Pennsylvania Rep. Daryl Metcalfe (R., Butler), the state's most vocal critic of illegal immigration, said the record crop of bills "reflects the realization that the federal government has been AWOL for decades" on immigration regulation. "States have a responsibility to protect their citizens from the illegal-alien invasion."
Rudolph Garcia, chancellor of the Philadelphia Bar Association, thinks Metcalfe and lawmakers who follow his lead are way out of bounds.
"Vilifying immigrants has become all too common in state legislatures," he said. "They seem to forget that we all came from somewhere else, either directly or through earlier generations. We need to control our borders [by] effective regulation at the federal level, not a patchwork of state laws."
Growing tension between state lawmakers and the federal government over immigration enforcement will come to a head in 2012, when the U.S. Supreme Court takes up Arizona's 2010 omnibus law on illegal immigration, with a ruling expected before summer.
The law gives Arizona police, using "reasonable suspicion," the authority to stop people they believe are in the country illegally and to transfer undocumented people to federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement for likely deportation. Opponents of the law say it will lead to racial profiling.
At least three states - Alabama, South Carolina, and Utah - followed Arizona's lead with tough new laws this year. The Department of Justice filed lawsuits barring them. On Thursday, a federal district court in Charleston enjoined key provisions of the South Carolina law.
By Morse's count, states have enacted a total of 1,700 immigration-related laws and resolutions since 2005.
