No free speech if the Secret Service says so
Can't find that in the Constitution, somehow
"A Colorado man has lost his bid to sue two Secret Service agents who allegedly had him arrested in retaliation for critical comments he made to then-Vice President Dick Cheney during a public meet and greet event at a local shopping mall.
The man, Steven Howards, filed a lawsuit against the agents, claiming the retaliatory arrest violated his First Amendment free speech right to express an opinion in public without facing punishment from government officials. The US Supreme Court ruled 8 to 0 on Monday that the two agents are entitled to the protection of qualified immunity from such a lawsuit."
Source
15 comments:
If you make false statements to the Secret Service, you can be arrested for lying to Federal Officials in the United States. So if you're going to make critical statements about your government, make sure you don't include any false statements later.
Um,... the Constitution doesn't say your (protected) political speech must be factual.
Stan,
Normally I would agree with you but the when the man shook Cheney's hand, he simply put his hand on Cheney's shoulder. The Secret Service asked him if he had "assaulted" the vice-president. He denied doing so as would most people. The police then asked him if he had touched the vice-president and he said "no."
In the context of the conversation, if you asked a person if their putting a hand on a shoulder rose to the level of an assault, or if merely touching a person was assault, I can see that as not a lie, but a misunderstanding of the question as the person is thinking that the Secret Service is trying to get him to admit he had assaulted the Vice President.
Still, the decision seems fair.
Stan, you are refering to statements made to a Federal agent "during official questioning". (ie. an investigation) That does not apply to expressing your political opinions, which is protected speech.
Um,... the Constitution doesn't say your (protected) political speech must be factual.
That is not the statement that was a lie. The lie was whether the guy had touched the vice president. He denied it. The Secret Service had witnessed it.
Stan, you are refering to statements made to a Federal agent "during official questioning". (ie. an investigation)
This was an official investigation. Please read the actual opinion and see that the Secret Service asked the guy if he had touched the vice president. The guy said he had not.
That was the lie - not his political statement.
So the political elite in the US become like the royalty they claimed to replace (cannot be touched) - how like "Animal Farm"!
I have some sympathy for the Agents here, actually. The man was angry/agitated, had slapped Cheney earlier, and then later had come back for more. I wouldda hustled him outta there, too, under the circumstances, esp given his demonstrable hatred on top of the physical slap.
The larger concern in this case is this passage:
In a concurring opinion, Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer said they would not extend immunity to an ordinary law enforcement officer under the circumstances of the Howards case.
Incorrect! How dare they! The law applies equally or not at all!
Rather, one should extend some form of immunity (sov. imm. itself being a highly overused and abused legal tactic, tho appropriate in this particular case) to anyone, Agent, Officer, or Other, who has reasonable grounds to think they are preventing an imminent danger.
If, for ex, I had been shouting angrily in a playground about how overpopulation was a crime against nature and had even slapped a kid, then came back later with the fur still on my haunches still up, it would not be unreasonable for an Officer, or even an Other, who had previously observed me, to drag me outta there before we all became a grim headline together.
I would venture that many people yell at Cheney, but the only one hauled in was the guy who slapped him and then came back later for more.
(I eschew the arg that Agents were extra protective due to Cheney's recent medical history as I don't have enough info to comment on that, tho medical frailty might have contributed to the Agents' concern re the slapping).
In any event, if the lesson from this is "talk but don't touch," I think that's a reasonable standard. Absent physicality or direct threats, my opinion would be diff.
stinky,
had slapped Cheney earlier,....
The opinion does support this statement. Quoting the opinion:
"The parties dispute the manner of the touch. Howards described it as an open-handed pat, while several Secret Service agents described it as a forceful push."
Neither action is a "slap." It doesn't matter to how the case was decided, however.
Incorrect! How dare they! The law applies equally or not at all!
You misunderstand the reasoning for this. The Secret Service are enabled by law to act similar to prosecutors when charging an individual. There is no intermediary between the arresting agent and the charges being filed. With a "regular cop," there is a "buffer" of the prosecutor who can dispassionately decide to charge or not.
Thus, the dissent was saying they would not extend the same immunity to regular cops because of the presence of a prosecutor needed to file charges. The Secret Service does not have that "buffer" or "intermediary." In essence, the dissent was saying when charging a person, the Secret Service acts more like a prosecutor than a "beat cop."
Anon 1:13pm,
Well explained, thx. I was unaware of the Secret Service being de facto prosecutors under law.
As for the "slap", call it a push or a shove instead, but regardless, coming on the heels of a tirade of hate, I doubt it was an innocuous good-buddy hand on the shoulder ... and when the guy then came back (to look for his little lost boy, of course, all innocent), well, powder present, keg present, fuse burning.
A hands-off standard is fine by me. I suspect the shove was just little enough they let him go the first time, but just hard enough they were on the lookout lest he return.
I want no elite class protected from honest protest, but neither do I want to see thuggery snowball. The line against physical contact should be a bright one in order to accomplish both goals.
P.S. If the Secret Service needs no dispassionate prosecutor, no third-party overseer, would that not argue for a stricter standard on them, rather than a looser one? I'm a Canadian layman (i.e. not a lawyer) so perhaps I'm missing something in the logic here. Expediency for a unique job description, perhaps?
stinky,
I doubt it was an innocuous good-buddy hand on the shoulder ... and when the guy then came back....
He didn't come back. The Secret Service heard him on the phone saying he was going to ask Cheney "how many kids have you killed today?" They were on the alert from that.
Then when he got into line and made contact with Cheney (other than the handshake) that is when they went to talk to him. In the interview, they asked him why he had assaulted Cheney. He denied assaulting him. They then asked why he had "touched" Cheney and he denied that.
The Secret Service arrested him for lying to the Secret Service. (You don't have to talk to them, but if you do, you have to tell the truth.)
He claimed the arrest was for his comment, but the facts don't support that in that he lied to the Secret Service which was the underlying crime - not his comment.
As for the observation of "being held to a higher standard," you have to remember what is being charged here. The man is charging the Secret Service arrested him without cause. If all prosecutors and Federal agencies had to worry about being sued whenever they make an arrest, the system would bog down. So the Feds and prosecutors are given "qualified immunity" under the law which means you cannot sue them for actions within the legal scope of their job.
That means if the Secret Service made a "good faith" arrest such as in a case like this, they cannot be sued. If they arrest someone for something that is so far outside their job or so far outside of the known and established law, they can be sued.
The immunity allows cops and prosecutors to act without fear of being constantly sued as a government employee and as an individual. After all, who wants to work in job where you are constantly defending your home and possessions?
Anon 4:36 - It would be helpful for you to read the WHOLE article before stating facts not presented to the court.
No action was taken against Howards at that moment[of initial contact]. He walked away and attended a family event elsewhere in the mall.
Later, on his way back to his car, his young son wandered off. As he searched for the boy, he again entered the area where Cheney was still greeting voters.
He came back. True, he claims his intentions were to find his son, not confront the Veep, but the Secret Service agents had to ascertain whether this guy who had made comments earlier and "assaulted" in their minds the Vice President constituted a clear and present danger (or even a foggy, hazy one).
When he denied doing something the agent had actually seen him do - that he even admitted doing in later court documents and testimony - the agent became concerned enough to arrest him.
Maybe reading is a skill that's still "evolving" in your life....
Various agents described the contact as a push-off, a slap, a forceful touch, or a “strike that caused the vice president’s shoulder to dip.”
Who cares? Cheney is in God's waiting room.
Who cares? Cheney is in God's waiting room.
Depends whether or not one understands the diff between a verdict and a precedent.
Clearly, most people here do; clearly you do not.
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