New Immigrations Publications

Law and Politics Book Review has a review of ILLEGAL, ALIEN OR IMMIGRANT: THE POLITICS OF IMMIGRATION REFORM, by Lina Newton. It is reviewed by Karen A. Woodrow-Lafield, Maryland Population Research Center, University of Maryland College Park.

“Dual Citizenship as Human Right” International Journal of Constitutional Law (I-CON), Forthcoming Temple University Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2009-41 PETER J. SPIRO, Temple University – James E. Beasley School of Law.  [BLOGGER’s NOTE:  Spiros’s scholarship pon citizenship has been influential.]  ABSTRACT:   For most of modern history, dual citizenship was considered an anomaly at best and an abomination at worst. It has since become a commonplace of globalization. The sequence has been from strong disfavor to toleration; some states have moved to embrace the status. Could plural citizenship now achieve the status of a right? This essay makes a bounded case for recognizing a right to acquire and/or maintain plural citizenship where an individual is otherwise eligible for the status. It does so through the optics of freedom of association and liberal autonomy values. Citizenship comprises both a form of association and a vehicle for individual identity. The liberal state has no business obstructing alternate national ties in the absence of a compelling interest. That interest once existed, to the extent that dual nationality destabilized interstate relations, and explains the historical opprobrium attached to the status. Laws directed at reducing the incidence of dual citizenship may also unjustifiably burden the exercise of political rights. Today, the material downside risks (if any) posed by plural citizens have dissipated to the point that the state is no longer justified in suppressing the status. To the extent that dual citizenship undermines social solidarities necessary to liberal governance, that is too diffuse an interest to overcome individual autonomy values. The essay concludes with some indirect evidence from practice that dual citizenship is gaining traction as a right.

“Putting an End to an Unconstitutional Result: Equal Protection and Due Process Analyses of the Requirement that Female Immigrants Receive the Gardasil Vaccine Prior to Becoming Permanent Residents of the United States” Valparaiso University Law Review, Vol. 44, 2009 ELIZABETH R. SHEYN, affiliation not provided to SSRN.  ABSTRACT:   This Article concerns the recent (August 2008) CDC-sponsored requirement that female immigrants to the United States receive the Gardasil vaccine prior to changing their residency status and, eventually, becoming naturalized citizens. The Article provides a background of the Gardasil vaccine including its usage and development, highlights the vaccine’s potential side-effects and other problems, and discusses potential social, economic, and constitutional issues raised by the Gardasil vaccine requirement in the immigration context. Finally, the Article argues that the requirement that female immigrants receive the Gardasil vaccine should be suspended.

KJ