Friday, April 14, 2006
Illegal Immigration and the Effects on Elections
Exerpts from:
Immigration Reform or 'Cooking the Apportionment Books'
By Frank Salvato
CNSNews.com Commentary
April 14, 2006
I have been saying for quite some time that border security and immigration reform are two separate issues.
True, these two issues share a common catalyst, illegal immigration, but this does not marry the two. Immigration reform has to do with how people come here legally and the process that entails. Border security has to do with keeping the ineligible, the unwanted and the avowed enemy out. Neglecting both of these issues for decades already has left its mark on American government.
When people think of illegal immigration they tend to think of it in terms of how it affects two general issues; the economy and security. While illegal immigration concerns people who may be willing to take the low-wage jobs currently done by those who have come to this country illegally, others are alarmed by the almost non-existent border security and the possibility of malcontents waltzing across the Southern border of the United States with dirty bombs or bio-chemicals to be fashioned into weapons of mass destruction.
Both of these issues are legitimate and serious. They both pose a major threat to the future of our country. But there is another factor in the issue of illegal immigration that most Americans don't recognize on its face. This is its impact on Congressional apportionment; the calculation of seats each state gets in the US House of Representatives and the effect illegal immigration has on the Electoral College...
...In the US House of Representatives, seats are apportioned based on the total population of each state relative to the rest of the nation. This population total - because of the way the census is administered - includes non-citizens, including illegal aliens.
In his testimony before the House Committee on Federalism and the Census, Mr. Camarota alluded to the fact that the more than 18 million non-citizens living in the United States in 2000 were equal to nearly 29 congressional seats. He noted that states with a large non-citizen population will gain seats in the House at the expense of those with a more limited number of non-citizens. In 2000, approximately 70 percent of all non-citizens lived in six states; 50 percent living in just three.
A 2003 report by the Center for Immigration Studies titled, "Remaking the Political Landscape: The Impact of Illegal and Legal Immigration on Congressional Apportionment" found:
...that the presence of non-citizens caused a total of nine [House] seats to change hands. Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin each lost a seat that they had prior to the 2000 Census while Montana, Kentucky and Utah each failed to gain a seat they otherwise would have gained, but for the presence of non-citizens in other states. Of the nine seats redistributed [because of] non-citizens, 6 went to California, while Texas, New York and Florida each gained a seat. New York retained a seat it otherwise would have lost.
The report goes on to say that of the nine states that lost seats due to non-citizens, four were the result of those here illegally.
The citizen to non-citizen ratios in states with high numbers of non-citizens also means that it takes fewer votes to win a district's House seat. In 2002 it only took 68,000 votes to win a House seat in California where it took, on average, 101,000 votes to win one in any of the states that lost House seats because of non-citizens. This certainly endangers the "one man one vote" principle.
Read more here.
Immigration Reform or 'Cooking the Apportionment Books'
By Frank Salvato
CNSNews.com Commentary
April 14, 2006
I have been saying for quite some time that border security and immigration reform are two separate issues.
True, these two issues share a common catalyst, illegal immigration, but this does not marry the two. Immigration reform has to do with how people come here legally and the process that entails. Border security has to do with keeping the ineligible, the unwanted and the avowed enemy out. Neglecting both of these issues for decades already has left its mark on American government.
When people think of illegal immigration they tend to think of it in terms of how it affects two general issues; the economy and security. While illegal immigration concerns people who may be willing to take the low-wage jobs currently done by those who have come to this country illegally, others are alarmed by the almost non-existent border security and the possibility of malcontents waltzing across the Southern border of the United States with dirty bombs or bio-chemicals to be fashioned into weapons of mass destruction.
Both of these issues are legitimate and serious. They both pose a major threat to the future of our country. But there is another factor in the issue of illegal immigration that most Americans don't recognize on its face. This is its impact on Congressional apportionment; the calculation of seats each state gets in the US House of Representatives and the effect illegal immigration has on the Electoral College...
...In the US House of Representatives, seats are apportioned based on the total population of each state relative to the rest of the nation. This population total - because of the way the census is administered - includes non-citizens, including illegal aliens.
In his testimony before the House Committee on Federalism and the Census, Mr. Camarota alluded to the fact that the more than 18 million non-citizens living in the United States in 2000 were equal to nearly 29 congressional seats. He noted that states with a large non-citizen population will gain seats in the House at the expense of those with a more limited number of non-citizens. In 2000, approximately 70 percent of all non-citizens lived in six states; 50 percent living in just three.
A 2003 report by the Center for Immigration Studies titled, "Remaking the Political Landscape: The Impact of Illegal and Legal Immigration on Congressional Apportionment" found:
...that the presence of non-citizens caused a total of nine [House] seats to change hands. Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin each lost a seat that they had prior to the 2000 Census while Montana, Kentucky and Utah each failed to gain a seat they otherwise would have gained, but for the presence of non-citizens in other states. Of the nine seats redistributed [because of] non-citizens, 6 went to California, while Texas, New York and Florida each gained a seat. New York retained a seat it otherwise would have lost.
The report goes on to say that of the nine states that lost seats due to non-citizens, four were the result of those here illegally.
The citizen to non-citizen ratios in states with high numbers of non-citizens also means that it takes fewer votes to win a district's House seat. In 2002 it only took 68,000 votes to win a House seat in California where it took, on average, 101,000 votes to win one in any of the states that lost House seats because of non-citizens. This certainly endangers the "one man one vote" principle.
Read more here.
posted by Steve Harris, 9:03 PM
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