Coast-to-coast 'movement' rages on

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The Roman Catholic Church, dozens of grass-roots coalitions and Spanish-language radio disc jockeys have helped fuel protests nationwide against congressional efforts to tackle illegal immigration.

One protest organizer described the effort as "the beginning of an immigration civil rights movement."

"This is the tip of the iceberg," said Marissa Graciosa, a political organizer at the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, one of several groups that rallied about 300,000 people into the streets of Chicago on March 10.

As activists rallied outside the U.S. Capitol yesterday, Daniel Sharp, legal director for the Central American Resource Center of Los Angeles -- a key group behind the 500,000-strong demonstration in that city Saturday -- called on Congress to act responsibly.

"If Congress doesn't address the problem in a realistic way, the demonstrations will continue," said Mr. Sharp at the event organized by District-based Center for Community Change and the National Capital Immigration Coalition, an umbrella immigrant-advocacy group.

Demonstrators, who have also gathered in Detroit and Cleveland, oppose legislation already passed by the House that would make it a felony to be in the U.S. illegally, impose new penalties on employers who hire illegal aliens and build fences along part of the U.S.-Mexico border.

The Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday approved legislation that would allow millions of undocumented workers to seek U.S. citizenship without having to first leave the country. It also stripped the felony penalty for illegal aliens. The full Senate is scheduled to begin debate today.

The Catholic Church has played a key role in opposing legislation to restrict immigration and rallying protesters.

"As we've been able to reach more and more people, they're waking up to the ills of the proposals made to date and seeing the need to be vocal about the kinds of reforms that would be more acceptable," said Mark D. Franken, executive director of migration and refugee services for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

The bishops conference in May began "Justice for Immigrants," a campaign focused on activating a network of grass-roots movements against punitive immigration-reform legislation.