5 ms·

The idea that law enforcement and government officials should be treated less strictly under the law is, to me, completely preposterous. If anything, they shoul

by baddox 6y ago

The idea that law enforcement and government officials should be treated less strictly under the law is, to me, completely preposterous. If anything, they should explicitly not be given the benefit of the doubt and should be treated much more strictly under the law. I realize that a huge number of people completely disagree with that, and I don't really know how to persuade any of them other than to urge them to examine history and note the consequences of authoritarianism.

tathougies 6y ago
Well, i mostly agree with you but want to point out one fine distinction which is that you can still sue the government for your rights being violated, but you can't sue the individual bureaucrat. Put another way, if your local DMV agent is acting funny, you can still sue the DMV, even if you can't sue the agent directly, FWIU Anyway, hopefully the SC will throw this all out in the coming weeks.
- baddox 6y ago
  If a DMV agent is depriving you of your rights or mistreating you in some tortious way, why shouldn't you be able to sue that DMV agent? I'm not necessarily against government offices providing legal services to help defend their employees (AFAIK that's common for public school teachers and employees), but why shouldn't you be able to sue the person who is committing the tortious act?
  - nerdponx 6y ago
    As a taxpayer, I'd much prefer individual DMV agents being sued and having to defend themselves, compared to the DMV itself being sued and my tax money being used in its defense.
    - gamblor956 6y ago
      Would you prefer that individual programmers be sued (instead of their employers) and have to defend themselves when apps/programs crash due to bugs? Because that's basically what you're saying you want. And anyways, if the DMV agent was acting in their capacity as a DMV employee and following established procedure, the DMV would end up paying their legal costs and settlements against the employee anyways...but without getting a say in the defense against the underlying lawsuit.
    - pas 6y ago
      It's an interesting problems. Doctors have liability insurance for this reason basically, which just pushes healthcare costs even higher, and creates this very opaque system of accountability and care quality.
    - landryraccoon 6y ago
      Your position is really contrary to your interests. DMV agents are probably not very wealthy. By suing them you would simply drive an underpaid worker into bankruptcy and probably never get much money back. Meanwhile, the DMV can easily scapegoat it's employee and never reform or make any systematic changes. Furthermore you would have no recourse to sue them directly since they can just keep hiring more poor workers to be thrown under the bus. Ultimately the tax payers (or voters) need to keep the DMV accountable. There is no alternative. Democracy doesn't have shortcuts. The tax payers have to pay when the government screws up. More to the point - the tax payer ALWAYS ends up paying when the government screws up, without exception, 100% of the time. Either they pay by having a corrupt DMV that hurts society and everyone at large, or they pay through lawsuits and higher costs at the DMV.
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    Qualified immunity wouldn't protect a DMV agent (or other bureaucrat) depriving you of your rights in violation of the law. It only protects a government employee who makes a discretionary decision as part of their normal duties. This might mean they get it wrong, but if they can show their decision was reasonable and (where relevant) pursuant to a process established by the agency, that's fine. In that case, the problem is the process not the employee, and so the proper defendant is the agency not the employee that is simply following procedures set forth by the agency.
  - Talanes 6y ago
    Because that agent is acting on the authority of the DMV, and the DMV is responsible for how their authority is wielded. The intent is to keep organizations from facing repercussions for bad behavior by just throwing the individual actors under the bus. Of course this only works out if the organization itself can be held accountable, and forced to properly deal with internal troubles.
closeparen 6y ago
So the planning commission denies a permit for an addition to your house, diminishing its value. Or grants a permit to your neighbor, to the same effect. One approach would be to have the judge say, "actually that addition looks fine to me, the commissioners shall pay you the corresponding value out of their kids' college funds." Another would be, "I'm not the planning commission, that's their decision to make, unless they've acted outside the bounds of their charter, tough shit." Qualified immunity is essentially the latter.
- nerdponx 6y ago
  Except in that example the planning committee did something that wasn't otherwise illegal. Unless your case is showing that they're picking favorites or something.
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    No, that example is precisely on point. Qualified immunity applies precisely because they didn't do anything illegal (based on the limited facts of the hypo). If they did something illegal, then qualified immunity would not apply.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
      This utterly tautological, which part of the problem with QI. QI applies precisely when there's no precedent that explicitly declares an action to be illegal (c.f the case of cops that used pepper spray, which was deemed sufficiently different from tasing that the rules established for tasing did not apply, there was therefore no precedent for the precise case of unnecessarily pepper spraying a person and thus QI applied. QI completely sidesteps the question "is it illegal" by replacing it with "has a suitable court ever established a precedent of suitable specificity saying that this is illegal when carried out by a government official/employee"? Which is likely how Gauvin will walk, since despite killing person being illegal, there are no suitable court precedents ruling with sufficient specificity that a government agent killing a person is illegal.
naravara 6y ago
>If anything, they should explicitly not be given the benefit of the doubt and should be treated much more strictly under the law. How many of your tax dollars are you willing to pour into addressing the volume of nuisance cases then?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

by baddox 6y ago

tathougies 6y ago

Well, i mostly agree with you but want to point out one fine distinction which is that you can still sue the government for your rights being violated, but you can't sue the individual bureaucrat. Put another way, if your local DMV agent is acting funny, you can still sue the DMV, even if you can't sue the agent directly, FWIU Anyway, hopefully the SC will throw this all out in the coming weeks.

baddox 6y ago
If a DMV agent is depriving you of your rights or mistreating you in some tortious way, why shouldn't you be able to sue that DMV agent? I'm not necessarily against government offices providing legal services to help defend their employees (AFAIK that's common for public school teachers and employees), but why shouldn't you be able to sue the person who is committing the tortious act?
- nerdponx 6y ago
  As a taxpayer, I'd much prefer individual DMV agents being sued and having to defend themselves, compared to the DMV itself being sued and my tax money being used in its defense.
  - gamblor956 6y ago
    Would you prefer that individual programmers be sued (instead of their employers) and have to defend themselves when apps/programs crash due to bugs? Because that's basically what you're saying you want. And anyways, if the DMV agent was acting in their capacity as a DMV employee and following established procedure, the DMV would end up paying their legal costs and settlements against the employee anyways...but without getting a say in the defense against the underlying lawsuit.
  - pas 6y ago
    It's an interesting problems. Doctors have liability insurance for this reason basically, which just pushes healthcare costs even higher, and creates this very opaque system of accountability and care quality.
  - landryraccoon 6y ago
    Your position is really contrary to your interests. DMV agents are probably not very wealthy. By suing them you would simply drive an underpaid worker into bankruptcy and probably never get much money back. Meanwhile, the DMV can easily scapegoat it's employee and never reform or make any systematic changes. Furthermore you would have no recourse to sue them directly since they can just keep hiring more poor workers to be thrown under the bus. Ultimately the tax payers (or voters) need to keep the DMV accountable. There is no alternative. Democracy doesn't have shortcuts. The tax payers have to pay when the government screws up. More to the point - the tax payer ALWAYS ends up paying when the government screws up, without exception, 100% of the time. Either they pay by having a corrupt DMV that hurts society and everyone at large, or they pay through lawsuits and higher costs at the DMV.
- gamblor956 6y ago
  Qualified immunity wouldn't protect a DMV agent (or other bureaucrat) depriving you of your rights in violation of the law. It only protects a government employee who makes a discretionary decision as part of their normal duties. This might mean they get it wrong, but if they can show their decision was reasonable and (where relevant) pursuant to a process established by the agency, that's fine. In that case, the problem is the process not the employee, and so the proper defendant is the agency not the employee that is simply following procedures set forth by the agency.
- Talanes 6y ago
  Because that agent is acting on the authority of the DMV, and the DMV is responsible for how their authority is wielded. The intent is to keep organizations from facing repercussions for bad behavior by just throwing the individual actors under the bus. Of course this only works out if the organization itself can be held accountable, and forced to properly deal with internal troubles.

closeparen 6y ago

So the planning commission denies a permit for an addition to your house, diminishing its value. Or grants a permit to your neighbor, to the same effect. One approach would be to have the judge say, "actually that addition looks fine to me, the commissioners shall pay you the corresponding value out of their kids' college funds." Another would be, "I'm not the planning commission, that's their decision to make, unless they've acted outside the bounds of their charter, tough shit." Qualified immunity is essentially the latter.

nerdponx 6y ago
Except in that example the planning committee did something that wasn't otherwise illegal. Unless your case is showing that they're picking favorites or something.
- gamblor956 6y ago
  No, that example is precisely on point. Qualified immunity applies precisely because they didn't do anything illegal (based on the limited facts of the hypo). If they did something illegal, then qualified immunity would not apply.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 6y ago
    This utterly tautological, which part of the problem with QI. QI applies precisely when there's no precedent that explicitly declares an action to be illegal (c.f the case of cops that used pepper spray, which was deemed sufficiently different from tasing that the rules established for tasing did not apply, there was therefore no precedent for the precise case of unnecessarily pepper spraying a person and thus QI applied. QI completely sidesteps the question "is it illegal" by replacing it with "has a suitable court ever established a precedent of suitable specificity saying that this is illegal when carried out by a government official/employee"? Which is likely how Gauvin will walk, since despite killing person being illegal, there are no suitable court precedents ruling with sufficient specificity that a government agent killing a person is illegal.

naravara 6y ago

>If anything, they should explicitly not be given the benefit of the doubt and should be treated much more strictly under the law. How many of your tax dollars are you willing to pour into addressing the volume of nuisance cases then?

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]