This is a day where I am so proud to be an immigration attorney. Today I received a message from Tony Suda. Tony has been a client of Joseph Law Firm, P.C. for several years. Today, he cast his first ballot as a Citizen of the United States of America. He e-mailed me to express his gratitude for our services and to describe the emotion that he felt as he cast his ballot in this historic election. This is a picture of Tony, casting his vote.On this day, we will elect our first African-American President or our first female Vice President. This is truly an amazing and inspirational step-forward for our democracy. However, on this historic day, as Barack Obama and Sarah Palin enter the ballot booths, it is important to remember that African-Americans did not even enjoy the right to vote until 140 years ago when Congress passed the 15th Amendment. It is even more shocking that women did not have the right to vote until 1920 when the 19th Amendment was passed. Voting is the ultimate symbol of political power and denial of the right to vote the ultimate tool of political disenfranchisement.
I am struck by the fundamental importance of the vote and the power of the vote as a tool for political, societal and moral change. People have marched, struggled and died to exercise the right. The ability to vote is the single most important of our Constitutional rights. It is our vote that enables us to elect our leaders, to determine which ballot initiatives reflect our values, who will speak for us in government, and who will express our will in the laws that are passed for our communities and our country.
At the same time it is important to know that many of the people I represent have never enjoyed this most fundamental of rights. In fact, many of them have come to this country fleeing oppressive governmental regimes that would imprison, torture or kill them for even considering expressing political opinions that are contrary to those of the political party in power. To these individuals, their ultimate dream in seeking refuge in the United States is that one day, they too would be able to freely cast their vote, voice an opinion--even a contrary one--and live to tell about it.
Immigrants do not have the right to vote. This is a right reserved exclusively to citizens. For many immigrants, it is a decades-long and torturous road to citizenship and the right to vote, but it is one that they are more than willing to take. To the extent that they have no right to vote, immigrants (both documented and undocumented) are the most politically disenfranchised group of people living in our country.
It is a travesty that those most effected by our nonsensical and broken immigration system are completely powerless to change it. It is up to us as Citizens today to cast our votes for leaders who will be courageous enough to fix our broken system, and it is up to our elected leaders, whoever they may be, to put politics aside and fix it.
Fixing our broken system means allowing the millions of undocumented people who are living here, paying taxes and contributing to our economy to come out of the shadows. It means sorting between those who are here to do us harm and those who are merely trying to provide a decent living for their families. It means allowing those who are willing to learn English, pay taxes and avoid committing crimes to regularize their status and to put them on a pathway to citizenship. It means ending the decades-long backlogs in family and employment based immigration and eliminating the systemic incentives to cross the border illegally because it is impossible to do it legally. It means creating a sensible guestworker program that matches willing workers with needing employers so as to improve our economy and create jobs.
Cast your vote today. Cast it because you can. Cast it for the sake of the millions around the world and in our own country who do not have the freedom or power to voice an opinion.
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