|
|
|
|
|
|
by jpxxx
4959 days ago
|
|
|
I appreciate your thoroughness. I fear I am not focusing my argument well. Administrative search at airports is legal, yes.
Consent is not required or relevant, yes.
Bag checks and scans are mandated by law, yes.
Magnetometer searches are protected by law, yes.
Weapons searches are protected by law, yes.
Carrying a meth pipe in your pocket is probably a bad idea, yes. I am very specifically arguing that modern physical custody searches (aka "pat-downs") as performed by the TSA do not qualify under any Fourth Amendment exemptions. They have not been ruled as constitutionally reasonable upon by the SCOTUS, and that until they are, they are forbidden by the fourth amendment. Administrative searches must be 'minimally intrusive' and 'escalat[e] in invasiveness only after a lower level of screening disclose[s] a reason to conduct a more probing search'. Custody searches, in my personal opinion, do not qualify as minimally intrusive. Prior to the TSA's inception they were only used in very restricted settings. Now they're considered commonplace. |
|
|
Were it true then every single new law or administrative action (of the federal government) would need to be reviewed by the Supreme Court before it could be applied. Instead, we have the court system to address these problems after the fact. We assume that laws and policies are constitutional when put into place and use the court system to correct instances where they are not.
For the sake of discussion, let's switch to something similar. The shoe scans are a nuisance and are not effective. People dislike it even worse than the scanners and pat-downs. It takes time, which slows down the number of people who can be processed. Some people have balance or other problems, so it means there needs to be a chair during the line before screening. Others have religious or cultural aversion to putting socks or bare feet on a dirty ground, so many airports provide booties or paper slippers. This makes everything more complex.
The requirement that people must take their shoes off has not "been ruled as constitutionally reasonable upon by the SCOTUS." Therefore, under your viewpoint is it forbidden by the 4th amendment?
The view of the circuit courts, and implied view of the Supreme Court, seems to be that the pat-downs which you mention are reasonable under the 4th amendment, given the "degree to which it is needed for the promotion of legitimate governmental interests" and that it occurs in a place where "the need for such measures to ensure public safety can be particularly acute."