A very good article that defines modern statists.

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Originally Posted by LWW

So you can't actually cite anything.

A "STATIST RIGHT WINGER" is as common as is boiling hot ice water.

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Here's a cite where the 'conservative' majority took away 4th amendment protection, in favor of state power, as was ruled unConstitutional by an appellate court, overturning it, in this case:

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Board of Education v. Earls 536 U.S. 822 (2002)

The Tecumseh, Oklahoma School District has a drug testing policy that requires all middle and high school students who wish to participate in extracurricular activities to undergo a urinalysis that tests for the presence of illegal drugs. At the time of this case, this policy had only been applied to activities sanctioned by the Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association. The school district was sued by some students and parents in an attempt to have this policy vacated on Fourth Amendment grounds.


The District Court hearing the suit granted the school District a Summary Judgement (a ruling without a full trial). On appeal, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision, holding that the testing of the students was a violation of the Fourth Amendment. They ruled that because the School District had failed to show that there was a drug abuse problem among a sufficient number of students who were to be tested and that the test was suspicionless, the testing program would not have an effect in reducing a problem with illegal drug use.


Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the opinion for the Supreme Court. In reversing the decision of the Appeals Court, he held that "a probable cause finding is unnecessary in the public school context because it would unduly interfere with maintenance of the swift and informal disciplinary procedures that are needed." He ruled that there need not be suspicion of an individual or individuals for a search of students to be deemed reasonable. He noted the the "special needs" of public schools are beyond the needs of law enforcement. Relying on Vernonia School District v. Acton (1995), Thomas, he concluded that the students affected by the drug testing had a limited expectation of privacy because they voluntarily participated in extracurricular activities. Additionally, the results of the urinalysis were not used to penalize students academically or shared with law enforcement. For these reasons, the drug testing policy was not a significant intrusion on the student's privacy expectations and therefore, was not a violation of the Fourth Amendment.


In summarizing the decision, Thomas wrote "Within the limits of the Fourth Amendment, local school boards must assess the desirability of drug testing schoolchildren. In upholding the constitutionality of the Policy, we express no opinion as to its wisdom. Rather, we hold only that Tecumseh's Policy is a reasonable means of furthering the School District's important interest in preventing and deterring drug use among its schoolchildren."


In dissent, Justice Ginsburg noted that the Superintendent of the School District had termed the District's drug problem as "not ... major." She held that the testing was not reasonable and, therefore, a violation of the Fourth Amendment because the tests targeted a particular group of students that was not likely to be at risk from the use of illegal drugs.

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Again, the 'conservative' majority throws 4th amendment protections overboard when it comes to enabling state powers.

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Florida v. Bostick 501 U.S. 429 (1991)

Terrance Bostick boarded a bus in Miami, Florida intending to arrive in Atlanta, Georgia. During a stop in Fort Lauderdale, officers from the Broward County Sherrif's Department, holding a gun in a recognizable zippered pouch and displaying badges, boarded the bus, approached Bostick without suspicion, questioned him and asked for consent to search his luggage. The officer's informed Bostick that he was free to deny their request to search. Bostick consented to the search. Cocaine was found in his luggage and Bostick was arrested.


Bostick moved to suppress the seizure of the cocaine as unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment. His motion was denied by the trial court and affirmed by the Florida Court of Appeals who requested a clarification from (certified a question to) the Florida Supreme Court. The Court, holding that a reasonable person would not have felt free to leave the bus to avoid the oficer's questioning, adopted a per se rule that "working the buses" was a violation of Fourth Amendment protections, overturning the decisions of the lower state courts.


In reversing the decision of the Florida State Supreme Court, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor held that the Florida Supreme court was mistaken in adopting the per se rule. Relying on INS v. Delgado (1984), O'Connor held that the fact that the events took place on a bus was but one factor in determining whether the encounter was coercive in nature. She held that the question was not whether Bostick was free to leave, as argued by the Florida Supreme Court, but rather was he free to decline the officer's request and terminate the encounter.


Justice Thurgood Marshall, joined by Justice Blackmun and Justice Stevens, dissented. He held, "The majority attempts to gloss over the violence that today's decision does to the Fourth Amendment with empty admonitions. "If the war on drugs is to be fought," the majority intones, "those who fight it must respect the rights of individuals, whether or not those individuals are suspected of having committed a crime." The majority's actions, however, speak louder than its words."

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Not to belabor the point, but see this site: http://www.fourthamendmentsummaries....80s_cases.html

It summarizes key 4th amendment cases before the high court by decade (tabs at the top of the page), which see. Over and over again, the 'conservatives' hew to the state powers line, often by overturning prior court rulings including state supreme court rulings, and their own prior binding precedents, including that anonymous tips (whether actual or not) provide ample probable cause for otherwise unlawful searches.

In Havens:

The opinion of the Supreme Court was written by Justice White. In overturning the Court of Appeals, he held that even though the seized tee shirt had been illegally obtained by a warrantless search, [fruit of the poisoned tree] Haven's testimony under direct examination could be reasonably understood as a denial of McLeroth's testimony and that cross examination grew directly out of Haven's testimony. Therefore, the impeachment of Haven's testimony by the government did not violate his Fourth Amendment rights.


Justice Brennan wrote in dissent, "Not only is today's decision an unwarranted departure from prior controlling cases, but, regrettably, it is yet another element in the trend to depreciate the constitutional protections guaranteed the criminally accused".


In Illinois v. Gates:

The Illinois Circuit Court ordered the evidence suppressed on the basis that the evidence presented to the Magistrate in obtaining the warrant failed to meet the standards of probable cause. Their ruling was affirmed by the Appellate Court of Illinois and by the Illinois Supreme Court.


Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court, in this ruling, abandoned the two-pronged test developed in Aguilar v. Texas and Spinelli v. United States and replaced it with a new standard, the "totality of the circumstances".

In dissent, Justice Brennan held, "By replacing Aguilar and Spinelli with a test that provides no assurance that magistrates, rather than the police, or informants, will make determinations of probable cause; imposes no structure on magistrates' probable-cause inquires; and invites the possibility that intrusions may be justified on less than reliable information from an honest or credible person, today's decision threatens to "obliterate one of the most fundamental distinctions between our form of government, where officers are under the law, and the police-state where they are the law."