Posted on 02/21/2007 1:21:55 PM PST by Jim Robinson
New York, NY (AHN) - The New York Coalition to Expand Voting Rights, an alliance of immigrant-rights activists, renewed their efforts to allow legal non-citizens to vote in New York City elections.
The activist alliance-which includes the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the Community Service Society, the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund and dozens of other groups-urged City Council and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to allow legal immigrants to vote in elections for mayor, comptroller and public advocate, as well as for the five borough presidents and 51 council members.
The alliance is urging both Mayor Bloomberg and the New York City Council to support the Voting Rights Restoration Act, a bill introduced by Councilman Charles Barron of Brooklyn that would allow legal immigrants who have been in the country for more than six months to vote in local city elections.
Due to the fact that it typically takes 8-10 years for legal immigrants to be granted citizenship, immigrant-rights advocates contend that the current law violates the longstanding U.S. principle of "no taxation without representation."
Cheryl Wertz, of New Immigrant Community Empowerment, echoes this sentiment, saying, "More than 50,000 adult non-citizen taxpayers in those two districts are disenfranchised by citizenship voting laws."
Currently, six communities in Maryland, including Takoma Park have given non-citizens the right to vote in local elections, while non-citizens may also vote in school board races in Chicago. Meanwhile, Massachusetts, Amherst and Cambridge have approved non-citizen voting measures, but are still awaiting approval by the State Legislature.
??????
Geez! Why not let them run for office after one year.
How was it put in Monty Python's "Life of Brian"? "He wants to know which end up you want to be crucified"? This was indeed a choice [offered by an authority], and therefore could be construed as a vote. As long as the proposed vote is similar to that, I do not see much of a problem.
Rudolph Giuliani sued all the way up to the Supreme Court to defend the city’s sanctuary policy against a 1996 federal law decreeing that cities could not prohibit their employees from cooperating with the INS.
In the 19th century I think some cities allowed immigrants to vote before they were officially citizens. Gore's plurality in the popular vote in 2000 may have been made up of non-citizens who were encouraged to vote by the Clinton INS.
Rove probably thinks this is a good idea, and that they'll all vote Republican. /s
Hey, Rudy fought his entire tenure to make NYC a sanctuary city for them.
I used to work in a job where I got to help immigrants (mostly S. Vietnamese, but some Russian, Kurdish, Korean and Mexican) study and prepare for their citizenship tests. Many had been here and working for many years before they were eligible for citizenship.
I got to know many of them very well and some had amazing stories. All were very proud new citizens when they passed the test. Some legal aliens (store owners) are quite prosperous business people who perhaps deserve a vote in their community. While I'm not sure I'm on board with this idea, I think the ability to vote in local elections would make them feel like they were a part of their community and is worth debating.
Immigrants are not the enemy JimRob. In your zeal to fight illegal immigrants, please don't blur the distinction between legal immigrants and illegal ones.
them? Legal immigrants? Something wrong with that? Wasn't that the whole raison d'etre for Ellis Island - you know... the Statue of Liberty, home of the free... all that nonsense...
They're talking about "non-citizen" immigrants.
Somebody should tell them... that taxation *with* representation ain't all that great, either.
~chuckling~
They're chip, chipping away. Just a matter of time and leftward drift, er, plunge.
In many Democrat jurisdictions illegals already vote.
You think so? Aliens have voted for many years in Chicago and St. Louis and many other Democrat machine areas. So have the dead.
It about leaves Hunter as the only guy out there.
Various Leftists every 4 years declare at some point that everyone in the world should be able to vote for the US President because that election affects everyone in the world.
Apprently they do it in Scandinavia. This came up once before and I mentioned it to my Norwegian friend who said it was typical for them to allow legal non-citizens to vote in local elections. I don't know if they can vote in the national elections tho.
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