One of the first bills that President Clinton likely will sign into law will devalue U.S. citizenship.
On Jan. 5, House Democrats led by Al Swift introduced HR 2, the motor-voter registration bill, which automatically registers driver's license applicants as voters.This bill opens the door for registering illegal immigrants as voters, because one of the first documents illegals obtain is a driver's license.
HR 2 is scheduled as one of the first items to be taken up by the new Congress. It is slated to go before the subcommittee on elections on Jan. 26 and will probably be voted on without hearings or amendments.
Many special-interest groups support the bill, including the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Foundation, which claims the bill is needed to overcome discriminatory and unfair voter registration laws that discourage minorities from voting.
However, such voting safeguards for minorities already are provided by the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Even if further safeguards were needed, making it easier for noncitizens to vote demeans the voting rights of minority citizens along with everyone else's.
The same day that the motor-voter bill was introduced, House Democrats gave the right to vote to delegates from Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands and Samoa. These are not states, but territories administered by the United States. Yet they have been given the vote in the House of Representatives, along with the District of Columbia, which is also not a state.
The Democrats who engineered this theft of U.S. citizenship argued that the residents of the territories are affected by U.S. government policy and, therefore, should have limited voting representation in Congress. This is an extraordinary argument.
There is not a country in the world that is unaffected by U.S. policy. If we are to take the argument seriously, we must consider giving the vote to Saddam Hussein and Somali warlords, as Iraq and Somalia are certainly affected by U.S. policy.
Under the U.S. Constitution, only states can have voting representation in Congress. By giving territories this right, the House has, in effect, made them into states and made the United States into an empire.
Supporters of HR 2 claim that language in the bill assures adequate safeguards to prevent illegals from becoming registered voters. But nothing has kept illegals off the welfare rolls in California, where they add to the burdens of taxpaying citizens. It seems clear that House Democrats view illegal aliens and residents of the territories as allies and are willing to devalue U.S. citizenship in order to obtain their votes.
This devaluation of citizenship has vast implications. As citizenship becomes meaningless, citizens will justifiably shirk their duties. And the American Empire will melt away like the Roman Empire before it.
Increasingly, productive American citizens - especially if they are successful and have above-average incomes - are viewed by government as resources to be plundered amid urgings for increasingly higher taxes to support income redistribution.
To avoid this fate, the United States should divest itself of its far-flung territories. We are not a colonial empire. We stretch from "sea to shining sea," not across shining seas. Free the colonials and let them go about their own business.