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How To Reduce Police Violence – Eliminate Nanny State Crimes
Authored by Stephen L Carter via Contra Corner, originally posted at Bloomberg View,
On the opening day of law school, I always counsel my first-year students never to support a law they are not willing to kill to enforce. Usually they greet this advice with something between skepticism and puzzlement, until I remind them that the police go armed to enforce the will of the state, and if you resist, they might kill you.
I wish this caution were only theoretical. It isn’t. Whatever your view on the refusal of a New York City grand jury to indict the police officer whose chokehold apparently led to the death of Eric Garner, it’s useful to remember the crime that Garner is alleged to have committed: He was selling individual cigarettes, or loosies, in violation of New York law.
The obvious racial dynamics of the case -- the police officer, Daniel Pantaleo, is white; Garner was black -- have sparked understandable outrage. But, at least among libertarians, so has the law that was being enforced. Wrote Nick Gillespie in the Daily Beast, “Clearly something has gone horribly wrong when a man lies dead after being confronted for selling cigarettes to willing buyers.” Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, appearing on MSNBC, also blamed the statute: “Some politician put a tax of $5.85 on a pack of cigarettes, so they’ve driven cigarettes underground by making them so expensive.”
The problem is actually broader. It’s not just cigarette tax laws that can lead to the death of those the police seek to arrest. It’s every law. Libertarians argue that we have far too many laws, and the Garner case offers evidence that they’re right. I often tell my students that there will never be a perfect technology of law enforcement, and therefore it is unavoidable that there will be situations where police err on the side of too much violence rather than too little. Better training won’t lead to perfection. But fewer laws would mean fewer opportunities for official violence to get out of hand.
The legal scholar Douglas Husak, in his excellent 2009 book “Overcriminalization: The Limits of the Criminal Law,” points out that federal law alone includes more than 3,000 crimes, fewer than half of which found in the Federal Criminal Code. The rest are scattered through other statutes. A citizen who wants to abide by the law has no quick and easy way to find out what the law actually is -- a violation of the traditional principle that the state cannot punish without fair notice.
In addition to these statutes, he writes, an astonishing 300,000 or more federal regulations may be enforceable through criminal punishment in the discretion of an administrative agency. Nobody knows the number for sure.
Husak cites estimates that more than 70 percent of American adults have committed a crime that could lead to imprisonment. He quotes the legal scholar William Stuntz to the effect that we are moving toward “a world in which the law on the books makes everyone a felon.” Does this seem too dramatic? Husak points to studies suggesting that more than half of young people download music illegally from the Internet. That’s been a federal crime for almost 20 years. These kids, in theory, could all go to prison.
Many criminal laws hardly pass the giggle test. Husak takes us on a tour through bizarre statutes, including the Alabama law making it a crime to maim oneself for the purpose of gaining sympathy, the Florida law prohibiting displays of deformed animals, the Illinois law against “damaging anhydrous ammonia equipment.” And then there’s the wondrous federal crime of disturbing mud in a cave on federal land. (Be careful where you run to get out of the rain.) Whether or not these laws are frequently enforced, Husak’s concern is that they exist -- and potentially make felons of us all.
Part of the problem, Husak suggests, is the growing tendency of legislatures -- including Congress -- to toss in a criminal sanction at the end of countless bills on countless subjects. It’s as though making an offense criminal shows how much we care about it.
Well, maybe so. But making an offense criminal also means that the police will go armed to enforce it. Overcriminalization matters, Husak says, because the costs of facing criminal sanction are so high and because the criminal law can no longer sort out the law-abiding from the non-law-abiding. True enough. But it also matters because -- as the Garner case reminds us -- the police might kill you.
I don’t mean this as a criticism of cops, whose job after all is to carry out the legislative will. The criticism is of a political system that takes such bizarre delight in creating new crimes for the cops to enforce. It’s unlikely that the New York legislature, in creating the crime of selling untaxed cigarettes, imagined that anyone would die for violating it. But a wise legislator would give the matter some thought before creating a crime. Officials who fail to take into account the obvious fact that the laws they’re so eager to pass will be enforced at the point of a gun cannot fairly be described as public servants.
Husak suggests as one solution interpreting the Constitution to include a right not to be punished. This in turn would mean that before a legislature could criminalize a particular behavior, it would have to show a public interest significantly higher than for most forms of legislation.
He offers the example of a legislature that decides “to prohibit -- on pain of criminal liability -- the consumption of designated unhealthy foods such as doughnuts.” The “rational basis test” usually applied by courts when statutes face constitutional challenge would be easily met. In short, under existing doctrine, the statute would be a permissible exercise of the police power. But if there existed a constitutional right not to be punished, the statute would have to face a higher level of judicial scrutiny, and might well be struck down -- not because of a right to eat unhealthy foods, but because of a right not to be criminally punished by the state except in matters of great importance.
Of course, activists on the right and the left tend to believe that all of their causes are of great importance. Whatever they want to ban or require, they seem unalterably persuaded that the use of state power is appropriate.
That’s too bad. Every new law requires enforcement; every act of enforcement includes the possibility of violence. There are many painful lessons to be drawn from the Garner tragedy, but one of them, sadly, is the same as the advice I give my students on the first day of classes: Don’t ever fight to make something illegal unless you’re willing to risk the lives of your fellow citizens to get your way.
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This one's a no brainer. You want to reduce crime you get rid of the Federal Government. Why? Because they will kill you if you don't.
The leach starves..it forces new rules bleed the host...till the host is dying.
Then they charge to kill the host.
2 laws.
Dont Lie.
Dont Steal.
Why do we need 500k laws to enact that?
RIPS
Ok since we are not Adult enough to see that we DO NOT Need "Police", then I purpose the following:
No more Military Veterans as police officers, you are either a soldier or a cop, but NO More Cop Soldiers, two entirely different mentalities, and we need not co-mingle them any longer.
To be a police officer you need to have at-least a Master Degree or better, so we can FINALLY get police with an IQ over 100
If as a police officer you commit ANY Crime while in uniform or otherwise whatever the civilian punishment would be for the same crime it is DOUBLE For you for violation of the Public Trust.
Police must go back to carrying revolvers ONLY!!! and ALWAYS deffer to the most Non-Lethal use of force as their first, second and third option.
All police will wear tamper proof body cams and mics at ALL time, and there should be no less then 3 cameras in every police vehicle constantly recording.
That's a good start for now, I have many, many more ideas to ?#Stop? the police violence once and for all.
And do away with qualified immunity. If a cop violates someone's rights, THEY (not their department/city/state) pay for the damages.
There is only one law that is needed.
That government is illegal.
You have encountered a contradiction, and must therefore, check your premise.
There must always be some entity (government) in order to enforce any prohibition.
Actually, no. Iceland went 2 centuries with only one government employee - the law one that memorized the laws.
If we're going to claim police officers are professionals, then they need to buy their own professional liability insurance. Sure, their departments can reimburse them for it as a perq. But I, like most other professionals, have to buy my own liability insurance. If I perform my profession in such a way that my insurer has to pay out a ton of money and decides to drop me as a policyholder, I'm S.O.L. So should it be for cops. One part of this problem is that cops have blanket coverage by the municipality they work for, and the municipalities can buy heavily subsidized insurance that never gets cut off. All the payouts in brutality cases come from this pooled insurance. The cities don't have to pay it out themselves, and neither do the cops, and nobody ever has their insurance cancelled. So they don't give a shit.
That is an excellent idea, haven't heard it anywhere before. That would give cops pause before pulling someone over for bullshit, or hassling anyone for committing victimless 'crime' and take us back to how it's supposed to be- no victim, no crime.
Never happen, as long as The State has a legal monopoly on the initiation of force.
no, "the state" has not a monopoly on the initiation of force, it has a monopoly on force, period
the purpose of this monopoly is to have less violence, not more
interesting article, interesting comments, but imho it's all details. the core of this matter is that civil society integrates it's police, which are civilians, too, and supposed to be the first upholders of... civility
selling contraband cigarettes? is it a violent crime? no? then violence is not warranted. it's really that simple
both civility and civil have their root in Latin cives, "the city", as well as policeman and politician have their root in Greek polis, "the city". A crowded, busy place that requires a lid on violence that would have been "ok" outside the city, in ancient times, including duels or just the usual "banging the heads of the other clan". That's why ancient cities had two legal systems, one inside the walls and one outside the walls, with a total, "sacred" ban on violence inside the walls, which included any display or use of weapons
in short, if you take a time machine and travel to ancient Athens or Rome, be forewarned: on the approach to the city's gates, it was perfectly ok to bring your goons with a fine display of weapons, but inside the city, non-violence was the paramount rule. No weapons to be seen, no violence to be done. If in dispute of anything, arbiters, judges and courts are available. That was ancient "civility", with it's punishments, including capital punishment... outside the walls, of course. Gates like in London would then be used for display of heads and limbs of executed criminals, in order to remind everybody to leave their violence and arms at the gates, before entering
How is this applied, today? Well, in most countries of this world, it starts that you are in general not thrown on the floor by police forces, and seldom handcuffed with your arms behind your back even when arresting you... except if the police has to fear you'll become very violent. And there you have it... Fear is the bane of civility, and leads to violence, which leads to casualties
nice
Likely if he was selling singlets the pack was taxed when he bought the pack. He therefore was not likely selling untaxed cigarettes.
A rumor I heard was that he was getting them through some connection from Virginia, which barely taxes cigarettes as a matter of tradition and greasing the local industry. So a pack of smokes costs way less there than in NYC, and the taxes paid were not paid to NYC, so to sell in NYC without collecting the tax, they would be considered untaxed.
Or maybe he was getting them from an Indian Reservation. Some Reservations sell an ugodly amount of cigarettes, taxed as they see fit in their jurisdiction (which is usually not at all if it's profitable enough).
I saw all this crap the day it happened and there was not a single mention of cigarettes at all. If you try to point that out on any MSM site or something Disqus powered, they are censoring those posts. Its pretty fkn ridiculous.
The whole loosies issue was made up after the fact to mask the reason the cops were at that location in the first place!!!!!
They were responding to a call about 2 men trying to fight someone.
Garner broke up that fight before the cops arrived and those 2 were gone. Yet when the cops showed up, they had it in their heads that they were bringing someone in come hell or high water, they didnt want to listen to a single word Garner said, and when Garner started accusing them of harassment, that's when they decided to forego the whole idea of arrest or detention and just quietly encircled him as if to surprise attack him....which they did....and then after subduing him they just lefft him there for dead and didnt even check on him as their jobs dictate.
FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
All non-constitutional laws should have a term limit (due date) that must renewed through the will of the People.
That way most of them would not be renewed and none of the dumb ones would be. It becomes self-cleansing.
Non constitutional laws should be stricken from the books immediately, e.g., "civil forfeiture".
There are many more in various shades of fuzzy and gray, but some of the worst ones could be dispensed with quickly
But, probably won't happen.
Won't work. You are talking about the same people who brought us Prohibition 1.0 (alcohol) and 2.0 (plants). The State makes the laws. It would simply make a law rendering the "term limits" null and void.
When is Rev Al Sharpton going to pay his $4.5 million in back taxes he owes the IRS??
Had this been you or me we would be in jail !
if congress did not pass laws for a year, but instead revoked old laws that are obsolete, would the press of the world call them a do nothing congress?..one could only hope that over regulated over lawed nations would come to thier senses.
So contact your state legislator and tell him/her that you want him/her to support a call for an Article V state Constitutional Convention to amend the federal government and their 200 volumes of nanny law out of existence. Turn Washington, D.C. into a ghost town. Then we can work on fixing our individual state governments.
A Con-Con is the worst idea ever.
I've got plenty of guns and lots and lots of lead for them but I would rather try the Article V method that George Mason gave us during the original Constitutional Convention (which, by the way, was anything but a runaway convention) to allow the states to change the Constitution to reign in, or eliminate, an out-of-control federal government.
If that doesn't work, then its to the trenches.
Then start digging, as that Mark Levin Con-con shit will not work. State politics is corrupted too, like it or not, it is the TRUTH. You think the statey's would let people like you and me in on the con-con? That's what I thought.
Diig 'em deep and long..........
De Opresso Liber
Bingo. Ever since the 17th Amendment, state politics has been corrupted by the devolution to Demockracy.
Better yet, let's end the be-spoiling of the Constitution and sunset its existence. Articles of Confederation, whose time has come...again.
There is no method to amend the Constitution out of existence. The federal government: Yes, Yes and Yes
Conspiracy Fact: UN reports confirm Israel aiding ‘rebels’, Al-Qaeda groups fighting in Syria
Does your pony do more than one trick many times a day?
This is at least the 4th time I've seen you post this today.
And I thought it was mccain and the neocons that was giving them weapons and training. Who knew?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Void_for_vagueness
The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws.
— Cornelius Tacitus, 55-117 AD, Roman historian
The President can moan all he wants about police being too heavy handed towards blacks and minorities, but he shares a great deal of the responsibility. Over the last six years while Obama has been in office the unrelentless trend to add a military component to police forces across the nation has continued to ramp up.
Many people see this as the governments way to extend control and power over the masses in case of a civil uprising in the future. More and more we see those paid with our tax dollars driving aggressive macho vehicles and strutting around in black uniforms with a swagger of intimidation.The article below delves deeper into this ugly trend and the issue of who holds this power.
http://brucewilds.blogspot.com/2014/12/police-violence-goes-beyond-black-and.html
Even with all the equipment, they can't win against an outraged populace. They can win individual battles though, and will try to leverage that into fear ... fear of losing a house, being jailed, etc.
Remember how freaked they got over Dorner? The Tsarnaev brothers? Multiply by 10 in every city. Their fear will force them into incidents that will only outrage people more.
That's why they need a war too. "We must unite against East Asia. Protestors are helping the enemy! Submit! Help us win the war!"
That's the basic theory behind terrorism. In a situation where one side has disproportionate power, the other side will do things to provoke an oversized response. This radicalizes both sides, and eliminates any would-be compromisers. If the weaker side can hold out long enough, the stronger side eventually alienates all but their hard-core supporters. At that point, they either have to kill everybody, which hasn't happened yet, or they collapse. At least, that's the theory. It's worked too; that's how the Algerians drove out the French.
This is why we have the Ministry of Love (Miniluv).
And remember, See Something Say Something
Also may want to remember that Snitches Get Stitches!
(that's all i got for now)
Agreed about getting rid of the nanny-state. Force parents to be parents as well, not the government.
Another method of reducing police violence: Allow conceal carry and self defense in all states. Crime drops dramatically. Police not needed much.
Of course the corrupt Justice Department will force you to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on lawyer's fees if you defend your or your family's lives.
Why would the State wish for parents to exercise parental responsibility when parenthood has already legally been deemed merely a convenience for the State vis a vis occasional feedings, housing, and clothing for the Village who is the Parent now?
Related: You May Think You Have Nothing to Hide … But You’re Breaking Federal Copyright Laws Several Times a Day Without Even Knowing It
Somewhere around the time drunk driving levies & fines began, policing turned into a profit center.
C'mon, dude.
It's just bid-ness (and slavery):
U.S. Prisons - Big Business or a New Form of Slavery
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-prison-industry-in-the-united-states-big-business-or-a-new-form-of-slavery/8289
Pussy won't call out the fucking goons that enforce the law. Hey dipshit, 'just following orders' will still get you hung. And if there isn't another Nuremburg, we have long memories.
Millions worked for the railroads of the Third Reich and Supreme Soviet as they sent their respective millions to their doom.
There are so many laws, rules and regulations with criminal enforcement on the books that you probably commit at least one crime before you leave the house in the morning. If you make everybody a criminal they may start all behaving like criminals.
By creating so many laws they can arrest (and silence) anybody, anytime they want too. That is the point.
Check this out.
It IS worth the look.
http://www.threefeloniesaday.com/Youtoo/tabid/86/Default.aspx
Especially the part about it being a felony to make "any" false statement to a federal law enforcement official e.g. FBI agent, Park Ranger????
So if I say, "Nice day officer" and its raining I have committed a felony? Only in the eyes of government.
Politicians won't repeal any nanny laws. That would be like ... freedom. And they are all about control.
Politicians need to have the laws beat out of them.
"In addition to these statutes, he writes, an astonishing 300,000 or more federal regulations may be enforceable through criminal punishment in the discretion of an administrative agency."
This one statement provides conclusive proof of an administrative state dictatorship as described by FA Hayek. If the bureaucracy is allowed to live and thrive, there will be a progressively agressive and violent reaction to the infection called the people.
"Of course, activists on the right and the left tend to believe that all of their causes are of great importance. Whatever they want to ban or require, they seem unalterably persuaded that the use of state power is appropriate.
That’s too bad.
Every new law requires enforcement; every act of enforcement includes the possibility of violence. There are many painful lessons to be drawn from the Garner tragedy, but one of them, sadly, is the same as the advice I give my students on the first day of classes: Don’t ever fight to make something illegal unless you’re willing to risk the lives of your fellow citizens to get your way."
Or your own life.
Because the older I get, the more I don't appreciate people telling me what is legal or illegal as I witness the multitude of legal crimes going on around me daily.
If you leave me alone, you just might survive, in spite of yourself ;-)
There there, are you feeling peekish tonite? Here, suck on this, it will make you feel all warm and fuzzy. Nanny will tell you a little story and then its beddie bye, OK? Well, there was once a poor little black boy from Africa who lived in a big white house in Washington DC.....
The legal system is about control, not protection of the individual.
Eliminate libtards.
The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.
Ayn Rand
Choking someone to death has nothing to do with too many laws (which there are) and everything to do with responsibility and the attitude that We the People are the enemy and their beats a war zone
The cop did not kill Garner because he sold illegal ciggerettes, he killed him because he could,,, and knew he had little chance of being held responsible.
He was right. Until cops are again held responsible for excessive force used on citizens already subdued these killings will continue.
How come the ME's report doesn't substantiate your claims?
Really?? Are you that naive? Oh nevermind.................................
The cop(s) (did you see all the cops taking the guy down are they all culpable?) did what the state ordered him to do. He was using a technique he knew would work on a 400lb man. It's the system. The system does not punish it's droids it's hard on moral.
Perhaps you should spend some time learning more facts about the Garner case. From what I've read, the order to take down Garner was given by a black female officer in charge of the incident. And the choke hold apparently did not kill him, since he didn't die immediately. I read that it was the combination of his own obesity and having several other officers climb on him to 'subdue' him.
I'm not saying there was any justification for killing him, but it appears - again, based on what I've read - that it was a confluence of factors that led to his demise. I seriously doubt that his death was intentional. The situation can only be judged properly if the grand jury records are released to the public for scrutiny. Right now, I believe tha story in the MSM and the words of Sharpton as much as I believe the BLS when it issues employment statistics.
Back to the point of the original article: there are too many laws. But then again, it's not like the US is the Land of the Free.
BTW: Justice for Dillon Taylor!
The cops know what they are doing. Watch this. And remember, this is just what has been caught on tape. The brutality is over the top. It has NEVER been like this before. Something has changed. A discussion is impossible. The rush to get the suspect under control is 2 minutes. What is the hurry? And why kill a man selling handfuls of loose cigarettes when men living in penthouses are billionaires due to espionage, murder, extortion and bribery. That explains the system. It's as illegal, as corrupt as a system can get and that has been verified.
THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU CALL THE COPS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlY9C6pzxKc
The irony here is that Bloomberg was the prick that signed the 8th Amendment violating ciggie tax into law in the first place.
And they write about the fallacy of that law on Bloomberg's news source.
He's the psycho that would stalk people through their credit card transactions just to make sure they're not skipping out on those taxes.
Banks rob people, they get off scot free. ONE man sells ciggies without taxation, they shoot him.
'
'
'
There's a platform to run on!
Line by F'ing Line. Go through the crap and with a big red pen, stroke'em off the books.
•?•
V-V
What cracks me up is the conservatives, the ones who always fight whatever is in their rear mirror, got wound up about the federal government requiring people to buy health insurance.
But they don't say a word about the states requiring people to buy auto insurance.
I am so sick of nanny laws, I almost said something impolite.
States don't require everyone to buy auto insurance. Only those who own cars licensed for use on public roads have to do so. And each state sets its own requirements. Your comparison fails.
Fails large. That dooshbag must be an ObamaBot.
I don't know which states you're talking about..
In this state it is a 'criminal' offense to drive without insurance. In the last state I where I resided, failure to present proof of insurance to an office of the law would result in you being taken out of your car, it being abandoned on the roadside with an orange sticker on it. I saw many cars parked on the side of the road with orange stickers on the back windows.
Are there still states in this country that do not require liability insurance for registered automobiles and motorcycles?
I only know of one state where you cannot be pulled over and assaulted, searched, beaten and possibly killed for not wearing a seatbelt while driving: New Hampshire.
Perfect Libertarian logic here. This is the thinking that makes me a Libertarian. less laws = more freedom
Perhaps we should amend the Constitution to state that "Ignorance of the law is a valid excuse." There are now probably more laws and rules and regulations than an individual could read, much less understand, during a lifetime. It's impossible to know all the laws, especially if one crosses state borders.
Imagine if Mayor deBlazio (or whatever his name is now) enforced the Illegal alien laws as vigourously as the illegal cigarrette law. There would be more jobs with higher pay, and guys would not have to sell illegal cigarretes to make money.
While in college, I researched and wrote a term paper comparing and contrasting nations whose "peace officers" were recruited from the military and those nations whose civilian peace officers were just that; civilians, who were proscribed by law to have ever served in their countries military. The nations who had civilian only police officers were far less likely to use deadly force against their own populations. Also, here in Amerika, it wasn't such a great idea to give local law enforcement military hardware of all kinds.
Upvote. And we hire guys with lots of expience being an occupying army that kicks in doors and terrorizes the native population, and who have learned to view the people with which they interact as part of the jobs as the enemy.
I mean, what could possibly go wrong?
I've believed for many years that eventually our overlords would 'turn the guns on us' when they tired of using them on other countries. Or perhaps when that was no longer profitable.
Local governments cannot print money so they have to get it where they can; what with inflation in general and the fact that they provide pensions and lifetime healthcare to their overpaid retirees for artificially short 'careers'.
Where they can get money is by extorting the people who already over taxed neighbors. They call it 'safety checkpoints', 'reasonable laws'or whatever but it all amounts to the same thing: a gun to your head will persuade you to give them extra money beyond all the fees, taxes, sales taxes, etc. Becuase you didn't click your seatbelt, or because you failed to note a new speed limit sign, or because you forgot to renew your registration, or perhaps you attempted to build a chicken house on your rural property or ran a garage sale without a permit.
They know this. Not everyone outside the LEO community is grasping this yet. The sheople still believe the cops are there to serve and protect them.
However, a growing minority of us understand their real mission is Harass and Extract.
America? FUCK YEAH!
"How To Reduce Police Violence – Eliminate Nanny State Crimes"
An excellent idea except that the overwhelming majority of people who go into politics or government do so to add to the growing heap of nanny state laws and regulations. And large numbers of police join up because they want to "boss people around".
Even without a lot of these nanny state laws the police still have a long standing array of laws available to them which they use & abuse to assert their authority over innocent members of the public.
"Behaviour Likely To Cause A Breach Of The Peace" is one such catch-all law that British police use & abuse whenever they don't have a specific law available to stop someone doing whatever it is they don't want them doing or even being in a place or spot they don't want them to be.
So, there's a lot more to this than just repealing nanny state laws (of which we have far too many). Many existing laws which are used/abused by the police need to be recodified to make them far less general and far more specific and/or only available for use in clearly defined circumstances.
It's not complicated....
http://law.sc.edu/library/tour/images/01_09b-us_code.png
As Rob Hustle correctly states - Nobody makes money if the violence stops...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlY9C6pzxKc
Here's an idea... do not allow police officers to carry guns and refer to them as Peace Officers. Only allow tactical units to carry weapons and they are to be called on when necessary.
You will see police behave in a completely different manner.