Big Bill Haywood's Revenge: The Original Intent of the Exclusionary Rule

Authors

Milton Hirsch

First Page

35

Document Type

Article

Abstract

We have been given fair warning. In two recent cases, Hudson v. Michigan and Herring v. United States, the Supreme Court made clear its desire to phase out the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule - that century-old ornament of constitutional jurisprudence pursuant to which evidence obtained in violation of a defendant's right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure will not be received in court. Justice Scalia, writing for a bare majority in Hudson, argued that the utility, if any, of the exclusionary rule has run its course; and that the rule itself is better supplanted by alternative means of redress for Fourth Amendment violations. Chief Justice Roberts, writing for the same five-justice majority in Herring, expressed the same dissatisfactions. The two cases differ factually, but the Supreme Court's message is the same in both.

Recommended Citation

Milton Hirsch, Big Bill Haywood's Revenge: The Original Intent of the Exclusionary Rule, 22 St. Thomas L. Rev. 35 (2009).
Available at: https://scholarship.stu.edu/stlr/vol22/iss1/4