Revisiting Random Traffic Stops
The dangerous implications of recent Supreme Court decisions.
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By: Dr. Ian Torney
To be honest, I have never really given this issue much attention since I reside in the UK -- and it's rare you see police even attempting to enforce traffic laws, especially in the larger metropolitan areas. But a recent trip to Boston made me examine the concept of random traffic stops according to rational law and philosophical intent.
I was pulled over near downtown Boston in a random traffic stop checkpoint; the officer asked for my papers and became visibly testy when I asked the reason. There was no real time to push the issue, as I was going to be late for a conference if the detention ran too long. But as the officer walked off a bit and called in my licence, plates, etc., I had enough time to reflect upon what was really going on in the country where the maxim "Guilty until proven innocent" is increasingly treated with disdain and oft-times derision by those in power -- and by many American citizens as well.
Regardless of the offical reasons for conducting such stops (and it honestly doesn't matter what the excuse is), the philosophical basis for random stops is simple and obvious: all of us are guilty and we are to prove we're not. Recent Supreme Court decisions, such as Whren v. United States, 116 S. Ct. 1769 (1996), Ohio v. Robinette, 117 S. Ct. 417 (1996) and Maryland v. Wilson, No. 95-1268 (Feb. 19, 1997) have given the police extreme discretionary powers to do what they wish when it comes to traffic stops -- while placing the onus on the generally limited legal prowess of the average citizen to know what he must say or do under a myriad of scenarios.
It's interesting, to me at least, that most of these decisions have been championed and hurrahed by the conservatives in America...after all, they claim to belong to the party (Republicans, generally) which supposedly maintains as a platform plank the limited scope and role of government in the citizenry's everyday life and affairs. All manner of ill-conceived reasons are typically trotted out by these people in support of their hypocritical stance...the War on Drugs, identifying illegal aliens and the favourite strawman of the 21st century, identifying and rounding up terrorists. What these foolish excuses are meant to cover up is something far simpler and much more sinister; the increased power of government to control the innocent.
Police already have more than enough power to properly investigate any and all potential criminal activity...fishing expeditions are simply a convenient way for the more lazy officials to catch more fish. And while we can all applaud law enforcement efforts to crack down on those who perpetrate crimes, we must also remain vigilant that those we hire to enforce the law don't sink to the level of those they're trying to catch at our expense. Government likes to trot out the tired song that states something to the effect that "citizen's freedom and rights must be tempered with the ability of government/law enforcement/immigration to go about their jobs unimpeded." This is a morally, ethically and philosophically bankrupt position for a proper government to hold, however.
Sadly, most of us have forgotten the antidote to such lame reasoning -- another old song by Patrick Henry that is more valid and certainly philosophically more correct -- both morally and ethically..."The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government - lest it come to dominate our lives and interests."
Dr. Ian Torney holds doctorates in Philosophy, Mathematics and European Literature and is currently living and working in Cambridge, UK.
