JHR, RE: <<She got belligerent and the arrest followed.>> I don't have any knowledge of the particulars but from your post it seems that you feel she was arrested for failing to show the proper deference to the cops in the face of her $50 violation. If that's true it's a dangerous policy to support.
The biggest danger to any society usually derives from the abuse of significant power. Many times this abuse is not at the hands of those outside of government, it is from those empowered by government. I have always felt capable of handling threats from the unlawful, it is the threat from those invested with governmental authority, like cops, that I fear.
Most cops I have known are good people but the truism that "power corrupts" is apparent in many law enforcement officers who abuse those who fail to show "proper deference" or who are economically and politically weak. I sure don't want them to have the power to arrest me, take me to their jail, create incidents that escalate into bigger charges and "teach me a lesson."
I've seen, and experienced first hand, what happens when the checks and balances of the courts and the legislature are ineffectual, and it is not pretty. People who you would least like to have power gravitate to those positions and abuse their power to the extreme.
In this country we usually take it for granted that we will not be subjected to these abuses since our rights have historically been protected. In fact, one of the most powerful thrusts of our founding fathers was to protect against the power of GOVERMENT, in our religions, our speech, our right to resist unlawful searches and seizures etc.
I think these are rights that are being slowly eroded for all the best of reasons but, for reasons that are not good enough to justify the place we may be traveling to. This decision is another inroad in the process that is now attacking the role of lawyers and the courts in protecting individual rights, in attacking the rights of citizens to be free of intrusive searches and seizures as the balance shifts dramatically to empowering law enforcement on an ends justifies the means rationale, and is fueled by the feeling that it is "them" that need controlling and "us" that benefit from these trends. Ultimately it is "us" that will lose important freedoms as a result of the direction we are taking.
I, for one, don't want some smart assed cop to stop me for some minor violation, puff up his chest, try to make me show deference and have the power to arrest me if I tell him to "just give me the ticket and save the attitude."
I imagine that most of us have had that "bad cop" experience. I also imagine that most of us had it when we were young as opposed to now when we drive nice cars, seem more established and may know their boss.
Based on the little I know, I think this is a bad decision. This is one reason that I wanted a better balance on the U.S. Supreme Court. Were these the same 5-4 that split on the Florida voting issue? Ed |
