Rights and Democracy
Extremely Unconstitutional
You know a law is bad news when even the police don’t want to enforce it. Officer Martin Escobar, a 15-year veteran of the Tucson police force, has filed suit in federal court, seeking to be exempted from enforcing Arizona’s new immigration law.
The State of Motherhood
The one day a year when we honor our mothers has come and gone again. If you’re a mom, you probably got some burnt toast and better-than-usual attention from your family. Kudos. But after the flowers fade and land in the garbage, and the dishes are re-washed (by guess who?), what happens next? When it comes to national policy, not much.
Family-Unfriendly
Arizona’s controversial immigration law may damage a lot more than the state’s image, as Raúl M. Grijalva argued in his OtherWords op-ed.
Arizona Immigration
Anti-Immigrant Vigilante Movement in Disarray
The Minuteman movement, whose members were denounced early on as “vigilantes” by then-President George W. Bush, is growing increasingly fractured and radical as Congress prepares to make another run at reforming the immigration system.
New Law Damages Arizona’s Credibility
Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has signed a statewide law forcing local police officers to question and potentially detain anyone they “reasonably suspect” to be an undocumented immigrant. If you believe our local law enforcement agencies, who will be required to implement the mandates of this law, it will lead to mistrust between police and the people they have sworn to protect.
Gotta Get Me a Gun
Everybody’s doing it. Buying a gun. Ever since the Supreme Court said anyone can own one, nervous citizens have been gobbling them up. Unconcealed weapons are even showing up in bars and supermarkets.
But Would Restaurants Have to Serve Libertarians?
Dr. Rand Paul, son of Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul, is a leading candidate to replace Kentucky’s outgoing Republican Senator, Jim Bunning. He’s seizing on the same citizen anger that fuels the tea partiers (Sarah Palin has endorsed him), but as Kentucky’s largest daily newspaper, the Courier-Journal, reports, “despite his independent thinking, much of what he stands for is repulsive to people in the mainstream.”
Letters to the Editor: Kaul’s ‘Enduring Literature’
If columnists tend toward liberalism, it is because their close contact with world tragedies teaches there is something better than illiberalism.
Remembering Dorothy Height
Dr. Dorothy Height was a lantern and role model for millions of women and a long-haul social change agent, blessed with uncommon commitment and talent. Her fingerprints are quietly embedded in many of the transforming events of the last seven decades as African Americans, women, and children pushed open and walked through previously closed doors of opportunity.
My organization, Children’s Defense Fund, was blessed to have her serve on our board for over 30 years. When she passed away on April 20 at 98, we all lost a treasure, a wise counselor, and a rock we could always lean against for support in tough times.
