[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 23 (Monday, March 7, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: March 7, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                IMPROVING AMERICA'S SCHOOLS ACT OF 1994

                                 ______


                               speech of

                        HON. ROBERT A. UNDERWOOD

                                of guam

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, March 3, 1994

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the State of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H.R. 6) to extend 
     for 6 years the authorizations of appropriations for the 
     program under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 
     1965, and for certain other purposes:

  Mr. UNDERWOOD. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the 
amendment offered by the gentleman from California requiring the 
reporting of the residency/citizenship status of children and their 
parents by school districts before receiving title I funds. This new 
bureaucratic requirement and unfunded mandate would, in effect deputize 
our schools and educational professionals into service for the 
Immigration and Naturalization Service. We cannot afford to spend the 
already scarce resources for education on the enforcement of 
immigration law.
  I've been an educator for most of my life and I can tell you from 
personal experience that school personnel do not need another Federal 
mandate taking them away from their primary duty of teaching our 
children, particularly one which in effect makes them law enforcers. 
But this amendment not only requires that the legal status of each 
student be assessed, it also requires a report on the status of their 
parents. The question is why do we want to continue to overburden the 
schools with additional activities that are not directly connected to 
the welfare of children.
  And where do we stop with the enforcement of law and policy; do we 
want to use children and their need to learn and the natural parental 
desire for educational advancement as the basis for the enforcement of 
other laws; do we want to start questioning kindergarterners about what 
their parents do or own in the hope of catching adults in an illegal 
activity; do we want to use the schoolhouse as the basis for the 
investigation of crimes and the implementation of policies for which 
enforcement agencies already exist?
  Most ominously, this amendment could lead to witch hunts, as schools 
single out children who do not look typically American, even if they do 
not require documentation. Such children might include the people I 
represent and Puerto Ricans and others who are native-born U.S. 
citizens. It may also single out Hispanics and Asians who have been 
here for generations. One of the possible effects of this amendment 
might be that all of us non-typical American looking types may be 
forced to carry documentation so as not to be misidentified by 
educational personnel as illegal immigrants.
  This is nothing more than lashing our at a population of foreigner; 
this is allowing emotion to reign in what is a very serious debate; and 
you know what is most bothersome--is that this is not in the best 
tradition of what makes America great.
  When you look at this debate, you see two great forces which make 
America stand out among the nations of the world--an immigration 
history which has been open and welcoming and which has provided 
opportunities to some Members of this body who are themselves first 
generation immigrants and to the sons and daughters, grandsons and 
granddaughters of immigrants who I'm sure make up the majority of the 
membership of this body.
  That legacy in combination with the quest for educational opportunity 
and the historical record of providing common schooling for children of 
whatever origin has accounted for much of America's present greatness. 
Educational opportunity and its expansion for immigrants and the 
children of immigrants as well as native-born have been the engines of 
progress in American history.
  In seeking to amend an educational opportunity bill for these 
purposes, we see the two great forces for American progress--
immigration and the expansion of educational opportunity--blunted, used 
and abused, perverted to block the very things which has made America 
the Nation that it is today.
  Clearly what America is today and its historical experiences to date 
are being ignored and discarded by these amendments.
  We need to talk about immigration policy and we need to deal with the 
issue of controlling the borders, but to use schools as the vehicles 
and children as the pawns in the process is not right and we know it.
  Vote down the Rohrabacher amendment.

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