About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

17 Chicano-Latino L. Rev. 118 (1995)
Critical Race Theory and Proposition 187: The Racial Politics of Immigration Law

handle is hein.journals/chiclat17 and id is 130 raw text is: COMMENT CRITICAL RACE THEORY AND PROPOSITION 187: THE RACIAL POLITICS OF IMMIGRATION LAW I. INTRODUCTION In mid-1993, a group of concerned California residents were fed up. They were tired of the illegal aliens1 whom they blamed for sapping the state's resources. These aliens were everywhere: crowding their children out of public schools, crowd- ing welfare offices, and crowding the emergency rooms of hospi- tals. To attack these problems, these angry residents formed a political movement. They saw themselves as the last hope for California, economically battered and bleeding from tax revolts, race revolts, natural disasters, and the crash of the defense indus- try. Accordingly, they gave their group a bold name: the Save Our State (SOS) movement. Their movement placed Proposi- tion 187 on the November 1994 California ballot - a proposal to deny undocumented immigrants the few public benefits to which they are legally entitled.2 The central question of this Comment is whether Proposition 187 is an attempt to save state resources 1. Alien is a legal term that defines all noncitizens of the United States. 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(3). Although the term illegal aliens is often used to refer to those who enter the United States without immigration documents, it further de- monizes undocumented immigrants as lawbreakers and outsiders. In opposition to this rhetoric, I will throughout this Comment use the term undocumented immi- grants, unless the term alien is more descriptive as a legal category. See also Jennifer M. Bosco, Note Undocumented Immigrants, Economic Justice, and Welfare Reform in California, 8 GEO. IMMIGR. L.J. 71, 71 n.1 (1994) (If we assume that undocumented immigrants are a criminal element, then we are automatically ac- cepting that the existing immigration laws are just and fair.). 2. Undocumented immigrants are ineligible for federal programs such as Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), Medicaid, Food Stamps, and Social Security Insurance (SSI). They are eligible for other programs including emergency medical treatment, the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) nutrition program, Headstart, and public education through the 12th grade. See Kevin R. Johnson, Public Benefits and Immigration: The Intersection of Immigration Status, Ethnicity, Gender and Class, 42 UCLA L. REV. 1509, 1528-31 (1995) (discussing the ineligibil- ity of undocumented persons for most major federal public assistance programs).

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most