US Constitutional Amendments I'd propose

[ZOmegaZ]

A few weeks ago I posted a thread asking what US Constitutional amendments people would propose. Since then, I've been blogging on the subject, synthesizing those ideas, others I've seen, and a few of my own. I've got a list of about fifty now. I'd like to post them here for discussion and feedback.

My plan is to post them in groups, and update this first post with more over time. That way things don't get overwhelming. I'm specifically trying to not advance partisan agendas. My primary intent with these is to start discussion, and preferably to address structural issues with our system of government. The goal is to fix problems that we observe today, much as the intent of the Constitution as written was to address the problems observed at the time.

1) Should 3/4 of states ratify identical amendments to the Constitution, and at least 1/2 of the total number of states containing at least 1/2 the total population of the US ratify that amendment by popular vote, that amendment shall be adopted, regardless of whether or not that amendment has been proposed by Congress or an Article V convention.

2) Persons arrested or charged with crimes have the right to privacy until convicted. No person accused of a crime shall have their name publicly released until and unless they are convicted. Purposeful violation of the privacy of the accused without their written consent, filed with the court, shall be punishable by law.

3) No person convicted of a crime shall be punished until all judicial appeals are exhausted. Appeals shall be conducted without undue delay.

4) Every jurisdiction shall have sufficient judges and public defenders to ensure swift justice for all in that jurisdiction, including appeals. These positions shall be funded as necessary by the relevant jurisdiction, with a dedicated funding source.

5) No fees shall be charged for access to the courts.

6) In all lawsuits, money contributed to legal representation shall be divided evenly among all parties. Money submitted for legal representation that goes unused by any party shall be used to fund attorneys for the public defense.

7) All persons in the US shall have full access to the US justice system at all times, including class-action suits, regardless of prior contractual obligations. Any clause of a contract which denies either party access to a court of law for redress of grievance, is hereby invalid.

[Rogue 9]

Your second proposal doesn't pass the smell test. People know people, and people talk. I've had coworkers arrested before; would my boss be liable under the amendment for telling me why I was called in and the scheduled person isn't there?

[Thanas]

Number 2 is problematic. If my bank manager is getting arrested for stealing, I better have a right to know even if he did not steal my money.

[ZOmegaZ]

Yeah, I can see that argument. Perhaps we improve the wording? I mean, it's an infringement on free speech, but there are already laws like that. You can't make public comments that materially harm an innocent person's reputation. I'm going for something similar for the innocent-until-proven-guilty. I understand this is done in some places, particularly with minors...

[Thanas]

No, it has to be scrapped altogether. The public needs to know. Especially if it causes past victims to come to light. Especially in cases of rape where we often find that other victims kept quiet but will come forward once they know the offender is in custody or faces trial.

[Esquire]

Number 7 looks like it makes liability waivers not a thing, is that actually true?

[Beowulf]

No, it has to be scrapped altogether. The public needs to know. Especially if it causes past victims to come to light. Especially in cases of rape where we often find that other victims kept quiet but will come forward once they know the offender is in custody or faces trial.

On the other hand, suppose a guy gets falsely accused of rape. Girl has second thoughts the day (or week) after, and rather than own up to her mistake, claims that he raped her. Guy gets arrested, publicized as a rapist (press will stick "accused" on there, but no one else will). Social life is shattered, name gets on the internet as a rapist (and nothing every leaves the internet). Month later, charges are dropped, as there's no corraborating evidence of any sort (since it was consensual to begin with).

[Knife]

Number 2 sounds iffy to me. The whole reason, as I understand it, to have it public record is so the government can't do sneaky stupid things. By making it law to no publicly release information of what the government is doing to whom, you're just inviting problems.

[Thanas]

No, it has to be scrapped altogether. The public needs to know. Especially if it causes past victims to come to light. Especially in cases of rape where we often find that other victims kept quiet but will come forward once they know the offender is in custody or faces trial.

On the other hand, suppose a guy gets falsely accused of rape. Girl has second thoughts the day (or week) after, and rather than own up to her mistake, claims that he raped her. Guy gets arrested, publicized as a rapist (press will stick "accused" on there, but no one else will). Social life is shattered, name gets on the internet as a rapist (and nothing every leaves the internet). Month later, charges are dropped, as there's no corraborating evidence of any sort (since it was consensual to begin with).

That is true, but the tradeoff of some people getting accused pales to me in comparison of not having any public information about criminal proceedings etc until they are already concluded. Tort and fraud cases would be considerably harder, if not impossible.

[PeZook]

Polish law demands you do not publish the full name or image of the accused until they are convincted, and it works fine.

[Thanas]

Polish law demands you do not publish the full name or image of the accused until they are convincted, and it works fine.

German law does as well, but none of our justice system is structured like the US.

[Simon_Jester]

That is true, but the tradeoff of some people getting accused pales to me in comparison of not having any public information about criminal proceedings etc until they are already concluded. Tort and fraud cases would be considerably harder, if not impossible.

Maybe information about ongoing criminal cases could be made available on request to the lawyers involved in tort/fraud cases, but otherwise be confidential? Or be confidentially available in some other specific list of circumstances?

Part of the problem here is that people do get charged with crimes they didn't commit, or (probably more often) get targeted with lawsuits that really shouldn't succeed. If we start from the presumption of innocence, there should be some means of protecting the reputation of the accused from false charges.

At the moment, the US system can really only handle this by suing for damage to your reputation caused by the other guy's lawsuit. Which serves only to increase the number of lawsuits on the docket.

[Thanas]

That is true, but the tradeoff of some people getting accused pales to me in comparison of not having any public information about criminal proceedings etc until they are already concluded. Tort and fraud cases would be considerably harder, if not impossible.

Maybe information about ongoing criminal cases could be made available on request to the lawyers involved in tort/fraud cases, but otherwise be confidential? Or be confidentially available in some other specific list of circumstances?

Part of the problem here is that people do get charged with crimes they didn't commit, or (probably more often) get targeted with lawsuits that really shouldn't succeed. If we start from the presumption of innocence, there should be some means of protecting the reputation of the accused from false charges.

At the moment, the US system can really only handle this by suing for damage to your reputation caused by the other guy's lawsuit. Which serves only to increase the number of lawsuits on the docket.

True. I am not saying the current system is perfect.

But there are a lot of troubles. For example, the sixth amendment also gives the right to a public trial, which does include such things as a public court. Given the propensity of the security apparatus to have secret trials (if any) I would rather not give them a law that says that secret trials are a-ok and even desired. It is not like in Europe where the right to a fair trial is not in question, in the US we find all kinds of shady stuff going on in secret courts.

[ZOmegaZ]

The goal of 7 was to overturn binding arbitration clauses in contracts. Liability waivers I don't see as a problem. Perhaps better wording is in order?

[ZOmegaZ]

As for 2, there's definitely a need for balance and (most important) practicality. If you get arrested and held for trial, obviously some people will know. Perhaps it's better phrased as a gag order on media publication of the full name?

[Mr Bean]

As for 2, there's definitely a need for balance and (most important) practicality. If you get arrested and held for trial, obviously some people will know. Perhaps it's better phrased as a gag order on media publication of the full name?

What about a wanted fugitive? Lets say Charile C Criminal robs a bank without a mask and takes off. Can you not name names and only give make/model of his car and physical description? Or the classic, guy says he's parent and walks off with someone else child for nefarious reasons, can you not ID him?

[ZOmegaZ]

Yeah, that should obviously be okay. If you're a fugitive, that's got to be public.

[Mr Bean]

Yeah, that should obviously be okay. If you're a fugitive, that's got to be public.

But you've not been charged with a crime. They already say "Wanted for questioning by police" if they think an axe murder is on the lose, but that person still has not been convicted of axe murdering yet. 2 conflicts with this kind of for the public good need of being able to war off the public if someone has snapped or is wanted.

[ZOmegaZ]

I don't disagree with that. So let's back up and start with the bigger picture: how might one formulate a law that better balances public safety with the accused' right to be treated as innocent? Or do we hold that our balance is optimal now?

[Borgholio]

One big problem is when news agencies try to fill airtime with pointless speculation and conjecture that can poison the public to think the suspect is actually guilty. Any law that serves to find an optimal balance between public safety and personal privacy should have the power to mute news agencies who do anything more than discuss who the man is, what he is wanted for, and where he might be found. I mean I know, freedom of the press and all that, but when you spend an hour with talking heads throwing every theory and idea about what the suspect may have done, it's hard not to come away from that feeling a bit biased against him already.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

No, it has to be scrapped altogether. The public needs to know. Especially if it causes past victims to come to light. Especially in cases of rape where we often find that other victims kept quiet but will come forward once they know the offender is in custody or faces trial.

On the other hand, suppose a guy gets falsely accused of rape. Girl has second thoughts the day (or week) after, and rather than own up to her mistake, claims that he raped her. Guy gets arrested, publicized as a rapist (press will stick "accused" on there, but no one else will). Social life is shattered, name gets on the internet as a rapist (and nothing every leaves the internet). Month later, charges are dropped, as there's no corraborating evidence of any sort (since it was consensual to begin with).

False rape accusations are a tiny insignificant fraction of unreported rape. False rape accusations that end up leading to any police action even less so. Our system is so dramatically lopsided in favour of underreporting rape that I don't think it's ever fair to try to stop anything that could help with that due to fears of the mythical false rape accusation.

Maybe when the system's fixed. Not until then.

[Darth Lucifer]

Number one is a little scary. With enough popular fear-mongering you could easily initiate mob rule.

[ZOmegaZ]

I'm not sure how that proposal makes that any more likely than the present convention system.

[Highlord Laan]

Polish law demands you do not publish the full name or image of the accused until they are convincted, and it works fine.

German law does as well, but none of our justice system is structured like the US.

It because doing something like that is responsible and makes sense, which means it would be immediately shouted down and demonized as being something a soshalist (read: nonmurrican) country does and denies media outlets their Father, Son and Holy Spirit given right to make a profit.

[bilateralrope]

2) Persons arrested or charged with crimes have the right to privacy until convicted. No person accused of a crime shall have their name publicly released until and unless they are convicted. Purposeful violation of the privacy of the accused without their written consent, filed with the court, shall be punishable by law.

This one will need fine tuning to strike the right balance between the privacy of the accused and protecting the general public. Meaning I doubt the first published version will need to be changed, maybe due to it having problems with the first attempt, maybe because society changes and it needs to be updated. Since changing the US constitution is hard, I don't think this is appropriate as a constitutional amendment. Leave it as a law.

3) No person convicted of a crime shall be punished until all judicial appeals are exhausted. Appeals shall be conducted without undue delay.

How does this work for violent offenders ?

What about fraudsters using their victims money to pay for appeals they know will not succeed ?

4) Every jurisdiction shall have sufficient judges and public defenders to ensure swift justice for all in that jurisdiction, including appeals. These positions shall be funded as necessary by the relevant jurisdiction, with a dedicated funding source.

5) No fees shall be charged for access to the courts.

6) In all lawsuits, money contributed to legal representation shall be divided evenly among all parties. Money submitted for legal representation that goes unused by any party shall be used to fund attorneys for the public defense.

To amendments to reduce the cost of court cases. Then you you propose one that raises the costs by funding public defenders through the amount the parties pay to their lawyers through a layer of bureaucracy. Wouldn't it be better to just fund the public defenders through taxes ?

What happens in cases where one party has greater costs than the other because their side of the case is more expensive ?
For example, one side needs more research into relevant laws than the other.

7) All persons in the US shall have full access to the US justice system at all times, including class-action suits, regardless of prior contractual obligations. Any clause of a contract which denies either party access to a court of law for redress of grievance, is hereby invalid.[/b]

This one needs a lot more detail before I can judge it.