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A few ways: 1) Freedom of speech in the US is the most unrestricted in the world. "Hate speech" (or more accurately: whatever the current cultural consensus de
by marcoperaza 9y ago
A few ways:
1) Freedom of speech in the US is the most unrestricted in the world. "Hate speech" (or more accurately: whatever the current cultural consensus deems to be beyond the pale) is not an exception.
2) Protections for criminal defendants in the US are the greatest in the world:
* No other country has a hard rule that excludes all illegally-collected evidence, and legally-collected evidence flowing from illegally-collected evidence, from trial.
* More generally, we have very extensive rules of evidence that limit what can be admitted into court, to protect the rights of the criminally accused, and both sides of a civil case. The UK has similarly extensive rules, but the rest of Europe does not.
* An absolute right to trial by jury for anything greater than a petty criminal charge.
3) The right to homeschool your children. This is essentially illegal in Sweden, Germany, and some other European countries.
- Daishiman 9y agoYou forgot how it is the other way around bro...
- PoachedSausage 9y agoI think I would still rather be a defendant in the Swedish justice system than the US one if I had a choice.
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- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- irhd 9y agoYou also have the highest incarceration rate in the world, private prisons, mandatory minimums, DAs who extort people into accepting plea deals under the threat of extreme sentences, a civil system which encourages frivolous lawsuits, etc...
- ddxxdd 9y agoRe: incarceration rate We have one of the highest crime rates in the world. If our penal system didn't work the way it did, America would descend into chaos.
- skissane 9y ago> 2) Protections for criminal defendants in the US are the greatest in the world: Other countries (such as Western Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand) have weaker protections for criminal defendants during the trial, yes. But, assuming you are convicted, prison sentences tend to be shorter on average and there is no death penalty. On another point, to compare Australia to the US, the High Court of Australia has basically full appellate jurisdiction (even on state law questions) when it chooses to exercise it, whereas the US Supreme Court's jurisdiction is limited to appeals on points of federal law only, and AEDPA has limited access to federal habeas corpus. So I think the convicted have greater rights of appeal under Australian law than US law. So it isn't clear to me that criminal defendants actually have more rights under the US system overall – they have more rights prior to conviction, but less rights afterward.
- marcoperaza 9y agoI don't see how the different jurisdictions of the high courts really plays into this. Everything in the Bill of Rights (with the exception of the right to jury trial in civil cases, recognized substantially by every state anyway) is applied to the states as a matter of federal law and is therefore subject to review by the federal Supreme Court. For things not implicating any federal question, why is having an appeal to the federal Supreme Court important? Having an extra layer of government does not grant you more rights in and of itself.
- skissane 9y agoFrom the criminal appellants viewpoint, it is in their interests to have as many opportunities to appeal and as many grounds to appeal as possible. The more opportunities to appeal, the greater chance that one of your appeals may turn out favourably to you. So, in the US system, you cannot appeal points of state law to federal courts, but in the Australian system you can, so you have more opportunities to appeal in Australia. Plus, AEDPA limits access to federal habeas corpus (which is a form of collateral appeal as opposed to direct appeal), whereas there is no corresponding limitation under Australian law. How does this to relate to rights? Well, arguably one of our rights is the right to appeal adverse judicial decisions. And the Australian legal system grants more extensive rights in that area than the US one does.
- yongjik 9y ago> 2) Protections for criminal defendants in the US are the greatest in the world That is assuming you stay alive, no? As far as I know, USA is the only developed country where a police officer killing an unarmed person doesn't even make national news. > 3) The right to homeschool your children. This is essentially illegal in Sweden, Germany, and some other European countries. Another way to see this is that kids in Sweden or Germany have basic right to education whose quality is certified by the government. In America, anything goes. (Whether it's good or bad is a matter of opinion, I guess...)