Another story about a local immigration law—in Spain!

Spain, a new country of immigration, has experienced for over a decade now a large scale migrant influx from Africa, South America and Eastern Europe. At the national level, the Spanish government has enacted various measures to address its immigrant population, ranging from regularizaciones or amnesties a few years ago to voluntary return plans most recently, following the economic downturn.

Despite these efforts, subnational and local governments in Spain have also gotten involved in immigration law and policy as well. The latest version of this phenomenon took place in Catalonia just last month. On April 29th, the Parlament de Catalunya, which is the unicameral legislature of the Autonomous Community of Catalonia, approved a new measure regarding immigrants. Entitled “Ley de Acogida de Inmigrantes,” (Law to Welcome Immigrants), it sets up an Catalonian Agency of Migration and a standardized process by which immigrants can earn their “certificado de arraigo” (literally “certificate of having taken root.”) These certificates are essential for obtaining work permits and legal residency. In the past, the issuance of these certificates had been left up to each locality, and local officials often issued these arbitrarily. The law also includes voluntary educational opportunities for immigrants to learn the Catalan language and other subjects, to show their arraigo, or that they have taken root in their new country.

It is refreshing to see an example of an immigration law that actually addresses the needs of immigrants and recognizes the contributions they can make, even in these difficult economic times.

See if you can tell which one is different/Adivina cual no es igual

Guest Post by Pedro Malavet, University of Florida, Levin College of Law

Imagine the following scene: You are being addressed by a student, a secretary or someone who works in the mailroom at the law school at which you work as a professor while you are in the company of colleagues. The students walk by and say, “hello professor Smith,” “hello professor Johnson,” “hello Mr. Malavet.” The secretaries and other staff will address the same group of faculty by saying, “hello professor Smith,” “hello professor Johnson,” “hello Pedro.” At the doctor’s office in the university’s home town, the receptionist calls out the names of the next patient that the doctor will see: “Ms. Johnson,” “Mrs. Smith,” “Mr. Jones,” “Mr. Brown,” “Pedro.” Even at Sam’s Club, where cashiers are clearly trained to address people by their last name, the same thing happens. “Malavet” becomes unpronounceable when preceded by “Pedro.”

It happened again today! I got a call from a pharmacy that wished to confirm an order. The receptionist asked “What is you last name sir.” I responded “Malavet”. “Can you spell that for me please,” she said. “M-A-L-A-V-E-T.” “First name?” “Pedro.” “Yes. Hello Pedro, we are calling about your prescription…”

These daily micro-aggressions are merely an illustration of the racialization —the process of becoming the “other”— faced by a Latino law professor in a small southern college town, and by Latinas and Latinos more generally. In general, as used herein, “Other” and “othering,” i.e., to be “othered,” mean to be socially constructed as “not normative.” (See, e.g., Cathy J. Cohen, Straight Gay Politics: The Limits of an Ethnic Model of Inclusion, in Ethnicity And Group Rights 580 (Will Kymlicka & Ian Shapiro eds., 1997) “Much of the material exclusion experienced by marginal groups is based on, or justified by, ideological processes that define these groups as ‘other.’ Thus, marginalization occurs, in part, when some observable characteristic or distinguishing behavior shared by a group of individuals is systematically used within the larger society to signal the inferior and subordinate status of the group.” (Id., citing Erving Goffman, Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity (1963)).

We must fight this marginalization and we cannot do it unless we correct these acts of racialized impertinence. It is a simple thing. Just because our names are Pedro, Juan or Maria does not mean that we should expect service providers or persons speaking to us in professional settings to address us by our last names and proper titles any less than Peter, John or Mary.

Asian-Americans to Join Litigation Coalition Against SB 1070

Asian-American civil rights organizations will join those opposing SB 1070 and file a lawsuit seeking to overturn the new Arizona immigration statute. (Sandip Roy, Asian Americans Join Fight Against Arizona Law, New America Media, May 7, 2010). Julie Su, Litigation Director of the Asian Pacific Legal Center, said that Asian-Americans are in danger of racial profiling under SB 1070 and that "we have to fight back because it affects us all." (Id.) Echoing these concerns, Deepa Iyer, Executive Director of South Asian-Americans Leading Together, said that "while the media may portray [SB 1070] as an anti-Latino bill, people understand that this law will affect all people who are brown and have accents." (Id.)

The War Over Knowledge Part II and Immigration Solutions: A Primer

This post responds to the repeated query of blog commentators asking whether the NVL boycott against SB 1070 has a solution to the immigration issue. This is a two-part response. The second part concludes this post. The first part illustrates NVL joining the ranks of innumerable others outraged at Arizona’s injury causing legislation including the National Association of Chicana, Chicano Studies (“NACCS”), also comprised of inter alia innumerable professors.

NACCS arose in part from the civil rights era in protest against the omitted histories of the nation’s Chicanas/os and Indigenous communities from the education of the nation’s youths. To their detriment their communities were exposed to the history of Anglo America in the Conquest of the nation’s “origins.” While it took the protests of the era to challenge such narrow minded approaches to education, hundreds of omitted hidden histories would have benefited all children from exposure to the “other.” Compare for example with Arizona’s present efforts to eliminate La Raza Studies.

Other civil rights protests also connect the past with the present. For example when the first generation of that civil rights period spoke in Spanish their “teachers” charged young grade school students (and primarily impoverished) their precious pennies or would rap their hands sharply with a ruler.[1] Compare such measures with Arizona’s present day “auditing” of English teachers who speak with an “accent.” Experienced teachers that are perceived as “foreign-sounding” will soon be facing their walking papers to the detriment of students losing their well-trained and highly effective instructors.

Yet who is “auditing” the “auditors”? One of the nation’s treasures is the much appreciated dialectical differences that spread across the different states. When Rock Hudson was preparing for a movie role as a Texan, he had to be trained on a Texas drawl and word usage. Accordingly what type of their own dialectical distinctions do the auditors possess? In a state with much valued and the beauty of Indigenous languages, and with words borrowed from the Spanish (etc., mustang, rodeo) or Nahuatl (etc., mole, tamales) the “audits” against this group of English teachers is leaking racism all over the State's cultural heritage.[2]

Other civil rights protests of the time emerged against the Viet Nam war when college males were exempt from the draft and with extremely minor exceptions the sons of politicians instrumental to the “war” effort were also excluded from the draft. Instead many young Chicanos their Black and Indigenous brothers disproportionate to their populations were drafted and paid the ultimate sacrifice with their lives. Were they to magically appear in Arizona today and their histories erased (as with the present threat of eliminating La Raza Studies) what would they say to a nation that owes them so much? Apply that group of facts to the present war against terrorism —what would non-citizen Mexican soldiers who also lost their lives were to say if they suddenly appeared and faced such legislation? It is not much of a logic leap to conclude how Arizona would react to their being granted citizenship after their deaths.

Innumerable other examples exist, such as the Los Angeles Chicano Moratorium of the 1970s. What began as a peaceful protest against the disproportionate deaths of Chicanos in Viet Nam resulted in mayhem when “law enforcement officers” threw tear gas at the protesters. Many of the protesters, their families and children were forced to flee. Newspaper reporter Ruben Salazar who had begun reporting on the disproportionate Chicano deaths in Viet Nam while also fleeing the tear gas ran into the Silver Dollar Bar.

It is beyond the incredulous to discern how a deputy sheriff’s tear gas projectile “found” Ruben in the bar and killed him on the spot. Although Ruben’s death was ruled a homicide the deputy was never prosecuted and while nothing can compare to Ruben’s ultimate sacrifice compare this against the framework of Arizona’s exclusionary tactics to thwart the education of more diverse histories and the burdens marginalized communities bear. Ruben in reporting on the disproportionate deaths had also witnessed threats against his life. Space and time limitations disallow a more complete history and the role of young Chicanas in protesting the above and in sum, this post promised a response to the “query regarding a solution.”

First, learn the nation’s real history. The above are but a few examples with innumerable examples also surfacing from the Chicana and other Latina theorists who began writing about their long excluded communities. Numerous other examples include the war over knowledge taking place at Michigan State University.[3] The list is endless of harmful injuries to the nation’s marginalized but in the process educators who dare teach these hidden histories have lost their jobs, tenure or are being threatened with negative teaching evaluations from provosts who have never visited the professors’ classroom and in violation of due process. But for the teachers' concern in teaching about the "other" coupled with a non-tenured status, would such a provost have submitted a negative review in a highly unusual departure from employment rules? Underscoring the lists is the fact that many have gone without remedies proving yet greater harm to their communities.

Third, and accordingly the immigration “solution” does not respond to the universalism of legal formalism and demand excursions beyond its limitations. They obligate referencing the scholarship of those critical of false norms (in the present and the past) and reified false “standards.” Numerous scholars and activists including several of the editors of this blog have significant scholarship that deals directly with immigration issues. Not only do they challenge falsehoods (as our united boycott against SB 1070) they also offer solutions.

With yet other states also threatening to adopt the false idol of the Arizona bills—multiple solutions are offered and yet many of its drafters are not invited to participate in conferences nor invited to engage in solution targeted efforts. In many instances they also encounter rejections in their quest for new educational institutions with greater funds and access to power brokers. In short the solution to the immigration mess ultimately obligates reading beyond the limitations of legal formalism and wandering purposefully into the land of yet more complete and diverse knowledge.

---

[1]See e.g, U.S. Comm’n on Civil Rights: The Excluded Student Educational Practices Affecting Mexican Americans in the Southwest (1972).

[2]Compare in the present when a Dean at a top ten school chastised a graduate student for greeting her friend in Spanish at a meeting where Chicana/o students were protesting the demise of their Program.

[3]See War Over Knowledge February Post.

Anatomy of a Boycott, Part Two

In an earlier post titled Anatomy of a Boycott I included former El Paso mayor Raymond Caballero’s correspondence to US Airways detailing his position in boycotting Arizona-based businesses. Below is his more recent correspondence with the Mayo Clinic, an internationally known medical non-profit with a significant presence in Scottsdale, Arizona. Raymond’s reply at the end of the chain makes compelling, heartfelt points about the leadership role that Arizona businesses should have played in stemming hate during the past few years while the legislature was wrestling with similar laws, and also about the different climate in two U.S. bordertowns, San Diego and El Paso, that prompted both cities to condemn the Arizona approach that finally emerged from its legislative cauldron.

(1) Raymond Caballero’s initial email to the Mayo Clinic:

I have gone to Mayo Scottsdale for a number of years and have been very pleased with your services. Unfortunately, I will not return to Arizona nor will I patronize any Arizona firm until the very hateful anti-Latino legislation is repealed. It was a premeditated and well considered act of hatred against the Latino community. No other way to interpret it. This was not the conduct of the lunatic fringe; it was an official and deliberate act of your legislature and governor.

Sincerely, Raymond C. Caballero

(2) The Mayo Clinic reply:

Sent: Monday, May 03, 2010 4:28 PM Subject: Arizona Legislation/Latino Community Feedback

Dear Mr. Caballero,

Thank you for your inquiry to Mayo Clinic and for sharing your concerns about the immigration legislation that was recently enacted by the Arizona Legislature. The response among the media and the general public has been well-documented.

As an employer and medical provider that has served Arizona for 23 years, Mayo Clinic has made a long-term commitment to this community and to the patients we serve, many of who travel here from other states and other countries. Our patients come to us for our medical expertise, but also for the unique model of kind, compassionate care that has been a hallmark of Mayo Clinic for over a century.

Mayo Clinic values and promotes diversity as a medical provider, as an employer and as a member of the communities we serve. Mayo's goal is to create a caring environment where individual differences are valued, allowing all staff to achieve and contribute to their fullest potential. We strive to serve patients, families and one another with respect, concern, courtesy and responsiveness. A climate that nurtures and supports the fullest contributions of everyone is essential to Mayo Clinic's success in patient care, education and research. Creating and sustaining this climate are the responsibilities of all who provide service and learn at Mayo Clinic.

Equal opportunity in employment and education at Mayo Clinic is a moral and legal obligation. Mayo Clinic is also committed to upholding federal and state laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, gender, age, national origin, marital status, sexual orientation, veteran's status, disability, or status with regard to public assistance.

We greatly appreciate the confidence and trust you have placed in Mayo Clinic. Thank you for taking the time to share your concerns with us.

Sincerely, Division of Public Affairs, Mayo Clinic, 13400 E. Shea Boulevard, Scottsdale, AZ 85259

(3) Raymond Caballero’s response:

Dear Mayo Clinic Friends

Thank you for your response. This is my problem with it. I'm in Oregon, where I and other individuals are putting ourselves on the record against the very dangerous Arizona anti-immigrant law. It's not enough to say you are a good employer and public citizen. I agree that you are. The obligation of citizenship goes beyond that. What is very clear to me is that the sober grownups, like Mayo, were asleep at the switch for several years as this hateful legislation worked its way along to be signed by the Governor. The legislation became law because people and employers of good will said little or nothing to stop it. Today, maybe afraid of a loss of business, they might speak up.

But what I want to know is where were you these past two years? How did you stand up for the 30% of Arizona or the 40% of Phoenix residents who are Latinos or your own Latino employees who were being vilified and demonized by the proponents of the law? I want to know what you did to educate the public and to do your part to stop the fear that led to hate.

Do not think for one second that you are innocent victims. Not for one second. I'll give you an example of what can and should be done in the face of hatred and calls to throw constitutional rights out the window. Cd. Juarez--I'm sure you have patients from there--is just across the river, one block away from El Paso. Battles between the various cartels over who will supply the vast U.S. drug market have made Juarez the most dangerous city in the world. Tijuana, just across the fence from San Diego, is almost as bad. Yet both San Diego and El Paso are among the 10 safest cities in the U.S., routinely so. El Paso is the second safest city in the U.S. This is ample evidence that waves of undocumented individuals are not responsible for waves of crime. This year alone, El Paso had received somewhere between 30,000 to 50,000 new, mostly undocumented, immigrants fleeing the violence in Juarez. If any two cities had the right and the facts to scare people into believing that they should fear undocumented Mexicans, these would be the places. Yet, instead of throwing the constitution out the window to satisfy a few hate and fear driven groups, El Paso and San Diego instead stood tall for the constitution and roundly yesterday condemned the Arizona law. That is what we expect from responsible public citizens.

This is the kind of action I would like you to point out to me. Can you?

Sincerely, rcc Raymond C. Caballero

Hunger Strike at UC Berkeley Opposing SB 1070

UC Berkeley students are engaging in a hunger strike in an effort to compel the university administration to denounce the new Arizona immigration statute. The students are also demanding that the university make the campus a sanctuary for undocumented persons. Since the strike started, the number of hunger strikers has grown from 20 to 40. (Javier Panzar, Hunger Strike Continues as Protest Enters it Fourth Day, The Daily Californian, May 6, 2010; Angela Woodall, UC Berkely Hunger Strike Increases in Size, Mercury News.Com, May5, 2010).

Benito Juárez, Benemérito de las Américas

5 de mayo is celebrated in a variety of ways in Mexico and across the Americas.  The commemoration of the victory of indigenous Mexican forces, led by Benito Pablo Juárez García,  against a French supported monarchical government at the Battle of Puebla has strong resonance throughout Latin America.  

 Benito Pablo Juárez García

This effort, among others, earned Mr. Juárez the honorific--benemérito de las Américas.  Within Cuba, Mr. Juarez is remembered as a supporter of revolutionary efforts to expel another European power, the forces of the Spanish Empire, from the island.

 Se preciarían los cubanos iniciadores de las guerras de liberación por contar con el concurso de sus apreciaciones. Durante varios años el presidente Juárez mantuvo correspondencia con el Padre de la Patria cubana, Carlos Manuel de Céspedes.

El 13 de diciembre de 1870, Céspedes se dirigiría al estadista mexicano manifestándole su agradecimiento por "... el interés con que usted ha seguido nuestra guerra de independencia y vuestra recomendación de que debemos confiar en nuestro valor, tener fe y perseverancia".

Su preocupación por el bienestar americano, aún en momentos de peligro para su patria, le granjearía el sobrenombre de Benemérito de las Américas. Quizás por ello no hay mejor homenaje a su figura que la creación del Premio Internacional Benito Juárez. Inspirado en el lema juarista: "entre los individuos como entre las naciones, el respeto al derecho ajeno es la paz", el reconocimiento es otorgado por diferentes grupos sociales a líderes y personalidades que en cualquier parte del mundo se hayan destacado en la lucha por la defensa de la soberanía y autodeterminación de sus pueblos.

Benito Juárez: el benemérito de las Américas, Somos Jovenes Cuba (A state supported website)

But generally, Mr. Juárez and the Battle of Puebla is a reminder of the power of indigenous people to expel a foreign force from its territory and the legitimacy of swift punishment for those who trespass--in the case of the Emperor of Mexico by execution before a firing squad.  In a blog post well worth reading the essence of this understanding is well described:

Durante cinco años, los mexicanos se batieron contra los franceses (los españoles se retiraron muy pronto de esta descabellada empresa), recibiendo ayuda del gobierno del presidente norteamericano Abraham Lincoln, gran estadista, quien terminó con la esclavitud en EEUU, reunifico su país, a punto de dividirse, y se cuido mucho de dejar que los europeos pusiesen un gobierno proclive del otro lado de su frontera.

Por fin, en las afueras de la ciudad de Querétaro, al norte de Ciudad de México, fueron decisivamente derrotadas las tropas invasoras. Y don Benito Juárez mando a fusilar a Maximiliano en el Cerro de las Campanas, mandando un claro mensaje al mundo de que aquél que quisiera apoderarse de México, pagaría con su pellejo.

La trascendencia de estos hechos resulta del periodo histórico en que ocurre. Durante la segunda mitad del siglo XIX, los europeos andaban adueñándose de toda el Asia, mediante la estrategia de “proteger” gobiernos débiles en esa región. Así, Siam (hoy Tailandia) paso a semi-colonia inglesa, y Viet-Nam, Camboya y Laos, a semi-colonias francesas. Y China, paso a ser un monigote de todas las naciones europeas juntas.

Si los mexicanos no paran la invasión de los franceses, y don Benito no fusila a Maximiliano en Querétaro, es muy probable que otras naciones europeas, animadas por el “éxito” francés en México, hubieran querido hacer con nuestra América lo que hicieron con Asia, y más tarde con el África: convertirlas en estados súbditos.

Jorge Luis Romeu, La Trascendencia Ibero-Americana del Cinco de Mayo, La Colmena, May 3, 2010. So on this great day commemorating Mexican liberation, and the spirit of all autonomous peoples, I will echo the sentiments of Mr. Romeu:

Para la figura histórica de don Benito Juárez, nuestro respeto. Y para nuestros hermanos mexicanos, una calida felicitación en su fecha patria. (id.) To the historical figure of don Benito Juárez our respects and to our Mexican brothers and sisters warm felicitations on your patriotic holiday that in its ideals and aspirations you share with the rest of the hemisphere.