I was going to title this post OOG, which old Guam hands know stands for Only On Guam. However, it turns out Hawaii has tried the same "nativist" scam with the same negative court finding, so "only on Guam" isn't quite accurate.
As Paul Mirengoff of Power Line writes, a federal court has ruled Guam limiting the franchise to persons of native stock violates the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution. The case was brought by a retired Air Force officer, resident on-island but not of island native stock, who was not allowed to vote in local elections.
The current governor has vowed to resist this finding. He apparently is sympathetic to the island's "brown power" movement.
The governor should reflect on what happened to former Governor Ricardo Bordallo who also thought U.S. law didn't apply to Guam. He was sentenced to four years in federal prison and committed suicide in lieu of serving his sentence.
True, Ricky B. is viewed by some as a martyr. However, political martyrdom is an uncommon aspiration among the native Chamorros.
