Immigration Reformers See Parallels in MLK's Work

[pampango]

Source: New York Times

The efforts of King and others in the civil rights movement created a political atmosphere in the 1960s that helped those who were trying to change the country's immigration laws, said David Canton, associate professor of history at Connecticut College in New London.

''The whole '60s were about democracy and reform,'' he said. Immigration laws at the time were extremely restrictive and prevented immigration from whole regions of the world, such as Asia, in favor of people from places such as northern Europe.

Those who wanted that changed ''made people realize that it's not fair, it's not democratic,'' Canton said. The current basic framework, that all countries get the same number of visas, was put into place through the Immigration and Natural Services Act of 1965.

In Oakland, Calif., the Black Alliance for Just Immigration invokes King's efforts to bring people together as it works to build support among blacks for immigration reform. The group tries to make links between what blacks have faced and what immigrants face, said Gerald Lenoir, director of BAJI. ''Even some of the migration experiences of African-Americans, coming from the South, leaving conditions of economic injustice and terrorism from both legal authorities and groups like the Ku Klux Klan, we see that same kind of movement in people across borders,'' he said.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/01/14/us/AP-US-MLK-Immigration.html

[FreakinDJ]

1. Which begs the bigger question ........

coming from the South, leaving conditions of economic injustice and terrorism from both legal authorities and groups like the Ku Klux Klan, we see that same kind of movement in people across borders

or should we be advocating for the Mexican and Central American Governments to forsake their Corporatist alliances with the Greedy Robber Barons that plague those countries and suppress their citizenry and start acting on behalf and for the betterment of their citizens.

At some point it becomes a delicate balance between "In-Sourcing Cheap Labor" and America attempting to police the world's problems. Either way, currently the corps are winning