Is Arizona becoming a 'police state'?

Angry opponents of Arizona's new immigration law, which makes it a crime to be in the state illegally, are calling for a tourism boycott. Gov. Jan Brewer says Arizona had to do something, because the federal government is failing to police the border and keep illegal immigrants out. But Linda Greenhouse says in The New York Times that the law is an assault on freedom, and the "good citizens" of Arizona shouldn't stand for it. Here's an excerpt:

"I’m glad I’ve already seen the Grand Canyon.

"Because I’m not going back to Arizona as long as it remains a police state, which is what the appalling anti-immigrant bill that Gov. Jan Brewer signed into law last week has turned it into.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

"What would Arizona’s revered libertarian icon, Barry Goldwater, say about a law that requires the police to demand proof of legal residency from any person with whom they have made 'any lawful contact' and about whom they have 'reasonable suspicion' that 'the person is an alien who is unlawfully present in the United States?' Wasn’t the system of internal passports one of the most distasteful features of life in the Soviet Union and apartheid-era South Africa?

"The intent of the new Arizona law, according to the State Legislature, is 'attrition through enforcement.' Breathing while undocumented, without a civil liberties lawyer at hand, is now a perilous activity anywhere in Arizona."

Read the full article in The New York Times.