WASHINGTON, D.C.\u2014Rep. Ra\u00fal M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who chairs the Natural Resources Committee of the U.S. Congress, introduced a resolution last Friday rejecting the racist and imperialist language present in the U.S. Supreme Court decisions referred to as the\u00a0Insular Cases.<\/p>\n
Grijalva\u2019s bipartisan resolution was introduced with insular delegates Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan (Ind-MP), Stacey Plaskett (D-USVI), Michael San Nicolas (D-Guam), and Jenniffer Gonz\u00e1lez-Colon (R-PR).<\/p>\n
The Insular Cases were decided in the early 20th century and establish the relationship between the United States and its territories. <\/p>\n
According to Grijalva\u2019s resolution, these cases rest on deeply offensive racial and cultural assumptions, and include such terms as \u201calien races\u201d and \u201csavage and restless people\u201d when referring to the people living in U.S. territories.<\/p>\n
According to a press statement from Grijalva\u2019s office yesterday, it said, \u201cThis historic congressional resolution rejects the use of the\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0in present and future cases and controversies. The racist and imperialist sentiments present in the\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0have no place in our current discourse and do not support equal rights or the interests of Americans living in the territories. Action on the\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0is long overdue.\u201d<\/p>\n
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on\u00a0Financial Oversight BD. V. Aurelius Investment, a case pertaining to the constitutionality of the appointments of the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico. Various organizations and groups have denounced the potential use of the Insular Cases in the case, including the American Civil Liberties Union, former federal and local judges, and legal scholars.<\/p>\n
In an\u00a0amicus brief\u00a0regarding\u00a0Financial Oversight BD. V. Aurelius Investment, the ACLU argues that, while reaffirming the limits of the Insular Cases would be sufficient to resolve this case, \u201cthe\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0explicitly rest on deeply offensive racial and cultural assumptions.\u201d Similarly, former federal and local judges argue that the\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0are based on discredited assumptions about the people living in U.S. territories and the Supreme Court should refuse to expand the\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0beyond their precise facts. Legal scholars express that the\u00a0Insular Cases\u00a0rest on antiquated notions of racial inferiority and should not be extended beyond their holdings. For these reasons, the U.S. Supreme Court should decide the litigation on other grounds.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WASHINGTON, D.C.\u2014Rep. Ra\u00fal M. Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who chairs the Natural Resources Committee of the U.S….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[9485],"class_list":["post-310502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-insular-cases"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/310502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=310502"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/310502\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=310502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=310502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=310502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}