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Resolution
Voting Rights for Residents of Puerto Rico
WHEREAS, Puerto Rico has been a territory of the
United States for the past 109 years, and
WHEREAS, the U.S. citizens who
reside in Puerto Rico do not enjoy all the
fundamental rights bestowed by the Constitution
as their fellow citizens who reside in the 50
states; and
WHEREAS, the current
territorial arrangement deprives the U.S.
citizens who reside in Puerto Rico with the
human and civil right to vote and to have
political participation in the government that
carries out many decision making processed that
may affect or have an impact in their daily
lives; and
WHEREAS, the U.S. citizens who
reside in Puerto Rico; do not have the right to
vote for Presidents, Vice-President, and voting
members of Congress, and
WHEREAS, the U.S. Supreme
Court has legitimized the partial application of
the U.S. Constitution as Congress has seen fit,
based on the nefarious doctrine of territorial
incorporation whereby Congress exercises
constitutional authority and full discretion
over Puerto Rico as a territorial possession
belonging to the United States, and
WHEREAS, such a policy has
allowed for the territorial discrimination of
the U.S. citizens who reside in Puerto Rico,
keeping them in a condition that can only be
described as separate and unequal, and
WHEREAS, on October 17, 2006,
former Governor Pedro Rossello and the
Unfinished Business of American Democracy
Committee filed a petition before the
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in
their individual capacities and on behalf of the
4 million U.S. citizens who reside in Puerto
Rico; and
WHEREAS, said petitioners
request the aforementioned omission to, among
other things, find and declare that the voting
rights denial at the national level to which the
U.S. citizens who reside in Puerto Rio are
subject constitutes a gross violation of ‘The
American Declaration of the Rights and duties of
Man’ and ‘The Inter-American Democratic
Charter,’ both of which the United States of
America is a signatory state; and
WHEREAS, there is a recent
precedent that is very similar to this petition,
as on December 29, 2003, the Inter-American
Commission on human Rights ruled against the
United States of America in a petition filed on
behalf of the citizens of the District of
Columbia declaring, among other things, that the
representation afforded to the residents of the
District of Columbia in Congress is
‘meaningless;’ and
WHEREAS, under international
law, the consent of some of the victims whose
human and civil rights have been violated does
not condone, excuse or legitimize any government
from its responsibility to provide and guarantee
those rights that have been denied; and
WHEREAS, the petition filed
before the Inter-American Commission on human
Rights does not seek to resolve the longstanding
quest of the people of Puerto Rico to
self-determination; and
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that
LULAC fully supports this petition filed on
behalf of the 4 million U.S. citizens who reside
in Puerto Rico as the continued denial by our
Government of their right to vote, to
participate in government and to the equal
enjoyment and exercise of fundamental principles
of democracy that led to the establishment of
our Nation; and formally requests the
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to act
in the most expeditious manner and provide
recommendations that would assist our government
in remedying, once and for all, the current
unlawful circumstances to which the 4 million
U.S. citizens who reside in Puerto Rico have
been subject for far too long.
Approved this 14th day of July
2007.
Rosa Rosales
LULAC National President |
