Do I think U.S. District Court Judge Bolton's recent decision striking down parts of Arizona's Immigration Law was a wise decision? Absolutely! And before anybody gets their dander up, they should take the time to read Judge Bolton's decision, because she makes it crystal clear that Arizona has a legitimate interest in controlling illegal immigration and the attendant problems that go with it. Because of the legitimacy of Arizona's interests, Judge Bolton left standing a provision of Arizona's statute that made human trafficking a state crime, a provision that outlawed the stopping of a motor vehicle to pick up day laborers and another provision that made it a state crime to knowingly employ an illegal foreign resident.
What has critics up in arms is Judge Bolton's decision to strike down those parts of Arizona's law that interfered with Federal statutes or infringed on areas of the law that are exclusively within the purview of the federal government. Understandably, those aren't legal concepts that the average American necessarily appreciates, but the application of those principles are absolutely essential to the orderly administration of the rule of law where you have two entities (in this case a state and the federal government) trying to regulate the same kind of activity.
Like a lot of issues, the devil is often found in the details, and the Arizona statute is no exception. For example, Arizona's statute required police officers to detain any person they arrested until his or her immigration status could be verified. Simply providing a valid driver's license would not have sufficed to prove a detainee's status. The officer would have had to submit a "status-check" request to the Immigration Service and detain a person for as long as it takes to get a reply. Just imagine spending a couple of days in prison awaiting clearance from the Immigration Service because you got stopped driving 40 MPH in a 35 MPH zone and didn't have a passport in your glove compartment. I wonder how many of us could prove out citizenship on a moment's notice.
Judge Bolton made an obviously unpopular decision, but having read the decision, I think her legal reasoning was solid and worthy of commendation.
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