The Nation - News from Dec. 4, 1988

All residents of Texas should be allowed to vote in state and local elections regardless of whether they are citizens of the United States, state Latino leaders said. John Garcia, an El Paso attorney and state president of the League of United Latin American Citizens, known as LULAC and the nation’s oldest and largest Latino organization, said the United States was founded on the revolutionary notion of “no taxation without representation.” He said that immigrants pay income and property taxes, state sales tax and serve in the U.S. armed forces and should be allowed to vote. Garcia said Texas should follow the example of New York, where a state law grants all residents of local school districts the vote in local elections, regardless of citizenship. Chicago has a similar law and a number of states are proposing that all residents of the United States be granted the right to vote in state and local elections.