If DC Fails To Act, CA Will Out-Fail DC

Posted on | December 3, 2011 | 26 Comments

by Smitty

SACRAMENTO, Calif.-Nearly 1 million undocumented immigrants could live and work openly in California with little or no fear of deportation under an initiative unveiled Friday by a state legislator and others.
Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes, a Democrat, is helping spearhead the measure, called the California Opportunity and Prosperity Act.
The proposal was filed Friday with the state Attorney General’s Office, marking a first step toward a drive to collect the 504,760 voter signatures needed to qualify for the ballot.
Fuentes called the measure a “moderate, common-sense approach” necessitated by the federal government’s inability to pass comprehensive immigration reform.
“I hope this shows Washington, D.C., that if they fail to act, California will take the lead on this critical issue,” Fuentes said in a written statement.

California Opportunity and Prosperity Act? COPA? COPAcabana? The hottest spot west of Havana?

vid Drudge

Category: California

Comments

26 Responses to “If DC Fails To Act, CA Will Out-Fail DC”

bradley
December 3rd, 2011 @ 8:41 pm

So they want to become a sanctuary state?

Is it too late to just give CA back to the Mexicans?
richard mcenroe
December 3rd, 2011 @ 8:56 pm

Oh, they’re downright cocky about it.

Had a carload pull up at one of our rallies, laughing and jeering, and announce they were taking over, this was their country now.

I looked at them and asked, “but if you take over, who’s gonna hire you?”

Morons actually looked confused.
Adjoran
December 3rd, 2011 @ 9:08 pm

As soon as I saw the “California Opportunity and Prosperity Act,” my first thought was, “They call it the COPA?”

The difference between the California proposal and the bills in Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, and elsewhere is that California is attempting to repeal federal law while the rest merely sought to help enforce the law.
Anonymous
December 3rd, 2011 @ 9:10 pm

Too late, they think they already own it.
Joe
December 3rd, 2011 @ 9:34 pm

Did you say lost love poster?

Hello?
Cris
December 3rd, 2011 @ 9:49 pm

“could live and work openly in California with little or no fear of deportation”

As opposed to what?
Anonymous
December 3rd, 2011 @ 10:38 pm

Wow, a sensible measure from a California Democrat. If I die tonight, I need to remember to take my ice skates with me when I climb on board that flying pig for the trip to hell.

“The difference between the California proposal and the bills in Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, and elsewhere is that California is attempting to repeal federal law while the rest merely sought to help enforce the law.”

Here’s the law:

“The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a Tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person.” — US Constitution, Article 1, Section 9, Clause 1.

“no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article” — US Constitution, Article 5

Amendments to said policy since 1808: Zero, zip, zilch, nada. bupkis, none whatsoever.
Joe
December 3rd, 2011 @ 11:01 pm

Just tax them like the rest of Californians.

Trust me, they will leave.
Jay
December 3rd, 2011 @ 11:13 pm

That law concerns the slave trade. What are you talking about?
Anonymous
December 3rd, 2011 @ 11:28 pm

Jay,

It concerned not only the slave trade, but the migration/importation of European workers in the north, particularly Pennsylvania.

The only way the Constitution got ratified was if immigration policy was left to the states. So immigration policy was left to the states, and that situation obtained for nearly a century until an activist Supreme Court dreamed up a previously non-existent federal power to regulate immigration in 1875, and treaty provisions with China enabled the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.

And even after that, the federal government still had enough sense to be relatively loose on immigration policy well into the 20th century.

Which is not a great deal more sense than it takes to pour piss out of a boot with instructions written on the heel. The correct immigration policy, from both a constitutional and “IQ larger than shoe size” perspective, looks something like this.
Dianna Deeley
December 3rd, 2011 @ 11:35 pm

Oh, dear. It’s California. Is anyone surprised?

I was born here, and I really hate this.
Dianna Deeley
December 3rd, 2011 @ 11:38 pm

You don’t get to give me to Mexico. I was born here, and I really resent what a bunch of people from elsewhere have done to my state.

Take your relatives back. I have a household full of Californians (2 of them more than 3 generations back) who will undertake to fix the situation. Just get those damned other states nuts out of here!
Adjoran
December 4th, 2011 @ 1:27 am

Sorry, but that clause only restricts Congress’ ability to regulate such “migration” UNTIL 1808, not after.

It might be time to check your calendar watch batteries.
Adjoran
December 4th, 2011 @ 1:29 am

Well, shucks, then – all you have to do is pay the filing fee in federal court and sue over it, and the Courts will recognize you as ultimate authority on the Constitution and order your every pronouncement etched in stone. So let it be written, so let it be done.

Either that, OR you will find yourself in a nice soft room for psychiatric evaluation.
Anonymous
December 4th, 2011 @ 3:18 am

The new administration will just have to build that wall on the CA/AZ/NV border, then… what’s the point of putting it deep in Reconquista- occupied territory?
ThePaganTemple
December 4th, 2011 @ 8:13 am

Everything that’s going on in California right now should be a featured part of most conservative sponsored political ads for the general election. Who knows, we might actually piss Californians off enough to vote for us.
Anonymous
December 4th, 2011 @ 9:15 am

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” — Amendment 10
Anonymous
December 4th, 2011 @ 9:46 am

So if the Supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution is the basics for all the law suits against the States that if passed anti-illegal immigration laws like Alabama, Arizona, and others why shouldn’t the Attorney General of the United States Eric Holder file suit against the state of California if the “California Opportunity and Prosperity Act” becomes law? Either the federal government is in-charge of and responsible for Immigration issues or they are not.

So that being the case the federal government would have to file suit against the state of California or drop all the others suits against all the others States. What would really put the Obama administration and the Attorney General in a quandary would be if the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in favor of the federal government on one or more for the pending suits already filed. If that happened then the president and the Attorney General would be left with no choice.
Anonymous
December 4th, 2011 @ 10:40 am

Except for that pesky 14th Amendment, which changed the citizenship criteria away from the States, because the States would have promptly used that provision to declare the freed slaves non citizens.

Which is why no Libertarian should mention Lincoln’s name without profanity attached. Once he decided it was proper to use Federal troops to keep states forcibly in the Union, the 10th Amendment (and much else, like the clauses you cite), became dead letters.
Anonymous
December 4th, 2011 @ 10:57 am

SDN,

Citizenship and immigration are different subjects.

The former, with respect to immigrants, was assigned to Congress from the beginning (“To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization” is among the powers enumerated in Article, 1, Section 8). “Birthright” citizenship was apparently left to the states until the 14th Amendment.

The latter was not enumerated to Congress in any way, shape, manner or form; was specifically prohibited to it prior to 1808, was forbidden to even be amended in to the Constitution prior to 1808, and has not subsequently been so amended.

The only reason I keep bringing it up is because “conservatives” like to prattle about how they’re dedicated to implementing the original intent of the Constitution — until you get to immigration, at which point they start sounding like the love children of an orgy involving the Warren Court and Nancy Pelosi.

The matter was debated.

Oddly enough, one area in which the ANTI-Federalists recommended a national power was regulation of immigration, to “preserve the national character” from alteration by a bunch of non-English-speakers, Catholics and other suspect people.

The Federalists rejected that argument because the southern slave states and the northern industrializing states were reliant on slave importation and European immigration respectively, and made it clear they would not ratify a Constitution which so assigned said power.

And Congress took the prohibition to heart for most of a century. From ratification until the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the only immigration-related legislation Congress passed were bills allowing federal port officials to enforce STATE immigration restrictions on arriving ships, and to levy fees and fines to cover the cost of that enforcement.

That’s what the Constitution says, and there is no lack of clarity whatsoever in the intent. If you’re a “conservative” who wants to regulate immigration at the federal level, you need to either support a constitutional amendment to allow it, or drop any pretense of being a constitutionalist.
ThePaganTemple
December 4th, 2011 @ 11:05 am

Yeah, its too late to give it back because they’ve already taken it. You’re probably joking. When I say stuff like that I’m dead serious. The only reason I’d hold off giving it to them would be to see if we can get something out of it first.
Victoria D
December 4th, 2011 @ 11:52 am

Nearly 1 million undocumented immigrants could VOTE openly in California with little or no fear of deportation under an initiative unveiled Friday by a state legislator and others.

FIFY
JeffS
December 4th, 2011 @ 12:15 pm

“Capital L”.
JeffS
December 4th, 2011 @ 12:18 pm

My apologies to the good and sensible people still residing in the formerly Great State of California, but…..

Let California fail. It may serve as a lesson to the other states.

I don’t hold out a lot of hope that the knuckleheads running other states will see the consequences of being an unabated idiotocracy. But it’s a better shot than waiting for the GOP to get it’s collective head out of Obama’s ass.
Anonymous
December 4th, 2011 @ 2:24 pm

I’ve always thought the better solution was to invade Mexico and annex the rest of it.
William T Quick
December 4th, 2011 @ 6:26 pm

Why is it illegal for states to enforce federal immigration law more strictly than the feds do, but not illegal for them to enforce it less strictly than the feds do?