When is it reasonable?
"The key word in the Fourth Amendment is unreasonable. That means under certain conditions a search or seizure without a warrant may be allowed."
Here's the Amendment in its entirety (the last half of which was conveniently left out in the above argument):
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
It would appear to me that the only time a search or seizure is reasonable is when there is a warrant. Or is it only saying you need a warrant for those unreasonable searches? That doesn't make any sense.
On a side note, pieces like this make me ashamed to have once rallied around such drivel and anything else that demonized freedom as long as it could be labeled "liberal".
File under: Fourth Amendment
3 Comments:
I, personally, support the NSA's intelligence gathering efforts...I don't believe that spying on the enemy during a time of war constitutes an "unreasonable" search or seizure...but with that said, I am a bit confused about one of the arguments coming from the right. I've seen this in several places.
The argument goes something like this: "The information used in the wiretapping is not going to be used in criminal proceedings so it's OK".
Where does the Fourth Amendment mention criminal proceedings? It says flat out that we shall be secure in our persons, papers etc and that that right "shall not be violated". It doesn't say that it's OK to perform unreasonable searches as long as anything found isn't used against us in court, it says "shall not be violated". Period.
This brings to mind the case of the individual stopped for a traffic violation who had $125k in cash in a cooler. He was never charged with a crime but the money was seized because they THINK it MIGHT be money intended for use in the drug trade.
What was the definition of "unreasonable" again?
"As you may have heard, the U.S. is putting together a constitution for Iraq. Why don't we just give them ours? Think about it -- it was written by very smart people, it's served us well for over two hundred years, and besides, we're not using it anymore."
--Jay Leno
I don't believe that spying on the enemy during a time of war constitutes an "unreasonable" search or seizure...
I don't think so either. Nobody is. That's the strawman. They only listen to terrorists? Give me a break.
I am not a lawyer, but I think the warrant clause relates to general warrants, which were popular with the agents of the Crown at the time. Bills of attainder seem to fall in there somewhere too.
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