Letter to the Editor, Feb. 10, Canyon Echo
- Grand Canyon Chapter Sierra
Club.
"I am disappointed that my friend Sandy Bahr has chosen to echo the Sierra
Club establishment by characterizing the Sierra Club ballot question on
immigration as 'anti-immigrant'. This is a grave charge. It is also a base
lie.
As one of the earliest endorsers of the immigration ballot question, I
feel personally and professionally slandered by the wild charges of
'anti-immigrant' being tossed around. I demand an apology from Sandy and the
Canyon Echo. Considering that I work in Mexico and have friends and
colleagues there, that I admire and respect recent immigrants who I know, and
that all of my nieces and nephews have Spanish surnames, I am getting pretty
hot under the collar about the free and easy charges of anti-Hispono bias
being tossed about by opponents of the immigration ballot question.
There is nothing in the immigration ballot question that is
anti-immigrant. Is The Wilderness Society anti-immigrant because their
official policy on populaiton recognizes that immigration accounts for a
major part of population growth in the United States? Those of us
supporting the immigration ballot question simply want the Club to recognize
that immigration contributes much to population growth in the United States
and that any comprehensive policy on population stabilization must take into
account immigration levels.
I recognize that good conservationists in the Sierra Club can disagree
about whether the Sierra Club should take any position on immigration levels.
That is not in dispute. What is intolerable are the ad-hominem attacks of
racism bias, and anti-immigrant attitudes being made by the Club
establishment against supporters of the immgration ballot question.
In closing, let me state for the record that the reason the Sierra Club
Board of Directors voted unaminously in September to oppose the immigration
ballot question was because I resigned from the Board the previous day.
Dave Foreman
Sierra Club Director 1995-7
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