I think the author’s approach of basing much of his analysis of the issue on constitutional grounds is faulty.
Before we ever get to the Constitution we should look at the law. After the law then the governing State Constitution and possibly the Federal Constitution.
However, prior to that entire legal analysis, most of us want to begin analysis of conduct based upon common sense, civility, commom manners in public conduct and other issues of ethics and morality.
We have an officer of the law and public safety operating within that capacity and by a set of rules related to that conduct.
We then also have a resident acting in a capacity outside that of a normal home owner. He chose instead to act in his capacity and persona as a racial ethicist, professor and possibly an agitator.
There is no way for the officer to know that Gates was improperly operating outside his role of a normal courteous resident and make adjustments for it. He wasn’t encountering Gates during a lecture or public appearance where he could make reasonable adjustments for how to deal with him as an activist of whatever validity. He was instead encountering him in the capacity of a person at the scene of a possible crime.
This attitude of thinking of everything in terms of constitutional rights, or rights in general, first, leads only to a battle of rights when convention, common sense, civility, common law and statute law should all be called upon in thinking, conduct and analysis, and called upon in that proper order first, before the rules of laws governing conduct ever get analyzed in light of the State or Federal Constitution.
Leftists in favor of revolutionalry change to collectivism love for all issues to be reduced to issues of a battle of rights. As T. Sowell points out, this preference is because they know that in that battle, when it is conducted in the public perception, they can always win by pitting rights held by many against rights held by a lone individual. They can get emotion, empathy, nebulous concepts of fairness and history all to play a part in the debate. In doing so they are able to skip past all issues of convention, morality, commonsense, accepted standards of public conduct, common law and local law and leave everything to a leftist centralizing list of priorities.
Excellent post.
BTTT!!!
“There is no way for the officer to know that Gates was improperly operating outside his role of a normal courteous resident and make adjustments for it. He wasn’t encountering Gates during a lecture or public appearance where he could make reasonable adjustments for how to deal with him as an activist of whatever validity. He was instead encountering him in the capacity of a person at the scene of a possible crime.”
The remarkable thing to me is that no one takes into account that the LEO must lock down the scene, clear the premises and conduct a proscribed routine. Suppose the Prof were being robbed, the perp was in a closet with a gun on him and telling him to get rid of the cop or else? Until the LEO knows the house is clear, the scene is “hot.”
Showing a University badge and screaming get out does not mean that there is no one else in the house or that there is no further crime in progress. THAT is why you need to look around and make sure the scene is clear and call for back up in the event it is not. The call clearly stated there were two men.