From Volume 85, Number 3 (March 2012)
DOWNLOAD PDF
Early in the morning of July 15, 2010, protestors began to assemble outside the Sandra Day O’Connor U.S. Courthouse on the sun-baked streets of downtown Phoenix. Nearly 400 individuals gathered, armed with megaphones, sunscreen, and a firm sense of resolve, to demonstrate their support or, more likely, opposition to Arizona’s immigration law known as S.B. 1070.
Senate Bill 1070, the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act, was signed into law by Arizona Governor Janice Brewer on April 23, 2010. The newly-enacted law, which added provisions to the Arizona law concerning the employment, law enforcement, and documentation of immigrants, has been labeled by pundits as “the nation’s toughest bill on illegal immigration.” The demonstration on July 15, one of dozens to occur throughout the nation that summer, was fueled by the first day of preliminary injunction hearings held by U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton, who was presiding over the seven lawsuits challenging S.B. 1070.
85_955