. [...] If securing its territory in this fashion is not within the power of Arizona, we should cease referring to it as a sovereign State.
So according to Scalia's logic, SB1070 is constitutional because Arizona wouldn't have entered into the Union if it weren't. Brilliant! Well, except for the fact that Scalia's glib assumption about what Arizona would have done is undercut by the fact that Arizona isn't seeking secession in the wake of today's ruling.
But even if Scalia is right, that Arizona wouldn't have entered the union, or if it tries to secede once its idiot governor figures out what it means, haven't we already answered the question of what happens to states that try to leave the union? And isn't it remarkable the Scalia, as a sitting justice, is taking the side that still calls it the War of Northern Aggression?
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Mz Pip
(27,467 posts)is the cost to the Federal Government to do it the way Arizona wants it done.
randome
(34,845 posts)Does that phrase make sense: 'sovereign state'?
agent46
(1,262 posts)EFerrari
(163,986 posts)Adam Winkler, a constitutional law professor at UCLA School of Law, piles on his criticism of Justice Antonin Scalias dissent against the Supreme Courts decision Monday to invalidate major parts of the Arizona immigration law.
He writes in an email to TPM:
Scalia has finally jumped the shark. He claims to respect the founding fathers, but his dissent channels the opponents of the Constitution. Back then, opponents argued that the Constitution denied states their sovereignty by giving too much power to the federal government, as with immigration. Now Scalia echoes their complaints that states are being denied their sovereignty. States are not sovereign when it comes to powers vested in Congress, such as the authority over immigration and naturalization.
Its mind-boggling to see Scalia rail against the Executives power to enforce the law. That is the core role of the president. He, not the state of Arizona, is the enforcer of our laws. Due to limited resources, every executive state, federal, municipal must make choices about how aggressively to enforce the law. Cities dont uniformly ticket every car that parks illegally. States dont lock up everyone who ever commits a crime. And the federal government simply cant use its limited funds to enforce every immigration violation without costs to other, more important laws.
Scalia is an originalist: he has his own original view of the Constitution, ungrounded in history and steeped in conservative politics.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/legal-scholar-scalia-has-finally-jumped-shark
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Lil Missy
(17,865 posts)Politicalboi
(15,189 posts)While the Fed's bust legal Marijuana shops. The States are at the mercy of the Fed's enforcement of their laws.
"Are the sovereign states at the mercy of the federal executives refusal to enforce the nations immigration laws"?