Guest Post: Jane Smith, The Ramifications of Alabama HB 56

To call Alabama HB 56 a controversial law would be an exercise in the most diplomatic forms of understatement. Since its passage in June 2011, the law has been critical in contextualizing the fundamental issues underlying the U.S. immigration debate. The law highlights the current randomness and subjectivity of immigration reform by giving state and local authorities the power to question the legality of a person’s immigration status on the basis of mere suspicion. The implications of such harsh, anti-illegal immigration policies have become ever more prominent in the public mind as candidates for the Republican nomination attempt to hedge questions on the subject. Indeed, though the economy looms as the prime talking point for all politicians, it’s the legislation like Alabama HB 56 (and the lack of powerful legislation such as the DREAM Act) that keeps immigration an issue of nearly equal importance.

But what notable changes have taken place in Alabama since the passage of such harsh anti-illegal immigrant legislation? Bloomberg reports that the state is leading the nation in lowered joblessness rates. According to the report, Alabama went from a jobless rate of 8.7% to 8.1% in time between November and December, and this is after already boasting a lowered rate from earlier in the year. Of course, proponents of Alabama HB 56 cite this decline as a direct effect of the state’s renewed vigilance against illegal immigrants in the workforce. Although reports also indicate that Alabama’s lowered jobless rate—at least in part— should be accredited to an increase in statewide hiring trends. It seems unlikely that Alabama HB 56 singlehanded solved unemployment issues in the state, though proponents of the law like to perpetuate the scenario of job-hungry American citizens taking the available jobs previously held by illegal immigrants. In a way it’s unfortunate that the state’s economy is experiencing a growth period at this time, because it gives proponents of Alabama HB 56 circumstantial evidence that the law is justified.

But there are ramifications of HB 56’s passage that receive markedly less media coverage. The law doesn’t just affect illegal immigrants working in Alabama. By making detection and deportation much more likely among illegal immigrants, the law threatens to disrupt entire family structures established in the state. Opponents of undocumented workers and illegal immigrants usually picture someone working in the service industry, taking a job that in their mind could easily be filled by an American citizen. What they don’t see is the family that that person supports with their low-paying job. In her article in The Huffington Post, Marian Wright Edelman of the Children’s Defense Fund examines the costly affects of HB 56 on the children of illegal immigrants. She explains how the new law has the potential to transform schoolteachers into immigration officers legally obligated to determine the immigration status of their students. Federal courts are currently investigating that aspect of the law, but if it indeed goes into effect, Marian Edelman worries that Alabama will create an environment recalling the troubling days of segregation in Alabama schools.

The effects of Alabama HB 56 can hardly be quantified at this point, but so far it has proven to do nothing more than perpetuate controversy and make the conversation surround immigration in the United States all the more contentious.

Byline: This is a guest post by Jane Smith from background check. She is a Houston based freelance writer and blogger. Questions and comments can be sent to: janesmth161@gmail.com.

KJ