The United States ought to limit qualified immunity for police officers.

Before I go on let it be noted that my opponent failed to address any of my contentions directly. They also failed to address my second criteria for upholding justice, which was preservation of individual rights. We can see this as one of two things- my opponent accepts them as true, or that they don't have an argument to respond to each of them. Given that the character limit in this debate is 10,000, and my opponent used significantly less than that, these are the only reasonable conclusions. Therefore we must extend the following: 1. Under QI, police officers are not held to the same standard as other Americans. This is in direct conflict with American values and poses a threat to equality. 2. American citizens have come to fear police officers as a result of QI. This prevents Americans from having the right to Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. 3. QI often prevents Americans from having any legal recourse when harm is done to them or a family member unjustifiably. And therefore, police officers are signaled that poor conduct is okay. 4. One of the ways to achieve justice is through the protection of individual rights Now to respond to the argument brought up by my opponent. My opponent's attack on my argument appears to be that the United States has no moral obligation to uphold the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Furthermore, the US Constitution is the status quo and we should keep it. The Declaration of Independence is not a legal document. Since they haven't answered my earlier arguments as mentioned above, this must mean that my opponent is indeed advocating for a world where those three rights are violated constantly, whether that be their actual intention or not. Let it be clear that I do not advocate for the protection of these rights simply because they are American, but because they are actually the rights all people ought to have. Just because something is law does not mean it is good or should be kept that way. What I am trying to prove is that we must change the status quo. Slavery, segregation, Japanese internment, and the slaughter of Native Americans were all law at one point. What we ought to be doing is striving for progress, regardless of whether or not something is law. What Con argues in this debate is essentially that because it's law, we should keep it. This is circular reasoning. We cannot justify something simply because it exists. The only other justification that my opponent provides for maintaining qualified immunity is that it helps police officers do their job. Well, if a police officer's job is to restrict people's rights, more specifically minorities, then yes, QI helps police officers do their job. My opponent provides no evidence that QI's intent is what actually occurs in practice. When a claim has no evidence to warrant it, it must be dropped. They only say what the goal of QI is. This has no impact on what the ballot should be in this debate. When discussing government action, consequences are of the utmost importance rather than intent. I will now discuss these three rights. In John Locke's Second Treatise of Government, he discusses the rights afforded to all peoples on this planet. Among them he considers life, liberty, and property. We can consider happiness to be a vague but implicit inclusion in Locke's theory, as it is evident that when people have life, liberty, and property they will likely be well on their way to the pursuit of happiness. This Enlightenment based philosophy is a moral obligation on the government. The government is morally obligated to protect these rights. Since I have clearly proven that QI harms these rights, it would therefore stem that QI ought to be limited as to protect them. Secondly, these ideals are indeed intrinsically American. The Declaration of Independence, although not legally binding, laid a roadmap for what United States was supposed to be. It ascribed American ideals that served to protect all people. Just because it is not legally binding does not mean we need to totally ignore it. To recap, my opponent's advocacy is that "...the legal precedent of Qualified Immunity should be upheld as it was declared Constitutional by the SCOTUS and helps law enforcement be more effective in protecting the people." This thesis uses circular reasoning and unsupported conclusions as justification. Its end result is the violation of intrinsic natural rights of all people. If we want to live in a world where these rights are protected, we must vote Pro. Sources: John Locke - https://www.gutenberg.org...