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Well we are absolutely fucked, there foes the fourth and second amendments right out the window.
@lucifargundam How could you make it impossible without fighting authority?
@freemo
You can't take what can't be held. You can't find what isn't there. Necessity breeds innovation and when there's a will- there's a way.
@freemo
It looks to me like SCOTUS is going to uphold the 2nd and 4th here and shoot down the lower court's ruling. They're taking the case and AFAIK there is no disagreement between appeals courts so there has to be some reason why they want to weigh in on the matter...
@cjd lets hope youa re right...
@freemo I'm not a lawyer, but from what I've read this is kind of suspect:
| "(Mrs. Caniglia’s consent to have the police search their home was legally negated because the police untruthfully told her that her husband had consented to the seizure of any guns.) " |
Police can lie to you in the course of enforcing the law. I'd want to see a source on this because Forbes is not a lawyer either.
@blucrunch The olice can not lie to you to force you to hand over your legally owned handguns though, so I wouldnt say that applies here, not that I'm a lawyer either.
@freemo That's not what happened though. They lied to Mrs. Caniglia to gain consent to enter the house. I mean, I'm assuming they're married and living in a place does give you the right to invite people into the place you live. That they lied to her about someone else maybe giving consent is sort of irrelevant.
@blucrunch well no, they lied in order to get into the house, then search it, then take the guns, all of which where no crime has happened or was suspected.. cant imagine that would hold up in court.
@freemo I don't know, it's a grey area and that's probably why it's going to the Supreme Court.
My guess here, considering how conservative the court is right now, is that they will decide that this is within the purview of existing Community Caretaking" guidelines, but I certainly can't pretend to know the details here.
I think if I were to be pressed I would be against the police being able to do this without prior official notice, signed off by a judge or something.
@freemo @blucrunch This might be one of those rare situations where the pedantic distinction between can and may is actually important.
@freemo It's going to court, it hasn't been decided yet.
If it were though this would probably be a terrible thing for groups of people that are often abused by police.
@swiley The fact that its already gotten through as many appeals court as it has (and as of right now is the "law" and upheld by the courts in a large portion of america unless and until SCOTUS overturns it) is scary enough
SCOTUS is just the last desperate attempt to fix this injustice, remember there are many levels of appeals each one have a larger and larger jurisdiction up to that point. So its already law in a huge swatch of the USA as a result.
@freemo I'm definitely not a lawyer but that all this does is create precedent (which is a big deal, but is really more about how the law has been "traditionally" interpreted.) Only the legislature and the white house can change the law.
@swiley strictly speaking, yes, in practice, no.. interpritation goes a long way. the "Community doctrine" isnt a law that was passed that is being tested, it is existing precedence on the interpretation of the 4th amendment. The very idea is entierly fabricated within the court system and for all intents and purposes has all the effect and efficacy of a law.
The distinction between law and precedence only becomes relevant when you consider the cycle that can exist if the law making body (congress in this case) disagrees with the courts. The courts can add all sorts of "interpritations" like this that have all the same effects any law would so long as the law doesnt directly or explicitly contradict it (well even then they could but arent supposed to). What congress could do, however, is rewrite the 4th ammendment or create new laws that directly clarify the courts interpritation and effectively eliminates the "community doctrine" principle.
So effectively what that means is when laws and the constitution isnt extremely explicit there is usually enough room for the courts to create interpretations that have all the effect of an unjust law. Since amendments to the constitution are a lot harder to achieve than courts making a ruling on the constitution this effectively gives the court system a lot of room to "mold" laws into meaning almost whatever they want them to.
@freemo this seems positive - like the SC is taking the case to reverse the lower Court's unconstitutional ruling.
@justin Can't imagine why you would assume that, how do you know they arent taking the case to uphold the lower courts rulling?
@freemo why would they take it at all in that case? Just let it stand.
@justin Huh, they do it all the time (take a case and rule the case valid). It is just as common for them to rule in either direction.
@freemo ...but if they didn't hear it, it would be an indication that they are okay with the lower court's decision and don't feel the need to take action. That seems like it would be much worse.
@justin Again, no, they take cases all the time (just as often as the contrary) when they agree with the case...
Why do you think the supreme court takes so many other cases that they wind up rulling in favor of the lower court's decision? If your reasoning made any sense such cases would be rare and they arent.
1. They choose not to hear a case. The issue is decided and the lower court's ruling is now precedent.
2. They choose to hear a case and they may rule to either uphold or reverse the lower court's decision.
I'll take 2 every time if I disagree with the lower court (which I do in this case).
@justin ok so your saying now that they may rule either way?
By the way just to be clear #1 means the lower courts rulling is **only** precedent in 1/5th of the USA and it doesnt become precedences throughout the entire court system unless and until the supreme court hears it (which by the way is why they often take cases where they are likely to uphold the lower courts ruling ).
@freemo of course. But the fact that they're taking it indicates there is a chance they will disagree. If they didn't take it, there would be no chance at all.
@justin Oh yes, of course.. and I do hope that is how it plays out.
But as I said before the fact that it got through a top circuit court already and was upheld is pretty fucking scary in its own right.
@freemo @justin Not to be a doomer, but I can't see this panning out well, even with the conservative majority court. While I hope freemo and I are wrong, there has been a significant, concerted effort from both the left and the right to erode the rights of private individuals and bolster the privileges of the ruling class and the various limbs of the government. A couple examples include civil asset forfeiture (and the *lovely* conflicts of interest therein) and the qualified immunity doctrine (implemented by the supreme court, not the legislature).
While I understand the constitution and the bill of rights themselves clearly prevent this kind of behavior, quite frankly most people in the government don't care. They buried both of these founding documents in a quagmire of indecipherable legal jargon that has only served to continuously restrict the liberties out of "the people", and they will continue to do so until there isn't a shred of actual freedom left.
Even if it isn't now, or in a decade, the slippery slope has slopped, and without a consistent, concerted effort to push this system back to the point of unstable equilibrium it was founded upon, we don't have a chance. As with all unstable equilibria, you have to put in energy to keep things where they are, or random fluctuations will eventually knock you down to the ground-state (read: authoritarian-state).
As much as I wish I could disagree with what you said, I really cant.. they have obscured away the constitution and its amendments. Frankly the moment they said you cant own military grade weapons (missiles, bazookas the works) it was already. aviolation of the second amendment. Now I'm not saying we should be able to own those things, what I am saying is if they wanted to take away our right to do so granted by the constitution then they should have written an amendment and gotten the 2/3 majority they needed to do it. They couldn't, and they didnt, but they made it law anyway and it that opened the floodgates a long time ago (and not just on the second amendment at this point.)
@freemo
Good luck taking anything away from me. Not that I would fight authority- I would just make it impossible to do so.