Hispanics -Any Reaction To GOP Platform Saying That Undocumented Residents Count Less Than Slaves?

[Median Democrat]

Hispanics -Any Reaction To GOP Platform Saying That Undocumented Residents Count Less Than Slaves?

Is there any broad reaction amoung Hispanic voters to the GOP's 2008 Platform limiting census to legal residents? Also, for purposes of determining congressional seats, doesn't this platform hurt border states who must provide services to such undocumented residents? In other words, could Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas lose congressional seats and clout if undocumented residents are not counted. This reminds me of the pre-civil war debate on whether to count slaves in the census since they can't vote. A compromise was reached in 1787 to count slaves as 3/5 of a person:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-fifths_compromise

/snip

The Three-Fifths Compromise was a compromise between Southern and Northern states reached during the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 in which three-fifths of the population of slaves would be counted for enumeration purposes regarding both the distribution of taxes and the apportionment of the members of the United States House of Representatives. It was proposed by delegates James Wilson and Roger Sherman.

Delegates opposed to slavery generally wished to count only the free inhabitants of each state. Delegates supportive of slavery, on the other hand, generally wanted to count slaves at their actual numbers. Since slaves could not vote, slaveholders would thus have the benefit of increased representation in the House and the Electoral College; taxation was only a secondary issue. The final compromise of counting "all other persons" as only three-fifths of their actual numbers reduced the power of the slave states relative to the original southern proposals, but is still generally credited with giving the pro-slavery forces disproportionate political power in the U.S. government from the establishment of the Constitution until the Civil War. For example, in the period prior to 1850, southerners held the Presidency for 50 of 62 years, and 18 of the 31 Supreme Court Justices were southerners despite the north having nearly twice the population by 1850.

The three-fifths compromise is found in Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3 of the United States Constitution:

"Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons."

/snip

However, if the GOP has its way, undocumented residents will count even less than slaves, because they won't be counted at all:

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5geMzd-MqiH0sfhOqPTYV1b5a-9LwD92URSTO0

/snip

WASHINGTON (AP) — The 2008 Republican platform, in language that is hostile to illegal immigrants, says the makeup of Congress should be determined by counting only those legally residing in the United States in the next census.

"The integrity of the 2010 census, proportioning congressional representation among the states, must be preserved," says the platform language, which is a reinterpretation of the Constitution that could affect how congressional seats are apportioned. "The census," it says, "should count every person legally abiding in the United States in an actual enumeration."

The 14th Amendment of the Constitution, ratified in 1868, says representatives to the U.S. House "should be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed."

"Our mandate is to count all residents regardless of legal status," said Mark Tolbert, a spokesman for the Census Bureau.

/snip

[thunder rising]

1. Illegal aliens don't count...sorry.

[Median Democrat]

5. Why? Same grounds as slaves? They don't vote?

[thunder rising]

6. Black men and women were brought here in chains and sold into slavery. Illegal ailiens don't have

anybody chaining them up at night. In a perfect world the illegal aliens would not have had to leave their homes. Still, they don't count in the census unless the census is counting illegal aliens.

[MarjorieG]

2. We should publicly compare platforms. Both salves to the bases, but still illuminating.

[bluestateguy]

3. I consider myself a hard-liner on illegal immigration, but they must be counted

The Constitution does not say count all citizens. It says count all persons.

[Median Democrat]

4. I Think The Position On Illegal Immigration Is Irrelevant For Census Purposes

You can be for or against immigration, just as folks were for and against slavery. However, states with substantial populations of undocumented residents do have greater needs, and simply not counting such residents does not make the issue go away.