High court ducks roadblock issue

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Sat, 20 Oct 2001 04:21:40 GMT

FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED OCT. 19, 2001
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
High court ducks roadblock issue

The U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 15 refused to hear an appeal in the case of two Dayton, Ohio men cited for driving without licenses in 1998.

Magus D. Orr and Andre L. Smith were ticketed in June 1998 at random local police roadblocks. The men argued the stops were unconstitutional because police had no particular reason to suspect specific criminal behavior.

Nonetheless, the Ohio Supreme Court unanimously upheld the roadblocks in May, and the high court's refusal to intervene means the convictions now stand.

"The idea that government agents may seize people at checkpoints without having any suspicion of wrongdoing it very un-American," lawyers for the two men wrote in asking the Supreme Court to hear the appeal.

Dayton police stopped cars according to a prearranged pattern -- whether it be every 10th car or every fourth -- after posting a sign 100 yards away warning drivers they might be stopped. (In some cases, motorcycle police are then stationed precisely to stop drivers who make U-turns or otherwise seek to avoid the roadblocks -- their very avoidance being considered "suspicious behavior.")

In Dayton, police asked for a license, and if the driver had none the officer ran a computer check. Approximately one in eight Dayton drivers were thus found to have no valid license.

Following the Supreme Court's decision not to review the case, "We intend to do more checkpoints," announced Dayton city prosecutor Deirdre Logan.

Back when the Fourth Amendment was taken to mean what it says, it was widely believed police needed a court warrant, or demonstrable "probable cause" to believe a specific crime had been committed, before stopping and detaining anyone. But in past rulings, the nation's highest court has watered down that protection, allowing police to set up sobriety checkpoints aimed at randomly detecting drunk drivers, as well as roadblocks as much as a hundred miles from the border, intended to intercept illegal immigrants.

In both those instances the court rationalized that the benefits to public safety and order outweighed inconvenience and loss of privacy -- and with them the erosion of our vital constitutional rights.

Last year, the court did at least invalidate random checkpoints set up for no purpose but to catch drug criminals, in its 6-3 ruling in Indianapolis vs. Edmond. But that left the issue more clouded than ever, since what matters now is apparently not what police do, but merely what reason they cite for doing it.

It's regrettable the court did not seize this opportunity to restore our Fourth Amendment to its previous grandeur as a bulwark of freedom. No one argues police should be barred from pulling over a driver who's obviously intoxicated, who's fleeing a crime scene, or from whose vehicle a kidnap victim cries out for help. But the notion that police can stop anyone, at any time, and demand to see our "papers please," moves us drastically closer to a totalitarian police state.

With our busy beaver legislators churning out endless new reams of legislation, it's been truthfully said that few Americans can even get to work in the morning without violating one or more obscure and new-minted edicts or prohibitions.

In a free country, spotting a policeman alongside the road should produce a feeling of reassurance that "the man" is there to protect us from wrongdoers, not guilty worries about whether we've just been spotted using a cell phone, or failing to cinch up our seatbelts, or that we're about to be nailed for any number of ways in which our "papers" might be out of order.

(Does the computer show we've paid our property taxes? Our child support? Ducked jury duty? Whether the officer should humiliate us by forcing us to unload our legally owned firearms ... seizing them if we're caught carrying one with a serial number not properly listed on our "permit"? What do you suppose they'll be able to program into that computer next year? Tax liens? Delinquent student loans? Results of our last doctor's exam?)

There are many reasons why the high court may decide to to turn down a specific case -- here's hoping they're merely waiting for a better test to use in throwing out these random roadblocks and checkpoints, entirely.

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. To receive his longer, better stuff, subscribe to his monthly newsletter by sending $72 to Privacy Alert, 561 Keystone Ave., Suite 684, Reno, NV 89503 -- or dialing 775-348-8591. His book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998," is available at 1-800-244-2224, or via web site www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html.

Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com

"When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong. The minority are right." -- Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926)

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken

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Government doesn't work. Never did. Never will. Can't. But there are lots of good people. Love them.

-- Bill St. Clair

The Atlanta Declaration

Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- any time, any place, without asking anyone's permission.

-- L. Neil Smith

Reread that pesky first clause of the Second Amendment. It doesn't say what any of us thought it said. What it says is that infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms is treason. What else do you call an act that endangers "the security of a free state"? And if it's treason, then it's punishable by death. I suggest due process, speedy trials, and public hangings.

-- L. Neil Smith

A Penalty Clause for the Bill of Rights

Any official, appointed or elected, at any level of government, who attempts, through legislative act or other means, to nullify, evade, or avoid the provisions of the first ten amendments to this Constitution, or of the Thirteenth Amendment, shall be summarily removed from office, and, upon conviction, deprived of all pay and benefits including pension, and sentenced to imprisonment for life.

-- L. Neil Smith

Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.

-- John Lott, commenting on the National Academy of Sciences report on gun control laws.

Who is a libertarian?

Zero Aggression Principle ("Zap")

"A libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."

-- L. Neil Smith

(Formerly called the "Non-Aggression Principle", or "NAP")

Why Did It Have to be... Guns?

Make no mistake: all politicians -- even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership -- hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician -- or political philosophy -- can be put.

If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash -- for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.

If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.

What his attitude -- toward your ownership and use of weapons -- conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?

-- L. Neil Smith

Concise

"Tell me," I was once asked, "What do you think about gun control? Give me the short answer." To which I replied, "If you try to take our firearms we will kill you."

-- Mike Vanderboegh

Also from The Atlanta Declaration:

... like going to the bathroom, breathing, eating, sleeping, or making love, it turns out that self-defense is a bodily function one cannot safely or effectively delegate to a second party.

-- L. Neil Smith

This does not mean that "Marijuana should be available by prescription." It means that morphine sulfate should be available in five pound bags at the supermarket for a couple of bucks, like sugar... but probably in a different aisle, to avoid confusion.

-- Vin Suprynowicz

If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.

-- Edward Abbey

The state can only survive as long as a majority is programmed to believe that theft isn't wrong if it's called taxation or asset forfeiture or eminent domain, that assault and kidnapping isn't wrong if it's called arrest, that mass murder isn't wrong if it's called war.

-- Bill St. Clair