Proactive policing was inimical to the scheme of the Framers, which is why they were evicted in complaint no. 10 of the Declaration, and they never sneaked back to these shores until after the War of Northern Aggression, when Lincoln proved that cries of “war” and “emergency” and “necessity,” whether accurate or not, would invite eviscerations of constitutional and founding precepts.

Proactive policing is the evil here, and there are unavenged/unpunished violations of people’s rights daily, all across the fruited plain, by various levels and versions of the police, and that only occurs because a weak and uneducated public allows it.

Jerry Dyer needs to note that “police” are not mentioned in the Constitution. Defense attorneys, judges, and juries are: they are the protectors of the public.

I suspect that American society has become increasingly conflict-averse. It’s true that there’s a deep strain of anger in the public discourse, but it frightens even the people who are caught up in it. (And well it should, as the incident that kicked this post off illustrates.)

The problem is that our society is founded, on a very deep level, on the principle of productive tension. The three arms of the federal government are supposed to produce good governance based on it. And yes, it is the essence of criminal trials.

But that kind of tension requires both passion and dispassion. As you say, you have to strongly and energetically oppose the wrong actions, the incorrect arrests, the wrong conclusions, while still believing deeply in law enforcement and its value to society. But it’s hard, in an emotional atmosphere, for people not to turn that into “do you like me? do you hate me?” Hard not to personalize it.

I don’t know what to do about this, not on a societal level. I do know that it frightens me that we aren’t doing anything except digging deeper in.
.-= Abi Sutherland´s last blog ..Semi-Occluded Light (Web) =-.

Kind of felt like you had been doing that, too, but I guess I misjudged you. It must be hard to appear fair when you’re pushing hard on things to get them back on track. Reaching out to sympathize with and to honor your adversaries is a great way to enlist their help in bringing things back into balance. And a generally respectful thing to do.

Caring and nuanced thinking like this makes me proud to be a friend.