In State Illegals > Out of State Citizens

[stebo0728]

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2 ... dents.html

Thoughts?

[IBCoupe]

In a ruling written by Justice Ming W. Chin, one of the panel's more conservative members, the state high court said a California law that guarantees the lower tuition for students who attend California high schools for at least three years and graduate does not conflict with a federal prohibition on giving illegal immigrants educational benefits based on residency.

...

The court observed that the state law also benefits U.S. citizens who reside in other states but attend and graduate from high school in California.

"It cannot be the case that states may never give a benefit to unlawful aliens without giving the same benefit to all American citizens," Chin wrote.

Sound reasoning. If you're pissed off about it, the Court might suggest, you should probably just keep them out of the high schools. Wiping out the law would adversely affect some legitimate use of it.

[stebo0728]

Sound reasoning. If you're pissed off about it, the Court might suggest, you should probably just keep them out of the high schools. Wiping out the law would adversely affect some legitimate use of it.

Understandable, if your gonna let them go to high school then may as well let them go to college too? Well not sure if I agree there completely, but I would agree to the notion of keeping them out of high school to begin with, even keeping them out of elementary school to begin with. I even go as far as to say stop making them citizens just because they are born here to illegal parents. Were about the only nation that even does that, and we only set that way years ago to insure citizenship of freed slaves. No more slaves, drop the anchor baby clause.

[IBCoupe]

Understandable, if your gonna let them go to high school then may as well let them go to college too? Well not sure if I agree there completely, but I would agree to the notion of keeping them out of high school to begin with, even keeping them out of elementary school to begin with. I even go as far as to say stop making them citizens just because they are born here to illegal parents. Were about the only nation that even does that, and we only set that way years ago to insure citizenship of freed slaves. No more slaves, drop the anchor baby clause.

I don't think that's the issue. It's not about letting them attend our colleges or not to attend our colleges, it's whether to let them do it for in-state or out-of-state rates. You don't have to be an American citizen to attend our public universities; I'm not even sure that you need to be an American citizen to attend our public secondary and primary schools.

California law says that if you attended a California High School for three years and graduated, you qualify for in-state tuition. I'm not saying that it's necessary or wise to restrict access to our high schools to people who are citizens, I'm just saying that in order to prevent legitimate use of the California law, one would want to go about undermining the qualifications of those, for lack of a better, non-Nazi term, undesireable people in the population.

[EDITED TO ADD: This also means that an illegal immigrant who went to high school in, say, Arizona that applies to UCLA will still pay out-of-state rates.]

Now, as for your comment about "anchor babies," I think you need to take it down a notch. First, the "anchor baby" is a myth - a child born in the United States is a citizen, true, but it will be another 21 years before that child can petition for citizenship on behalf of its foreign parent(s). Second, the founding fathers didn't seem to care much about illegal immigration (though there were thousands of non-citizens wandering and living freely among us - freed-slaves, Canadians and European immigrants among them), so I don't see any reason to, either. In fact, it wasn't until 1882 that the American government caved to racism and passed the Chinese Exclusion Act.

[srellim234]

Here's an interesting take on it. The majority of the judges ruling in favor of the illegal immigrants in this case are Republican appointed. May well have ramifications on the national level.

http://www.caivn.org/article/2010/11/16 ... tion-illeg

[IBCoupe]

At the core of the court's justification is their interpretation of the Privileges and Immunities clause of the United States Constitution. While the clause applies to citizens, the court ruled, that doesn't necessarily mean that the buck stops at that point.

"But no authority suggests the clause prohibits states from ever giving resident aliens (again, lawful or unlawful) benefits they do not also give to all American citizens. The fact that the clause does not protect aliens does not logically lead to the conclusion that it also prohibits states from treating unlawful aliens more favorably that non-resident citizens," the court wrote.

A common trope in legislative interpretation, especially from Conservative judges could apply here. Often, when someone's arguing for an expansive view of a law, a Court will respond, "If Congress wanted to do X, they knew how to do it."

If the founding fathers wanted to prohibit States from treating resident aliens more favorably than nonresident citizens, they could have done so.

[heliochrome85]

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Education/ ... -it-matter


COINCIDENCE?!?!?!

[AZhitman]

Here's an interesting take on it. The majority of the judges ruling in favor of the illegal immigrants in this case are Republican appointed. May well have ramifications on the national level.

http://www.caivn.org/article/2010/11/16 ... tion-illeg

And that surprises you?

[srellim234]

Nope. Never said it did, either. Just that it was another take on it.