One of the more important freedoms granted by the Bill of Rights might be one you would never guess, never think of. You'd jump to pick freedom of speech, or freedom to bear arms, or freedom of religion, wouldn't you?
Then, you'd say, What else is there?
And, I'd say, Freedom from false imprisonment. The freedom to be free from prison unless you really belong there. Oh, that is not the actual verbiage in the Constitution, but there are no less than 14 protections for those accused of crimes spelled out in the Bill of Rights. Fourteen. Since there are only 10 amendments in the Bill of Rights, that there are that many protections mentioned ought to catch some attention. Amendments four through eight are pretty much devoted, entirely, to the rights of the accused.
Don't know for sure that this right, but I wonder if the day and age the Founding Fathers lived in has something to do with all the attention to rights of the accused that we have in the Bill of Rights. Kings tossed people in jail without needing to cite a law or justify it. If they wanted someone flogged, or put in stocks -- for whatever silly reason -- it was done.
I ran into a man today who was convicted of a felony. I tended to believe him when he told me he hadn't done it, but those who had done it had friends who were going to witness against him, and his kid brother was wanted on separate charges and when prosecutors offered leeway for the brother, he chose to plead guilty to save the brother.
A likely story, you say, and note I can be gullible. Well, I can be gullible, but just consider that if it didn't actually play out that way, it could have. I say, false imprisonment is a wrong, and to be free from it is one of the most important rights we have.
No comments:
Post a Comment