Political Quotes

“I agree with my colleague from California that we cannot solve all of our immigration problems by adding these types of amendments on the bills that come before us either in authorization or appropriation. Earlier colleagues, as I got to the floor, talked about obeying the law. I wonder if they understand that the reason that we do not ask for birth certificates, and we have not since 1982, has been that the Supreme Court, in the decision of Plyer versus Doe, they said that all children have the right to a public education regardless of the status of their parents. So that is the law of the land today. I think the Supreme Court, in their judgment, looked at that law for social reasons. They knew that throughout the years, in the past and in the future, we are going to have immigrants, legal and unlegal, in this country. And rather than have an underclass of uneducated residents, that it was in good social policy that we educate them, because they will become, whether we like it or not, the work force of the future. We would want them to be competitive in this country. So we are obeying the law, Mr. Chairman. We are obeying the law of 1982, as set down by the Supreme Court. I agree with my colleague, the gentleman from California [Mr. Horn], that we are going to have to solve our immigration problem.”