" When all is said and done, police are subjecting a significant fraction of America's population to a police state..."

What’s Bad About a House-to-House Search?

by Michael S. Rozeff

Unless the search passes certain legal criteria, it is illegal.

The search in Boston set a precedent, which means that such searches can be generalized to other places in America and to other situations, unless whoever authorized the Boston search is reprimanded and sanctioned for having ordered it. That seems to be Governor Deval Patrick, at a minimum.

Unless this search is clearly labeled and understood as being illegal and wrong, it creates a precedent. This changes the law de facto, even if not de jure. A de facto change will become a de jure change if only by interpretation

But what's bad about such a precedent? What's bad about the police having the power to make house-to-house searches routinely?

Consider what sorts of searches were common in totalitarian countries. This provides an inkling of the results of such police power.

First of all, America is in some respects following a path that Nazi Germany followed. I quote from one account:

"Police manpower was even extended by the incorporation of Nazi paramilitary organizations as auxiliary policemen. The Nazis centralized and fully funded the police to better combat criminal gangs and promote state security. The Nazi state increased staff and training, and modernized police equipment."

This has been happening in America for some time now. These are initial steps in creating a police state. The centralization is done through building authoritative organizations that control local deviations in behavior and through funding. The funding brings in militarization and central coordination, training, and routines.

From the same source, we next read

"The Nazis offered the police the broadest latitude in arrests, incarceration, and the treatment of prisoners. The police moved to take 'preventive action' that is, to make arrests without the evidence required for a conviction in court and indeed without court supervision at all."

We are seeing in America a broad latitude given to police in making charges against civilians, in mistreating them and getting off the hook, in killing civilians in some cases rather than arresting them, in bringing false evidence into courts, in lying under oath and having their words accepted, and in seizing property. We also see prosecutors suppressing evidence and bringing false charges. Add to these misbehaviors and others the fact that almost anyone can be guilty of one or more felonies. When all is said and done, police are subjecting a significant fraction of America's population to a police state...

Read the rest here:
http://lewrockwell.com/rozeff/rozeff404.html