Just how to non-citizens get Constitutional rights?

  

People keep asking how non-citizens manage to get Constitutional rights. Now, they’re asking it about President Trump’s proposed 90-day ban on immigration from several countries in the Middle East.

But. in the past, it has been asked about a lot of other things. Still, it is always the same question - why do non-citizens get the rights that our country gives to its citizens.

I just watched a debate on this on TV. And, sadly, none of the commentators managed to give the right answer. So, let me try.

The Constitution of the United States of America - a wonderful document, by the way - generally does two things. It tells us what the federal government can do and it tells us what the federal government can not do.

It does not divide rights between citizens and non-citizens when it bans certain actions. It simply says that the federal government can’t do that to anybody.

Let's take something really simple, freedom of speech.

The government can not keep someone from speaking in public, or printing something for the public to read. (Again, an exception might be made - in time of war, for example, you can’t publish the timetable of cargo ships carrying troops or medical supplies).

What the government can do is take action against someone who has said or done something it feels is improper - after they say it or print it.

So, when Donald Trump says - without offering any proof - that he is banning an existing government process for 90 days because “the security of our nation is at stake,”    you or I or anyone else has the right to go to court to ask him to prove it.

In the case of immigration, for example, the federal government might have to show why refugee immigrants are banned from coming into the country under an existing review program that already takes a year or more to get through, while the door is wide open to people from those very same countries who come in on student visas. To me, its just common sense that an 18-year-old is more likely to be a terrorist than a six year old child.

But, that’s something for a court to decide.