Since its conception, the U.S. Constitution has been used to justify the impediment of progress. Strict constitutionalists claim any amendment to the Bill of Rights is incendiary and will lead to the demise of the U.S. They claim we must enact the visions of our Founding Fathers: the rapists, slave masters and elitists.
A strict constitution has never been about protecting citizens’ rights, but rather keeping alive institutions which benefit those who feel entitled to this nation. These institutions include white supremacy, patriarchy and homophobic sentiment. It is hypocritical for U.S. citizens to accuse any gun reform as infringement of the Second Amendment, but stay silent when minorities lose their Fourth Amendment rights through methods like the Patriot Act and “broken windows” policing. Advocates of a strict constitution protest government intervention in the state’s right to recognize marriages, but are silent when minorities lose their right to vote.
Stop-and-Frisk was put in place for police forces without warrants to be able to search anyone they deemed suspicious. Because it infringes on the Fourth Amendment, stop-and-frisk was illegal until Terry v. Ohio in 1968.
The effects of stop-and-frisk’s can be observed in a microcosm: New York City. During its decade long run, stop-and-frisk lead to over 100,000 stops per year, peaking at 684,330 stops in 2011. More young black men were stopped by the NYPD than the amount of young black men which lived in the city. In 2013, U.S. District Court Judge Shira A. Scheindlin ruled that New York’s version of stop-and-frisk was a form of racial profiling and unconstitutional.
Sadly, there are many other variants which undermine the Fourth Amendment. “Fruit from a poisonous tree” is a legal metaphor used to describe evidence obtained illegally. The analogy insinuates that evidence obtained illegally should be illegal to use. There have been many attempts to undermine this concept, such as the successful good faith exception. The “good-faith” exception allows officers to search without a legal warrant if their actions were rational, measured by the reasonable-person test.
The Patriot Act and expansion of mass surveillance programs are also part of the issue. Through various leakers, such as Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning, the power of organizations, such as the National Security Agency, to surveillance has been discovered.
As a result of the tragic mass shooting of Stoneman Douglas High School on Feb. 14, gun control has been introduced for legal discussion. Consequentially, gun advocates have used the constitution to deter any conversation about gun control. These advocates seem to be cynical believers of a strict constitution. Democrats have taken a pro-gun control stance and Republicans have taken an anti-gun control stance. If strict constitutionalism is the reasoning behind an anti-gun control stance, it is odd President Donald Trump has called for nationwide stop-and-frisk policies.
The tragedy of firearm-related deaths resides in its reduction to a couple mass shootings. Mass shootings create needed political discourse. What is lost is over 33,000 Americans are victims of firearm related deaths yearly. If our lives are valuable enough to spend more on defense than the next seven nations combined, it’s peculiar that gun policies aren’t in place to save lives on U.S. soil.
The ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment by Abraham Lincoln would have been even more exhilarating if the syntax of the amendment did not lead to free labor by private prisons. The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery “except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted,” a concept which has lead to mass incarceration of black Americans and modern day American slavery.
As our definition of morality becomes ever clearer, we must redefine our laws. Our forefathers gave the right to amend the constitution in Article V of the Constitution. Empirical models of working gun control exist for the U.S. to follow. The Second Amendment was put in place for protection against a tyrannical government. Despairingly, government technology, including mass surveillance, exceeds any gun’s ability to defend its owner.
Legal arguments should be made based on rational thought, not strict constitutionalism, which is derived from a heightened sense of nationalism. Any change is followed by resistance, as Americans are afraid to lose their heirloom. However, the requisite of living is adaptation governed by a forever changing time. Americans should welcome amending the constitution to abolish injustices such as private prisons and an anarchic gun state, while preserving the rights of appropriate amendments.
Soheil Saneei is a biological engineering freshman from Metairie, Louisiana.
