Immigration

Inauguration Day in Arizona

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Today is Inauguration Day in Arizona. The clouds will part, the sun will shine, bells will be ringing and Arizonans will be dancing in the streets and singing “Ding dong the witch is gone! The witch is gone! The witch is gone! Ding Dong the wicked witch is gone!” as la bruja Jan Brewer leaves … Read more

My ancestors didn’t immigrate to America legally or illegally; they were just immigrants

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When the media reports on America’s history of immigration, they typically begin with Ellis Island in New York. But Ellis Island did not even open until 1892.

My ancestors came to America much earlier. They entered through Castle Garden in the Battery of New York, which opened in 1855. For 35 years Castle Garden served as the chief immigration depot in the United States and was the first formal receiving station anywhere in the world. Prior to Castle Garden there was virtually no regulation of immigration or routine process for dealing with immigrant ships that arrived in New York. US Immigration 1840-1920: Step One.

Castle_Garden2

Which brings me to this post by Ben Railton at Talking Points Memo. No, Your Ancestors Didn’t Come Here Legally:

Prior to 1875’s Page Act and 1882’s Chinese Exclusion Act, there were no national immigration laws. None. There were laws related to naturalization and citizenship, to how vessels reported their passengers, to banning the slave trade. Once New York’s Castle Garden Immigration Station opened in 1855, arrivals there reported names and origins before entering the U.S. But for all pre-1875 immigrants, no laws applied to their arrival. They weren’t legal or illegal; they were just immigrants.

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Federal judge tosses Crazy Uncle Joe Arpaio’s frivolous lawsuit

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A federal judge gave the Obama administration an early Christmas present by tossing out a challenge to President Obama’s immigration executive actions filed by desperate-for-attention Crazy Uncle Joe Arpaio. “No soup for you!” The Hill reports, Judge rejects challenge to Obama’s executive action on immigration : U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell warned in an opinion … Read more

(Update) Federal judge skeptical of Crazy Uncle Joe Arpaio’s frivolous lawsuit

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The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank takes down Crazy Uncle Joe Arpaio’s unethical lawyer Larry Klayman in an op-ed today, A conservative gadfly:

gavelLarry Klayman is losing again.

The conservative gadfly, who has been suing presidents for years with little success, was back in court Monday morning, this time representing Joe Arpaio, the Arizona sheriff famous for his immigration crackdowns, who wants President Obama’s immigration orders to be struck down.

Judge Beryl Howell, an Obama appointee to the U.S. District Court in Washington, was unimpressed. Over an hour, she smiled patiently at Klayman, arched her eyebrows, squinted and shook her head at his arguments, and stared at the ceiling in exasperation.

She pronounced herself “confused” and “puzzled” by his claims. “That doesn’t cut it for me,” she told him, pointing out a “fallacy” in his case and saying, “I fail to see” the applicability of his argument. The judge further told Klayman, “You’ve got a big standing problem.” And when he tried to argue otherwise, she replied: “I really don’t find it at all persuasive. We can move on.”

Klayman faced his near-certain defeat with aplomb. He asked the judge to move “quickly” because “however you rule, it’s probably going to the Supreme Court.”

“I wouldn’t predict,” Howell said tartly.

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Federal judge skeptical of Crazy Uncle Joe Arpaio’s frivolous lawsuit

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It looks as if the federal court for the District of Columbia is not as enamored with Crazy Uncle Joe Arpaio’s ridiculous antics as is our feckless Arizona political media. The Hill reports, ‘Sheriff Joe’ challenges Obama in court:

gavelA federal judge on Monday appeared highly skeptical of a lawsuit from Sheriff Joe Arpaio that challenges the constitutionality of President Obama’s executive actions on immigration.

After listening to an hour of oral arguments, District Court Judge Beryl A. Howell said she was not prepared to rule on the case the same day. Her opinion on whether to block Obama’s action, she said, would come “very shortly.”

The lawsuit from Arpaio, the sheriff of Maricopa County, Ariz., is the first federal challenge against Obama’s move to shield up to 5 million undocumented immigrants from deportation.

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