DUI checkpoints and 'no refusal' weekends

mandatory blood draws, are they constitutional?

  • No, it violates my rights as a person

    Votes: 24 88.9%

  • yes, they are clearly constitutional

    Votes: 3 11.1%
  • Total voters
    27
SmarterThanYou said:
so then the courts are always right. public safety trumps individual rights.

BREITHAUPT V. ABRAM, 352 U. S. 432 (1957)

(c) The right of the individual to immunity from such invasion of the body as is involved in a properly safeguarded blood test is far outweighed by the value of its deterrent effect due to public realization that the issue of driving while under the influence of alcohol can often by this method be taken out of the confusion of conflicting contentions. Pp. 352 U. S. 439-440.

I find this quite pathetic, that rights can be judicially eliminated due to public pressure over some pressing societal need. we are no longer a free country, unless the courts say it is so.
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while i disagree with the court, the scotus in SCHMERBER v. CALIFORNIA had a very different reasoning than breithaupt....i see their logic, i disagree with it though and imo it is an invasion of privacy notwithstanding the facts of that case

4. In view of the substantial interests in privacy involved, petitioner's right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures
applies to the withdrawal of his blood, but under the facts in this case there was no violation of that right. Pp. 766-772.
(a) There was probable cause for the arrest and the same facts as established probable cause justified the police in
requiring [384 U.S. 757, 758] petitioner to submit to a test of his blood-alcohol content. In view of the time required to bring
petitioner to a hospital, the consequences of delay in making a blood test for alcohol, and the time needed to investigate
the accident scene, there was no time to secure a warrant, and the clear indication that in fact evidence of intoxication
would be found rendered the search an appropriate incident of petitioner's arrest. Pp. 770-771.
(b) The test chosen to measure petitioner's blood-alcohol level was a reasonable one, since it was an effective means of
determining intoxication, imposed virtually no risk, trauma or pain, and was performed in a reasonable manner by a
physician in a hospital. P. 771.
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I detest people who drive while impaired. But enough is enough. The idea that Constitutional protections are invalidated by the "needs of society" is beyond the pale. With a precedent like that, what is stopping them from taking the same course with anti-terrorism? Torture to get a confession because the needs of society outweigh the rights of the individual.

Thank God Montana's Constitution disallows sobriety check points and all the unconstitutional crap that goes with them. (There are 11 states which disallow them.) Seems it is becoming more and more up to the states to protect the rights of its citizens, since all three branches of the federal government have become more and more concerned with ways around the U.S. Constitution that actually following it.
 
Good Luck said:
I detest people who drive while impaired. But enough is enough. The idea that Constitutional protections are invalidated by the "needs of society" is beyond the pale. With a precedent like that, what is stopping them from taking the same course with anti-terrorism? Torture to get a confession because the needs of society outweigh the rights of the individual.

Thank God Montana's Constitution disallows sobriety check points and all the unconstitutional crap that goes with them. (There are 11 states which disallow them.) Seems it is becoming more and more up to the states to protect the rights of its citizens, since all three branches of the federal government have become more and more concerned with ways around the U.S. Constitution that actually following it.
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i don't have a problem with dui check points...there is no invasion of privacy and no denial of any right
 
Mojo said:
..."The Constitution of the United States clearly says that police can't just stop someone and conduct an investigation unless there are "articulable facts" indicating possible criminal activity. So how can they do exactly that with drunk driving roadblocks? Good question. And it was raised in the case of Michigan v. Sitz, in which the Michigan Supreme Court striking down DUI roadblocks as unconstitutional. In a 6-3 decision, however, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the Michigan court, holding that they were constitutionally permissible.

Chief Justice Rehnquist began his majority opinion by admitting that DUI sobriety checkpoints do, in fact, constitute a "seizure" within the language of the Fourth Amendment. In other words, yes, it appears to be a blatant violation of the Constitution. However, he continued, it's only a little one, and something has to be done about the "carnage" on the highways caused by drunk drivers. The "minimal intrusion on individual liberties," Rehnquist wrote, must be "weighed" against the need for -- and effectiveness of -- DUI roadblocks. In other words, the ends justify the means.

The dissenting justices pointed out that the Constitution doesn't make exceptions: The sole question is whether the police had probable cause to stop the individual driver. As Justice Brennan wrote, "That stopping every car might make it easier to prevent drunken driving... is an insufficient justification for abandoning the requirement of individualized suspicion... The most disturbing aspect of the Court's decision today is that it appears to give no weight to the citizen's interest in freedom from suspicionless investigatory seizures."

Rehnquist's justification for ignoring the Constitution rested on the assumption that DUI roadblocks were "necessary" and "effective." Are they? As Justice Stevens wrote in another dissenting opinion, the Michigan court had already reviewed the statistics on DUI sobriety checkpoints/roadblocks: "The findings of the trial court, based on an extensive record and affirmed by the Michigan Court of Appeals," he wrote, "indicate that the net effect of sobriety checkpoints on traffic safety is infinitesimal and possibly negative."

The case was sent back to the Michigan Supreme Court to change its decision accordingly. But the Michigan Supreme Court sidestepped Rehnquist by holding that DUI checkpoints, though now permissible under the U.S. Constitution, were not permissible under the Michigan State Constitution, and ruled again in favor of the defendant -- in effect saying to Rehnquist, "If you won't protect our citizens, we will." A small number of states have since followed Michigan's example."

http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/09/921.asp
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Further proof (as if any more was needed) that Michigan is the greatest state in the union.
 
Yurt said:
i did not say the court was right...

i believe it is an invasion, however, the courts believe our blood lawfully obtained evidence...imo, it is unnecessary invasion because you could still try the case w/o the blood sample, the testimony of the officer and other witnesses could make a case and your refusal to take the breathalyzer should be held against you
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WA state has gay DUI laws. Here, .08 on a breathalyzer is merely a guideline. The police have the final word on whether or not you were impaired, and therefore guilty of a DUI.
 
Toki Wartooth said:
Further proof (as if any more was needed) that Michigan is the greatest state in the union.
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Ha! Montana has the same prohibition. Not to mention other instances of telling Uncle Fed to take a hike. During the days of the old double-nickle, when the feds literally blackmailed states by withholding highway funds - Montana passed the 55, but made it a "conservation fine", set the fine a $5, with no hit on the driving record.

When the feds started their national ID kick, our governor told them to take a hike. When the feds told him he needed to file for an extension after the original deadline passed, he told them there is no way in hell he is filing anything. We still do not the so-called REAL IDs in our state - just good old fashioned, non-electronic state driver's licenses. (Michigan caved.)

Recently, we were one of a very few states to pass a law that states if a firearm is manufactured and sold in the state, it is not subject to federal regulations because interstate commerce does not apply. That law is currently in the federal courts. We're hoping it makes it to SCOTUS.

When our governor signed the bills he said:
I like guns. I like big guns, I like little guns, and I would like to buy a gun made in Montana.
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(I really like our governor - though he has been playing partisan a bit too much recently...)

We also passed a "shall issue" law for concealed carry, though those are not unusual any more.
 
It's pretty much the same here. We have no practical enforcement of speed limits, have our own FFA (freedom firearms act) about to be passed (may have already) and shall issue CC. We also don't have 3.2 beer.
 
So Michigan places caps on the alcohol level in beers that stores are allowed to sell? That's what I was asking you about earlier when I said "ridiculous caps."
 
Threedee said:
So Michigan places caps on the alcohol level in beers that stores are allowed to sell? That's what I was asking you about earlier when I said "ridiculous caps."
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No, we don't, Montana does. So does Utah, and a few other states. Michigan is a drinking paradise.
 
Yurt said:
i don't have a problem with dui check points...there is no invasion of privacy and no denial of any right
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Bullshit.

First, this isn't about privacy, it is about unreasonable search and seizure. Previous cases have upheld that stopping a person on public roads and highways without the justification of reasonable suspicion constitutes unreasonable seizure. Whether you are stopped your legal activities by a roving patrol car, or at a checkpoint, you are involuntarily stopped from your legal activity. That is seizure of person, regardless of how brief that seizure may be.

Even SCOTUS acknowledges that the 4th Amendment applies to any type of random stops, which includes checkpoints. But, according to them now, it doesn't apply enough.

What their decisions says (and I still can't think about this without getting seriously pissed off) is the violation is "minimal" and therefore, in "balancing the needs of the state" then the state takes precedence.

This is quite possibly one of the most dangerous precedents in allowing government to do whatever the hell it wants to do, because the "balance" of the "intrusion on rights" is subjugated to the "needs of the state" because those needs "take precedence"

Utter totalitarian nonsense, no matter what the good intentions may be.
 
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