Putney Friends Meeting

A proposed resolution by the Vermont Senate and House of Representatives:

Joint resolution expressing strong opposition to any governmental registry based on religion, race, or ethnicity and to any mass deportation of undocumented residents.

Whereas, the Declaration of Independence’s proclamation “that all men are created equal,”  has, on occasion, fallen short when members of religious, racial, or ethnic groups have been subjected to discriminatory federal policies, and

Whereas, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the far broader Immigration Act of 1924 are two of examples of federal laws that either prohibited or restricted immigration based on religion, race, or ethnicity, and

Whereas, at the start of World War II, Civilian Exclusion Order No. 34 directed the exclusion of persons of Japanese ancestry, including U.S. citizens, from the nation’s west coast and resulted in the relocation of Japanese Americans to internment (concentration) camps, and

Whereas, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld this order in an infamous decision, Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944), and although Congress enacted the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, Pub.L. No. 100–983, that apologized for this wartime policy, the potential of the federal government mistreating individuals based on their religion, race, or ethnicity still exists, and

Whereas, while campaigning, now President‑elect Donald Trump stated his support for mandatory registration of Muslims residing in the United States, seemingly to include American citizens, and

Whereas, although he quickly began to narrow, if at times ambiguously, the scope of his proposed registry, the mere fact that he would contemplate a religiously based national registry raises chilling comparisons to the relocation of Japanese Americans during World War II, and

Whereas, President-elect Trump also proposed while campaigning to deport all 11 million undocumented persons residing in the United States, and

Whereas, although he subsequently narrowed the deportation proposal to those undocumented persons who have committed crimes, a number he estimated at two to three million individuals, the concept still raises core constitutional issues of due process, and

Whereas, this proposal, depending on the ultimate scope of its coverage, has the potential to result in the deportation of hundreds of thousands of undocumented young persons who are living in this country through President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, and

Whereas, the registry and mass deportation proposals run contrary to our nation’s most fundamental democratic principles, now therefore be it

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives:

That the General Assembly expresses its strong opposition to any governmental registry based on religion, race, or ethnicity and to any mass deportation of undocumented residents, and be it further

Resolved:  That the Secretary of State be directed to send a copy of this resolution to President-elect Donald Trump and the Vermont Congressional Delegation.

*Clerks Note: This text was read at the rally. It has not been minuted as approved by the Meeting, it will be considered at the next monthly Meeting.