School Board Challenge of Proposition 187

The nasty tone of the article by Bob Scott (Valley Commentary, Dec. 18) disturbs me--particularly as it was written by an attorney. He demands that school board members require educators to comply with all details of Proposition 187, regardless of its undetermined constitutionality.

Serious questions of constitutionality have been raised regarding Proposition 187, and the members of the Los Angeles Board of Education would be remiss in their duties to both the voters and the employees of the school district if they had not made an appeal to the proper courts on this issue.

Mr. Scott is correct on one point: The City Council seriously gerrymandered the school district. The board members he attacks also agreed on that issue and some objected at the time of the reapportionment. But then, instead of urging future votes against the City Council members responsible for the gerrymander, he demands a costly recall campaign against a majority of the school board!

Of course, many people are concerned about the extent of both legal and illegal immigration, just as they were during the Great Depression when they sought to prevent immigrants from Oklahoma and other states from entering California. But by appealing to California law and ignoring our federal union and its Constitution, those who supported Proposition 187 sought the remedy from an invalid source.

It is to our Congress that voters must appeal; Congress has the right and the responsibility to modify and to enforce our immigration laws, and to submit a constitutional amendment to the states if it is felt necessary. Mob frustration, appealed to by Mr. Scott and his supporters, can do nothing but uselessly increase the load on the taxpayers by supporting an irresponsible recall election in an attempt to elect a crew of rubber stampers whose only qualification would be a promise to ignore their legal duty by enforcing an untested law which the board’s legal advisers recommend be tested.

We can only hope that the mob spirit fades away and that responsible leaders direct their efforts at Congress to make clearly needed changes to our immigration laws.

GUY RANER

Chatsworth

* Bob Scott (“Democracy 101: Obey Voters on 187,” Dec. 18) raises two key questions regarding elected officials spending taxpayers’ dollars to oppose the will of the people:

* Why are they doing it? The “public-sector special-interest” theory Mr. Scott proposes “works for me,” as Fred Dryer would say. It especially applies to the public educators where they are underfunded and they receive tax dollars for every child in the classroom, illegally enrolled or not. Public schools are concerned with education; the leaders have no business spending school tax dollars on political issues. They should keep the money in the classroom and leave politics to the people and elected representatives.

* How can they spend public funds against a duly passed initiative? I don’t know, do you? Law enforcement should be requesting injunctions on those kinds of activities as beyond the scope of their powers. The people provide the tax dollars for all public enterprises, including education. The people have said they do not want to reward illegal acts (illegal immigration) when our own children are suffering from underfunded education.

I hope the voters will follow Mr. Scott’s suggestion and do some “head hunting” come election day. We need officials who will support the will of the people. We are not talking silent majority--we are talking about a duly passed initiative.

JOHN F. NICHOLSON

Woodland Hills