HB 3119 Squeaks Through Committee, But Faces Tough Road Ahead

(I.R.O.N. Exclusive)

A picture is worth a thousand words, it is said. Similarly a live reel of an event probably is worth a thousand pictures. So going from words to a full description of what happened this week at the capitol, is quite a stretch, but we can start with these words, in the Daily Oklahoman. (http://newsok.com/article/1769171/)

House Bill 3119

AT STAKE: Would require all Oklahomans produce a valid government ID, backed by proof of citizenship, before they are allowed to vote. It also would require people to provide proof of citizenship before they can receive government aid and would require state workers to report anyone who fails to produce proper identification.

WHAT HAPPENED: Passed a House committee, 5-4, on Wednesday.

WHAT'S NEXT: Goes to the full House for a vote.

“Passed by a 5-4 vote”. What a wealth of information on the poverty of so much of our present crop of civic and political leadership is hidden herein. For starters, it is a clear portent on the future of immigration reform on the floor of the legislature for starters. Beyond that of course, to the future course of the bill through the legislative process if it perchance survives the House vote, and on to the enactment of additional bills of a similar nature, and to their systematic implementation in Oklahoma as governmental policy fully supported and enforced. At this time this vision for immigration reform in Oklahoma, which is clearly only a start in what is needed to gain some sort of control over the problem, clearly faces a long road ahead, if the voices heard in committee were any indication, and to think otherwise seems unlikely. The opposition to the bill seemed highly scripted, planned, and organized and reflecting a systematic opposition to the intent of these bills and any others like them. In so doing they seem reflective of a dogmatic opposition to all serious attempts of border control which for so long have stifled in political gridlock and constructive efforts to deal meaningfully with uncontrolled immigration in this country.

With IRON’s website at www.okiron.org in conjunction with our sister organizations we have attempted to deal with the history of such efforts, the nature of the systematic and dogmatic opposition, and the future for our state as with the country as a whole to a small degree, and provide links to sources that considering the extent of the problem to a pretty good job. A modest amount of research can yield a general understanding of the problem even to one initially unacquainted with it. But going back to the picture metaphor it is also illuminating in a way all these written resources are not to take a brief look at the committee hearing on Wednesday of this week (February 22), and see what was actually said and the way they said it by the opponents of the bill.

Concerning the background of the bill and its history, and the atmosphere around the meeting, much could be said. Reports were that LULAC would appear, and although not born our, because of that extra security was requested. I.R.O.N. members and supporters from the Minutemen made a good turnout. The meeting was late getting started, but those of us who were looking for a committee hearing with some animated discussion and lively disagreement, even some post-mortem rhetorical fireworks, were not disappointed.

For those of you who have not been at a legislative committee meeting the format is probably not unlike what one sees at standard civic meetings. Legislatures are seated at a table in the center, with guests seated at chairs on the outside. HB 3119 was introduced by its author, Representative Randy Terrill of Moore, with an explanation of the importance of immigration reform for Oklahoma and of the need to do something at the state level since the Federal government isn’t doing its job. From a legal standpoint the discussion of the immigration reform superstructure seemed perhaps slightly unnecessary. The provisions of the bill seem common sense and practicable in any context, or by themselves, without even understanding the background or immigration context of the bill, and one might imagine in a different world its suggestions would be completely uncontroversial. Oops, back to the real world of immigration politics in America….. We were to learn this was in keeping with the whole political context of the bill. Clearly this was not a bill whose fate was to be decided today. Like most legislative committee meetings on important matters, members had already made up their minds, and the discussion was pro forma and political, not be taken at face value.

Representative Opio Toure from Oklahoma City was the first to offer criticisms of the bill. His objection appeared initially to relate to minor procedural issues concerning the bill. Such objections I think are typical at times of such venues. Opponents of a bill sometimes initially attempt to object on the basis of minor technical issues rather than their fundamental reasons for opposing the bill. The objection in this case was on the basis of something called “logrolling” or something similar, referring to the practice of combining unrelated provisions into one bill. The objection superficially appeared to make some sense, as the bill combines legislation in a couple of different areas, such as voting rights and state benefits, under the superstructure of immigration. In general such is not an uncommon parliamentary practice of course, as anyone familiar with Congress is aware of .

The application of the anti-logrolling rule to HB 3119 was disputed by Representative Ron Peterson, who said it did not apply to the item in question. Rather than wait for a Supreme Court ruling on the subject, the committee did what appears to be a more common practice, ask Representative Terrill to withdraw and redraft the bill, and failing that, just take a vote on it. Representative Terrill declined, a vote was taken to table the bill, and defeated along party lines, 5-4, a party line split repeated in the subsequent “No-Pass”, and “Pass”, votes.

After the initial party line vote however a certain change in the tenor of discussion seemed to take place, to a more frank, animated, and at times even somewhat rancorous tone. Representative Richard Morrissette dominated the discussion, with an aggressive, broad, and at times brusque attack on the bill and interrogation of Representative Terrill. Morrissette objected that some sections of the bill were unnecessary and duplicitous, like the section on voting requirements, citing the requirement that all voters provide I.D. and proof of citizenship, citing the constitutional requirement that all voters be citizens that already exists in the Oklahoma constitution.

The objection seemed confuse constitutional requirements with the enforcement procedures in the bill. It indeed is probably true that if all laws already on the books were already being enforced in regards to illegals there would not be any need for new laws. That in fact is why they are called illegals. Encouraging enforcement however is certainly a necessary and essential duty of all branches of government. When one hears excuses for not doing more to enforce laws or jurisdictional excuses, one can almost invariably assume the law in question is not considered of high importance at the time. Morrissette and Toure also inquired whether the strict language of the bill had been enacted in any other state. Terrill replied that was under review in several states and actually was in place in Arizona, to which the comment was made, “Arizona, unlike Oklahoma, is a border state”.

Toure and Morrissette obviously don’t follow our website. Obviously such remarks reflect a great deal of, in uncertain combination, degrees of ignorance, self-deception, or deception regarding the present nature of the problem in Oklahoma. But such is the unflappable logic of immigration-reform opponents. In general either the problem is too small to warrant attention, or too big, (and too much of a multicultural political issue) to do anything about. To not leave any tired argument out, the “federal responsibility” line was also repeated, although clearly nothing in federal law prevents Oklahoma and other states from acting in the areas of law under our jurisdiction, in fact it would appear to encourage and in some cases technically require that we do so. (Although the feds are equally lax about enforcement.)

Overall their basic concerns quite clearly go far beyond minor procedural and technical-legal issues, to the basic ideological discomfort with immigration restriction that so dominates much of this country’s elites, in Oklahoma as elsewhere. After the votes were over, Toure said we’d just have to discuss this on the House floor. What exact arguments will be made are not clear, but in all likelihood they will simply be more polished arguments of the evasions given, polished up for political grandstanding as hinted by Toure after the meeting.

After the meeting, in the discussion outside, attended by a couple of prominent outlets including the Oklahoman, (which surprisingly rated no coverage I could find) Morrissette and Toure continued their bellicose opposition to the bill, in a definitely less nuanced form. Among the remarks Toure made was the classic one of open-border supporters “If the Indians had said, ‘all you pilgrims are just illegal aliens who ought to get back on the boat’ we wouldn’t have had Thanksgiving’ ” I am not sure if the Indians contained any tribesman of Toure’s persuasion, but if any of the Indians coming to Oklahoma on the Trail of Tears had repeated the argument at Thanksgiving, “well, giving up our land to the foreigners is just the right thing to do in the spirit of the Thanksgiving – one must always make room for and follow the wishes of one’s guests, no matter how many”, one suspects he would not have been reelected to the tribal council, at the minimum. But it is a measure of the cretinous nature of Oklahoma immigration supporters and elites that someone like Toure appears likely to be one of their leading spokesman.