By Hans von Spakovsky
A group of racial activists in the Pacific is beginning the process of separating from the union one of America’s most important strategic assets in the Pacific theater. On Thursday morning, in a federal courtroom on the other side of the world, in the capital, Hagatna, the Territory of Guam will argue that it may exclude any residents of the island who are white, black, or non-Chamorro from registering to vote and from participating in a plebiscite over the future relationship of Guam to the United States.
As I explained when this case was first filed back in 2011, Guam permits only “native inhabitants” to vote. This is a bloodline qualification, the same as the odious “one drop” rule in the racial-segregation codes that were used to prohibit anyone with a “drop” of African-American blood from political participation in some parts of the United States in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The political leadership of Guam apparently sees nothing wrong with applying the same type of discriminatory rule against the residents of the island.
Guam is the most western deep-water port in the Pacific and hosts a critical U.S. naval base. The home of Andersen Air Force Base, it is also the forward tip of the spear for American airpower, serving as a critical point from which the United States can protect its interests, assist its allies, deter potential enemies, and quickly respond with overwhelming power to defeat an aggressor. The proponents of the racially exclusionary election are visceral opponents of the U.S. military presence on Guam, formerly going so far as to try to impose tolls on anyone leaving Andersen.
The Center for Individual Rights and J. Christian Adams, an attorney and former Justice Department official, challenged the racially discriminatory election in federal court. They are representing Arnold “Dave” Davis, a retired Air Force major who made his home on the beautiful tropical island and is the plaintiff in this lawsuit. Davis’s problem is that he is white and has no Chamorro blood. When he submitted his voter-registration application to the Decolonization Registry, the application was rejected because of his race. The plebiscite advocates in Guam routinely refer to him to in racially derogatory terms; Michael Bevacqua, a member of the Independence for Guam Task Force, has called him an “annoyingly retarded haole.”
Crucial to resolution of this case are the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution, which guarantee equal protection to all voters and prohibit discrimination based on race or ancestry. In Oklahoma and most recently in Hawaii, in Rice v. Cayetano (2002), the Supreme Court has struck down voting laws that vest the right to vote on criteria based on ancestry or bloodline.
