|
Separation of Powers - After Supreme Court defeat, the Trump administration said it will try again to end the DACA program within 6 months
https://www.oann.com/white-house-plans-to-end-daca-within-next-six-months/ Gentle Reminder: Incitement to riot is not protected by the First Amendment https://reason.com/2020/06/23/prosecution-for-incitement-to-riot/ 1A: Woke Georgetown students declare ‘oppressive language is violence’, blah-blah https://www.mrctv.org/blog/catholic-georgetown-declares-oppressive-language-violence-includes-theistic-language 1A: prisoner’s claim against prison officials for hijacking correspondence with his lawyer survives motion to dismiss https://www.ca4.uscourts.gov/opinions/187340.P.pdf 1A: California law prohibiting the publication of Hollywood stars’ ages and birthdates is unconstitutional (9th Circuit) https://reason.com/2020/06/20/ninth-circuit-strikes-down-statute-limiting-imdbs-display-of-actor-ages/ 1A / RLUIPA - California court OK’s restrictions on church to help city create “a street of fun” even though nursing homes and post offices operate downtown unimpeded https://www.lifenews.com/2020/06/17/court-says-california-city-can-keep-churches-closed-over-coronavirus-but-massive-protests-are-ok/ 2A: Johns Hopkins report on Baltimore finds that arresting people on gun charges does nothing to lower crime https://bearingarms.com/came/2020/06/13/johns-hopkins-report-on-baltimore-homicides-is-bad-news-for-gun-control-fans/ 4A: Continuous non-stop surveillance of house by camera is constitutional (1st Circuit) http://media.ca1.uscourts.gov/pdf.opinions/19-1582P-01A.pdf 4A: Yikes! 7th Circuit affirms lower court ruling that hanging a tree-shaped air freshener from your rearview mirror justifies a traffic stop and any evidence seized is fair game. http://media.ca7.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/rssExec.pl?Submit=Display&Path=Y2020/D06-17/C:19-2928:J:St__Eve:aut:T:fnOp:N:2532217:S:0 State Constitutions: New Mexico Supreme Court denies privacy claim, upholds warrantless grand jury subpoenas for personal banking records https://ladailypost.com/new-mexico-supreme-court-rules-on-state-constitutional-privacy-protections-for-banking-records/ 5A: phone decryption issue likely headed to Supreme Court after Indiana Supreme Court rules defendants can’t be compelled to incriminate themselves by order to unlock their phones https://reason.com/2020/06/24/indiana-supreme-court-creates-a-clear-split-on-compelled-decryption-and-the-fifth-amendment/ 14A: Clarence Thomas dissent rejects incorporation doctrine and concludes free speech is protected from state restrictions by the Privileges or Immunities clause https://reason.com/2020/06/22/justice-thomas-concludes-that-the-freedom-of-speech-is-a-privilege-or-immunity-under-the-14th-amendment/ Shame! Ignorant ingrates tear down George Washington statue in Portland, wrap it in burning U.S. flag https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/06/19/portland-george-washington-statue-torn-down-draped-in-burning-u-s-flag/ Discrimination: Supreme Court decision protecting LGBT rights in the workplace sets up the next battle which will be over exemptions in civil rights laws for religious employers
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-lgbt-religion-analysis/next-lgbtq-rights-legal-battle-looms-after-supreme-court-victory-idUSKBN23M36O
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/11/875466130/no-knock-warrants-banned-in-louisville-in-law-named-for-breonna-taylor
https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/15/politics/supreme-court-qualified-immunity/index.html 1A Religion: D.C. Mayor gets sued for Black Lives Matter street painting; suit alleges she is promoting an orthodoxy in violation of 1A Establishment Clause https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/jun/11/mayor-bowser-washington-dc-mayor-sued-over-black-l/ 1A: Charleston cannot require tour guides to get a license or jump through educational hoops; city can’t prove any of that protects the public (4th Circuit) https://www.ca4.uscourts.gov/opinions/191044.P.pdf Leftist writer bemoans the fact that Hugh Hewitt stands up for the “undemocratic” Electoral College and two-senators-per-state provision of the Constitution. There’s only one problem: we don’t live in a democracy with its tyranny of the majority, and that’s by design. #ARepublicIfYouCanKeepIt https://www.minnpost.com/eric-black-ink/2020/06/hugh-hewitt-stands-up-for-two-of-the-most-undemocratic-provisions-in-the-constitution/ In 2014, a SWAT team executing a no-knock warrant in Georgia, threw a flash-bang grenade that landed in a child’s playpen causing blast injuries to the child’s face and chest. The child’s nose was separated from the underlying bone. The child was placed in a medically-induced coma and underwent several complex surgeries. The county ended up paying $3.6 million to settle the case. The raid yielded no drugs, no drug dealer, and no weapons.
Fast forward to today and the name Breonna Taylor is being chanted by protesters across the country seeking police reforms in the wake of George Floyd’s unjustifiable death in police custody. Breonna was killed during the execution of a no-knock warrant in Kentucky after police smashed down the front door and her boyfriend opened fire, not knowing who the intruders were. Again, no drugs were found and a lawsuit was filed. The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which applies to the states under the Supreme Court’s incorporation doctrine, is silent on the question of whether law enforcement officers must announce their identity and purpose when executing search warrants based on probable cause. In 1958 [Miller v. U.S.], the Supreme Court ruled the police must give notice before making a forced entry, but created an exception in 1995 to prevent the destruction of evidence [Wilson v. Arkansas]. Federal law enforcement must generally knock-and-announce under the terms of a federal statute, although there are some exceptions in that law [18 U.S.C § 3109]. The use of no-knock warrants has substantially increased, from 1,500 a year in the 1980s to 45,000 in 2010 by one estimate. Thirty-one civilians and eight officers died during the execution of no-knock warrants from 2010 to 2016. There have been at least seven settlements of a million dollars or more. It’s been estimated that 42 percent of SWAT warrants are executed on blacks and another 12 percent on Hispanics. They may have higher crime rates, but you can see how this is causing resentment and racial animus. Oregon state law bans no-knock warrants and the Florida Supreme Court invalidated them in that state. Thirteen states specifically allow no-knock warrants and 20 more routinely grant them. The Louisville, Kentucky city council just passed ‘Breonna’s Law’ banning no-knock warrants. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky introduced a bill to prohibit federal law enforcement and local police that receive federal funding from using them. House Democrats propose to ban no-knock warrants in drug cases. Law and order is one thing. Being stupid about it is another. The question is whether, in light of all the ruinous consequences, the use of no-knock warrants is an indispensable tool in fighting crime. One former police chief-turned-consultant is of the opinion that, if a quantity of drugs is so small it can be flushed down the toilet if police announce themselves, then it’s not worth getting a warrant in the first place. However, fentanyl might change the analysis. Minute quantities are now routinely cut into other drugs which can be sold for millions of dollars. I’m not an illicit drug expert - I don’t even play one on TV - but a thoroughly reasoned position on no-knock warrants might be harder to develop than critics and protesters want to believe. Shame! “Burn down this f*ing Constitution,” former SNL star says (Constitution news round-up)6/10/2020
Shame! “Burn down this f*ing Constitution,” former SNL star says. Would that be the same Constitution that protects her rights to express her opinion and earn a cushy living through acting?
https://www.breitbart.com/entertainment/2020/06/01/leslie-jones-burn-down-this-fking-constitution/ 1A: city painting ‘Black Lives Matter’ on city street does not require equal time for competing messages, law prof says https://reason.com/2020/06/09/does-citys-painting-of-messages-on-city-streets-require-it-to-give-equal-access-to-other-messages/ Protests put qualified immunity from liability for violating constitutional rights under the microscope - totally made up by judges without any historical basis (Clarence Thomas)? Or needed to protect police from mistakes involving split-second judgments? Eight cases pending at Supreme Court. https://www.theepochtimes.com/george-floyds-death-renews-calls-to-revisit-qualified-immunity-for-police-misconduct_3374335.html + https://www.npr.org/2020/06/08/870165744/supreme-court-weighs-qualified-immunity-for-police-accused-of-misconduct Right to International Travel: Georgia claimant argues it’s unconstitutional to deny passports to people with unpaid taxes https://www.law360.com/articles/1279971/ga-atty-says-passport-denial-over-tax-debt-unconstitutional 2A: Defensive Gun Use Database shows how law-abiding gun owners protect individual rights and public safety https://www.dailysignal.com/2020/05/22/a-counterbalance-to-the-false-narratives-about-gun-ownership/ 4A: unconstitutional for police to conduct a criminal investigation under the guise of getting housing inspector to issue administrative warrant for property code violations (9th Circuit) https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2020/05/27/18-50328.pdf 8A: man who won civil asset forfeiture case at U.S. Supreme Court gets his Land Rover back after 7 years, but state STILL won’t give up; appealing to Indiana Supreme Court for the third time https://reason.com/2020/05/27/indiana-returns-land-rover-seized-7-years-ago-in-landmark-asset-forfeiture-case/ 10A: the Left turns on a dime, LOVES federalism and state sovereignty now that they are being used to keep Trump from undoing state pandemic orders https://www.nysun.com/national/eureka-the-left-discovers-the-tenth-amendment/91144/ Separation of Powers: Department of Labor indefensibly created federal contract office out of thin air; office adjudicates and assesses penalties without congressional delegation of authority https://thefederalist.com/2020/05/28/doj-shouldnt-defend-the-labor-departments-gross-violation-of-the-separation-of-powers/ President Trump threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act to put down the riots occurring after the death of George Floyd in police custody. The President said, "If a city or a state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them." He hasn’t done it yet and the question is: would it be constitutional?
The U.S. Constitution is mostly silent on the question of presidential emergency powers and martial law. Article I, Section 9 allows habeas corpus to be suspended “in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion” when the public safety requires it. We’re not being invaded and the current circumstances fall short of a full-fledged rebellion. Abraham Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus, but there was an actual civil war going on at the time. That’s it for the text of the Constitution. Now let’s look at federal statutes. The Posse Comitatus Act was passed in 1878 to prevent the use of the U.S. military to enforce domestic policy inside the United States. However, the Act is subject to the provisions of the Insurrection Act of 1807 and its later revisions. The Insurrection Act, as amended, authorizes the President to use military and National Guard troops within the United States:
The Insurrection Act has been invoked at least 20 times - first in conflicts with Native Americans, then labor conflicts, slave rebellions, to suppress the Ku Klux Klan, to desegregate public schools in Little Rock in 1957, to put down riots in D.C., Chicago, and elsewhere in the late ‘60s, as well as the Los Angeles riots of 1992. George W. Bush wanted to use the Act to intervene after Hurricane Katrina when the governor of Louisiana refused to ask for help, but did not. The Act was changed in 2007 to allow the use of the military without state consent in emergencies, but that was quickly repealed after all 50 governors objected. Alan Dershowitz wrote about using the Act in the circumstances we are in today:
I’m not so sure the same pattern would hold today. Consider the following scenario: Trump issues a proclamation he will use the Insurrection Act and send troops if rioters don’t disperse. Former President Obama immediately gets on a plane to visit his friend, the federal judge in Hawaii, who issues a nationwide injunction against the use of the Insurrection Act in a case he cooks up with the ACLU. The generals at the Pentagon immediately voice their approval of the Hawaii judge’s action. Where would we be then? Uncharted waters in uncharted territory in an uncharted universe. Maybe it’s better to let the governors take the lead in this, after all. I must confess, though, that I do like the idea of not allowing federal money to be spent to repair the damage the riots cause in states where the governors decline to ask for the National Guard to be sent in. If they want to stand down, defund the police, abolish their police departments, and try to make friends with bears, the consequences should be on their dime, not mine. Supreme Court Puts Stamp of Approval on Pandemic Emergency Orders (Constitution news round-up)6/3/2020
1A Religion: Supreme Court upholds California emergency orders restricting religious worship (Roberts joins the liberals)
https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/u-s-supreme-court-upholds-california-s-98263/ 8A: Supreme Court approves federal judge’s order to transfer medically vulnerable Ohio inmates to safer conditions during pandemic https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2020/05/26/COVID-19-Supreme-Court-rules-in-favor-of-vulnerable-Ohio-inmates/9021590517455/?ds=3 5A Fundamental Rights: Sixth Circuit to Rehear "Right to Literacy" Case En Banc https://reason.com/2020/05/21/sixth-circuit-votes-to-rehear-right-to-literacy-case-en-banc/ 5A: Third Circuit upholds due process in campus sexual assault cases https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/06/title-ix-regulations-sexual-assault-cases-court-upholds-due-process/ 14A Equal Protection: “Federal Judge Rules Florida Cannot Bar Ex-felons Who Cannot Pay Fines, Fees From Voting” https://www.theepochtimes.com/federal-judge-rules-florida-cannot-bar-ex-felons-who-cannot-pay-fines-fees-from-voting_3363732.html Amendments: Louisiana Senate rejects Convention of States resolution https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/politics/legislature/article_d3e5d822-a3a7-11ea-bd32-27e506f5b84b.html Appointments Clause: Supreme Court upholds federal financial oversight board for Puerto Rico https://whbl.com/news/articles/2020/jun/01/us-supreme-court-upholds-puerto-rico-financial-oversight-board-appointments/1024308/?refer-section=national 14A Fundamental Right: new Oklahoma law allows wrongful death suits against abortionists who fail to disclose risks or check for coercion - ‘undue burden’ on fundamental right to abortion? https://www.lifenews.com/2020/05/27/new-law-allows-lawsuits-against-abortionists-for-the-wrongful-death-of-unborn-babies/ 4A: Louisville suspends ‘no-knock’ warrants; woman killed after unannounced entry https://apnews.com/a67df4764f2acc50dcef7bc32506b719 1A: Supreme Court turns away case trying to apply Janus logic to bar dues; lawyers compelled to support bar association positions they disagree with https://freebeacon.com/courts/supreme-court-turns-down-free-speech-challenge-to-mandatory-bar-dues-membership/?utm_source=actengage&utm_campaign=FreedomMail&utm_medium=email The future of the FISA court is in doubt. Nancy Pelosi and other supporters of the court had hoped for a quick reauthorization of three parts of the FISA surveillance program, but a tweet from President Trump caused Republican support to erode. Also, Democrats defected over privacy concerns. Nancy Pelosi pulled the bill and the House voted to send the matter to a conference committee with the Senate.
Before this vote, President Trump had tweeted:
This broadens the scope of the inquiry beyond the three sections originally at issue, and may put the entire FISA process up for grabs in conference committee. How much sympathy you have for the FISA court depends on what scenario is running through your head. Is terrorist activity afoot and lives will be lost unless the court acts quickly? Or is the court all too willing to grant warrant applications from the FBI based on unverified information produced by political operatives intent on sabotaging an opposition presidential candidate and incoming administration? Both scenarios are true. There are two major constitutional issues with the FISA process. The first is the Fourth Amendment and civil liberties concerns arising from the surveillance process. The government seeks and the FISA court routinely grants generalized search warrants without reference to the facts of any specific case. General warrants are usually a big constitutional no-no. Critics say the court has gone off the rails by puffing up the ‘special needs’ exception to the Fourth Amendment. The Supreme Court created the exception, but has thus far confined it to narrow circumstances where a minimal intrusion on privacy is justified by the government's need to combat an overriding public danger. Drunk driving checkpoints provide one example. But now we have a secret court authorizing the collection and sifting of mountains of data whenever the government claims there are threats from espionage, cyberattack, or nuclear proliferation. These critics say the FISA court has created a secret body of law incompatible with Supreme Court jurisprudence in the process. The second major constitutional issue revolves around Article III. Article III places the judicial power in the Supreme Court and such lesser courts as Congress may establish. However, some critics say the FISA court isn’t a court at all. No other court meets in secret, or holds proceedings without there being a case or controversy at bar. The FISA court approves warrants, but there is only one party - the government. There is no case being tried. Also, there is no right to counsel. The people who are to be surveilled don’t even know the court is meeting. An advocate sometimes speaks on their behalf, but the advocate isn’t even allowed to see the information the government is presenting to the court in support of its warrant application. Unsurprisingly, given the way things are set up, it’s exceedingly rare for the court to deny a warrant application from the government, leading critics to say the court is nothing more than a rubber stamp. Thus, the FISA court is a Frankenstein creation, neither beast nor fowl. In this, it has something in common with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a Franken-agency - the first independent agency ever headed by a single person whom the President could not fire except for cause. [Constitution Minute, 12/3/17] When I spoke to you about the CFPB in 2017, I mentioned the country runs into problems whenever we stray from the Founders’ designs. Another example is the War Power, which I spoke to you about the same year [Constitution Minute, 11/13/17], where we strayed from the Founders’ design that only Congress would have the power to declare war. The War Powers Resolution of the 1970s authorized Presidents to start military conflicts on their own and the result has been controversy about the constitutionality of presidential military actions ever since. Some say the FISA court as we know it is dead and only two choices lay ahead - either meaningful reform of the current system, or throwing it all out and starting over from scratch. Let us hope, whatever happens, the end result is more faithful to the Fourth Amendment and the separation of powers than the system we currently have. |
The Web Team
Our web team is dedicated to bringing you Constitutional news you can use. Archives
June 2023
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed
Photo used under Creative Commons from Fibonacci Blue