Sunday, April 29, 2012

Arizona v. United States: Reading the Tea Leaves of Oral Argument


American Thinker ^ | April 29, 2012 | Herbert W. Titus and WIlliam J. Olson



The issue arose early in the oral argument, even before the solicitor general could make his claim of exclusivity. Justice Scalia kicked off, asking Mr. Clement whether he would concede "that the State has to accept within its borders all people who have no right to be there, that the Federal Government has no interest in removing ... and the State has no power to close its borders to people who have no right to be there."

This time Mr. Clement answered: "I think my answer to that is no." But he did not back up his answer with either reason or conviction, resting Arizona's case on the sole ground that the state has the constitutional right to help the federal government to enforce federal law. In contrast, General Verrilli boldly rejected Mr. Clement's basic argument that the Arizona immigration law was nothing more than the state "aid to Federal immigration enforcement," when as a matter of fact, "Arizona is pursuing its own policy of attrition through enforcement and that the provisions of this law are designed to work together to drive unlawfully present aliens out of the State. That is something Arizona cannot do because the Constitution vests exclusive --"
Before General Verrilli could finish his sentence, Justice Sotomayor asked him to "answer Justice Scalia's earlier question...whether it would be the Government's position that Arizona doesn't have the power to exclude or remove ... from its borders a person who's here illegally." Given the opportunity to finish his sentence, General Verrilli stated: "It is our position [that] the Constitution vests exclusive authority over immigration matters with the national government."
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...

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