[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 5]
[House]
[Pages 7363-7364]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



            QUESTIONABLE DECISIONS COMING FROM SUPREME COURT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Flake). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Hinchey) is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. HINCHEY. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to address myself this evening to 
a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States which came down 
around the end of last month, about 2\1/2\ weeks ago. It is a decision 
by the Supreme Court, a five to four decision, another one of those 
narrow decisions that is decided by one of the nine justices, which I 
think has very deep and compelling implications for every American.
  Let me tell you what that decision entailed. It involved a case in 
the State of Texas. The situation was this: A woman, a young mother, 
was bringing two of her children home from soccer practice. She was 
driving a pickup truck. The two children were in the cab with her. She 
was driving through a community at 15 miles per hour.
  She was stopped by a police officer of that community, and she was 
stopped because the police officer observed that she was not wearing a 
seat belt. There was no other infraction. She was driving below the 
speed limit, she had not violated any other of the vehicle and traffic 
laws or anything else. She was simply stopped by the police officer 
because he observed that she was not wearing a seat belt.
  He stopped her, with her two children; and he placed her under 
arrest. He put her in handcuffs, arrested her, took her into custody, 
and was about to take the two children into custody when, fortunately, 
a neighbor came by and took custody of the two children and took them 
home. But the woman was arrested and taken off to jail in handcuffs. 
She was later forced to place bond, $310 bond, for a violation, the 
fine for which would have been no more than $50 if the maximum fine had 
been imposed.
  The woman sued the city in Texas. It went through the court system 
and finally worked its way to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court in a 
five to four decision declared that the officer was right in arresting 
her; he was right in putting her in handcuffs; he was right taking her 
into custody, taking her to jail; and it was right to force her to post 
a bail of more than $300.
  By the way, in the meantime they searched the vehicle. They searched 
the pickup truck, and they found some very dangerous equipment in the 
truck: A bicycle, two tricycles, a cooler for keeping beverages cool, 
some barbecue equipment, and a pair of children's shoes. That is what 
they found in the back of the truck. The Supreme Court said that that 
was right.
  Now, I am here this evening talking about this because I am 
increasingly disturbed by these right-wing decisions that are being 
made by a court which places in jeopardy the civil liberties and the 
civil rights of every single American, because after that Supreme Court 
decision, the court in effect has made law. It is now the law of the 
land that any police officer in any community at any time can stop 
anybody for not wearing a seat belt and take them into custody and take 
their children into custody too, for that matter, apparently, and 
search their vehicle, simply because they were not wearing a seat belt.
  It is interesting to note as I mentioned earlier it was a five to 
four decision. We are seeing a lot of these five to four decisions 
recently. The five justices included Justice Kennedy, who was appointed 
by President Reagan; Justice Rehnquist, appointed by President Nixon 
and elevated to be the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court by President 
Reagan; also joining in the majority was Justice Thomas, who was 
appointed by President Bush, the first President Bush; and also Justice 
Scalia, who was appointed by President Reagan. Also, oddly enough, 
Justice Souter, who usually has better sense than to join these other 
four in these decisions, but on this particular occasion it seems 
perhaps his experience as a prosecutor before becoming a judge may have 
overcome him and he displayed the kind of bad judgment which is 
exemplified in this five to four Supreme Court decision.
  I am worried about this also because we have seen recently that the 
President of the United States, Mr. Bush, the second Mr. Bush, has made 
it clear that he is no longer going to take recommendations from the 
American Bar Association with regard to justices on any of the Federal 
courts, that is the Federal Appeals Court, the circuit courts or the 
United States Supreme Court; and instead he is going to take 
recommendations from the Federalist Society.
  I think we all ought to be deeply concerned about what is going on in 
our courts and about the way that this particular decision typifies or 
exemplifies at least the kind of bad decisions that are being made on a 
five to four basis in the Supreme Court of the United States.

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