Speaking of which, do you remember watching this?

I was 16, and it was about as moving as anything I'd experienced at that point in my life.

But in a sign of how times change, 8 years later, my friend Tony Granato was playing on the US team and I didn't watch a game, nor did the olympics register much of a blip on my radar after 1980.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYscemhnf88&feature=player_embedded

Last edited by Max (4/22/2013 2:29 am)

"WTF?!? Do we have those unconstitutional "check points" in the USA now??!!??  I thought that was only in Indonesia that I had to deal with that shit."

We've had them around here for 20 years. My buddy once got cited at a checkpoint for not wearing a seat belt. We got pulled over in an antique Ford Galaxy convertible that didn't have seat belts, but that didn't seem to matter to the cop who wrote him the ticket. We didn't complain too much because we each had a couple of beers in us and it wasn't a certainty he would pass the breathalyzer.

APIAD wrote:

Max wrote:

WTF?!? Do we have those unconstitutional "check points" in the USA now??!!??  I thought that was only in Indonesia that I had to deal with that shit.

 

Why do u think they are unconstitutional?
 

The US Supreme Court has deemed check points constitutional under the US Constitution, but a handful of states' courts have found them unconstitutional under their particular state constitution.

They're legal in Missouri and Illinois, but not everywhere.  And in the states that permit them, there are usually strict guidelines that must be followed.

Last edited by forsberg_us (4/22/2013 2:23 pm)

Depends on which Constitution you're talking about. 

forsberg_us wrote:

"But in a sign of how times change, 8 years later, my friend Tony Granato was playing on the US team and I didn't watch a game, nor did the olympics register much of a blip on my radar after 1980."

Next time you see Tony be sure to tell him his sister was a better hockey player.

He hasn't gone to the reunions.  I think his sister was a soccer player.  But in any case, she was younger by enough that I never even knew her.
 

artie_fufkin wrote:

"WTF?!? Do we have those unconstitutional "check points" in the USA now??!!??  I thought that was only in Indonesia that I had to deal with that shit."

We've had them around here for 20 years. My buddy once got cited at a checkpoint for not wearing a seat belt. We got pulled over in an antique Ford Galaxy convertible that didn't have seat belts, but that didn't seem to matter to the cop who wrote him the ticket. We didn't complain too much because we each had a couple of beers in us and it wasn't a certainty he would pass the breathalyzer.

In MA for 20 years?!? 1993?  I stopped living in this country full time in 1994, and I don't remember hearing anything about this.  Not that I care too much for myself, becuase I am legal at all times, to the best of my ability, but I watched these in Indonesia, where the cops try to toss something into the trunk when you are not watching in order to extort a bribe.  

If they are not unconstitutional now:

a) they were when I was young
b) they should be now
c) they will be again as soon as we get past this demographic blip 
 

I was a cop from 1989 through 1996 and checkpoints were legal throughout.

The US Supreme Court confirmed their legality under the US Constitution in Michigan Dept. of State Police v. Sitz which was decided in 1990.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Dept._of_State_Police_v._Sitz

Last edited by forsberg_us (4/26/2013 11:41 am)

Max wrote:

forsberg_us wrote:

The US Supreme Court confirmed their legality under the US Constitution in Michigan Dept. of State Police v. Sitz which was decided in 1990.

Well, there you go.  It did happen after my time, more or less.  In any case, I have never seen a checkpoint in the USA, but experienced many in Indonesia.

Not entirely Max.  The fact that the Supreme Court confirmed the constitutionality of these checkpoints doesn't mean they were unconstitutional before 1990.  Just that this specific issue (DUI checkpoints) hadn't been addressed.  The first police checkpoint case was actually decided in 1976 and involved checkpoints set up on major highways leading from the border.  According to the Michigan case, the Michigan State Police began using checkpoints in 1986 (it took 4 years for the case to reach the Supreme Court).  I don't know if Michigan was the first state to do so or if other state's simply didn't face similar legal challenges.

Max wrote:

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

So, where is the crack by which this entered?  Is it because the 4th amendment only covers you in your house, person, houses, papers, and effects (and this does not mean "in their cars")?  Or do the police claim "probable cause" because you are driving at a time and place known to have drunk drivers?

You're correct that a person has greater protection in their home than in a car.  But the decision was based on the following language from an earlier decision

“[W]here a Fourth Amendment intrusion serves special governmental needs, beyond the normal need for law enforcement, it is necessary to balance the individual's privacy expectations against the Government's interests to determine whether it is impractical to require a warrant or some level of individualized suspicion in the particular context.”

Based on that balancing test, the Court concluded as follows:

"No one can seriously dispute the magnitude of the drunken driving problem or the States' interest in eradicating it. Media reports of alcohol-related death and mutilation on the Nation's roads are legion. The anecdotal is confirmed by the statistical. “Drunk drivers cause an annual death toll of over 25,000 and in the same time span cause nearly one million personal injuries and more than five billion dollars in property damage.”  Conversely, the weight bearing on the other scale—the measure of the intrusion on motorists stopped briefly at sobriety checkpoints—is slight.

In sum, the balance of the State's interest in preventing drunken driving, the extent to which this system can reasonably be said to advance that interest, and the degree of intrusion upon individual motorists who are briefly stopped, weighs in favor of the state program. We therefore hold that it is consistent with the Fourth Amendment."

 

My first reaction is that I utterly dislike the "balance" argument.  Sounds like the people lost rights in this case.  

Immigration problem?  checkpoints
Gun problem? checkpoints
Deadbeat dads?  checkpoints

Why is drunk driving so much worse than a myriad of other problems our nation faces?

Well, it is the case that there is a large immigration checkpoint north of San Diego, but it is a permanent structure and seems to me more like border control than a what I think of as unconstitutional.  Perhaps random checkpoints is where my beef is. 

For example, if a city were to control liquor service in a single section of town, and then limit access to that section via a few roads, I suppose I wouldn't object to sobriety checkpoints.  But the idea that I could be driving down the highway and suddenly come upon a checkpoint, where all cars are waived over and checked . . . that's a bit galling as an American.

I think I remember a Gestapo-suburb I once lived in, Woodridge IL, tried to use random checkpoints for something like "city registration stickers", and there was a legal fight over it.  Damn, it's been so long ago I can't remember things clearly, but I seem to remember that back in the suburbs of Chicago it was pretty common for the local village/city to require you purchase a little registration sticker and put it on youer windshield.  Does that sound right to anyone else?

forsberg_us wrote:

If you're looking for the specific "crack," it's probably found in the word "unreasonable" (as in unreasonable searches and seizures).  The evolution of the law is that where the State's interest sufficiently outweights the degree of instrusion, the search/seizure is considered reasonable.

i agree.  How long does it take for a car to pass a checkpoint.  5 minutes tops?  Ive never been through one or been involved in one.  I assume a check on the insurance, plate number and drive is all that is aksed.  If the driver happens to be drunk then they are going to be delayed longer but that is kind of there fault for being drunk.  
 

I will drop all complaints about sobriety check points, under the "probable cause" argument, if the government will stop and examine the laptops of every billionairre, and their consiglieres, searching for financial crimes.  

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-30/william-koch-must-face-false-imprisonment-suit-judge.html