How many of you have every been arrested? Hopefully none, but how many of you have seen those online videos of American Citizens or even Legal Aliens from across the country getting pulled over and asked a series of question with trying to prove their citizenship and being asked to where their final destination is? Some reply with “Am I free to go,” or even “If I’m being detained what law do you suspect me of breaking or committing?” These traffic stops or police checkpoints have been a controversy in today’s society for quite a while and have yet to be completely figured out by today’s justice system. When Thomas Jefferson said, "A government big enough to give you everything you want, is a government big enough to take away everything that
Many people believe that they have to follow the laws no matter what the cause or suspicion. But what Gairdner states is that you have the right to protest to avoid the unjustness of the law whenever you feel is necessary. Although the unjust law system basically states if you break one of the laws you could basically be sentenced to a whole life in prison or basically sentenced straight to death. Even thought Gairdner states that there are plenty law abiding citizens that don’t really care if the system is corrupt in any way and will do anything “for a buck” but, there is also a handful of people willing to against it and willing to go to jail in the process. Just like Martin Luther King Jr. went to jail for abiding by the law, many are still inspired by the movement and continue to follow in his great words or
Augustine’s quote in saying, “an unjust law is no law at all,” and, as Thoreau would have said it, “transgressed at once,” I firmly set my foot down and agree with them completely with them in terms of how unjust laws shouldn’t even be considered laws at all. Like Martin Luther King once said, “I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law (BrainyQuotes). Never let the law fool you into thinking it has absolute control over actions, you have freedom as a citizen of the United States and you should use that freedom wisely and to your absolute advantage. You have nothing to lose but your self esteem and
Stop and Frisk is a procedure put into use by the New York Police Department that allows an officer to stop and search a “suspicious character” if they consider her or him to be. The NYPD don’t need a warrant, or see you commit a crime. Officers solely need to regard you as “suspicious” to violate your fourth amendment rights without consequences. Since its Beginning, New York City’s stop and frisk program has brought in much controversy originating from the excessive rate of arrest. While the argument that Stop and Frisk violates an individual’s fourth amendment rights of protection from unreasonable search and seizure could definitely be said, that argument it’s similar to the argument of discrimination. An unfair number of Hispanics and
One of the biggest reason stop-and-frisk should be abolished is in hopes to decrease such blatant racial profiling that has been going on under the name of “stop-and-frisk”. In 2007, 55% of the people stopped in New York were blacks and 30% were Hispanic (“Update: Crime and Race”). When checked again in 2011 a total of 685,000 people were stopped by the police of that 685,000, 52.9% were African Americans, 33.7% were Latino, and 9.3% were white (“Racial Profiling”). There is a story of an innocent victim of the stop-and-frisk policy, a man by the name of Robert Taylor. Police in Torrance stopped the elderly man and claimed he fit the description of a suspect that was linked to a robbery. But there was one simple problem; Taylor is a light complexioned, tall, 60 year-old man and the suspect was believed to be a short, dark complexioned, stocky man in his thirties; nothing like Taylor at all (Hutchinson). His shows that the police do not always stop people based on the right reasons, they tend to stop people based on the color of thei...
Have you ever been followed by store officials or security while shopping in a department store? At first, all of the attention can be flattering but quickly becomes insulting once you realize they’re not following you to offer any assistance. Instead because of how you look you fit a certain profile that causes store officials to think you’ve come to their store to steal. This type of behavior is called racial profiling. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, racial profiling refers to the discrimination practice by law enforcement officials of targeting individuals for suspicion of crime based on the individual’s race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin. Citizens need to be more aware of racial profiling and make laws that racial profiling should be illegal. Racial profiling is carried out by law enforcement airport security, and other security personnel that look to profile the minorities for no reason. Heather Sally Newton Driscoll ebscohost.com stated “The practice of profiling is rooted in centuries of discrimination and is based on stereotypes that have long been disproved. Profiling holds on entire population accountable for the committed by a small minority”.
According to St. Augustine “an unjust law is not a law at all”(p186). This belief has been shared by many influential leaders in the past, including Henry Thoreau, Mahatma Ghandi, and Martin Luther King. They all believed in a non-violent approach to solving their social grievances. In most cases their approach was successful and was noticed by society and brought about a change in the laws. This nonviolent perspective stems straight from Jesus, who says, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”(p192). Others believe that by being disobedient you are under minding the laws and thus creating chaos within society. But, if unjust laws are not brought into light or under minded, then there will be no change in those laws. Martin Luther King felt there is a misconception of time in that the very flow of time cures all ills. On the contrary, time is neutral and it can be used either destructively or constructively(p190).
Does the federal government deserve to determine who gets the death penalty? It is debatable whether or not capital punishment should be expunged. Sending someone to the death, it is an important and serious decision to make. Capital punishment is cruel and unusual punishment. The thought of taking someone’s life is unjustified. Is capital punishment, even beneficial for our society? Capital punishment should be abolished because people can change, their other forms of punishment, and every person has the right to live, regardless of what they have done.
In his famous essay, “Letter from Birmingham Jail,’’ Martin Luther King, Jr. cites conscience as a guide to obeying just laws and defying unjust laws. In the same way, Henry David Thoreau wrote in his famous essay, “Civil Disobedience,” that people should do what their conscience tells them and not obey unjust laws. The positions of the two writers are very close; they use a common theme of conscience, and they use a similar rhetorical appeal of ethos.
I think there are always times when disobeying a law is morally justified. "They are sometimes unfair and repressive; common sense, social custom, and religion already provide enough guidance; and morality can never be legislated" (Kessler 154). Thoreau argued that any given law is not as high or not above what you believe in or what your conscious tells you is right. "We all have a moral duty to obey our consciences" (Kessler 154). I believe it is very clear how I stand on the subject of civil disobedience. After researching this topic and formulating my own opinions I have learned a great deal about my morals and myself. It simply shocks me when I think of the accomplishments of people like King, Gandhi, and Thoreau.
In 1986, Randy Steidl was convicted of the murder of Dyke and Karen Rhoads. After spending seventeen years in prison, twelve of which were on death row, he was freed from his sentence. The police had discovered that he had been framed through fabricated testimony in an effort to keep the real killer hidden from the police. When the jurors found no solid evidence of his relation to the crime, he was released and now contributes in an effort to repeal the death penalty (Exonerees). Capital punishment is the legal authorization to kill someone for committing a crime of a certain status. Capital punishment is expensive, it poses a risk of executing someone who is innocent, and it does not deter crime. The United States should federally ban capital punishment.
Corporal punishment is a traditional practice of imposing pain, which is commonly used by parents towards children to remove an unpleasant behavior. It is also a physical force towards a child for the purpose of control, and as a disciplinary penalty inflicted on the body. The parents play a pivotal role in honing and disciplining their child with regards to his/her actions. Hitting them with physical objects and forcing them to do cleaning works are some of the ways of discipline, which were done at home. In the year 2000, research, the convention, and law reform – modified the punishment towards children. According to research, 20,000 people in the U.S – particularly those who are 20 years old and above, 1,258 experienced punishment by pushing, grabbing, slapping and hitting. 19,349 people had been reported that they didn’t experience such kind of punishment. Moreover, it is also executed on the children, in order for them to act independently and to visualize the negativities of being careless and dependent to others. Punishment is also
Martin Luther King Jr. states “the law cannot make a man love me, but it can restrain him from lynching me, and I think that 's pretty important also." In this quote, Dr. Kings is referring to how biases the legal system is in the United State. His hope that one day the justice system will treat all man equal and race wouldn’t be a factor. However, African American and Hispanic are still being suppressed by the justice system. Police officers are still discriminating against minority and getting away with it. One can argued, that police are to be blamed for what is transpiring nowadays in our society. Furthermore, most of the riots emerged after an officer killed an individual and gets acquitted.
Imagine being involved in so much pain and misery, pharmaceutical tests, vaccine tests, Military experiments and training and brain experiments. 125,000 primates are imprisoned in US laboratories every year. In order to take the Primates at a young age from their natural habits, trappers will shoot the mothers from the tree, shock the animals with dart guns and capture the babies who are still clinging onto their dying mother. Do animals not deserve to be cared for the same way people care for other people? In laboratories, primates go through series of experiments that lead up to their death. 90 percent of primates in laboratories develop psychological issues. After being taken from family, Primates are locked in a small steel cage and left to be alone. At most the primates are given cheap plastic toys, scratched mirrors and occasional fresh fruit such as an apple or banana. Primates will eventually begin to
Imagine dedicating your life to a university not only on the academic level, but also the athletic level. With a full scholarship your time is dedicated to getting to class on time, finishing assignments, and making it to mandatory practices while also maintaining a strict workout schedule. With your day pretty much full of responsibilities, you do not have the time for a job to pay for anything that you may need outside of tuition, books, and housing. If your car breaks down or you run out of gas you have to pay for that out of your own pocket which is fairly difficult when you do not have an income to cover the costs and if you accept money or free services from any businesses, you could lose you eligibility as a NCAA athlete and lose your
We call ourselves the United States, yet we are anything but united. Social justice, which I believe to be the promotion of equality in money, opportunity, and rights amongst all people, plays a key role in todays ever-so-demanding society. Although many aspects can be affected by social justice, gender is major one. By creating equal pay between men and women and making feminine hygiene products for women become free, I believe that we as a society will inch towards creating a more just society.
High school education is for students to learn the basic information that is needed to prepare them for college. It is critical for students to feel that it isn’t a waste of time for them to wake up and go to high school everyday. Is it right for students to not come to school because they feel high school is a waste of their time? Majority of students has also felt that the courses they are attending aren’t giving them enough information that will be useful beyond high school. Shouldn’t students be in classes that will benefit them in the future? Should students be able to know what might be their strengths, and weaknesses in the courses that are required to be taken for a certain major? High schools should offer useful courses because it
Capital Punishment has always been a big question in peoples lives when asking how to deal with a prisoner dealing with life imprisonment. These prisoners have to put their lives in the hands of the judge and jury when putting out the punishment they get for the crime they committed. People have to decide if the crime the committed is worth ending someones life then and there or letting them live their life in prison. The death penalty to me is a horrible but needed part of life to prove a point to people who think getting away with crimes worthy of this punishment is worth doing. It puts the fear of god into people cause you are playing with god and your life when you have to decide between life and prison and lethal injection. Many states are still deciding whether or not they want their state to use the death penalty and that has kicked up a lot of controversy in there states population. Many different people on both sides of the debate on how to handle these types of criminals based on the crimes they have committed.