Law in America

[midcan5]

The application of law in America is another item in which class and money matter, often more than the law. Long ago I sat in jail next to a poor black man, we were both there for the same reason, traffic violations we could not pay. My single call to my employer at the time, performed magic. I was suddenly almost graciously let go. I'm sure my black friend spent his time in jail. If I had a wayback machine, he too would be graciously forgiven. That teenage experience changed forever my view of law. Being in large poor family, it was only one of several meetings with the law. Interesting piece below and please don't misunderstand me, sometimes the law gets it right as they did in 'National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius' and 'Florida v. United States Department of Health and Human Services.'

"If middle and upper-class American communities were policed in the same manner working-class and working-poor communities are — that is, if standard operating procedures, applicable criminal codes, and the U.S. Constitution were applied equally, at both the arrest and prosecution stages, against citizens of all socioeconomic classes—a substantial percentage of our nation’s criminal statutes would soon be appealed, repealed, or dramatically amended." You Won?t See This on TV | Boston Review

"Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty." Henry M. Robert

 

[Spiderman]

Yes I'm sure your questionable anecdote is evidence of unequal treatment.

Why don't you take it to court and see if it holds up?

 

[midcan5]

That case would be too easy, next.

'Race, Incarceration, and American Values' by Glenn C. Loury

"The United States, home to five percent of the worlds' population, now houses twenty-five percent of the world's prison inmates. Our incarceration rate—at 714 per 100,000 residents and rising—is almost forty percent greater than our nearest competitors (the Bahamas, Belarus, and Russia). More pointedly, it is 6.2 times the Canadian rate and 12.3 times the rate in Japan." Race, Incarceration, and American Values | The MIT Press

More here: The Sentencing Project News - Racial Disparity


"White children, in the main, and whether they are rich or poor, grow up with a grasp of reality so feeble that they can very accurately be described as deluded--about themselves and the world they live in. White people have managed to get through their entire lifetimes in this euphoric state, but black people have not been so lucky: a black man who sees the world the way John Wayne, for example, sees it would not be an eccentric patriot, but a raving maniac." James Baldwin