Landowner Sues After State Searches Property Without Warrant or Consent
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As someone who grew up in rural PA, this is a pretty straightforward way to get shot as a trespasser.
For being found guilty (overturned on appeal) of fishing with more than 8 lines due to what is likely a vendetta on the part of the officer. A particularly succinct example of automated cruelty. But what can one do?
Maybe it was negligent rather than intentional. For example, the company might've just been using some form they got from an outsourced service. Or a lawyer might've made the form for them, but using an obnoxius template (as templates tend to be, AFAICT).
So, when people are in this situation, they can try asking the company about it (a recruiter, HR contact, or the hiring manager). The company's response could be strong signal about the actual corporate culture you'd find if you joined.
(Personally, if I was a hiring manager, and didn't know that candidates had started seeing this form, I'd want to know, and I'd make sure the right people were looking at it. To see whether that was intended, is it legal, is it a message we want to send, etc.)
You could also try contacting a labor regulatory authority or state AG's office, to see whether it's even legal. And/or, contact a state lawmaker, and suggest that it seems unconstitutional. It might even be an arguable EEOC violation where you are (e.g., if some protected group there is more likely to have adverse interactions even when innocent).
I'm not trying to be an ass, but the US' principles of justice are universally fucked.
That sounds like you're talking about our practice of justice. It is, unquestionably, pretty fucked.
I would say that "our principles of justice," on the other hand, a) clearly include "innocent until proven guilty", which would preclude the above question from an employer, and b) pretty well condemn a lot of stuff in our practice of justice, as well, with prison labor high on the list.
Which I guess you could call a problem with the practice, but that begs the question: if it's never practiced, is it really a principle? Or is it just propaganda?
Also, prison labor is built into our constitution, making it more than just a practice.
Whether it's principle or propaganda, it was the deal. So, if it's not a principle, make it one. Including reminding employers who forgot civics class.
You put them in your founding documents and spread them in your rhetoric because you believe that, even if people are not following them now, it is important to make sure the people in the future know "This was our goal. This is what we think is a good ideal to shoot for." That way, they can see it, compare it to the practice, and say, "Y'know, maybe we should do better."
Here we are in the future, and it's not right. We can see the principle, and compare it to the practice. Will we shrug, and say, "Eh, everyone knows that sort of thing is just blue-sky idealist thinking. No one really thinks it can work in the real world."?
Or will we say, "Y'know, maybe we should do better."?
If you 100% truly owned your own land you'd be the monarch of your own state.
In this legal case the state is policing their water/fish on behalf of all the other property owners in the area as well as anyone that would benefit from said water/fish (downstream impacts, as it were).
You're confusing ownership with control. Ownership grants but does not guarantee control [1].
Countries nominally control the territory within their borders. In this case, the state is also legally entitled to certain rights pertaining to the water. (Similar to how a homeowner is entitled to certain rights pertaining to their property.)
Neither the U.S. nor Pennsylvania purport to own freeheld private property. That means they aren't entitled to it. And aren't entitled to exercise unlimited control over it. If the answer is well it's only pieces of paper that delineate that divide, then sure, but it's only pieces of paper that delineate a state's border.
> If you 100% truly owned your own land you'd be the monarch of your own state
Again, control. In many monarchies, the monarch controls a legal entity that owns the lands of the state. Or is the legal represenative of a deity who is the legal owner.
[1] https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9780333983898_3
It's a bit of a sore spot for me, when the local city tried to condemn my parent's land for $30k - less than a quarter of what they paid for it back in the 70's.
As you observed, ownership is never absolute. It's a social construct. Evertyhing from squatters' rights to condemnation by public officials to private foreclosure show that.
No. The officer trespassed. Burglars aren't promulgating an alternate legal foundation of ownership, they're just jacking your shit.
In the general case however, I'm not sure they should have the powers that the statute implies without proportionate limits.
“In open court, out loud, Officer Moon said he wasn’t bound by no-trespassing signs, and said he had a mandate to go anywhere. He is wrong because private property is sacred. The Fourth Amendment and its protection from search and seizure is the only thing standing between us and tyranny.”
No Monetary Gain
According to 12 words of Pennsylvania state code, PFBC officials have authority to “enter upon any land or water in the performance of their duties.” The statue provides wide latitude for PFBC to enter onto any property without consent, probable cause, or warrant—with no limits on duration, frequency, or scope.
Say what? That is how you get shot in rural america, as you should...
Similar things have happened a few times (eg [1]) often no charges are filed
[1] https://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/fort-worth-man-who-shot-st...
I'm sure we'll see more important fishing license violation, constitutional law articles, here on ycombinator in the near future...
I guess this is all they have to worry about out in lake side Pennsylvania...
On the one hand, they aggressively advocate for obvious constitutional rights cases like this one and have put a lot of effort into fighting legally-accepted-yet-fundamentally-nonsensical practices like civil forfeiture.
On the other, they also aggressively support school vouchers, which are mostly a scheme to drain money from public schools into private ones that can use broad excuses to keep out students that would cost more or lower their grade averages.
As currently posed, the voucher is a subsidy to already wealthy people who can afford to supplement the voucher with extra $$ to pay for their children’s education.
Frankly, I don't actually buy that all private schools are necessarily superior to public schools.
You're probably just thinking of elite private schools, of the type that rich people in NYC want to send their kids to, but there are plenty of other kinds of private schools out there.
The degree to which they have to meet any standards at all vary by jurisdiction.
Some are explicitly religious, and will not be teaching accurate history or biology because of that.
Some are based on experimental (to put it kindly) pedagogical theories that are not well-grounded in research or evidence (but have some wealthy people willing to buy into them).
Just because it costs more money to go to does not remotely guarantee that it will provide a better education.
Interestingly, I work with a lot of people who do have a stay-at-home partner and homeschool their kids in large cities.
In my personal experience, I haven't met a single home school adult who was well-adjusted. I have met some who became well-adjusted after working a demanding enough job (I used to work in a kitchen). I don't think software engineering is nearly demanding enough for that kind of development.
You could argue that the 1st Amendment only applies to laws written by Congress and not the whims of state governments but the Supreme Court has ruled in the past that it does extend downwards like that.
Then again, the Supreme Court also ruled that if a state does decide to subsidize private education it can't discriminate based on religion VS non-religion (Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue).
The bigger argument: By allowing a state to fund religious institutions (educational or not) you're basically granting the state great power over religious institutions (as well as taking non-sectarian money and giving it to sectarian causes). A governor or powerful congressman/regulator could demand all sorts of concessions from religious institutions or their funding could be withheld or reduced. In other words, it gives the government direct (and/or indirect) influence over the religion itself.
As long as the schools meet certification and minimum curriculum, I dont see how it is different than the city buying concrete from a religious vendor.
It is not expected that the religious vendor will try to teach religion to every person who uses the structure built by the concrete the government pays for in your example.
I think it would be a separation issue if vouchers 1) could only be used for one religion or 2) could only be used at secular schools.
The key is equal treatment, not enforcing atheism.
Vouchers as a whole should be eliminated. Giving public funds to private schools is nothing short of evil. Using children as a pawn to move that money doesn't change anything.
Ultimately these schools exist to completely bypass any standards of education. That includes teaching religion, which is not allowed in public schools for good reason. This, on its own, isn't awful. But combined with stealing money from public schools it's a huge problem.
It isnt stealing money because the schools dont deserve it. Students success should be the focus, not institutions.
Then, of course, you would jack up the prices. Private schools are only limited in greed due to competition with the public sector. The more you erode the competition, the more expensive and lower quality private schools will become. Eventually we'll reach an inflection point, in which private schools are too expensive for vouchers, or our public funds would have to increase.
I also disagree on the institution not mattering. What many don't realize is there are virtually zero standards for private schools. Even today, many are not competitive. Rather, they exist as a way for insane parents to "educate" their children on fringe teachings. Sometimes that's religious schools, sometimes it's cult teachings, sometimes these private schools are more or less abuse centers or conversion camps.
SOME private schools have competitive education. It's not a given they have more competitive education, and I'd actually argue it's far less likely, because they have no rules anywhere saying what they have to do. Public schools are, at least, pretty reasonable in process and curriculum.
The reason conservatives are so keen on dismantling public education and pushing private schools isn't due to quality, although that's a convenient talking point. It's due to this lack of standards that allow conservative beliefs to flourish. It's often said education is an anti-conservative space. Naturally, the end goal is lower quality education, and this is simply the propaganda used to get to that desired end state.
First seems to be that public schools cant compete with private schools on student success. This seems strange from a public school proponent.
Why do you think private school competition will erode over time?
Why cant students flow back into public schools if private ones become expensive and terrible over time.
In my opinion, the whole point of vouchers is to let failing institutions fail. If you think accreditation criteria are too lax for private schools, then that is a workable objection. I think they should be the exact same as public schools.
No, please read carefully. I said if this continues and more money is diverted from public schools, this will be the case. This should be obvious - every dollar on vouchers is a dollar NOT in public schools. That's not a side effect by the way, that's the entire purpose of these developments.
> Why cant students flow back into public schools if private ones become expensive and terrible over time
Because the public schools have no money now because you took it. That money doesn't fall from the sky.
> let failing institutions fail
Okay, so you agree with me. If we go down this path public education will fall. Once again this is the nature of this political movement, not a side effect.
> If you think accreditation criteria are too lax for private schools, then that is a workable objection
Sigh. No, no it's not. Because then you have a school that has accreditation and curriculum managed by the government that receives public funds.
Um... you just described a public school. That will never happen because the very idea is at odds with the ideology behind it.
The idea isn't "public school 2.0". The fact private schools have no standards is not an oversight, it's the motivation.
Why cant public schools scale up and down, just like private schools?
>Because the public schools have no money now because you took it. That money doesn't fall from the sky.
Maybe I wasn't clear. the money follows the students in the form of vouchers. IF more kids want to go to public schools because private ones have become shitty, then the public schools will have more money.
>> let failing institutions fail
>Okay, so you agree with me. If we go down this path public education will fall. Once again this is the nature of this political movement, not a side effect.
It will at least shrink. If public schools get better and provide comparable student education, then they will survive. IF they cant, I wouldnt want them anyways.
>> If you think accreditation criteria are too lax for private schools, then that is a workable objection
>Sigh. No, no it's not. Because then you have a school that has accreditation and curriculum managed by the government that receives public funds. Um... you just described a public school. That will never happen because the very idea is at odds with the ideology behind it.
Public universities have accreditation requirements, that doesnt mean they are government institutions. It means they are regulated. Just like your doctor, butcher, or dentist are regulated but not government.
At the end of the day, what exactly are you worried about? If you and like minded people want to keep sending their kids to public schools they can do so. Is it more about controlling what other students and parents do?
When I have spoken with other people on this topic, their concern is generally the latter. They think that good students pull up bad students, and therefore it is acceptable for them to be dragged down by bad schools and bad students.
It's about attempting to stop the American right from achieving their decades-long goal of destroying public education.
I'm not stupid, I can see this issue for what it is. The conservatives thrive on a stupider population, and everyone knows that. It's no wonder that since Reagan our public schools have been under constant attack.
The end-goal here is having no public education at all, and instead forcing children to attend private schools where they will be taught religious teachings and other obviously wrong ideology. In the ideal outcome for the right, those who cannot afford education will simply not receive it, becoming fodder for the next generation of conservative propaganda. Without poor, stupid people the republicans have no voter base to manipulate.
Once republicans stop trying to put the ten commandments in public schools and stop trying to pass genital inspection legislation for school children, I'll humor your position. Until then, I'll stick with the reality that the right simply does not like the fair and equal access nature of public education.
I have progressive friends who teach in public schools but pinch pennies to send their children elsewhere. It isn't because they want to abolish education education.
I see atheist Chinese immigrants who pay top dollar to send their kids to catholic schools because they know it maximizes their education and path the IVY league.
I guess it's a matter of perspective. But, from a legislative perspective, this is 100% being pushed by the conservative right. You may have some progressive friends - I don't care. I live in a deep red state, I understand the rights intentions.
It is 100% to abolish education. These people get personally offended if you've went to college.
Maybe giving money so more kids can attend Catholic schools is a good thing
No; the very very obvious "good thing" here would be to fix the Chicago public school system, whatever that entails. (And yes, I know that's guaranteed to be politically and logistically more difficult than just diverting more taxpayer money to private schools, but it's still the right thing to do.)
Gates-Davis also lives on the far south side, which has structural school quality problems that aren't reasonable to pin on CTU.
I don't like CTU. I'm generally not a fan of teachers unions in major metros (most major metro teachers are in fact surprisingly well compensated). But I'm a little tired of this dunk; it's not a good one.
Or are you saying that should only be a privilege of the rich?
Having gone to both public and private schools, while I had horrible experiences with both, at least there was teaching going on in my private schools.
My public school experience was horrific, even in NYC's so-called "gifted" schools. My brother's kid only went to NYC public schools and her experiences were so much worse. My public school tried to have me put on psychiatric medication without a diagnosis from a qualified professional and my niece's public school spent two years trying to gaslight her that she was not gay but trans (as well as a whole bunch targeted harassment from her teachers for being vocally politically conservative).
Neither of those things have anything to do with what the schools' mandate should be: education.
No: I don't think anyone should have the option of private schools.
Yes, I think public education should be mandatory in the US. That way, when there are problems with the public school system in a given area, rather than just pulling their own children—and money—out, the rich people would be personally incentivized to find ways to make it better for everyone.
As a kid my option was to be forcibly medicated by some random tyrant bureaucrat or not be allowed to attend school. I had no disorder or diagnosis that required this. Luckily I was able to escape to private school.
More importantly, children are not one-size-fits-all in terms of learning requirements or ability, but public schools only provide one-size-fits-all opportunity.
This isn't true - there's many specialty public schools. Schools for the deaf, schools for the blind, schools for those with severe learning disabilities.
The core issue with private education is it gives richer people an incentive to screw over public schools, which is exactly what we're seeing. They're greedy, it's not just enough for them to have private schools. They also have to siphon money from public schools, which hurts poorer Americans.
In theory, private schools could be fine. But when we give millions of public dollars to private schools, we have a huge problem.
Grew up with plenty of other poor kids going to those schools too.
School should be the same way. Education should not be lowest-common-denominator. My kids should not have less opportunity because other kids have greater challenges.
Operating that way is ethical and humane.
Why should your tax dollars only go to schools controlled by the state? Do you care that public schools in the US typically have worse outcomes and have to spend more per child to get there?
That statement is not true.
There are many problems with the non-public system. I'll use the term "voucher" school to mean a school which is not controlled by a school board whose members are voted for by the residents of the school catchment area. (This isn't quite correct, as there are public schools run by a school board controlled by the state.) A "voucher" school also receives either money directly from taxes, or indirectly through, for example, a tax credit to the school or to the parents of the student.
1) the finances are not public, and include cases where the non-profit voucher school pays rent to a for-profit company, and pays license fees to a for-profit company, where are three are owned by the same person. The non-profit is not incentivized to get the best deal, which means my tax dollars go to enrich the owner rather than the students.
2) voucher schools generally spend money on advertisements, which target the student population they prefer rather then the entire population. The money for advertisements reduces the amount of money available to schools. Good advertising beats good teaching, because the advertising comes first. A local voucher school advertised a few years ago that all students would get their own tablet for learning. Now this school is in financial troubles, and doesn't have enough staff.
3) voucher schools can select their student population through many means, for example, require parental involvement every week, which selects for richer families which have that amount of free time.
4) voucher schools have more freedom to expel students. If a student is unruly, rather than using expensive counseling to help resolve the issues, a voucher school can expel the student. If a student has subpar grades, the school can make it known that the student is unwelcome for the next year, and can use behavior problems as subtext to expel that student.
Thus, you have some voucher schools which appear to do well, but they are not held anywhere near the same standards and obligations as actual public schools.
I don't want my tax dollars going to voucher schools. If you want to sent your kid to a private school, go ahead. Just don't expect me to subsidize you.
If public schools are less desirable, we should celebrate that the money is going elsewhere.
Enter upon any land or water in the performance of their duties.
If they couldn't move between properties along shorelines they'd have a hell of a time doing their actual job. Any criminal could fish illegally on private property then flee when a they see a conservation officer approaching in a boat. They'd never catch anyone who fishes along a shore.
This lawsuit seems like a nuclear weapon being thrown at an overly zealous individual who possibly has some sort of personal vendetta against the property owner.
> right to be secure in their homes, papers, and effects
It also explicitly lays out "unreasonable" as the qualifier. Personally... I don't think he has much of a case to challenge the state wording.
So while I strongly support the 4th amendment, I don't really agree with the guy here. It sounds a lot like he's pissed off the officer by fishing illegally.
My bigger takeaway is that Uber and Lyft are able to automatically dismiss him from a position without consequence for a completely unrelated offense. Even if I think he's completely guilty (and to be clear - I don't) I'm hard pressed to consider "wildlife & game license violation" worthy of impacting a job that involves driving other folks around.
The Fourth Amendment is a level above that, fortunately.
Also - despite the repeated attempts at implying it in the article, I really don't suspect the guy is there to creep on an elderly cancer patient in her bathroom.
It sounds a lot like he's on land, which is not protected by the 4th, and he's there well within his scope of authority as granted by the state.
No trespassing signs only apply to someone there without permission. He explicitly has permission from the state. And trespassing is very clearly not "search".
Harassment? Possibly. Abuse of authority? Possibly. Illegal search? ehhh... probably not.
The state can't give you permission to something that the federal government explicitly doesn't give you access to.
persons, houses, papers, and effects,
> In Hester v. United States,1 the Court held that the Fourth Amendment did not protect “open fields” and that, therefore, police searches in such areas as pastures, wooded areas, *open water*, and vacant lots need not comply with the requirements of warrants and probable cause.
I also want to point out something very important regarding this case in particular: Curtilage is generally known to be the area between a front door and the street however if your property backs up to open water--and you have a back door--that area between the water and the back door also counts as curtilage.