Tag Archives: SCOTUS

‘Civil Death’: SCOTUS Eviscerates Fourth Amendment, Validates Police Profiling

The Supreme Court may not be complete, but that doesn’t mean they are any less capable of causing a firestorm.  In what seems to be an incredibly short-sighted decision, a major pillar of the United States Constitution has been all but gutted.  Here’s the information from the New York Times editorial board…

The Fourth Amendment protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government — or that’s how it works in theory, anyway.

In practice, though, court decisions over several decades have created so many exceptions to this constitutional principle as to render it effectively meaningless in many real-world situations.

On Monday, the Supreme Court further weakened the Fourth Amendment by making it even easier for law enforcement to evade its requirement that stops be based on reasonable suspicion. The justices ruled 5 to 3 that a police officer’s illegal stop of a man on the street did not prevent evidence obtained from a search connected to that stop to be used against him.

The case, Utah v. Strieff, started when the police in Salt Lake City got an anonymous tip of drug activity at a house. An officer monitoring the house became suspicious at the number of people he saw entering and leaving. When one of those people, Edward Strieff, left to walk to a nearby convenience store, the officer stopped him and asked for his identification. A routine check revealed that Mr. Strieff had an outstanding “small traffic warrant.” The officer arrested him based on that earlier warrant, searched him and found drugs in his pockets.

The State of Utah agreed that the initial stop was illegal, because it was not based on reasonable, individual suspicion that Mr. Strieff was doing anything wrong. Instead, the state argued that the discovery of the valid warrant — after the illegal stop — got around the Fourth amendment violation.

The Utah Supreme Court rightly rejected this argument, but that decision was overturned in a majority opinion written by Justice Clarence Thomas. The officer’s lack of any specific suspicion of Mr. Strieff, Justice Thomas wrote, was a result of “good-faith mistakes.” The illegal stop was, at worst, “an isolated instance of negligence.”

So basically, police can suspect anything they want about an individual, and use that information as an excuse to detain them, check for warrants, and then quite possibly disrupt the entirety of their life.  And I suppose if one has never been profiled by the police, and never had any reason to think that they would be, this judgement seems rather sensible.  It’s not like police officers ever make mistakes, or use their judgement in an unfair way, right?

It’s important to note here that this was a 5 to 3 decision by the court, with Justices Clarence Thomas (who wrote the majority opinion), Stephen Breyer, Anthony Kennedy, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito in the majority.  The three dissenters?  Justices Elena Kagen, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor.

So at least on the face of it, gender appears to be a factor.  But let’s spend a brief moment to also discuss the court’s only true racial minority, Justice Sonia Sotomayor.  Remember during her confirmation, the whole firestorm around being “Wise Latina“?  In her dissenting opinion to this case, that wisdom shines through like never before.  Directly from Justice Sotomayor’s dissent

The Court today holds that the discovery of a warrant for an unpaid parking ticket will forgive a police officer’s violation of your Fourth Amendment rights. Do not be soothed by the opinion’s technical language: This case allows the police to stop you on the street, demand your identification, and check it for outstanding traffic warrants—even if you are doing nothing wrong. If the officer discovers a warrant for a fine you forgot to pay, courts will now excuse his illegal stop and will admit into evidence anything he happens to find by searching you after arresting you on the warrant. Because the Fourth Amendment should prohibit, not permit, such misconduct, I dissent.

[…]

The officer’s control over you does not end with the stop. If the officer chooses, he may handcuff you and take you to jail for doing nothing more than speeding, jaywalking, or “driving [your] pickup truck . . . with [your] 3-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter . . . without [your] seatbelt fastened.” Atwater v. Lago Vista, 532 U. S. 318, 323–324 (2001). At the jail, he can fingerprint you, swab DNA from the inside of your mouth, and force you to “shower with a delousing agent” while you “lift [your] tongue, hold out [your] arms, turn around, and lift [your] genitals.” Florence v. Board of Chosen Freeholders of County of Burlington, 566 U. S. ___, ___–___ (2012) (slip op., at 2–3); Maryland v. King, 569 U. S. ___, ___ (2013) (slip op., at 28). Even if you are innocent, you will now join the 65 million Americans with an arrest record and experience the “civil death” of discrimination by employers, landlords, and whoever else conducts a background check.

By legitimizing the conduct that produces this double consciousness, this case tells everyone, white and black, guilty and innocent, that an officer can verify your legal status at any time. It says that your body is subject to invasion while courts excuse the violation of your rights. It implies that you are not a citizen of a democracy but the subject of a carceral state, just waiting to be cataloged. We must not pretend that the countless people who are routinely targeted by police are “isolated.” They are the canaries in the coal mine whose deaths, civil and literal, warn us that no one can breathe in this atmosphere. See L. Guinier & G. Torres, The Miner’s Canary 274–283 (2002). They are the ones who recognize that unlawful police stops corrode all our civil liberties and threaten all our lives. Until their voices matter too, our justice system will continue to be anything but.

What Justice Sotomayor says here can hardly be improved upon.  It’s a shame that our nation’s Supreme Court has cleared the way for the “Civil Death” of millions of Americans, and the 4th Amendment of our Constitution.  Sadly, the only ones who can affect this ruling are Congress, and it is far from a major election issue.  Let’s hope others learn the truth of this ruling, and soon.  But in the midst of such an atrocious oversight, at least those Americans most prone to police profiling had a few voices on the court to speak the truth.

Sotomayor

SCOTUS to Hear Case, Hopefully Settle ‘Immigration Action’ Stalemate

By this point in the Obama Presidency, one thing is clear… the legacy of our nation’s 44th President is not being debated in the halls Congress, but in the halls of our nation’s highest courts.  Such was the case with the President’s landmark legislative achievement– the 2010 Affordable Care Act, and again the case in last year’s historic ruling which brought Marriage Equality of to all 50 states.

And yesterday, it was revealed that one more cornerstone move by the Obama Administration will also get its day at the Supreme Court.  From Amy Howe of SCOTUS blog, here are the details…

In the summer of 2014, efforts to pass new laws to overhaul the country’s immigration system seemed to be on a slow road to nowhere.  In remarks at the White House on June 30 , President Barack Obama announced that then-House Speaker John Boehner had told him that Republicans would “block a vote on immigration reform at least for the remainder of this year.”  Arguing that “Americans can’t wait forever” for Republicans to act on immigration, Obama indicated that he planned to go it alone.

And he did.  In November of that year, Obama announced a new policy that would allow undocumented immigrants who can meet two criteria – they have children who are U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents (also known as “Green Card holders”) and they have been in the United States at least since January 2010 – to apply for a program that would allow them to stay in the country for three years and work here legally.

The policy, which could allow as many as four million undocumented immigrants to remain in the country, never went into effect.  Instead, Texas and twenty-five other states went to federal court to try to block it.  So far, they have been successful:  a federal trial judge issued an order to keep the policy from going into effect, and a federal appeals court upheld that ruling.

The Obama administration asked the Supreme Court to weigh in, and today the Justices agreed to do so. This means that the Court will almost certainly hear oral arguments in the case in late April, with a decision expected in late June – just as the 2016 presidential campaign, in which immigration has already played a major role, really starts to heat up.

Given how bonkers the race for the White House has been so far, “heat up” doesn’t even begin to describe what could occur with this new drama thrown into the mix.

But even accepting the drama, the court’s decision to hear this case is beyond critical.  Congress has simply refused to take any action towards Comprehensive Immigration Reform, even as American families continue to be torn apart by the deportation of their loved ones.  Instead of doing what is best for the nation, Republicans in particular (though plenty of Democrats share the shame of this issue as well) have chosen to take the “easy way out”– blame President Obama for everything wrong with the system, and avoid the issue as long as possible.

One other essential point, the case states are waging against Obama’s Immigration Action Plan is in itself something of a long, overly politicized farce.  For starters, Texas has been begging the Supreme Court to not weigh in on the matter.  Eventhough they (we??  UGH) are lead plaintiffs in the case, they would rather keep the issue in legal limbo than actually get any answers that would help real Texas families figure out what to do.

Secondly, the states’ argument is is inherently unequal.  They are essentially petitioning for the Executive Branch to do its job less well.  The whole reason that an Immigration Action Plan is needed is because the United States cannot deport all of the undocumented persons within its borders at any given time.  This creates the absolute necessity for prioritization.  The states themselves would never do this.  If Greg Abbott announced today that he was going to fill every pothole that existed in the state of Texas within 24 hours, people would laugh off his words because the task is simply not possible.  Yet in their petition, they are asking the Federal government to sustain a system that is just as senseless.  By rejecting these prioritization policies by the Obama Administration these states are asking for the courts to let our communities be less safe, to continue to orphan more American citizens by tearing their families apart, and to not seek and remove dangerous criminals from our streets.

Third, a central point of the state case again boils down to resources. Admittedly, this is a valid argument in many respects, as it is state and local government that ultimately must implement this Federal policy, and would bear the cost of processing the deferred action requests.  But the question to ask here is whether or not this presents an “undue burden to the state.  For all of the time that it takes to enact a DACA or DAPA request, how much time and money is being saved by not having to enact the expensive and often tragic processes of deportation?  If our communities are ultimately safer and better by bringing people out in the open, do those temporary inconveniences bear better results in the end?  While these questions are still up for debate, many legal scholars consider the Obama Administration’s case for the plan to be very strong.

For all of the above reasons and more, let’s hope that the Supreme Court’s decision to take up the case will lead to a common-sense result.

Scotus Texas

GOP Leaders File Amicus Brief Supporting Marriage Equality

In what can only be interpreted as a visible sign of progress, several prominent Republicans have filed an Amicus Brief to the Supreme Court stating that they support marriage equality for the whole United States.

Here’s the story from Time magazine

More than 300 veteran Republican lawmakers, operatives and consultants have filed a friend of the court brief at the Supreme Court in support of same-sex marriage late Thursday.

The amicus brief, organized by former Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, was filed for the four same-sex marriage cases the Court will hear on April 28 that could legalize the unions nationwide. In 2013, Mehlman marshaled a similar effort for the case that overturned California’s Proposition 8, which had banned same-sex marriage in the state.

Among the signatories are 23 current and former Republicans members of the House of Representatives and Senate and seven current and former Governors. Sens. Susan Collins and Mark Kirk have signed onto the brief, as has Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker and former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman. Other notables include former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal and billionaire GOP mega-donor David Koch.

The 2013 brief included 131 signatures, featured many former top aides to Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, including his general counsel and two senior advisors. The list has now grown to 303 signatories.

Next Gen party voices like MSNBC host Abby Huntsman, columnist Meghan McCain and political commentator S.E. Cupp, along with many top-level staffers from Mitt Romney’s 2012 Presidential campaign also join the brief.

Noticeably absent from the signers are any members of the Texas Congressional delegation, or even any former elected officials from the state.  Republicans vying for the Presidency in 2016 like Rand Paul or Chris Christie are also nowhere to be found.

Yet still, this is a welcomed show of strength and bravery for those that were willing to sign on.  They clearly get the message that the Republican Party must move past marriage equality if they expect to be a competitive national force in the future.

But in the end, the fate of marriage equality still rests at the foot of the Supreme Court to decide.  Let’s hope they settle this issue in the United States once and for all this summer.

LGBTQ Nation has a copy of the Amicus Brief.

Supreme Court Upholds Right to ‘Digital Privacy’

In a landmark ruling this week, the United States Supreme Court has taken a bold step to protect ‘digital privacy’ rights in the United States.  Here’s the story from the New York Times

In a sweeping victory for privacy rights in the digital age, the Supreme Court on Wednesday unanimously ruled that the police need warrants to search the cellphones of people they arrest.

While the decision will offer protection to the 12 million people arrested every year, many for minor crimes, its impact will most likely be much broader. The ruling almost certainly also applies to searches of tablet and laptop computers, and its reasoning may apply to searches of homes and businesses and of information held by third parties like phone companies.

“This is a bold opinion,” said Orin S. Kerr, a law professor at George Washington University. “It is the first computer-search case, and it says we are in a new digital age. You can’t apply the old rules anymore.”

With so much of our lives taking place through these small, electronic devices, it’s not surprising that the Justices issued a unanimous ruling on this.  In the 21st century, we already place far more value on intellectual capital than almost any other pursuit.  But the only way to protect this new economic engine is by strengthening our ‘digital privacy’ rights.  The Supreme Court has succeeded this week in protecting all Americans. Let’s hope for more common-sense conclusions on other issues.

From ThinkProgress: A Run-Down for SCOTUS’ Marriage Equality Hearings

The folks over at ThinkProgress have done a spectacular job on summarizing the very complicated range of possibilities for what could happen this week. As the Supreme Court has historic hearings on both the Defense of Marriage Act and Prop 8, here’s what you’ll want to look for…

How The Court Could Rule

A Broad Decision: The best, and most obvious, decision would be for the justices to follow the Constitution and the clear command of precedent and extend marriage equality to all fifty states. It is fairly likely, however, that at least one member of the majority will be too cautious to require Alabama to follow the Constitution, even if they are prepared to order California to do so. If the justices punt on the Alabama question, the important question is whether they hold that anti-gay laws are subject to “heightened scrutiny,” a skeptical kind of constitutional analysis that will make it very difficult for anti-gay discrimination to withstand court review in the future.

A One-Off: The Ninth Circuit proposed a way to strike down Prop 8 while leaving most other states free to engage in marriage discrimination (the court said that voters were not permitted to withdraw the right to marry once it had been established by the state Supreme Court). The logic of the ruling was thus confined to California. Similarly, two of the Court’s most important gay rights opinions relied on very narrow reasoning that advanced equality only incrementally. It is possible the justices will repeat this performance.

Jurisdictional Dodges: In both cases, the Court could potentially rule that it lacks jurisdiction to hear the case, a decision that would cast a cloud of uncertainty over the rights of gay couples.

A Stealth Attack: Several prominent conservatives are pushing a dangerous legal theory that would strike down DOMA on states’ rights grounds, and potentially endanger Social Security, veterans benefits and progressive taxation in the process.

A Loss: Ultimately, however, it is important to remember that this is a severely conservative Court, and even so-called swing vote Justice Kennedy is a severely conservative justice. Equality could lose.”

They even go into detail to examine the histories of the Conservative judges. Remember how the court is currently tipped 5 to 4 in favor of Conservative views? Oh yeah, how could we forget?? Well anyway, be sure to check it out.

Unbroken news: Who’s NOT sharing today’s SCOTUS announcement

Yes that’s right… Fox News. How did you guess?

Apparently, breaking news that the Supreme court has decided to take up landmark cases on both California’s Prop 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act isn’t really “newsworthy” to the Right-wing network. Given the outcome, these decisions, to be handed out on June 27th of 2013, could re-make the Civil Rights landscape for the GLBT community. But on the front page of their website, they bury it about halfway down…

Well, I understand that the network has a wide online readership. Perhaps the history-making headline was good enough for the U.S. section? After all, it is news that applies only to the United States.

Uh, ok. The last shot here… a specific section on politics. There wasn’t any bigger news of the day…

Quite sad, but this is how the Right-Wing machine has been engineered. Insulate the readership so that they can live in their own bubble, and thusly, be uninformed.

And in case you missed the New York Times hyperlink from the top, here’s their Breaking News headline for December 7th, 2012…

The Verdict on Healthcare…

Finally the long wait is over. Per SCOTUSblog, the Supreme Court has ruled the Affordable Care Act CONSTITUTIONAL by a 5-4 vote. The Healthcare law remains mostly intact.

on the individual mandate:

“The Affordable Care Act is constitutional in part and unconstitutional in part The individual mandate cannot be upheld as an exercise of Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause,” Roberts wrote. “That Clause authorizes Congress to regulate interstate commerce, not to order individuals to engage it. In this case, however, it is reasonable to construe what Congress has done as increasing taxes on those who have a certain amount of income, but choose to go without health insurance. Such legislation is within Congress’s power to tax.”

However the court did not agree with the right of Congress to control Medicaid expansion. It allows states to “opt out” if they do not wish to participate in the expansion, while still retaining their current levels of funding without penalty. That’s the only major provision of the law that wasn’t upheld. Here is the link to the full opinion.

Here’s a few reactions via Twitter…