Why Do Our Laws Protect Criminals?

on July 23, 2015

It’s past time to rethink the practice and name of sanctuary cities.

Sanctuary policies are laws, resolutions, and ordinances passed by local authorities that prohibit city employees from notifying federal authorities- or cooperating with federal immigration laws- regarding the presence of illegal immigrants living in and around their communities.  The origin of these laws apparently dates back to the so-called Sanctuary Movement of the 1980’s, an American social and religious agenda that sought to protect and provide “sanctuary” for immigrants seeking asylum from violence primarily in Central America.  During this time, churches and other social organizations acted as safe havens for illegal immigrants and refugees who were refused asylum by the United States government.

Though the beginning of this movement may have been borne out of good intentions, the current policies associated with sanctuary cities are unfortunate (to put it politely).  Today, sanctuary cities and those who support them openly defy and ignore the federal immigration policies concerning illegal aliens.  Sanctuary cities, by-and-large, no longer protect refugees seeking asylum.  Rather, these cities are actively protecting illegal aliens who knowingly and intentionally thwarted the country’s immigration procedures to take advantage of the social and economic spoils that come with living in America.  This all comes at the expense of taxpaying and law-abiding citizens.

This law breaking and blatant theft is aided and abetted by policies and supported by people whose moral and ideological worldview see no difference between illegal aliens, legal immigrants, and US citizens.  For them, the “rights” of illegal aliens are just as important as the rights of citizens. But when aliens deliberately come to the country illegally, or overstay their visas, they have no rights. They’re not immigrants; they’re lawbreakers who’re eligible for deportation. To purposefully equate citizens and legal immigrants with illegal aliens is immoral and it both undermines and trivializes US citizenship, and our immigration laws, respectively.

This kind of politicized and ideological defiance of federal immigration laws is an issue of public safety, as the recent murder of Kate Steinle in San Francisco demonstrates. Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, an illegal alien and seven-time felon who had been deported five times, casually murdered Kate Steinle earlier this month.

The original Sanctuary Movement and its illegitimate offspring, sanctuary cities, centers its moral basis among several traditions of defending life which includes the sanctuary cities found in the Old Testament, the Underground Railroad that sought to help slaves escape the dehumanization of slavery in the American south; and the program of protecting Jews from persecution and death during World War II.  Though these precedents were noble actions that attempted to protect and sustain the sanctity of life against revenge and the forces of evil, my concern is the biblical notion of sanctuary cities.  This idea has been morally and politically perverted in favor of an ideological agenda that refuses to distinguish right from wrong in its quest to weaken federal immigration laws under the banner of social “justice.”

Biblically speaking, sanctuary cities were “cities of refuge.” Examples and prescriptions that applied to these cities of refuge are found in several places in the Old Testament (including Numbers, Deuteronomy and Joshua), where God commanded the Israelites to establish specific places as safe havens for those who had accidentally and or unintentionally killed another person.  Because a person killed accidentally- as opposed to having murdered someone intentionally (and there is a moral difference between killing and murdering), the designated city would provide refuge- a safeguard against the avenger of blood (generally a family member seeking retribution for the unintended death). The person seeking sanctuary was required to remain in the city of refuge until the death of the high priest serving at the time of his arrival, after which the person was allowed to go back to his family without fear of reprisal.

However, if someone sought asylum in a city of refuge and was found guilty of intentional murder- proof of which came after a trial, he was not allowed to receive sanctuary; he was rightly put to death. He was shown no pity. The divine directive commanded the Israelites to purge the evil from their midst (Deut. 19:19).  Plainly speaking, there was a very clear distinction between intentional and premeditated murder and unintentional killing; between the guilty and the innocent- all in the pursuit of maintaining the law and preserving the sanctity of human life.

Not so with the current manifestation of sanctuary cities. Unlike the recommendations regarding cities of refuge in the Bible, current sanctuary cities sanctimoniously and defiantly refuse to differentiate between the guilty and the innocent. In a moral inversion of the original, current sanctuary cities actually provide sanctuary for the guilty at the expense of the innocent. Sanctuary cities flout federal immigration laws, refusing to report the illegal aliens (and their extra-criminal activity) they knowingly harbor, consciously and unreservedly perverting justice in the process. Again, we must be clear: sanctuary city policies transparently and without shame, protect and defend the guilty, not the innocent.

Rather than bringing the deviants to justice, sanctuary cities redefine justice to appease and cater to illegal aliens, which is an injustice to legal immigrants and American citizens.

Illegal aliens receiving sanctuary (and those who grant it) are, by definition, guilty of intentional law breaking. As increasing examples demonstrate, many are guilty of much, much worse. In harboring illegal aliens, these cities don’t just simply blur the lines between life and death; they actually invite death itself. Again, as the preventable death of Kate Steinle demonstrates, Francisco Lopez-Sanchez (a fitting name, indeed)- the illegal alien and convicted felon- said he knew San Francisco was a sanctuary city so he knew he wouldn’t be deported.

Politicians and others who create and defend sanctuary city policies and who willfully participate in blurring the lines between legal and illegal, right and wrong, justice and injustice, are guilty of perpetuating a caricature of moral authority that invites and nurtures the kind of criminality that violates public safety. Embracing a sympathetic ideology that lacks common sense to justify the continued harboring of illegal alien criminals is socially destructive and a moral shame.

And if sanctuary cities shelter the guilty and the criminal at the expense of the innocent, who or what protects the innocent victims of such policies?

Christian or not, politicians and those who support the postmodern notion of sanctuary city policies violate the law, common sense, and Leviticus 19:15 which says, “Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly.”

  1. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 28, 2015 at 1:11 am

    The politicians are under tremendous pressure from the US Chamber of Commerce to admit more and more cheap labor, and, not correct the mexican border situation.
    The democrat party politicians also have determined that this mexican immigration will provide them with millions of democrat voters, so they have even more reason to not take action on the border issue.
    The US Chamber has also been influencing politicians to expand legal immigration many fold, to the detriment of the American worker, and especially to the detriment of the people who vote democrat, since they represent labor to a greater degree, amazingly enough.
    But screwing your own constituents has been easy.
    The republican politicians pretend to be doing something about immigration, like Boehner, who is finally getting the boot.
    The democrat politicians basically have always been fooling their constituents into thinking they are doing something for them even though they never get any improvement in their lives even after 7 years under super progressive Obama.
    Democrat voters have to be pretty dense not to see they are being kept on the plantation, but who knows, they might suddenly wake up.
    The democrat party is scared, hence the wholesale citizenship drive they just started of mexican immigrants, because if someone like Carson becomes the republican nominee, they will need to replace the black vote with someone else, therefore a mexican vote.

  2. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 28, 2015 at 7:47 am

    I seriously doubt that the bulk of the American Black constituency would vote for Carson.

  3. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 8:34 am

    Certainly not the ones the democrat party has brainwashed down on the plantation, no.
    But that coalition is beginning to fracture, and they wont be so kind when they realize how the democrat machine has been using them will they?
    Better late than never, Obama is a racist and a divisive manipulator of the black population in this country, good riddence to his divide and conquer philosophy, very soon he will be gone and go down as one of the worst presidents in US history.
    His “constituants” have lost ground big time under his imperial Chicago style presidency.

  4. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 29, 2015 at 8:43 am

    Funny how some people make our first black President out to be the “Master of the Plantation”!

    I guess there will always be those kind of xenophobes?

    History will prove Obama to have been a remarkably astute Executive. And as a Community Organizer with skills to heal wounds created by the Greedy Class that he inherited upon entering office.

    ‘Sorry you have difficulty seeing that!

  5. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 8:54 am

    Obama has not done anything whatsoever, a genuine disappointment to the people who hoped this guy would be the transparent uniter he claimed to be.
    He will be lucky if voters would even consider putting a black man in that office again for a long time.

  6. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 29, 2015 at 10:21 am

    I’ll grant you, Obama did cave-in to the Big Banks and The Insurance Industry.
    We were all hoping that he would be much more Liberal and Progressive from the beginning. But alas, we’ll just have to elect Bernie Sanders to rebuild America!

    Good luck in YOUR world!

  7. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 1:40 pm

    Thats funny, democrats are the middle classes sole representatives, could it be that they are in bed with “gasp” qqqbig business?
    Could it be that, as in every issue, they are lying to people?
    And the middle class, what exactly have they done for them?
    If you want progressive, move to Cuba, and live the utopian dream with them.
    Or maybe, you just want to play with fire and not actually get into the cooking pot?

  8. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 29, 2015 at 3:10 pm

    After trying my best to decipher your language, I can assume you still hold that either Party has something worthwhile to offer our Country?
    Neither has done much for the Middle Class, they are both in bed with BIG Business and Wall Street.

    Bernie Sanders is the only one talking realistically about saving the Middle Class. So that’s why we’ll be voting for him!

    We will be visiting Cuba for sure, but I don’t understand what you mean by moving there. Perhaps you could rephrase what you meant to say?

  9. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 3:41 pm

    Hmm, apparently you’re not reading as carefully as you think.
    Since Sanders is a self declared socialist, and Cuba is the nearest socialist paradise, and if you have studied socialism, and know what it is like and what happens under socialism, and the millions of innocent people that have been murdered under that banner, I am simply suggesting that you go down and live there because America was founded as a democracy, and thats why we live here and why everyone else is trying to get in here.
    So if you want socialism, dont try to force it on others when you can just go down to Cuba and live it yourself.
    Let us all know how that works out for you, OK?

  10. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 29, 2015 at 4:12 pm

    Yes, I know Senator Bernie Sanders is a self proclaimed Socialist, but don’t think for a minute that he’s a Communist. There is a difference!

    There will be no force required because Sanders will be elected to office by the people who know our current system is rigged by the Billionaire class and Corporations.

    Best of luck to you as well!

  11. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 4:17 pm

    No, there is no difference, ever hear of national socialism? Socialist workers paradise?
    Totally incompatible with a free democracy.
    The people are not as dumb as you think they are, well not the republicans anyway, and some democrats.
    Your medicine is worse than the disease.

  12. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 29, 2015 at 4:24 pm

    Then I can count you out of the victory party after the election? Okay!

  13. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 4:51 pm

    Oh I will be there.
    You guys had your chance with Obama, but, turns out he was more interested in creating rather than solving problems for the majority of Americans.
    Now, it’s our time.

  14. Comment by Alfred1957 on September 29, 2015 at 3:45 pm

    By the way, Bernie is running as a democrat, not as an independant, so that is the same democrat party that you admit is in bed with big business.
    I thibk just maybe that will have an influence on his policies, just as it does with Obama, who is a stealth socialist.
    Its odd how you know the truth but then you subsequently ignore it too.

  15. Comment by MarcoPolo on September 29, 2015 at 4:17 pm

    Correct, Bernie is running on the Democratic ticket. That’s so he can be included in the debates, AND to pull Hillary further to the Left.
    We will happily support Sanders, and if he gets eliminated in the Primaries, we’ll just have to hold our noses and vote for Hillary Clinton. Still much better than the clowns in the Republican camp, who offer nothing for the average American citizen!

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