Posted on 04/19/2014 2:49:04 PM PDT by BuckeyeTexan
Whether it’s the Patriot Act, NDAA, NSA spying, the IRS, or whomever, government intrusion into our fundamental rights is wrong, illegal, and unconstitutional.
The unreasonable search and seizure isn’t the relevant provision; the ban on general warrants is, and that is unambiguous, and absolute.
They both claim that that is the reason they went up the hill. Do we have any independent corroboration of that? Or could they have gone up the hill for another reason. A reasonable person would not expect to find a well there.
“Whether it’s the Patriot Act, NDAA, NSA spying, the IRS, or whomever, government intrusion into our fundamental rights is wrong, illegal, and unconstitutional.”
Easy to say now, but a vast majority of the people supported them and their reps enacted them. All of those bureaucratic agencies are part of the system now. How many conservatives loved the Patriot Act when they thought they had it all figured out? The big gubmint folks (libtards and neocons alike) are taking it one step further.
Said so at the time. I don’t really think a majority supported them. They were passed without much, if any, opportunity to comment or to look at what was provided for.
Scalia: Governmental listening to private conversations does not apply to the persons, houses, papers, and effects protected from unreasonable searches and seizures by the 4th Amendment. So Scalia is saying that government doesn’t have to have to show any particular reason, certainly not a probable-cause reason, to listen in on private conversations.
Me: Not sure I agree with that. Here is where I think Scalia is weak and conflicts, IMO, with the original-intent approach of constitutional scholar Judge Robert Bork – when Scalia uses the letter of the text to trump original intent. If original intent and understanding may be reasonably suspected to conflict with the text per se, especially in the current usage of the word(s), a good-faith effort should be made to uncover original intent and understanding. Here, that effort might very well show that something in persons, houses, papers, or effects that may have in fact included governmental listening to private conversations.
Examples:
• secure in your “houses” could certainly include wiretapping
• secure in your “papers” or “effects” may very well have been intended to include private communications.
IMO, the Constitutional issue in the NSA case is not the level of threat, but whether the NSA has probable cause and whether a warrant would be required (usually required for a house search).
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