Massive marches against state's heavy hand

A new piece of legislation in the United States is causing massive demonstrations there. The bill, HR 4437, would make it illegal to give assistance to an illegal immigrant.

Basically the bill forbids even private charity to “illegals” in need. It is already illegal to hire them for jobs and then, the racists pushing through such legislation, complain that one reason to stop the immigrants is because they resort to crime. One has to wonder if they are either so stupid as not to see what they are doing or so vicious that they know and are doing it intentionally.

One thing that has happened with the US conservative movement is that they are showing their true colours. For years they argued that immigrants should not be allowed on welfare because it is state funded. But now they try to push through legislation forbidding private help. They argued that gay relationships should not get state sanction and now are passing laws forbidding private recognition as well.

Like socialists they do not make a distinction between the private and public. The Left argues that if one should be privately charitable then government ought to do the same. The Right argues that if government shouldn’t sanction “immoral” behaviour then private individuals should be forbidden from doing so. True liberalism recognises the differences between the public and the private.

This legislation turned out 20,000 protesters in Phoenix, the largest demonstration that city has ever had. It was peaceful and quiet but the local Mayor, Phil Gordon, attacked it anyway. Gordon is a supercilious kind of politician. A little man too small for the job with grander visions of what he thinks he should become. In Los Angeles some 500,000 people demonstrated. Good for them.