The Supremes are at it again. In a 5-4 vote, the US Supreme Court just said that the police do not have to "knock and announce" before implementing a search warrant. If the cops went right on in, any evidence they found pursuant to the warrant would not be excluded just because they didn't first let the occupants know they were coming. Antonin Scalia wrote the majority opinion, and the newest justice, Samuel Alito, apparently was the swing vote. The case had been argued twice, once before Sandra Day O'Connor retired, and once after. Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the dissent. [So we also get a clearer picture of how the balance of power has moved to the right on the Court.--Ed.]
My question pertains to Scalia's logic. He asserted at one point in the majority opinion that since the police had a warrant, it simply didn't matter whether they "knocked and announced." If it makes no difference, why not just do it? The only answer I can come up with is that this opinion is an early volley in the extreme right wing attack to end the exclusionary rule and eviscerate the Fourth Amendment. That is an answer I do not like and of which I am deeply afraid. I have to agree with Justice Kennedy in his dissent, who asserted that the exclusionary rule is settled law. Changing it now is blatant judicial activism.
Nevertheless, I'll bet the right-wingers who froth at the mouth at activist judges won't bat an eye at Scalia's opinion in this case. After all, the results agree with their predilections. So that's my next question: why can't people just be honest about their prejudices instead of hiding behind so-called "higher principles"?
Or do people really not see the contradictions in their claimed beliefs vs. their actual behavior? Are we really collectively so imprecise and uncaring? Or so dumb?
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This brings another subject to mind. I heard a Spanish radio announcer on NPR yesterday railing against the idea to make English the official language of the United States. His argument seemed to be that since Spanish was here already anyway, we cannot stop it, so we shouldn't even try. Besides, he claimed, no one is going to stop anyone from speaking Spanish at home, in their cars, at restaurants and grocery stores, and the like.
But that's NOT what the "English as official language" notion is about. It pertains strictly to official business, like dealings with the government at every level. An official language means only that the government's business is done in English. People in their personal lives are free to speak as they wish. What is wrong with that?
One of my uncles says it's unfair, because it takes a full three generations for immigrants to assimilate. But I'm not talking about assimilation. I'm talking about simple, basic transactions. When I lived in Germany, I wouldn't have dreamed of trying to force the Germans to deal with me in English. My German, bad as it was, would have to do. After all, I was a guest in their country. If they spoke English to me because their English was better than my German, so be it. But it's always the host's choice, not the guest's.
Don't get me wrong. I continued to use English in my personal life--it is, after all, my native tongue. Besides, I do have some heartburn about the fact that my great grandparents were so eager to assimilate that they lost their native Irish and didn't pass it along to their children and their children's children and their children's children's children. I'm as proud of my ethnic heritage as anyone. But I am an American first.
Too many people in this entire debate seem to forget that for a nation to survive, it needs a fundamental unified identity. Traditionally, language and ethnicity did the trick. But we are in the "melting pot" (personally, I prefer the idea of a "salad bowl," because the contents are diverse and clearly identified individually, but exist in harmony with the other ingredients). Language is what's left. That, and the dedication to the American ideal as expressed through the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Being an American is being in a certain state of mind . . . and to an awful lot of us, forcing official multilingualism on us takes away that state of mind. It makes us no longer America.
Please do not misinterpret me. I am all for multilingualism--the better we can understand each other, the less likely we are to have a world-demolishing war. But we also need to preserve the core of what America is if we are to preserve America. There are no easy answers. I do know that insisting we must yield American English is not the best way to foster understanding or to come to an answer that satisfies everyone. Or that satisfies no one, entirely. That's the genius of compromise, and that, too, is part of the essence of being American. Of course, a lot of Americans don't get that, either, so I guess I should not be surprised.
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I see that Tom Delay is now officially gone. Thank goodness! Not only is he corrupt. He also is one of the Americans who doesn't "get it." In his farewell to Congress, he was as defiant as ever; he said if he had it to do all over again, he'd be even less willing to compromise than he was before. For him, "compromise" seems to be a dirty word. Where the heck was he during civics classes? Not paying attention, obviously.
This whole "my way or the highway" approach to government is why we are in a lot of the mess we are in at the moment, with gridlock, deadlock, and partisan acrimony. So where are true statesmen when we need them, anyway?
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