Duffy’s Distain for the Constitution and the Courts
Photo by Andrew Slominski
I’ve always been opposed to the curfew in Rochester, primarily on principle. This week I was glad to see that the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court ruled the 2-year old law unconstitutional. Since I still have faith in our country as a free society I could have predicted this ruling, but what did surprise me was our mayor’s reaction. Duffy has stated that he is going to appeal the decision and continue enforcing the law, against the will of the court and the state and federal Constitutions. Amazing.
The Democrat and Chronicle wrote an article about the ruling yesterday and I’m glad to see that the reporter quoted City Council member Carolee Conklin as saying:
I have always felt it was an unconstitutional law targeting young people. I still feel that way…I don’t fault the mayor for continuing on with a program that he supports until all appeals have been exhausted.
It’s interesting that Carolee is not bothered by Duffy continuing to enforce this law. I disagree, but I think we should turn our attention to why the curfew was struck down. The court ruled 3-2 that:
The ordinance prohibits the presence of minors in any ‘public place’ for five or six hours each day … and thereby restricts expression in all public forums for approximately one-fourth of each day.
Therefore, the curfew was struck down as a violation of the 1st Amendment. The curfew did have six exceptions, one of which was that “teens exercising fundamental rights of free speech under the state and federal constitutions” would be exempt. Ask yourself: what does free speech look like? Is it a protest or rally? Certainly this is what comes to mind when we think about protecting free speech, but isn’t a small group of people assembled peaceably in a public place look like free speech as well? What about two people walking down a sidewalk? I agree that curfews fundamentally are a violation of the 1st Amendment.
One other important argument to note is that it does not matter what the government may intend by attempting to limit our rights, they cannot do so on principle. A public safety argument could be used to sign away all of our other rights as well, such as the right to bear arms, the right to petition the government for grievances, the right to due process or the right to be safe from unlawful search and seizure. If we don’t have these rights it doesn’t really matter how ‘safe’ we are, because our government has turned into a tyrannical one and we are not safe from it. Remember the words of Benjamin Franklin who wisely warned us that:
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
I find it unreasonable the contempt that Mayor Duffy has for the courts, the Constitutions and the youth of this community. He outright stated that he hadn’t gotten complaints from parents but that the young people didn’t like it too much. So it’s obvious that he doesn’t care about the rights of the young people, but now he’s bragging about setting up a nanny-state for the youth? Interesting.
I’m also pleased with the young person the Democrat and Chronicle interviewed for their article. Ifeyinwa Obieke is a student at Franklin and she doesn’t agree with the law either.
If I’m going to do bodily harm to someone, I’m not going to wait until 11 p.m. to do it…Young people are getting killed in the daytime, too. The curfew’s not going to eliminate the homicides and the crime rate. It’s a waste of money.
No 16-year-old should be in the streets after 11 o’clock … [but] I still see kids out, and I feel like the money (the city) spent is not worth it. It’s not making any progress. If we put that to education, into books, it would make progress.
Good point.
See also: http://stopcurfew.com/news.htm
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Absolutely. As far as I knew adults were also committing crimes in Rochester. When is it that Mayor Duffy will be instituting an across the board curfew? Perhaps his next move will be a city wide bedtime. I have faith that the courts will strike down this law at every turn. If they do not then it opens the door for the continued erosion of our rights.
Good point Ethan, I meant to mention that in my article, too. I think we all can agree that if adults weren’t allowed to be on the streets that it would be a violation of our civil liberties, but why is it any less so for minors? Look at the related articles by Zemanta for real examples of the police and military enforcing different types of curfews.
Another issue this touches on is parent’s rights to raise their children in a manner they deem acceptable. My parents certainly didn’t let me be out that late at night until I was approaching high school age, but it still happened a number of times before I was 16. Once the state assumes responsibility for an aspect of parenting that means the parents have just lost an equal amount of ownership over their children.
I really have no problem with the curfew, as for what is Constitutionally allowable. Minors do not posess the full set of rights that adults do, as being a minor means that the person has not yet reached the age of being a sovreign individual.
That said, I think there is a necessary discussion revolving around the sentiment evident held by the mayor and others in law enforcenment: namely, that the city cannot control crime unless teenagers are held in their apartments and houses.
This is the issue to examine, because honestly, I don’t see how Constitutional protections extend to minors. If they did, parents of children have NO AUTHORITY to raise their kids and make appropriate decisions for them.
More meaningful, to me, is the idea that the mayor and RPD are totally toothless as to their duties of supressing crime in Rochester, unless of course, people of all sorts stay inside their apartment and houses. This is what the mayor is admitting. Someone should force him to say in on the podium, because this is the essence of the matter. And when we can finally admit this to ourselves and ecah other, then we start wirking of the solution.
But ya can’t find a solution until you face the problem.
Schrodinger’s Cat:
I’m shocked that you would claim that minors have no Constituional protections. This is simply not the case. Minors should head to flexyourrights.org for some quick tips on what they should do when confronting the police. A quick summation is in the answer to number 15:
I’m also not sure how having constitutional protections would prevent parents from doing their job. The Bill of Rights is meant to protect individuals from the Federal Government, not their parents. Parents are still free to search their children’s rooms without consent, etc. I’m pretty sure that giving due process to minors is a good idea. The same can be said for the other rights, especially freedom of speech, which is the most precious of all of our rights.
Ask yourself this: If the young people among us (I’m almost that young) aren’t allowed free speech, how will we ever change our society for the better? Isn’t it with youth that comes great ideas?
Again, I refer you to Franklin’s quote posted above in the article.
Andrew and the Cat, you both make good points but I have to side with Andrew on the rights issue. Children must be granted Constitutional rights; otherwise, the age at which someone does obtain full rights could be arbitrarily changed. I know a few “children” that are 30 years old, so maybe they should not have full Constitutional rights.
Yes, parents are granted authority over their children up to certain ages prescribed by law but that does not mean that children have no rights. Children may not have full legal authority to make their own decisions but they do have rights. They must have rights to protect them from abuses of government and these rights even extend to protecting them from abuses by their parents. There a many organizations that exist specifically to protect the rights of children.
But the Cat makes a good point as well. Why do the police want to use a curfew as a crime fighting tool? Because they are inept.
Exactly Ethan. That is so on-target with the “curfew as a crime fighting tool” viewpoint. Paradoxally, it makes more criminals than existed previously, because now the act of being on the street during a certain hour has become a crime.
In response to the following quote: “This is the issue to examine, because honestly, I don’t see how Constitutional protections extend to minors. If they did, parents of children have NO AUTHORITY to raise their kids and make appropriate decisions for them.”
I strongly disagree. THE CURFEW is what takes the authority and responsibility away from parents and puts the government/law enforcement in the parental position of “making appropriate decisions for them.” The parents should be the ones in the driving seat of setting and enforcing the curfew for their children, not the government/law enforcement. In the case of minors who are not abiding by their parents rules (i.e. curfew, school attendance), then there are other legal avenues that parents can take for these specific minors (i.e. PINS, Family Assess and Connection Team).
So what age do you think that Constitutional Rights should be extended to a citizen of our country? When they turn 18? When they turn 21? When they get married? When they have a child? Or maybe we should have to pass a test in order to be extended Constitutional Rights? We should be empowering minors to embrace and advocate for their rights as citizens of this country. Maybe if we did this, as these young citizens near the age of voting ability, they would have a better knowledge of what the role and responsibility of government should be and what the role and responsibility of being a citizen of this country should be.
It strikes me as odd that the debate so far has been regarding the legality of curfews, when youth curfews in one form or another have existed for a long time and continue to remain legal today. Clearly curfews are something that our society accepts, largely because they are something that just makes sense and can be instituted in ways that still protect individual rights. We prohibit new drivers from driving at night for the same reasons: inexperienced individuals are not fully capable of making the best decisions, and if allowed to do as they please they can harm society in significant ways. Last fall I was hit by a driver without a night license, thankfully it was only a minor accident. When we turn 18 we mostly gain the rights of full fledged adults. This is not an arbitrary point in time, it is approximately when most people graduate from the public school system. In the mean time we make up for these restrictions by allowing many exceptions, having read the exceptions to the curfew, I think the policy is very reasonable. Had the driver who hit me been coming home from work, there would have been no legal issue, because we allow that as a reasonable exception. Do you consider East Rochester to be a police state because it has had a youth curfew in effect for many years now?
“…youth curfews in one form or another have existed for a long time and continue to remain legal today.”
Ryan, the state supreme court just ruled it unconstitutional. That’s the opposite of legal.
“Do you consider East Rochester to be a police state because it has had a youth curfew in effect for many years now?”
Well, I believe our entire country has been turned into a police state, not just East Rochester. War on Drugs, War on Terror, Federalization of state and local police forces, microphones on street corners (sold to the public as gunshot detectors), cameras, cell-phone triangularization and tracking, NSA supercomputers scanning phone calls and internet communications. Honestly, a youth curfew seems pretty minor compared to all of these things, but it does set the precident to allow for curfews for all.
Do you remember the gun confiscation that when on in New Orleans in the high and dry neighborhoods?
Also, did you know that there are ACTIVE DUTY troops patroling American streets as we write with lethal and non-lethal weapons? Check the Army Times website. If that’s not a police state, I don’t know what is.
“Ryan, the state supreme court just ruled it unconstitutional. That’s the opposite of legal.”
Correct, so obviously the legality of this particular curfew is still up for debate. My point is that curfews are legal, but they have to be crafted in ways that abide by existing laws. From the article the main issue the Appellate court found with the curfew appears to be the violation associated with the curfew:
“The teenager and his father appealed to the Appellate Division, which found that the city was superseding state laws — the Family Court Act and another part of the Penal Law — by allowing teens younger than 16 to be charged with a violation.”
My guess is that if the court of appeals throws the curfew out, it may be redrafted to give violations to the parents, who can also be held accountable for other crimes youths commit.
I think your idea that the curfew could be applied to the population at large is ridiculous:
“Honestly, a youth curfew seems pretty minor compared to all of these things, but it does set the precident to allow for curfews for all.”
How could you possibly get people in this country to vote for such a thing? Clearly you and I live in a different world. We have it good in this country. We’re far from North Korea, pretty much the definition of a police state in every right. Yet we don’t live in a lawless society, which you can read about here (1100 murders this year!!):
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap_travel/20081015/ap_tr_ge/travel_brief_border_violence
I’m glad to see you take note of the Mayor’s response.
A government curfew for children is unconstitutional. Any government official who says otherwise is ignorant of the Constitution and thus unfit for office, or worse, they are a traitor.
Unfortunately, Americans have grown accustom to actions of traitors.
“Clearly you and I live in a different world.”
So your world doesn’t have surveillance cameras, police with tasers that have resulted in hundreds of deaths, microwave and sound cannons for crowd control, warrant-less wiretapping, the Patriot Acts I & II, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, free-speech zones, and a witch-hunt for the “White al-CIAda”?
Man that must be awesome. Where do you live?
Good point Kenyatta, make sure you’re logged in when you leave a comment next time.
“How could you possibly get people in this country to vote for such a thing?”
Have you been paying attention to the news recently? Our elected officials love to pass ridiculous laws even when the vast majority of the society disagress (ahem, the Bailout Plan).
I absolutely agree that this curfew is far from the many more serious violations of our Constitution that exist in our country, but it is the “can of worms” that a violation, like this curfew, opens.
Good point Nicole.
Ryan,
I don’t know if you just missed this one but it is absolutely possible that a curfew can be extended to the whole population. Lawmakers will do this without regard for citzens rights or the Constitution. Allowing it to happen and not standing up against these infringments despite the intentions or outcomes of the unconstitutional actions only invites more infringments.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/08/13/town.curfew.ap/index.html
And this article explains that during that week there were 10 felony arrests in a 10 block neighborhood, obviously this area has a extraordinary drug/crime problem. It pains me to see this too, short of gross natural disasters or other extreme states of emergency, I hate to see curfews applied to the general public too.
And this article explains that during that week there were 10 felony arrests in a 10 block neighborhood, obviously this area has a extraordinary drug/crime problem. It pains me to see this too, short of gross natural disasters or other extreme states of emergency, I hate to see curfews applied to the general public too.
A seriously bad spot of town, I guess. How can so much crime be in such a specific Rochester neighborhood without getting serious attention from the Rochester PD? I would think they would be all over it. Or if they are, how can this continue to be so bad…. What's the deal Rochester?
That's the problem. The "bad" parts of town are expanding. That's what the police are supposed to be doing. Bringing those areas down and the good ones up.
Thanks for that amazing disinformation. Your IP has been logged Julie, or should I say John or perhaps Lisa?
Actually 'Lisa' commented as Lisa, Julie and John all under the same IP. I don't think that's being very helpful or productive - it's called trolling.
Also, which part of 'free speech' means I don't get to disagree? Isn't that my free speech?
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