Placement on the FBI’s Terrorist Screening Database (the “Watchlist”) is never a good thing. For 23 Muslim‐American litigants, among thousands of others listed, it means reduced employment opportunities, potential arrest and detention, and, most notoriously, severe limitations on their freedom to travel by air. The government insists it doesn’t need court approval before placing someone on … Continue reading You Ought to Be Able to Challenge Your Placement on the No‐Fly List
Category: Justice
In the famous Norman Rockwell painting “Runaway,” seen on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post in 1958, a kindly police officer and a pubescent boy sit at a lunch counter, the boy clearly having packed some belongings in a kerchief and run away. It’s a wholesome encounter and one wholly at odds with our modern image of police. That’s because it’s … Continue reading How the Drug War Broke Policing
Connor Friedersdor writes in the Atlantic that police reform is popular, while rioting is not. He’s right. While only 16% of Americans favor cutting funding for police departments, the Cato Criminal Justice National Survey found that Americans across racial and political backgrounds support a variety of policy changes that reformers say would help mend fences between police and the communities they serve. Read the … Continue reading Americans Don’t Want to #Defund Police, Instead They Agree on Reform
With today’s decision to deny all pending petitions raising Second Amendment issues—Cato had filed in three—the Supreme Court has abdicated its responsibility to say what the law is in this important and contentious area. For the last decade, lower courts have engaged in judicial disobedience, aiding and abetting many states’ hostility to the right to armed self‐defense. They’ve also been … Continue reading On Second Amendment, Supreme Court Abdicates Its Duty to Say What the Law Is
Every presidential election in the United States follows a clear formula. First, many people with absolutely no chance of winning the presidency declare their candidacies. Those who get washed out of the race late in the game see their fortunes rise, which was their goal from the first. Second, candidates with even a chance at … Continue reading Wickard v. Filburn: The Supreme Court Case That Gave the Federal Government Nearly Unlimited Power
It’s been a decade since the Supreme Court affirmed, in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010), that the Second Amendment protects an individual and fundamental right, striking down laws that effectively prohibited the possession of handguns in one’s own home. Since then, the court has routinely declined to … Continue reading The Supreme Court Punts on an Easy Second Amendment Case
By and large, police officers are heroes who put their lives on the line to protect the communities in which they live and serve. How then should we react to cases of police misconduct and brutality when they come to light? Confronting this requires what Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey referred to as “this one, nearly impenetrable barrier, … Continue reading Confronting Police Abuse Requires Shifting Power From Police Unions
Amid the nationwide focus on the death of George Floyd, another tragedy has unfortunately fallen by the wayside. We should not forget the death of Breonna Taylor—or the dire need to abolish the “no-knock” warrants that caused her death, trample property rights, and routinely endanger Americans. Here’s the sad story of Taylor’s death. On March … Continue reading Don’t Forget Breonna Taylor: Her Death Shows Why ‘No-Knock’ Warrants Need to Go
Catherine Wessinger, Loyola University New Orleans Twenty-five years ago, on February 28, 1993, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents attempted to execute a “dynamic entry” into the home of a religious community at Mount Carmel, a property 10 miles east of Waco, Texas. David Koresh and his Bible students – who became known as … Continue reading The deaths of 76 Branch Davidians in April 1993 could have been avoided – so why didn’t anyone care?
It takes a lot for me to defend a liberal Democrat, but the case against New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez is just another sleazy, politically-motivated attack by the so-called "Justice Department" and the misnamed "Public Integrity Section." I said two and a half years ago, after reading the indictment, this was a political hit job … Continue reading Bob Menendez is right. It’s time to start arresting Justice Department officials.
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