{"id":974,"date":"2011-12-28T14:11:15","date_gmt":"2011-12-28T18:11:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/live-immigrationreform.pantheonsite.io\/?p=974"},"modified":"2015-08-12T16:31:25","modified_gmt":"2015-08-12T20:31:25","slug":"a-question-of-semantics-or-does-the-law-really-matter%e2%80%a6anti-borders-rally-leaders-need-a-dictionary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2011\/12\/28\/a-question-of-semantics-or-does-the-law-really-matter%e2%80%a6anti-borders-rally-leaders-need-a-dictionary\/","title":{"rendered":"A Question of Semantics? Or Does the Law Really Matter?\u2026Anti-borders Rally Leaders Need a Dictionary"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The \u201cUnited 4 the Dream group\u201d has asked the <em>Charlotte Observer<\/em> to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wbtv.com\/story\/16361249\/immigration-rally-to-drop-the-word-illegal\" target=\"_blank\">stop using the word \u201cillegal\u201d<\/a> when referring to people in the United States illegally. They prefer the word \u201cundocumented\u201d since \u201cillegal\u201d has, they claim, a criminalizing and dehumanizing connotation.<\/p>\n<p>United 4 the Dream needs to take a peek in the dictionary. Dictionary.com defines illegal as \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/dictionary.reference.com\/browse\/illegal\" target=\"_blank\">forbidden by law or statute<\/a>\u201d and undocumented as \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.merriam-webster.com\/dictionary\/undocumented\" target=\"_blank\">lacking documents required for legal immigration or residence<\/a>.\u201d An immigrant who is in this country illegally is illegally present in the U.S., as defined by American law. Changing the word \u201cillegal\u201d to \u201cundocumented\u201d doesn\u2019t make an illegal immigrant any more legal; it merely takes the onus of responsibility off the law-breaker. We go from \u201cHe\u2019s in this country illegally\u201d to \u201cWoops, he\u2019s undocumented. He just doesn\u2019t have the documents needed for legal residency.\u201d \u201cUndocumented\u201d sounds like the person lost, forgot, or never received correct documentation through a clerical error, rather than committed the criminal act of entering our country without permission.   <\/p>\n<p>Changing the word doesn\u2019t change the facts. Whether undocumented or illegal, people who trespass on our border have no legal right to be in the United States. They have broken at least one law \u2013 probably more. When an alien is given the right to enter the U.S., this involves an implied consent to respect the laws of our nation. Those who enter illegally or through fraud\/misrepresentation have made no such promise to respect our laws. Laws matter. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The \u201cUnited 4 the Dream group\u201d has asked the Charlotte Observer to stop using the word \u201cillegal\u201d when referring to people in the United States illegally. They prefer the word \u201cundocumented\u201d since \u201cillegal\u201d has, they claim, a criminalizing and dehumanizing connotation. United 4 the Dream needs to take a peek in the dictionary. Dictionary.com defines<\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2011\/12\/28\/a-question-of-semantics-or-does-the-law-really-matter%e2%80%a6anti-borders-rally-leaders-need-a-dictionary\/\" title=\"Read More\">Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[21],"tags":[1038,922,19,519],"yst_prominent_words":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=974"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":976,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974\/revisions\/976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=974"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}