Mediaboss Marketing

CHARLOTTESVILLE(Rutherford) Despite all appearances to the contrary, martial law has not been declared in America. We still have rights.

Technically, at least.

The government may act as if its police state powers suppress individual liberties during this COVID-19 pandemic, but for all intents and purposes, the Constitutionespecially the battered, besieged Bill of Rightsstill stands in theory, if not in practice.

Indeed, while federal and state governments have adopted specific restrictive measures in an effort to lockdown the nation and decelerate the spread of the COVID-19 virus, the current public health situation has not resulted in the suspension of fundamental constitutional rights such as freedom of speech and the right of assembly.

Mind you, thats not to say that the government has not tried its best to weaponize this crisis as it has weaponized so many other crises in order to expand its powers and silence its critics.

All over the country, government officials are using COVID-19 restrictions to muzzle protesters.

It doesnt matter what the protest is about (church assemblies, the right to work, the timing for re-opening the country, discontent over police brutality, etc.): this is activity the First Amendment protects vociferously with only one qualificationthat it be peaceful.

Yet even peaceful protesters mindful of the need to adhere to social distancing guidelines because of this COVID-19 are being muzzled, arrested and fined.

For example, a Maryland family was reportedly threatened with up to a year in jail and a $5000 fine if they dared to publicly protest the injustice of their sons execution by a SWAT team.

If anyone had a legitimate reason to get out in the streets and protest, its the Lemp family, whose 21-year-old son Duncan was gunned down in his bedroom during an early morning, no-knock SWAT team raid on his familys home.

Imagine it.

It was 4:30 a.m. on March 12, 2020, in the midst of a COVID-19 pandemic that has most of the country under a partial lockdown and sheltering at home, when this masked SWAT teamdeployed to execute a high risk search warrant for unauthorized firearmsstormed the suburban house where 21-year-old Duncan, a software engineer and Second Amendment advocate, lived with his parents and 19-year-old brother.

The entire household, including Lemp and his girlfriend, was reportedly asleep when theSWAT team directed flash-bang grenades and gunfire through Lemps bedroom window.

Lemp waskilledand his girlfriend injured.

No one in the house that morning, including Lemp, had a criminal record.

No one in the house that morning, including Lemp, was considered an imminent threat to law enforcement or the public, at least not according to the search warrant.

Now what was so urgent that militarized police felt compelled to employ battlefield tactics in the pre-dawn hours of a day when most people are asleep in bed, not to mention stuck at home as part of a nationwide lockdown?

According to police, they were tipped off that Lemp was in possession of firearms.

So instead of approaching the house by the front door at a reasonable hour in order to investigate this complaintwhich is what the Fourth Amendment requirespolice instead strapped on their guns, loaded up their flash bang grenades and acted like battle-crazed warriors.

This is the blowback from all that military weaponry flowing to domestic police departments.

This is what happens when you use SWAT teams to carry out routine search warrants.

This is what happens when you adoptred flag gun laws, which Maryland did in 2018, painting anyone who might be in possession of a gunlegal or otherwiseas a threat that must be neutralized.

These red flag gun laws allow the police toremove guns from people merelysuspectedof being threats.

While in theory it appears perfectly reasonable to want to stop dangerous people before they act, where the problem arises is when you put the power to determine who is apotentialdanger in the hands of government agencies, the courts and the police.

Remember, this is the same government that uses the words anti-government, extremist and terroristinterchangeably.

This is the same government whose agents are spinning a sticky spider-web ofthreat assessments, behavioral sensing warnings, flagged words, and suspicious activity reports using automated eyes and ears, social media,behavior sensing software, and citizen spies to identifypotentialthreats.

This is the same government that keeps re-upping the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which allows the military to arrest and detain American citizens with no access to friends, family or the courts if the government believes them to be a threat.

This is the same government that has a growing listshared with fusion centers and law enforcement agenciesof ideologies, behaviors, affiliations and other characteristics that could flag someone as suspicious and result in their being labeledpotentialenemies of the state.

Let that sink in a moment.

If you believe in and exercise your rights under the Constitution (namely, your right to speak freely, worship freely, associate with like-minded individuals who share your political views, criticize the government, own a weapon, demand a warrant before being questioned or searched, or any other activity viewed as potentially anti-government, racist, bigoted, anarchic or sovereign), you are most likelyat the top of the governments terrorism watch list.

Moreover, as aNew York Timeseditorial warns, you may be an anti-government extremist (a.k.a.domestic terrorist) in the eyes of the police if you are afraid that thegovernment is plotting to confiscate your firearms, if you believe theeconomy is about to collapseand thegovernment will soon declare martial law, or if you display an unusual number ofpolitical and/or ideological bumper stickerson your car.

Needless to say, if you happen to be passionate about the Constitution and a vocal critic of government corruption, youve already been flagged in a government database somewhere.

Likely, Lemp was, too.

Now Lemp is dead and his family is devastated, outraged and desperate to make sense of what appears to be an insensible act of violence resulting in an inexcusable loss of life.

As usual in these kinds of shootings,government officials have not been forthcoming with details about the shooting: police have refused to meet with family members, the contents of the warrant supporting the raid have not been revealed, and bodycam footage of the raid has not been disclosed.

So in order to voice their objections to police violence and demand answers about the shooting, Lemps family and friends planned to conduct an outdoor public demonstrationadhering to social distancing guidelinesonly to bethreatened with arrest, a year in jail and a $5000 finefor violating Marylands stay at home orders.

Yet heres the thing: we dont have to be muzzled and remain silent about government corruption, violence and misconduct just because were wearing masks and social distancing.

Thats not the point of this whole COVID-19 exercise, or is it?

While there is a moral responsibility to not endanger other lives with our actions, that does not mean relinquishing all of our freedoms.

Be responsible in how you exercise your freedoms, but dont allow yourselves to be muzzled or your individual freedoms to be undermined.

Understandably, no one wants to talk about individual freedoms when tens of thousands of people the world over are dying, and yet we must.

The decisions we make right nowabout freedom, commerce, free will, how we care for the least of these in our communities, what it means to provide individuals and businesses with a safety net, how far we allow the government to go in protecting us against this virus, etc.will haunt us for a long time to come.

At times like these, when emotions are heightened, fear dominates, common sense is in short supply, liberty takes a backseat to public safety, and democratic societies approach the tipping point towards mob rule, there is a tendency to cast those who exercise their individual freedoms (to freely speak, associate, assemble, protest, pursue a living, engage in commerce, etc.) as foolishly reckless, criminally selfish, or outright villains.

Sometimes that is true, but not always.

As I make clear in my bookBattlefield America: The War on the American People, there is always a balancing test between individual freedoms and the communal good.

What we must figure out is how to strike a balance that allows us to protect those who need protection without leaving us chained and in bondage to the police state.

We must find ways to mitigate against this contagion needlessly claiming any more lives and crippling any more communities, but lets not lose our heads:blindlyfollowing the path of least resistanceacquiescingwithout questionto whatever the government dictatescan only lead to more misery, suffering and the erection of a totalitarian regime in which there is no balance.

Feature photo | A nurse stands in counter-protest during a demonstration against stay-at-home orders at the State House, April 25, 2020, in Providence, R.I., during the coronavirus outbreak. Michael Dwyer | AP

John W. Whiteheadis founder and president ofThe Rutherford Institute. His new bookBattlefield America: The War on the American People (SelectBooks, 2015) is available online at http://www.amazon.com. Whitehead can be contacted atjohnw@rutherford.org.

The views expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect MintPress News editorial policy.

See the article here:
Your Freedoms Don't Have to Be Muzzled Just Because You're Wearing a Mask - Mintpress News

Apple and Google recently announcedthey will jointlylaunch digital contact tracing tools to combat COVID-19. Their Bluetooth technology will allow Android and iOS phones to communicate and track when individuals pass within six feet of someone who tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Apple and Google are not alone. Around the world, countries including the UK, China, Taiwan, and South Korea have implemented comparable programs.

While these steps appear desirable, they raise serious risks for autonomy, privacy, and data security. The information collected could be used for commercial purposes, hacked by cybercriminals, or used to discriminate against individuals with COVID-19 or other health conditions. Moreover, it is difficult to establish whether the apps are beneficial and surveillance methods implemented now may persist long after the pandemic subsides.

To address these concerns, Apple and Google promised there will be strong protections around user privacy and emphasized that transparency and consent are of utmost importance. However, tech companies have repeatedly failed to protect user privacy and security; the time to rely on privacy legislation and industry self-regulation has passed. Instead of those top down approaches, which privilege legislators, lobbyists, and tech companies over individuals, we argue for a bottom-up approach.

State and federal lawmakers should create a right to digital self-defense ensuring that Americans can freely use anonymity, privacy, and cybersecurity tools to shield themselves against widespread and relentless data collection by private and public actors. Some examples of these tools are the TOR browser, virtual private networks (VPNs), personal servers such as the FreedomBox, and low-tech solutions such as clothing that disrupts facial recognition.

There are many more available tools of digital self-defense, and not all of them will be relevant to COVID-19 apps; nevertheless, recognition of a right to digital self-defense may serve as a catalyst to the development of new tools, covering different platforms, operating systems and scenarios.

While some of these tools are widely available, their use often comes at a cost. Specifically, people who adopt them may be subjected to increased government scrutiny. On the public side for example, the FBI usedspywareto track Tor users activity. Whether such surveillance constitutes an illegal search under the Fourth Amendment remains anunresolvedlegal question. In this context, people may wish to protect their privacy and cybersecurity even if they have committed no crimes.

On the private side, platforms such as Netflix and Hulu often refuse access to people who use these tools of digital self-defense. Some platforms, including Google, penalize users by requiring them to complete time-consuming CAPTCHAs thattrain the companys algorithmsto identify objects such as street signs and fire hydrants. These mechanisms frustrate users and encourage them to sacrifice privacy for easier access to services.

The right to digital self-defense may find support in the Bill of Rights, which was designed to protect states and their citizens from government tyranny. In the information age, we are witnessing the emergence of a new oppressive force digital tyranny, where tech companies threaten our privacy and security through widespread surveillance, profiling, and manipulation. They often work with federal agencies through public-private partnerships, such as the collaboration between Amazon Ring and up to400 law enforcement authorities.

Public-private partnerships including those directed at COVID-19 tracking can excuse federal agencies from respecting individual rights and freedoms because tech platforms conduct the surveillance, and most constitutional protections provided by the Bill of Rights do not extend to these private actors. Once the data is obtained, they pass it to their government partners. But the Bill of Rights is of limited effectiveness in the information age if it doesnt also extend to technology companies.

Some may argue that a right to digital self-defense is unnecessary because people can always choose not to opt-in to a contact tracing program. However, this criticism is rooted in outdated notions of consent. Tech companies have a history of using deceptive methods to influence peoples choices. They use deceptivechoice architectureto nudge people to consent. Besides, some surveillance programs are not optional; Chinas mandated contract tracing app Health Code controls where citizens may travel, and U.S. programs could shift in that direction.

Others might contend that a more desirable approach is to demand that tech companies take privacy and security more seriously. However, platforms have no obligation to implement safeguards beyond what the law requires, and U.S. privacy laws are inadequate and overly susceptible toinfluence by industry lobbyists.

A federal right to digital self-defense can serve as a foundation on which state lawmakers can build. For example, the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) sets a national floor for health privacy, and states can pass their own laws that provide protection above and beyond what HIPAA mandates.

Alternatively, states could establish the right to digital self-defense on their own by statute and incorporate it into their constitutions. In states where citizens can pass their own laws through ballot initiates, such as California and Alaska, the right could be implemented by the people, thus bypassing state legislatures, and stifling lobbyist efforts to water down legislation.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a public health emergency, but widespread surveillance carried out by private actors is not the solution. Given Big Techs track record, the social cost of widespread surveillance likely outweighs potential benefits, especially if tracking persists beyond the pandemic.

Lawmakers should codify a right to digital self-defense and encourage Americans to use anonymity, privacy, and cybersecurity tools to ensure that their privacy and security are not threatened by digital tyranny.

Ido Kilovaty is an assistant professor of law at The University of Tulsa College of Law, visiting faculty fellow at Yale Law Schools Center for Global Legal Challenges and an affiliated fellow at Yale Law Schools Information Society Project. He was a 2028-2019 Cybersecurity Policy Fellow at New America.

Mason Marks is assistant professor at Gonzaga University School of Law and an affiliated fellow at Yale Law Schools Information Society Project. In addition to a law degree from Vanderbilt University, he also holds an M.D. from Tufts University School of Medicine.

Read more from the original source:
A right to digital self-defense will prevent abuse of COVID-19 surveillance apps | TheHill - The Hill

Societal consequences resulting from the novel coronavirus pandemic have been partially mitigated by the growing technological abilities of our society. Remote work environments, technology-driven logistics and supply chain management, online stores, and direct-to-consumer grocery delivery are all features of our society. With the technological advances of the past two decades, a large portion of the workforce is able to continue operating even while many business locations remain physically closed. We owe a lot of this success to information technology and, particularly, to our abilities to collect, store, and share data.

Increased computing power, complex collection and sharing of data, and powerful algorithms are helping to sustain our economy, as much as possible. This combination of factors along with consumer buy-in has produced in many respects a potential surveillance apparatus. Unlike the science fiction version of a surveillance state, these surveillance tools are largely fed through consumer buy-in and understanding.

Consumer or user knowledge of the potential side-effects may be limited, but all services require costs. This cost comes in the form of trade-offs, whereby consumers understand that a free online service like Facebook may be providing a social media platform in return for the right to use the data inputs to Facebooks advantage.

During this pandemic, much of life has been turned on its head. The majority of the American population is under shelter-in-place or lockdown orders. Restrictions vary by state, municipality, and county. These orders have forced most of American life to adapt through technology and wireless high-speed Internet. What most Americans do not yet understand is the complex collection and sharing of data that takes place mostly unnoticed. Some may encounter this when they search for a product on one electronic device and discover advertisements for that product appear on a totally separate device.

Behind the scenes, companies are not only selling products or services; they are exchanging data points to further target specific consumers. Harvard Business School Professor Shoshana Zuboff has coined the term surveillance capitalism to describe this phenomenon. Surveillance capitalism is the unilateral claiming of private human experience as free raw material for translation into behavioral data. These data are then packaged as prediction products and sold into behavioral futures markets.

Why does this surveillance apparatus matter during this pandemic?

Generally speaking, Americans are skeptical of invasions of privacy, whether it is by the government or business. During times of crisis, individuals are more prone to turn a blind eye to infringements of civil liberties. Unfortunately, America has instituted several disastrous measures during times of crisis in recent decades. We should ensure that similarly devastating measures are not implemented during this pandemic.

On April 10, Apple and Google announced a joint effort to enable the use of Bluetooth technology to help governments and health agencies reduce the spread of the virus, with user privacy and security central to the design. The novel coronavirus is transmitted through close proximity. As Googles Press Release noted, public health organizations have identified contact tracing as a valuable tool to help contain its spread; contact tracing is not itself a novel concept.

Countries throughout the world have implemented similar measures. For example, the Israeli government recently passed a law allowing their security agency to conduct contact tracing. Contact tracing is the process of identifying persons who have come into contact with an infected person, as well as the collection of further information about the nature of the contact. It is a much more tailored version of quarantining than lockdowns. This collaborative effort between Apple and Google allows individuals to opt-in through downloading an official application. Unlike other countries, the United States is relying on a private sector-led effort to conduct contact tracing.

Government surveillance and data collection have long been a point of contention in the United States, albeit in varying forms. The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution ensures a right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.

The Supreme Court, in Carpenter v. United States, held that the governments acquisition of cell-site records was a Fourth Amendment search, thus the government needed a warrant to conduct the search. Carpenter did not address the question undergirding the Third-Party Doctrine, which covers an individuals expectation of privacy in information voluntarily turned over to third parties. It remains unclear how the government may differentiate between cell-site location information (CSLI) collected by smartphones and other like information.

Given the onslaught of local and state orders prohibiting certain activities and, in many cases, threatening individuals with arrest, it is prudent to ask whether or not such behavior may result in a scenario whereby the government has a need for surveillance. Carpenter answered one question and simultaneously led to more questions than before. At Protocol, Charles Levinson discusses a product called Locate X which allows investigators to draw a digital fence around an address or area, pinpoint mobile devices that were within that area, and see where else those devices have traveled, going back months. According to the article, Locate Xs terms of use forbid the tool as evidence in legal proceedings.

CNN recently published an article highlighting the use of a different location data tracking tool. Weve all encountered this story about spring breakers in Florida who ignored warnings to practice social distancing and then fell ill with the novel coronavirus. X-Mode, the company behind the tool, provides location tracking services and, in turn, provides the data it collects to advertisers only after it is anonymized. Why is this problematic? This lesser-known tool is generating considerable interest from the government in using location data from Americans cell phones to try to track and possibly curtail the spread of the coronavirus.

Assumg mass collection and sharing of data points, even those data points for which we may be unaware of their existence.

Much of the concern about government surveillance would subside if government were to take a less intrusive role in each of our lives. Unfortunately, this pandemic has resulted in more calls for government action, such as increased policing, police department lists of addresses of confirmed virus cases, curfews, mandatory closure of non-essential businesses, and government payments to all. For example, Judge Stuart Kyle Duncan in writing for the majority of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals writes, "Jacobson instructs thatallconstitutional rights may be reasonably restricted to combat a public health emergency.

Given the overwhelming technological tools in the governments possession, it is imperative that the private sector takes the initiative so the government does not feel inclined to do so. Google and Apple have begun to address contact tracing here in the United States. Should their initiative be unsuccessful, government may feel the need to coerce businesses and information providers into providing data to their surveillance agencies.

As Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in Carpenter, It is true that the Cyber Age has vast potential both to expand and restrict individual freedoms in dimensions not contemplated in earlier times. Even as our technological capacity has expanded to provide opportunities and capabilities the world has never seen, we must remain vigilant. We must ensure that our tools and resources are used to the advantage of individuals and not to power-hungry government officials or businesses that cower to the state.

Read more:
Mass Surveillance Is Spreading along with COVID-19 - Foundation for Economic Education

A few hours after the initial searches, Jessop and Ashjian told the court, Kumagai returned alone to Jessops house while his wife was home alone and said he needed to search it a second time. From there, they allege that Kumagai went into the bedroom, where the officers had previously observed that Jessop kept a collection of rare coins, purportedly valued at $125,000. Kumagai spent several minutes alone in the bedroom, making this second sweep, and then left after saying his investigation was finished. According to their petition, the officers seized more than $275,000 from their searches, including the the coin collection, creating a discrepancy with the police inventory sheet the officers filed later that night, which stated that the officers had only seized $50,000 in cash. No charges were filed against Jessop and Ashjian, though the city and officers say they avoided charges by agreeing to become informants and forfeiting the $50,000.

In their reply brief for the court, the officers and the city categorically deny that any theft took place. The brief strongly implies without stating outright that Jessop may be exaggerating the coin collections existence and value. They also note that the plaintiffs didnt bring a lawsuit until two years later, after Kumagai was arrested in 2015 for what the city describes as an unrelated incident. In that incident, federal prosecutors said that Kumagai told a suspected drug dealer in 2013 that he could shield him from a federal investigation and get him registered as a confidential informant in exchange for a $40,000 bribe. Kumagai eventually pleaded guilty to accepting $20,000 and received a two-year prison sentence.

Whether the thefts really happened, however, doesnt actually matter at this point in the litigation. When public officials ask a court to dismiss a lawsuit against them on qualified-immunity grounds, courts always assume that the plaintiffs allegations are factual when considering the request. Its unsurprising that the officers and the city want to strenuously insist that they didnt do what the plaintiffs claim they did. But its also irrelevant as a factor for judges to consider in qualified-immunity cases. If theres a factual disputeand there often isthats what the trial, which the officers are trying to avoid, is supposed to untangle.

The Supreme Courts test for qualified immunity hinges on whether the officers alleged actions were not just unconstitutional, but clearly established as unconstitutional at the time. Courts typically rely on federal court opinions to determine this. In the Jessop case, both the district court and the Ninth Circuit found no clear precedent to establish that the Fourth Amendment barred officers from stealing during a search. The Ninth Circuits survey of cases found only an unpublished Fourth Circuit case from 2004 that found it would be unconstitutional to not return seized property and a Ninth Circuit case from 2017 on impounding vehicles without a warrant. Thats not enough for a consensus, the panel found.

View original post here:
To Protect and Serve, or Pilfer and Steal? - The New Republic

Some years ago, I led an 18-member department in a small town as chief of police. I was ordered by the mayor, my boss by statute, to summarily seize another officers property (long story, I will spare you). I advised the mayor that to do so without probable cause or a warrant would be a Fourth Amendment violation that I refused to be a part of.

I was fired for disobeying a direct order.

I have always been convinced that no chief should serve without being willing to be fired. Should no police officer serve unless they, too, are willing to stand between the Constitution and an unlawful order?

Police officers are not only trained, but they are also enculturated and indoctrinated. The availability of tools of coercion is the very reason for the existence of the police, otherwise, social workers and bureaucrats would answer the phone instead of officers. There is no government policy, much less law, that is not leveraged by its police power to enforce compliance.

The evolution of uniformed police in America began with the office of sheriff, then municipal police, then the state police agency entered with much political suspicion and often opposed by sheriffs. The exponential growth of federal law enforcement since the U.S. Marshals service now embraces over 75 federal badge-carrying, gun-toting entities.

Unlike most countries where policing is a national, unified force or a branch of the military, the U.S. resisted such an approach. The dislike of uniforms, formed by the excesses of the British Redcoats, was eventually overcome after the ubiquitous blue or gray of the Civil War. Law enforcement was a local affair governed by the voting public who could throw out a sheriff every 2 or 4 years, remove a councilperson or mayor, or even press for a recall of an elected official. The exponential growth of federal agents in law enforcement was exceeded only by the rapid growth of bureaucracies to which the legislatures granted administrative power backed by civil and criminal penalties.

An example I am experiencing as I write this is a prohibition on a drive-in service for the church I attend during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our Governor specifically endorsed drive-in services but gave latitude to local health agencies to alter the regulations.

Our regional health department said no drive-in services for the church, after two requests with no further avenue of appeal. This department is staffed by persons hired by a board of health who, in turn, are appointed by our Board of County Commissioners. The public health order prohibits, specifically, all church events other than electronic delivery. That same order allows marijuana curbside pickup, restaurant drive-up service, and I can still walk into my local coffee shop to get a cup to go.

Frankly, since I know of no scientific evidence that COVID-19 would be leaping from car to car in our church parking lot while drivers listen on the FM radios short-range transmission, the order is in violation of both the freedom of peaceably assemble and the free exercise of religion and lacks the means to petition for the redress of grievances.

Clearly the disobeying of an order will not go unpunished. Whether you are regarded as a hero or a pariah, courageous or cowardly, there are those who will never forget your choice.

Beyond job loss, or discipline, or even prosecution there looms the reputation as a troublemaker. You may or may not be asked to be interviewed by the news media, but every idle word and every social media post will be examined for reasons to terminate you that cannot be directly pinned to your choice. Do not expect the next promotion.

Clarity of conscience is one thing, but the clarity of the rules is another. Is there a process and policy for refusing or countermanding orders of superiors? Is the thing you have been told to do a breach of law or ethics about which a court would agree?

Failure to arrest a protestor with whom you agree but who is trespassing or disturbing the peace is using your office to express your views. Failure to arrest a law-abiding protestor because the agency head vehemently dislikes the protestors views is a matter of principle.

There are times when citizens engage in civil disobedience for the sole purpose of generating a court case or media attention.

The motives of a drive-in churchgoer may be to sincerely adhere to religious belief about gathering together, or atheistic anarchists just wanting to stick it to the man. The motive of the object of our police action is of no concern to the enforcer, only whether the overt behavior gives us cause to take enforcement action.

If a controversial matter can be resolved through debate in the courts on legislative bodies, an officers refusal may be of no value in addressing the wrongful action of superiors or other government actors.

The issuance of $500 summonses to drive-in church attenders in the parking lot of Temple Baptist Church in Greenville, Mississippi, was received by each violator graciously from all reports, but what if one had resisted? Would the effort be worth using a TASER on grandma in her Easter best? Will the loss of amicable relations between those good citizens and the police be easily rebuilt? Will the image of an unmasked bus rider being dragged away by Philadelphia police be forgotten by summer?

As I reflected in a former PoliceOne article, Justice Brandeis made a famous dissent in the 1928 caseOmstead v. United Statesin which he stated,

The makers of our Constitution undertook to secure conditions favorable to the pursuit of happiness. They conferred, as against the Government, the right to be let alone the most comprehensive of rights, and the right most valued by civilized men. To protect that right, every unjustifiable intrusion by the Government upon the privacy of the individual, whatever the means employed, must be deemed a violation of theFourth Amendment.

To be clear, we understand that great powers accrue during crisis times. Whether overstated or understated, the science of the coronavirus made most of the current restrictions on our freedom of movement and commerce justifiable. We also know that litigation and legislation about those measures will continue for years. But can the uniformed officer remain silent and go about a duty that is repugnant to the Constitution at that moment, hoping for a distant resolution in the courts of law and public opinion? Each officer must examine their willingness not only to die for their duty to the public but to lose much in carrying out their ultimate duty to the Constitution.

Visit link:
Police balance enforcing the law with upholding the constitution - Police News