Justice Sotomayor: What Truth and Justice Sounds Like in a Courtroom

By Michelle Alexander, Michelle Alexander's Facebook Page

22 June 16

am giving Justice Sotomayor a standing ovation for her courageous and candid dissent from the Supreme Court's decision to uphold yet another routine violation of the Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. She writes as a former prosecutor and says in dissent:

"Do not be soothed by the opinion’s technical language: This case allows the police to stop you on the street, demand your identification, and check it for outstanding traffic warrants—even if you are doing nothing wrong . . . .

"[T]his case tells everyone, white and black, guilty and innocent, that an officer can verify your legal status at any time. It says that your body is subject to invasion while courts excuse the violation of your rights. It implies that you are not a citizen of a democracy but the subject of a carceral state, just waiting to be cataloged. . . .

"We must not pretend that the countless people who are routinely targeted by police are 'isolated.' They are the canaries in the coal mine whose deaths, civil and literal, warn us that no one can breathe in this atmosphere. They are the ones who recognize that unlawful police stops corrode all our civil liberties and threaten all our lives. Until their voices matter too, our justice system will continue to be anything but."

THIS is what truth and justice sounds like in a court of law. I pray one day these words find their way into a majority opinion rather than calling out to us in dissent from the highest court in the land. For now, let me just say thank you. Thank you, Justice Sotomayor. Thank you for speaking truth from a position of power.