Immigration Law Commons^™

The Normative & Historical Cases For Proportional Deportation, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

Is citizenship status a legitimate basis for allocating rights in the United States?

In immigration law the right to remain in the United States is significantly tied to citizenship status. Citizens have an absolutely secure right to remain in the United States regardless of their actions. Noncitizens’ right to remain is less secure because they can be deported if convicted of specific criminal offenses. This Article contends that citizenship is not a legitimate basis for allocating the right to remain. This Article offers normative and historical arguments for a right to remain for noncitizens. This right should be granted to …

Closing The Schoolhouse Doors: State Efforts To Limit K-12 Education For Unauthorized Migrant School Children, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Reverse-Commandeering, Margaret Hu

Faculty Publications

Although the anti-commandeering doctrine was developed by the Supreme Court to protect state sovereignty from federal overreach, nothing prohibits flipping the doctrine in the opposite direction to protect federal sovereignty from state overreach. Federalism preserves a balance of power between two sovereigns. Thus, the reversibility of the anticommandeering doctrine appears inherent in the reasoning offered by the Court for the doctrine’s creation and application. In this Article, I contend that reversing the anti-commandeering doctrine is appropriate in the context of contemporary immigration federalism laws. Specifically, I explore how an unconstitutional incursion into federal sovereignty can be seen in state immigration …

Separation, Deportation, Termination, Marcia A. Yablon-Zug

Faculty Publications

There is a growing practice of separating immigrant children from their deportable parents. Parental fitness is no longer the standard with regard to undocumented immigrant parents. Increasingly, fit undocumented parents must convince courts and welfare agencies that continuing or resuming parental custody is in their child’s best interest. This requirement is unique to immigrant parents and can have a disastrous impact on their ability to retain custody of their children. Best interest decisions are highly subjective and courts and agencies increasingly base their custody determinations on subjective criteria such as negative perceptions regarding undocumented immigrants and their countries of origin, …

The Curious Relationship Between "Self-Deportation" Policies And Naturalization Rates, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

Governor Mitt Romney has stated that the country’s immigration problems can be solved through “self-deportation.” Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia agree. For example, K–12 public schools in Alabama are required to ascertain the immigration status of all enrolling students. Police officers in Arizona, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia check the immigration status of all individuals booked into jail. These “self-deportation” laws and policies, also known as immigration enforcement through attrition, are designed to discourage and deter unauthorized migration. Yet these policies are having a broader impact; they are creating a hostile context of reception for immigrants regardless …

Enabling Refugee And Idp Law And Policy: Implications Of The U.N. Disability Convention On The Rights Of Persons With Disabilities, Michael Ashley Stein, Janet E. Lord

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Deporting Families: Poliltical Question Or Legal Issue?, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

Last year 245,424 noncitizens were removed from the United States, and courts played virtually no role in ensuring that these decisions did not violate individual substantive rights like freedom of speech, substantive due process, or retroactivity. Had these individuals been deported from a European country, domestic and regional courts would have reviewed the decisions to ensure compatibility with these types of rights. Numerous international law scholars and immigration scholars seek to minimize the gap between the legal processes offered in the United States and Europe for noncitizens challenging deportation orders. Many of these scholars contend that greater recognition of international …

Searching For Equality: Equal Protection Clause Challenges To Bans On The Admission Of Undocumented Immigrant Studies To Public Universities, Danielle R. Holley-Walker

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Should I Stay Or Should I Go: Why Immigrant Reunification Decisions Should Be Based On The Best Interest Of The Child, Marcia A. Yablon-Zug

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Crossing Over: Why Attorneys (And Judges) Should Not Be Able To Cross-Examine Witnesses Regarding Their Immigration Statuses For Impeachment Purposes, Colin Miller

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Deporting Grandma: Why Grandparent Deportation May Be The Next Big Immigration Crisis And How To Solve It, Marcia A. Yablon-Zug

Faculty Publications

This Article explores the issue of grandparent caregiver deportation. The phenomenon of grandparents raising grandchildren is not new, but the number of children being raised by grandparents is at an all-time high and growing. Numerous circumstances can lead to a grandparent's assumption of caregiving responsibilities, but in most cases, grandparents assume this role because there is no one else. For thousands of children, grandparents are the only family they have, and without them these children would be placed in foster care and subject to the serious problems that plague children in foster care. The importance of grandparent caregivers cannot be …

Not Very Collegial: Exploring Bans On Illegal Immigrant Admissions To State Colleges And Universities, Marcia A. Yablon-Zug, Danielle R. Holley-Walker

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Between A Rock And A Hard Place: Landlords, Latinos, Anti-Illegal Immigrant Ordinances, And Housing Discrimination, Rigel C. Oliveri

Faculty Publications

In the face of federal inability to effectively police our national borders and to remove unauthorized immigrants, many local governments have recently sought to take measures into their own hands by passing anti-illegal immigrant ("AII") ordinances. These ordinances usually contain a combination of provisions restricting housing, employment, and public benefits for unauthorized immigrants, among other things.This Article focuses on AII provisions that are targeted at private rental housing, which typically take the form of sanctions against landlords who rent to unauthorized immigrants.

Sanctuary Policies & Immigration Federalism: A Dialectic Analysis, Pratheepan Gulasekaram, Rose Villazor

Faculty Publications

This Article explores the doctrinal and theoretical challenges confronting San Francisco's non-cooperation ordinance, and similar subfederal actions. It does so using a non-conventional but useful method of engaging in a dialectic exchange. In using the dialectic structure, we take our cue from Professor Stephen Legomsky's elegant use of the device in his recent article on the meaning of undocumented status. As he noted, the format has been "under-utilized" in legal scholarly literature. More scholars should use this method, he contended, because it helps to reveal the diametrically opposed positions of various groups concerning aparticular issue. Importantly, a dialectic conversation facilitates …

Who Says "I Do"? Reviewing Judith Butler & Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Who Sings The Nation-State? Language, Politics, Belonging (2007), Noa Ben-Asher

Faculty Publications

This Book Review offers an analogy between two forms of resistance to legal discrimination by marginalized minorities: singing the national anthem in Spanish on the streets of Los Angeles in the spring of 2006 by undocumented immigrants, and possible future public marriage ceremonies by LGBT people and other marriage outlaws. Based on the conceptual grounds laid by Judith Butler and Gayatri Spivak, and earlier by Hannah Arendt, the Review uses an analogy to the public singing of the anthem in Spanish in order to argue that the performance of public marriage ceremonies by LGBT people and other marriage outlaws may …

Proportional Deportation, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Sovereignty, Deference, And Deportation: Allocating And Enforcing Immigrants' Rights In The United States And Europe, Angela M. Banks

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Constitutional Displacement, Timothy Zick

Faculty Publications

This Article examines the intersection between territory and constitutional liberty. Territoriality, as defined by Robert Sack, is the attempt to affect, influence, or control people, phenomena, and relationships by delimiting and asserting control over a geographic area. Territoriality affects constitutional liberty in profound ways. These effects have been apparent in certain infamous historical episodes, including the territoriality of racial segregation, the geographic exclusion and internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, early state migratory exclusions, and isolation of the sick and mentally ill. Today, governments are resorting to territorial restrictions in an increasing number of circumstances, including detention of enemy …

The Alien Invasion, Ediberto Román

Faculty Publications

Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, repeatedly complains about strict immigration policies' impact on the ability for businesses to hire skilled workers. In terms of other sectors of the economy, an American Farm Bureau Federation study notes that "if agriculture's access to migrant labor were cut off, as much as $5- 9 billion in annual production of... commodities.., would be lost in the short term. Over the longer term, this annual loss would increase to $6.5-12 billion as the shock worked its way through the sector." Preeminent economist John Kenneth Galbraith effectively responded to those who have advocated for closed borders …

Monetizing Diaspora: Liquid Sovereigns, Fertile Workers, And The Interest-Convergence Around Remittance, Jose M. Gabilondo

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

'Tis A Gift To Be Simple: A Model Reform Of The Federal Sentencing Guidelines, Frank O. Bowman Iii

Faculty Publications

This essay introducing the June 2006 edition of the Federal Sentencing Reporter (Vol. 18, No. 5) describes two important contributions to the movement for real reform of the federal sentencing system. First, Professor Bowman summarizes the recommendations of the Constitution Project Sentencing Initiative (CPSI) report on federal sentencing. The CPSI report, reproduced in this Issue, cautions against any over-hasty legislative response to the Supreme Court's decision in United States v. Booker, suggests some near-term improvements to the existing federal sentencing system, and then sets out a framework for a reformed and markedly simplified federal sentencing regime. Second, Professor Bowman describes …

Decentering The Firm: The Limited Liability Company And Low-Wage Immigrant Women Workers, Miriam A. Cherry

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

Imagine the following scenario: a group of immigrant women clean houses and offices in the suburbs of a large northeastern city. These workers speak languages other than English. Therefore they depend on an intermediary, another immigrant who has been in the United States for a longer period of time, to solicit jobs, negotiate schedules, and communicate with customers. Although this “intermediary” does not actually perform any of the cleaning work, the intermediary’s “cut,” or share of the income generated, is substantial. The immigrant workers are typically paid a low wage, often averaging below the minimum wage set by the …

Due Process Erosion: The Diminution Of Live Testimony At The Icty, Megan A. Fairlie

Faculty Publications

Shortly after its creation in 1993, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) adopted an adversarial construct and advocated a preference for the presentation of direct evidence, or live witness testimony, in its criminal trials. In the wake of that decision and under considerable pressure to expedite its proceedings, the ICTY judges responded with efforts to streamline the trial process, amending the Tribunal’s Rules of Procedure and Evidence so as to incrementally increase the admissibility of written evidence. This article tracks the relevant rule changes and questions the merit of the decision to move away from live testimony. …

Ain't?, Susan Grover

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Zoe Baird, Betrayal And Fragmentation, Susan Grover

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.