'Anchor babies' is hate speech

By: RAOUL LOWERY CONTRERAS - Commentary

AUGUST 24, 2007

Today's North County Times readers can't find an article that uses the infamous N-word, the Q-word (queer) or words like "homo" for homosexual.

What they find is the use of the words "anchor babies" in letters or Opinion pieces.

"Anchor babies" are words used by extremists to define babies born of illegal alien parents in the United States.

Most of these children are born to Mexican parents illegally in the United States. Shamefully, the anti-illegal alien cohort also applies the term to any Mexican-American regardless of the legality of one or both parents, grandparents or great-grandparents.

Example: Janet Osborn's letter (Aug. 23). She labels all with Spanish surnames "anchor babies." "(Raoul) doesn't say how many (Latinos in prison who are not illegals) are anchor babies, grown up and taught to break our laws by their illegal parents ... after all, they broke our law coming here illegally and snub their noses at it."

Talk about a broad brush. Most such children have no idea their parents are illegally present. The law parents broke is a misdemeanor administrative law, as is talking on a cell phone in court.

Why should natural-born United States citizens be insulted with "anchor babies"?

These children are natural-born United States citizens. They are because the Constitution of the United States says so, and says so unequivocally. Those who use "anchor babies" are ignorant of the Constitution or can't read and understand it or reject it for specious reasons.

The 14th Amendment states: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."

Critics maintain the 14th Amendment (186 applied only to Negro slaves (the last of whom learned of their emancipation in 1865) and their descendants. The Supreme Court took a different view in the 1870s "Slaughterhouse" cases, in which it declared that laws apply to all ---- not just special people. "All persons" means just that, all persons.

Critics also maintain that natural-born automatic citizenship is nothing but a "current" interpretation, a George W. Bush interpretation. That is wildly untrue.

Even before the amendment, the "common law" (which was the law during Colonial times) of the United States when the Constitution was adopted in 1789 mandated all children born in the United States as "natural-born" citizens, except for children born to foreign diplomats, Indians and children of invading soldiers. The original Constitution even used the words "natural born" in qualifying presidential candidates. It used the "common law" definition as its basis, i.e., someone born here or present when the Constitution took effect.

These people claim that illegals aren't under the "jurisdiction" of the United States. Try that argument on behalf of an illegal alien charged with murder in Los Angeles, Vista or Newark and see how far you get.

The media should voluntarily ban today's hate speech ("anchor babies") against Mexicans, Mexican-Americans and anyone with a Spanish surname, the fastest growing community in North County, just as it bans the N-word.

Del Mar Heights resident Raoul Lowery Contreras is a former columnist for the North County Times.

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/08 ... _23_07.txt