The Supreme Court Gives and Tennessee Tries to Take Away

The U.S. Supreme Court handed down a decision last week that upheld rights under the Fourth Amendment. Now Tennessee is considering a bill that would eliminate the exclusionary rule that prevents evidence seized in violation of your Fourth Amendment rights from being used against you.

Now, I think that most of us can agree that such a bill would be subject to constitutional attack but you still have to wonder what the legislature is thinking. Why is it considered so important to obtain convictions that they are willing to do it at any price? Why do they think that it is ok to condone breaking the law (the Fourth Amendment) in order to enforce the law? And since most of these cases involve such serious crimes as simple possession of marijuana or some other drug is it really that important to take the suspect off the street that we would effectively abolish the Fourth Amendment?

I really don't get it. I guess we have been lucky here in this country not to live under an oppressive government. So lucky that we have forgotten that the basic protections that are provided by the constitution are the reason why we haven't lived under an oppressive government.

The bill will likely fail, but why would they even try?

~Tim