Shoot First Alito

I've been meaning to write something about the Alito nomination for some time, but yesterday's piece in the LA Times motivated me to get off my ass and do it. The LA Times piece summarizes a case in which Alito essentially ruled that the police have the right to shoot first and ask questions later if they feel like it. Here's the lede:

WASHINGTON — Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr.'s views on abortion caused a stir this week, but another memo that surfaced from his years as a Reagan administration lawyer was notable for its strong support of the police.

Alito wrote that he saw no constitutional problem with a police officer shooting and killing an unarmed teenager who was fleeing after a $10 home burglary.

"I think the shooting [in this case] can be justified as reasonable," Alito wrote in a 1984 memo to Justice Department officials.

Because the officer could not know for sure why a suspect was fleeing, the courts should not set a rule forbidding the use of deadly force, he said.

"I do not think the Constitution provides an answer to the officer's dilemma," Alito advised.

A year later, however, the Supreme Court used the same case to set a firm national rule against the routine use of "deadly force" against fleeing suspects who pose no danger.

For quite some time, I've been bothered by the seemingly myopic focus of Alito's opponents on his position re. Roe v. Wade. While the question of a woman's right to choose is certainly important, I think most of us in the country have very queasy feelings about abortion-on-demand. At least as important, in my view, is the impact a judge like Alito is likely to have in other unrelated areas. And, one of the most important of those is civil liberties.

This ruling on police perogatives, others like it, and the philosophy that seems to govern Alito's thinking, all point to the probability that Alito will be a strong supporter of the encroachments on civil liberties that the Bush Administration has been pushing so strongly. It's almost certain that Alito would support the imprisonment of "enemy combatants" without formal charges or rights to counsel, probably even if they were American citizens on American soil. It's pretty clear he would support the secret searches of library records of innocent citizens. And, there is little doubt he would support the government's position on the Guantanamo detainees. This I think is truly dangerous. The only real defense we as individuals have against imprisonment by a dictatorial despotic regime is a strong and vibrant judiciary that protects the rights of all people to have a fair hearing before the Court.

In that regard, this should be a cause which our libertarian friends should be eager to join us in, if they would only take the Bush blindfold off. To his credit, libertarian columnist William Safire, Bush hack though he was in most respects, took a firm stance against the Patriot Act's encroachment on civil liberties. We should be trying to win libertarian support in our efforts to dump Alito, and the focus on Roe v Wade isn't likely to do that.