Federal judge halts key part of Arizona's immigration law

[Guest]

I think Won meant that 99.9% of offenders of illegal immigration laws are hispanic. In which case he is right.

[Bravus]

Nup, still wrong. What about the Canadians and over-stayers on student and work visas from other countries? A large majority, perhaps, but no way 99.9%.

[Bravus]

From Wikipedia:

Quote:

According to a Pew Hispanic Center report, in 2005, 57% of illegal immigrants were from Mexico; 24% were from other Latin American countries, primarily from Central America;[3] 9% were from Asia; 6% were from Europe; and 4% were from the rest of the world.

[Tom Wetmore]

...Are large percentage of the Arizona population is Hispanic. Most of them are here legally. Many were born here. There is a real concern that the Arizona law will lead to racial profiling. Won's question was asking why racial profiling is a problem since most illegal immigrants are Hispanic.

The answer is that it is a problem because 30% of the population is Hispanic and most of them are here legally.

How do you prove you are here legally? Do you carry your birth certificate with you? I carry my passport card with me but as an American citizen, I do not have to carry proof of my citizenship with me. Those in Arizona legally (including those born there) have a legitimate concern they are going to be harassed...

Yes, the problem is not that most illegals are Hispanics but that most Hispanincs are not illegal. So if Hispanincs are routinely targeted with demands for proof of citizenship just because their appearance 80% of the time they will be citizens or legally here.

What is needed to prove citizenship for a natural born citizen? (More than 60% of Hispanics in the US were in fact born here.) A birth certificate. And believe it or not there are people born here who have no birth record. And who among you carries your birth certificate around with you? Citizens do not need to, nor are they required to carry proof of citizenship. So there will be many Hispanic natural born citizens that will fail to have the necessary proof and will be treated as if they are illegals because they do not have proof of being here legally.

[Tom Wetmore]

Speaking of natural born citizens, another misperception is that most Hispanics in the Southwest are recent immigrants or maybe no more than 2nd generation immigrants.

I was set straight on this by an Hispanic pastor whose ancestors were from the Southwest. We were talking about our respective heritage and I related how I was a decendent of the Pilgrims that came to America in 1620. (That would be 10 or 11 generations ago) He responded by saying that his ancestors were already here in America when the Pilgrims landed and had been here for a generation or so.

Only one ethnic group predates Hispanics in the US - Native Americans.

[rudywoofs (Pam)]

Quote:

The official language in Mexico is Spanish, simply because this is the language that most Mexicans communicate with. Initially, when the Spanish arrived, they tried to keep Nahuatl as the country’s official language. However, at the end of the 1600s and on until the 1700s, the Spanish colonizers began ordering decrees to change the official language of Mexico from Nahuatl to Spanish.

During the 1990s, an amendment to the Mexican constitution led to the acceptance of indigenous languages as national languages. Thus, legal documents can now be written in all indigenous languages, as well as in Spanish.

The most widespread indigenous language in Mexico is the Nahuatl language, which was the native tongue of the Aztecs. There are over a million Mexicans who can speak Nahuatl. Other widespread indigenous languages include the Mayan languages, Guarani and Quechua.

So Spanish was not the original language of Mexico. Interesting. spanish not the indigenous language...source