Voices are spoken. Important voices. Voices such as the president of the United States, the governor of Missouri, the mayor of Ferguson, religious leaders and community leaders. These voices are often neither heard nor heeded by joyriding teens, professional agitators, and criminals looting local business establishments. What must the civilized world think of the United States?
The United States has always stood for the rule of law and the right of free speech. The right of free speech without vandalism, looting, and total disrespect for law enforcement. The right of assembly and free speech does not include the burning of and destruction of private and public property. In America, it never has, and we hope it never will.
As frustrating as the unfolding scene in Ferguson was, the intensity, method, and lack of professionalism on the part of the news media was indeed significantly flawed. When do reporters become biased commentators? When do entire networks, both left and right leaning, have a right to totally distort a news story into a circus? That is not good journalism; it is a travesty.
The American jurisprudence system may not be perfect; however, deriving its basic concepts from English law, and refining the precepts over centuries, it has become the envy of the world, and one which emerging nations seek to emulate.
In The Common Law, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. wrote, “The first requirement of a sound body of law is, that it should correspond with the actual feelings and demands of the community, whether right or wrong.”
Neither race, religion, ethnicity nor sexual persuasion can be allowed to determine legally what is right or wrong in the eyes of the law. Any such deviation serves only to help destroy our democracy.
The determination of the grand jury in Ferguson was a legal decision by community citizens, based on a preponderance of the evidence, sworn testimony, and solid forensic evidence. Whether we agree or disagree with their conclusion, the inappropriate actions of some should not be tolerated.
While there can be legitimate debate about the decision, there cannot and must not be destruction, violence, mayhem, and lawlessness resulting from the grand jury decision in Ferguson or any other place in United States. This is not who we are as a nation.
The destruction of local businesses, especially before the holiday shopping season, causes unnecessary economic pain, the loss of jobs, and the task of trying to rebuild businesses and lives. Those who loot and destroy should be made to help rebuild.
Demonstrations and protests in other distant parts of America should not be tied to a local incident that had nothing to do with jobs, wages, and work hours. These incidents again portray an America in dislocation and disarray.
The current dislocation in the United States includes domestic issues, national security issues, military strength issues, and foreign policy. In this country voices of reason, voices of conciliation, voices of authority, and voices of the future need to be heard and not fall on the ears of a dislocated minority. These voices should no longer be futile voices.
Joe Lill says
Hmmm…….I wonder how Mr. Hall would describe the Boston Tea Party if it happened today?
Tina Jenkins says
The Boston Tea Party was shown to be the voice of the majority. Ferguson is a mob of attempted intimidation by a few.
Joe Lill says
At the time of the Boston Tea Party the country was divided…just as now. In fact, John Adams,…..2nd President of the United States, represented the British Soldiers accused of murder at the Boston massacre.
James Nick says
Not to go off on a tangent here but Ms Jenkins needs to go back and re-read her history books. The Boston Tea Party cannot be characterized as having been the voice of the majority. The Tea Party was organized by the Boston tea merchants, lead by a small cadre of activists, and joined by perhaps 100 spontaneous volunteers. They hardly represented the majority of Boston, the colony of Massachusetts, or the 12 other colonies. The basis for the Tea Party was to protest the removal – not the imposition – of a tax by the Crown on tea coming into the colony from the British East India Company. The cheap tea was seen as a threat by the Boston merchants since it undercut the price of the smuggled tea that they were selling. In reality, the Boston Tea Party wasn’t the mythological seminal event that catalyzed the American Revolution. It was mostly ignored for half a century and rescued by conservatives in the 1830s who renamed the event the “Tea Party”, to invoke a more genteel image instead of “the destruction of the tea.” as it had been known.
But Mr Hall’s Op Ed raises many more issues pertinent to today that need a more vigorous response that will be forthcoming. Watch this space.
James Nick says
Mr Hall’s focus on the civil unrest following the events in Ferguson and Staten Island is just like a magician’s sleight of hand. It is a distraction – smoke and mirrors. No rational person of any political stripe condones mob action that results in death or injury or the destruction of property. It is indefensible and is not an issue to even be questioned or debated. Mr Hall uses the specter of joyriding teens, professional agitators, and criminal looting to distract from the details of the Ferguson and Staten Island cases that revealed for all to see that pervasive and gross law enforcement and prosecutorial misconduct exists throughout this country.
In 1985 the US Supreme Court held that ” [It] is unconstitutional … [to use] deadly force against… an apparently unarmed, nondangerous fleeing suspect; such force may not be used unless necessary to prevent the escape and the [police] officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others.” (see https://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=471&invol=1),
According to the 13 civilian eyewitnesses in Ferguson who were able to answer questions about what happened after the encounter between Mr Brown and Officer Wilson at the window of his SUV, 11 witnesses consistently said that Mr Brown was running away from Officer Wilson and had put his hands up when he was fired upon (see https://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/newly-released-witness-testimony-tell-us-michael-brown-shooting/). Based on sworn testimony, Mr Brown was wounded, unarmed, and fleeing, which, by Supreme Court definition, no longer represented an immediate significant threat to Officer Wilson’s life or others. I totally get and accept that after the struggle for his gun in the SUV, Officer Wilson must have been operating in an almost automatic reflexive manner fueled by an overwhelming complex of fight or flight impulses and emotions. But nevertheless, by established US law, he was obligated at that point to refrain from the use of deadly force.
The testimony before the Ferguson grand jury along with the Supreme Court ruling seems like a sufficient reason for a grand jury to move the case to trial and let a criminal jury decide whether Officer Wilson acted appropriately under the circumstances. That is all most protestors have demanded. But what lead the jury to short circuit the judicial system and not indict? According to knowledgeable commentators, the conduct of the grand jury was highly unusual from the get-go. The DA conducted the grand jury inquiry like a full-blown trial, cherry picked eyewitness testimony, and otherwise acted as if he was Officer Wilson’s defense attorney during the questioning of witnesses. But that was not the worst of the prosecutorial misconduct. It turns out that the jury was provided with a copy of a Missouri law that predated the 1985 Supreme Court ruling that allows police to use lethal force if they reasonably believe it is “immediately necessary” to effect the arrest of someone who has “committed or attempted to commit a felony.” (see, for example, https://crooksandliars.com/2014/12/missouri-ag-ferguson-grand-jury-was-misled). The jury heard Officer Wilson’s testimony with the wrong understanding of the applicable law. It was not until three days before the jury made their decision that the Assistant Prosecuting Attorney informed the jury, without further clarification or instruction, that the Missouri statute they were using to judge the lawfulness of Officer Wilson’s actions did not comply with US case law. The Assistant Prosecuting Attorney soft-pedaled the “oversight” this way: ” … So the [Missouri] statue I gave you, if you want to fold that in half just so that, you know, don’t necessarily rely on that because there is a portion of that that doesn’t comply with the law.”
Mr Hall writes that “The determination of the grand jury in Ferguson was a legal decision by community citizens, based on a preponderance of the evidence, sworn testimony, and solid forensic evidence.” That’s just plain nonsense! The grand jury was manipulated by DA to come to the predetermined conclusion he wanted. Is there any wonder that this blatant misconduct sparked protests across the country? Can there be any doubt that the Ferguson and Staten Island cases revealed that there are separate justice systems for whites and blacks?
Mr Hall asserts that “Neither race, religion, ethnicity nor sexual persuasion can be allowed to determine legally what is right or wrong in the eyes of the law. Any such deviation serves only to help destroy our democracy.” What’s that, again? Doesn’t that totally contradict the quote by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes that Mr Hall himself cites, to wit: “The first requirement of a sound body of law is that it should correspond with the actual feelings and demands of the community, whether right or wrong.” In other words, Justice Holmes said that it is incumbent that people of all races, religions, ethnicities and sexual persuasions see to it that their unalienable rights, endowed by their creator, are protected and legal in the eyes of the law.
Finally, Mr Hall ponders what the civilized world must think of the United States in light of the grand jury decisions in Ferguson and Staten Island and their aftermath.
I’ll venture a guess. I think they are wondering what in the world is going on in this country. I think they wonder how it is that a community like Ferguson that is 85% black has a police force that is 94% white. I think they wonder why there is an epidemic of white police killing unarmed young black men around the country. I think they wonder why we are systematically dismantling our democracy by legalizing political bribery through the Citizen’s United ruling, gerrymandering congressional districts that now result in sham elections, and are actively working to suppress voter participation instead of encouraging it. I think they see a legislative branch that has gridlocked itself with vicious, uncompromising, zero-sum partisanship and wonder why. And now, mostly recently, I think they wonder why we have ceded all moral authority by having authorized torture.
Mr Hall frets that this country used to stand for the rule of law, was a place of reason and conciliation, and a country that emerging nations seek to emulate. I wonder why he can’t figure out why that isn’t the case anymore?
Steve Payne says
The prosecutor in this case has now admitted publicly that he knew some of the witnesses that he put up before the grand jury lied.
https://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/unmasking-Ferguson-witness-40-496236
Ron Jordan says
As the new year is upon us, I wanted to thank James Nick for his very informative piece in relation to the fantasy of Mr. Fletcher Hall. May everyone have wonderful New Year and may Fletcher Hall wake up and joins us in this century.