Posted on 06/16/2006 3:44:08 PM PDT by NewDestiny
June 16, 2006
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson will appear as a guest on "Hannity & Colmes" tonight, Friday, June 16, at 9 p.m. EST / 6 p.m. PT to discuss a District of Columbia Superior Court grand juries decision to not indicte Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney for allegedly assaulting a Capitol Police Officer last March.
*Due to the nature of live Television, dates and times are subject to change.
She did not pick this police officer at random. His actions in attempting to prevent her from attending Congress were unConstitutional.
If the Demoncrats ever take the majority in the House again, and attempt to use police action to prevent Republican representatives from attending Congress, what do you want your representative to do?
The burden is on all of us to obey the Constitution. It should not be necessary for a representative to petition the Supreme Court to rule that Congress has exceeded its authority. If the protections outlined in my previous post to protect the attendance of representatives does not apply, then tell me when such protections would apply.
Absolutely true. Anyone who thinks otherwise may just have to look up recent history and the jury that acquitted Hinckley of shooting Reagan on the basis of "insanity". OJ McKinney beat the rap for one reason and one reason only. Justice is a foreign concept in the DC court system. Race trumps everything there.
uh, he did not recognize her. She should have stopped. Are u saying its ok to strike a police officer if you don't feel like identifying yourself and you are on your way to a session?
My reps have class.. they would stop for a split second that it takes and show an id.
U must be kidding. Protections here are irrelevent. She commited a crime. If she was read her rights, the constitution was followed
In her case, she has both rights and privileges under the Constitution. Our Founders recognized that the powerful executive branch they were creating was a risk to the proper authority of Congress. They included specific privileges for members of Congress.
The protection written into the Constitution does not contain an "identification" exception. The burden on the police is total. They may not detain a member of Congress without probable cause that they have committed a serious crime.
Congress itself has complete power to hold their members responsible. They can expel a member, despite the decision of the electorate, if they deem the matter serious enough.
Prior to stopping her, the police had no information indicating that the Congresswoman was guilty of "treason, felony" or "breach of the peace". There is nothing treasonous, felonious, or breaching the peace associated with a representative attending a session of Congress.
For example, it would be entirely unConstitutional for the executive branch to decide what constitutes proper identification of a member of Congress. Otherwise, the executive branch could exclude members that they didn't like simply by denying proper credentials.
What sort of punishment do you think would be appropriate for a police officer stopping a member of Congress from attending its session lacking probable cause that the member had committed treason, felony, or breach of the peace?
If the Supreme Court became involved to decide who, if anyone, should be punished, what do you think they would decide and why?
Consider the case of the protections for the Presidency. Recent precedent has made clear that the President is virtually unaccountable for crimes he might commit, if Congress refused to first remove him from office through the impeachment process. The President's power to pardon for crimes committed contains no exception for the President pardoning himself. The only way to hold him to account while he is in office, is first to remove him from office.
The immunity from arrest for members of Congress is a similar protection. It simply reflects the fact that it is more important to maintain the government in the face of a threat than to hold the duly elected officials to immediate account for misbehavior.
amazing. why don't we all beat up the DC cops for stopping us to identify ourselves at the Capitol building. apparently, it is ok with the grand jury. it might even be fun.
It would be very interesting to know just what the decision making was at the grand jury.
If you are not a member of Congress, you may not want to take this chance. As I pointed out above, members of Congress are specifically exempted from being detained while Congress is in session. If our Founders had wanted to give Congress the power to prevent some Congress members from attending, they could have done so. In fact, they did give Congress the power to expel members.
I don't really see why people are so uncomfortable with this. During the performance of their duties, the average DC cop is more powerful than the average citizen. Similarly, during the performance of their duties, every member of Congress is more powerful than the average DC cop. This is a good thing.
Just because we don't like what one Congresswoman does with her power doesn't mean that we should change a system which has been in place for two centuries. If I had a representative that I cared at all about, I would be very wary of making them subject to control by the DC police.
Remember, these same DC police enforce what is a virtual ban on firearms. I would eliminate the entire force if it were up to me. They are an embarassment to freedom-loving people.
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