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61 Guild Prac. 151 (2004)
Haitian Refugees and the Rule of Law

handle is hein.journals/guild61 and id is 169 raw text is: IRWIN P. STOTZKY HAITIAN REFUGEES AND THE RULE OF LAW All of us in this country, except perhaps for Native Americans, are either immigrants or the children of immigrants. Our roots, our origins, of course, suggest both subtle and stark cultural differences in the ways we live, view the world, behave. As a nation, a community, we publicly celebrate these differences. Moreover, the fact that the United States has a long history as the valiant champion of the displaced refugee and has long embraced the political and social outcasts of other countries is reflected directly in our national psyche and even our monuments. Indeed, the Statue of Liberty loudly proclaims this favorable and welcoming view toward immigrants and refugees.' Rarely, however, do we live up to this rather comforting image. In the past thirty years, as a world hegemon, we have invidiously discriminated against Haitian asylum-seekers based solely on their race and economic status while purporting to uphold international norms protecting the displaced. The wide- scale detention of Haitian refugees while releasing asylum seekers from other nations is also driven by our foreign policy objectives, which, when it comes to Haiti, are clearly anti-Democratic. Indeed, in Haiti, the U.S. government has consistently supported dictators and undermined the only three demo- cratically-elected governments in the 200 year history of Haiti.2 The tenuous relationship we manage between wanting to view ourselves as a haven for the dispossessed and conflicting foreign policy objectives is evidenced by our migration policies that curb immigration and detain refu- gees while advocating human rights. Indeed, to put it mildly, the importance of immigration to the development of the United States has certainly not al- ways been appreciated. Immigration was hard on newcomers, and hard as well on the communities to which they came. When poor, ill-educated, and frightened people disembark in a strange land, they often fall prey to native racketeers, unscrupulous business people, and cynical politicians. Moreover, our immigration laws have often reflected xenophobia and nativism-the policy of keeping America pure; that is, of preferring old immigrants to new ones. The same bigotry against recent immigrants, especially against Haitian refugees, is clearly visible in this country and particularly acute in the South Florida community. Let me take a concrete example-the varying treatment of Cuban (or al- most any other nationality) and Haitian asylum seekers by the former Immi- gration and Naturalization Service (INS).3 Several days before Christmas, on Irwin P. Stotzky is a professor of law and director, Center for the Study of Human Rights, University of Miami School of Law. The author wishes to thank Alice E. Meyer for her excellent research assistance.

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