This week Adam Gopnik published a piece at The New Yorker on this country’s mass incarceration problem. Not only does it provide a number of sources and statistics to back up its claims, it also does so in a wonderful yet chilling way.
The piece is long but well worth the read. You can find it here.
Between my first year of law school and two young children, I have really cut down on the amount of media I read in a given day. I tend to follow a pattern of checking the headlines at the New York Times, and then looking to see if any members of the Supreme Court press corps (mostly Adam Liptak, Mike Sacks and Dahlia Lithwick) have new pieces. If I have some free time (and if it’s not college football season), I then will read a little about politics.
I find that most political pieces are just that: political. Most political writers are so ideologically-driven that the pieces they write are mostly fluff–much like a Mitt Romney answer. And rarely will a political writer question the wisdom of a sitting President that they actually voted for. And if they do, they never do it in an election year.
I never quite understood why orthodoxy is more important than the general well being of the country, especially when you are an influential member of the media. Democrat and Republican is not a principle, and sometimes its not worth holding onto when the country is in a free-fall on some pretty fundamental issues. But digress do I.
So I recently discovered two writers who don’t just follow the mold of party ideologue; they break it. The first is Salon’s Glenn Greenwald. He is an admitted progressive. And yet, he challenges President Obama on civil liberties, war, cronyism, corporate influence, and government transparency. Better yet, he does it in an election year.
The other writer I really admire is Conor Friedersdorf over at The Atlantic. He has a libertarian bent, but it’s a pragmatic libertarianism (for example, he doesn’t oppose a basic social safety net or a progressive income tax). If he had a choice for President it, probably, would be Ron Paul. But like Greenwald, he too is willing to criticize his candidate in the midst of an election year. Read More
Brief for the Petitioner in Vasquez v. U.S., Inc., No. 11-199, filed on January 23, 2012
Brief for Petitioner in Hill v. U.S., No. 11-5721, filed on January 25, 2012
Brief for Petitioner in Dorsey v. U.S., No. 11-5683, filed on January 25, 2012
When it comes to free speech rights, the Supreme Court typically applies the rule of “strict scrutiny,” which holds that a government restriction on free speech is presumed unconstitutional, until the government proves otherwise. The reason is that, given the importance of freedom of speech, courts should “not presume acquiescence in the loss of fundamental rights,” and should “indulge every reasonable presumption against the waiver of fundamental rights.” If government is going to interfere with your religious freedom or your freedom of speech, it has to prove that it has darn good reason.
K.C. Johnson has an insightful blog post on the collapse of serious American history scholarship, due in large part to the influence of politically correct fads in the academy. Johnson notes that the recent Montana Supreme Court decision regarding campaign finance restrictions relied heavily on scholarship about Montana history, yet the court cited nothing published after 1977:
In a big loss for the federal government, the Supreme Court held today that when the government attaches a GPS device to a vehicle to monitor the vehicle’s movement, the government conducts a Fourth Amendment search. Justice Scalia wrote the opinion for the Court in United States v. Jones, No. 10-1259, backed by the Chief Justice, and Justices Kennedy, Thomas, and Sotomayor. You can read the opinion here.
Justice Scalia said:
It is important to be clear about what occurred in this case: The Government physically occupied private property for the purpose of obtaining information. We have no doubt that such a physical intrusion would have been considered a “search” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment when it was adopted.
Concurring in the judgment was an unusual line-up of Justices Alito, Ginsburg, Breyer and Kagan. Justice Alito argued that:
This case requires us to apply the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures to a21st-century surveillance technique, the use of a Global Positioning System (GPS) device to monitor a vehicle’s movements for an extended period of time. Ironically, the Court has chosen to decide this case based on 18th-century tort law. By attaching a small GPS device to the underside of the vehicle that respondent drove, the law enforcement officers in this case engaged in conduct that might have provided grounds in 1791 for a suit for trespass to chattels. And for this reason, the Court concludes, the installation and use of the GPS device constituted a search. Ante, at 3–4.
This holding, in my judgment, is unwise. It strains the language of the Fourth Amendment; it has little if any support in current Fourth Amendment case law; and it is highly artificial.
I would analyze the question presented in this case by asking whether respondent’s reasonable expectations of privacy were violated by the long-term monitoring of the movements of the vehicle he drove.
Three sets of amici have recently filed briefs in DHHS v. Florida, No. 11-398:
Brief Amici Curiae of Prescription Policy Choices, Professors of Law, and Professors of Health Policy in Support of Petitioners on the Minimum Coverage Provision
Brief of Health Care For All, Inc., Health Law Advocates, Inc. The Massachusetts Hospital Association, Inc., The Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers, Inc., Greater Boston Interfaith Organization, Inc., and Community Catalyst, Inc., as Amici Curiae in Support of Petitioners Urging Reversal on the Minimum Coverage Provision Issue.
Brief of Amici Curiae Jewish Alliance for Law & Social Action (JALSA), Jewish Council on Urban Affairs (JCUA), Jewish Social Policy Action Network (JSPAN), New England Jewish Labor committee (JLC), and Professor Abigail R. Moncrieff in Support of Petitioners on the Individual Liberty Implications of the Minimum Coverage Provision
You can read these briefs at the Cockle Printing website.
Brief for Respondent in U.S. v. Alvarez, Inc., No. 11-210, filed on January 13, 2012
Brief for Petitioners in Reichle v. Howards, No. 11-262, filed on January 19, 2012
The Independence Institute has filed its Brief As Amicus Curiae In Support of Petitioners – Medicaid Mandate in Florida v. DHHS, No. 11-400, and you can read it at the Cockle Printing website.
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