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Alabama Takes Immigration Law Back to Appeals Court

BY: News Staff | Alabama | September 11, 2012

Arizona officials are calling on federal judges to reverse last month's ruling that blocked parts of the state's tough immigration law.

Lawmakers, including Gov. Robert Bentley are asking for a rehearing from the full 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, looking to reinstate provisions like mandated immigration status checks of public schools students and making it a crime for undocumented workers to work or solicit work, The Montgomery Advertiser reported Tuesday.

"We are filing this based on principle," Bentley, a Republican, said in a statement. "As the governor of Alabama, I have a duty to uphold and defend Alabama law. Federal courts should not restrain state governments in a way that is contrary to the U.S. Constitution."

The three-judge panel from the appeals court permitted part of the law that allowed state local and state police to ask for documentation while enforcing other laws, in line with the Supreme Court's decision in June to uphold a similar provision in Arizona.

The Obama administration brought the case to court arguing that several provisions overstepped the federal government's authority on immigration.

The state argued that the provision requiring public schools to tally their undocumented students is not unconstitutional, as the court ruled last month, because the information would be tracked solely for data purposes.

The state argued in a brief, “If a student says that he is an unlawfully present alien, nothing happens to the student."

The brief also argued that the law's provision making it a crime to harbor an undocumented immigrant should stand. The state argued that the provision "does not attempt to determine the status of an undocumented alien, and only calls for the invalidation of contracts if one of the parties enters it knows the other is unlawfully present."

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