St. Thomas Law Review
First Page
7
Document Type
Article
Abstract
This short essay reemphasizes a simple truth about the exercise of the various freedoms embodied within the Bill of Rights. That is: constitutional rights are not self enforcing and their effective articulation is dependent upon the restraint of officers of the state, principally the individual police officer on the beat. Courts are crude and often ineffectual protectors of those rights because their judgments and pronouncements occur long after the events have transpired. This distance is true even when an injunction has been rendered explicitly protecting the exercise of such rights. Even in those exceptionally rare cases when an injunction is issued, the authorities still retain the power to intervene if circumstances arise negating the exceptions, such as an outbreak of violence. Who instigated the violence is an issue debated long after the fact.
Recommended Citation
Roger Handberg,
The Bill of Rights, Freedom of Speech, Censorship, and the Cop on the Beat,
3
St. Thomas L. Rev.
7
(1991).
Available at:
https://scholarship.stu.edu/stlr/vol3/iss1/5