Alienated: Immigrant Rights, The Constitution, and Equality in America

Extract

Alienated: Immigrant Rights, The Constitution, and Equality in America. By Victor C. Romero. New York: New York University Press, 2005. 320p. $42.00.

Victor Romero is convinced that the Constitution, properly understood, extends to all people living in the United States, citizens and noncitizens alike, the same constitutional and statutory rights. That is the theme of his book. Romero concedes that the federal judiciary has failed, as often as not, to provide this parity—in part because it vacillates uneasily between the so-called personhood and membership paradigms—between guaranteeing every person, regardless of immigration status, due process and equal protection of the laws, and deferring almost reflexively to the political branches whenever it is confronted with issues involving the admission or deportation of aliens.