Speech #1040117815

Mr. President. the Dole bill requires that income and resources of an immigrant sponsor be deemed as available to the immigrant when determining eligibility for all federally funded. meanstested programs. This is the case. whether or not the immigrant is a United States citizen. In other words. it creates two classes of citizens. A naturalized citizen. under the Dole bill. could not be eligible for any form of assistance. I believe this is unprecedented and. as I said. creates two classes of American citizens. which will surely be challenged in the courts on constitutional grounds. So I rise today to offer an amendment to this bill to provide equal treatment for naturalized and nativeborn U.S. citizens. This amendment is cosponsored by Senators KOHL and SIMON. It is supported by the National Governors Association. the National Conference of State Legislatures. the National Association of Counties. the National League of Cities. the United States Catholic Conference. and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. as well as several other organizations. The amendment simply removes any reference to citizens in all places in the underlying bill that require deeming. and leaves in place the deeming requirements for benefits to legal aliens. I think the question before the Senate is this: Does the Constitution of the United States of America provide for two distinct classes of United States citizens--those who are naturalized and those who are nativeborn? I know of only one benefit which is denied by the Constitution to citizens of our country who were not born in this country. and that one thing is the Presidency of the United States. Article II. section 1 of the Constitution expressly states that "no person. except a natural born citizen. or a citizen of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. shall be eligible to the office of President." That is where the line is drawn for me. I do not believe that. absent a constitutional amendment. the Constitution gives this body the authority to deny outright any benefits. save that one. to naturalized citizens. Article I of the Constitution does contain one other distinction with regard to naturalized citizens and their qualifications to be Members of Congress. It says. "No person shall be a representative who shall not have attained the age of 25 years and been 7 years a citizen of the United States." That is whether they are nativeborn or naturalized. It also says. "No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained the age of 30 years. and been 9 years a citizen of the United States." I do not believe our forefathers necessarily foresaw the specifics of the debate which is before us today. But I do believe they considered what distinctions should be made between naturalized and nativeborn citizens. And the result of that consideration is reflected in the Constitution. The Department of Justice has expressed serious concerns about the constitutionality on the proscription of benefits as applied to naturalized citizens in this bill. In a letter to Senator KENNEDY. dated July 18. a copy of which was also provided to me. Assistant Attorney General. Andrew Fois states: The deeming provision. as applied to citizens. would contravene the basic equal protection tenet that "the rights of citizenship of the native born and of the naturalized person are of the same dignity and are coextensive." The letter goes on to say: To the same effect. the provision might be viewed as a classification based on national origin. among citizens otherwise elif:ible for government assistance. the class excluded by operation of the deeming provision is limited to those born outside the United States. A classification based on national origin. of course. is subject to strict scrutiny under equal protection review. and it is unlikely that the deeming provision could be justified under this standard. At this time.