Library of Congress to Stop Using Term “Illegal Alien”

Library of Congress to Stop Using Term “Illegal Alien”

Back in 2012 Professor Jacobson reported on the organized movement to ban the term “illegal alien” because it is deemed “racist.”  Since then, California governor Jerry Brown has banned the term, the LA Times drifted into lala land banning both “illegal immigrant” and “undocumented immigrant,” and former House Speaker John Boehner issued a memo about “individuals living outside the rule of law.”

A group of graduate students at Dartmouth have succeeded in their bid to get the terms “illegal” and “alien” to describe illegal aliens removed from public libraries across America that use the Library of Congress subject list.

The Washington Times reports:

The Library of Congress has decided to no longer use the heading “illegal aliens” in bibliographic records after Dartmouth College students petitioned to ban the “racially charged” term.

The Library of Congress denied the ban request in 2014, arguing that “illegal alien” is an official term for people who are in the country without proper documents, students told Fox News.

That’s when the Dartmouth Coalition for Immigration Reform, Equality and DREAMers, or CoFIRED, enlisted the help of librarian associations across the country to petition the Library of Congress to stop using the term, which they argued dehumanizes undocumented immigrants, Fox News reported.

Officials concluded that the meaning of “aliens” is often misunderstood and should be replaced with “noncitizens,” and that the phrase “illegal aliens” has become pejorative. The heading “illegal aliens” is being replaced by “noncitizens” and “unauthorized immigration,” The Associated Press reported.

The term “alien” is from the Latin alienus meaning “foreigner” or “outsider” and has been in use in English common law since at least 1769 and was adopted by our Founders.   The term is used—currently—by the federal government to mean the same thing:  “An individual who is not a U.S. citizen or U.S. national.”  The federal government also defines an “illegal alien”:  “also known as an ‘Undocumented Alien,’ is an alien who has entered the United States illegally and is deportable if apprehended, or an alien who entered the United States legally but who has fallen “out of status” and is deportable.”

The historical background and legal use of the word aside, apparently, the term “illegal alien” is now “dehumanizing” according to the SJW crowd, who prefer, for the time being at least, to be called “undocumented immigrants.”  This sort of Orwellian word play reflects, among other things, the degradation of our nation’s education system.

Fox News Latino reports that one of the Dartmouth graduate students involved in petitioning the Library of Congress for the change states, “Illegal aliens is a dehumanizing, racially charged term. It’s about changing how we talk about things. The word alien makes undocumented people seem far removed…extraterrestrial.”

White washing the language is a favorite pastime of the progressive left, and in some instances, their “new” terminology makes a difference in the way the general public views an issue, but this is a case where it may not have the desired effect.

Remember attempts to change “terrorist attack” to “man-caused disaster”?

Words alone don’t change the fundamental fact that “undocumented immigrants” are here illegally and are not American citizens or nationals and that they are subject to deportation.

The people who are not happy with the huge illegal alien population in the country are not likely to be swayed by the “official” policy change emanating from the Library of Congress and possibly seeping down into their local public library.

[Featured image via The Washington Times]

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