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As Latino immigration to the United States increased in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, discrimination also increased in many places. In 1994, California voters passed
Proposition 187 . The proposition sought to deny non-emergency health services, food stamps, welfare, and Medicaid to undocumented immigrants. It also banned children from attending public school unless they could present proof that they and their parents were legal residents of the United States. A federal court found it unconstitutional in 1997 on the grounds that the law’s intention was to regulate immigration, a power held only by the federal government.
CNN. 19 March 1998. “Most of California’s Prop. 187 Ruled Unconstitutional,” http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/03/19/prop.187/; Patrick J. McDonnell, “Prop. 187 Found Unconstitutional by Federal Judge,”
Los Angeles Times , 15 November 1997. http://articles.latimes.com/1997/nov/15/news/mn-54053.
In 2005, discussion began in Congress on proposed legislation that would make it a felony to enter the United States illegally or to give assistance to anyone who had done so. Although the bill quickly died, on May 1, 2006, hundreds of thousands of people, primarily Latinos, staged public demonstrations in major U.S. cities, refusing to work or attend school for one day.
Teresa Watanabe and Hector Becerra, “500,000 Pack Streets to Protest Immigration Bills,”
Los Angeles Times , 26 March 2006. The protestors claimed that people seeking a better life should not be treated as criminals and that undocumented immigrants already living in the United States should have the opportunity to become citizens.
Following the failure to make undocumented immigration a felony under federal law, several states attempted to impose their own sanctions on illegal immigration. In April 2010, Arizona passed a law that made illegal immigration a state crime. The law also forbade undocumented immigrants from seeking work and allowed law enforcement officers to arrest people suspected of being in the U.S. illegally. Thousands protested the law, claiming that it encouraged racial profiling. In 2012, in
Arizona v. United States , the U.S. Supreme Court struck down those provisions of the law that made it a state crime to reside in the United States illegally, forbade undocumented immigrants to take jobs, and allowed the police to arrest those suspected of being illegal immigrants.
Arizona v. United States , 567 U.S. _ (2012). The court, however, upheld the authority of the police to ascertain the immigration status of someone suspected of being an undocumented alien if the person had been stopped or arrested by the police for other reasons.
Arizona , 567 U.S.
Today, Latinos constitute the largest minority group in the United States. They also have one of the highest birth rates of any ethnic group.
Center for Public Affairs Research. 24 November 2015. “UNO Study: Fertility Rate Gap Between Races, Ethnicities is Shrinking,” http://www.unomaha.edu/news/2015/01/fertility.php. Although Hispanics lag behind whites in terms of income and high school graduation rates, they are enrolling in college at higher rates than whites.
Rakesh Kochhar and Richard Fry. 12 December 2014. “Wealth Inequality Has Widened Along Racial, Ethnic Lines Since End of Great Recession,” http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/12/12/racial-wealth-gaps-great-recession/; “State High School Graduation Rates By Race, Ethnicity,” http://www.governing.com/gov-data/education-data/state-high-school-graduation-rates-by-race-ethnicity.html (April 10, 2016); Mark Hugo Lopez and Richard Fry. 4 September 2013. “Among Recent High School Grads, Hispanic College Enrollment Rates Surpasses That of Whites,” http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/04/hispanic-college-enrollment-rate-surpasses-whites-for-the-first-time/. Topics that remain at the forefront of public debate today include immigration reform, the
DREAM Act (a proposal for granting undocumented immigrants permanent residency in stages), and court action on President Obama’s executive orders on immigration.
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