Constitutional Rights The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States was added to protect the citizens of this great nation from unlawful search and seizure, it states that warrants must be specific and particular and have probable cause based upon available evidence against the individual. But in the past 10 -20 years that Constitutional protection for you and I to live without fear of government agencies prying into our personal lives hoping to find some crime has been ignored, skirted, and abused. Following will be a brief list of the ways and means of violating my rights. Local Governments Local governments have resorted to public cameras to enforce stop light laws and speed laws. This violates the 4th Amendment in that it is a manner of investigation that assumes the guilt of all driver’s on the road. It violates my ability live and move freely without being monitored by the government which is essentially spying on us. These cameras can be used by law enforcement for nefarious purposes. And further, in many cases the ultimate goal of these cameras is revenue not law in enforcement. Note that the Memphis city council is considering adding 150 speed cameras for the purposes of raising millions of dollars in new revenues. I must note that there is a difference between a private individual or company putting cameras on their property to protect their property and government putting cameras on public properties in the hope of seeing a crime. They also take away context, possibly unusual circumstances, and so on. Federal Government The Patriot Act. This act allows law enforcement to circumvent normal judiciary standards for warrants in the threat of terrorist activity. This sounds good on paper, but it becomes the slippery slope we are on today. It requires little if any real evidence for a FISA warrant, just suspicion due to common connection, etc. Please know that I am as concerned about terrorist activity as anyone else but this slope is secretive and extremely slippery. The slippery slope just mentioned has led to the recent revelations that the NSA has obtained warrants to collect data and phone calls from all phone carriers and data mining email accounts and other online resources. Neither the government nor any law enforcement agency thereof has the right to seize, look at, collate, data mine, collect or keep in a data base any correspondence without either my permission or a properly exercised warrant that shows probable cause that I have done something wrong. My communications are personal property between myself and those with who I communicate. Now some have suggested that we cannot claim ownership of our communications because the phone company or online service owns the infrastructure that they are carried and recorded on. If they are allowed to use that logic any government agency can search your residence or other property if you have a lien held by some financial institution one property or vehicle, or if you rent. All they have to do is go to XYZ Bank with a FISA warrant based upon the suspicion that one or more of its customers may be a terrorist or other law breaker. After, as long as someone has a lien on your property or vehicle, etc. you do not own it. Now does that scare you? That is essentially what they have done with phone records and online data mining. This is not the stuff that America was made of or founded. Frankly, we need to push back by suing our government over and over again for unlawful search and seizure.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 18:23:16 +0000
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