It's up to New Jersey's elected representatives to restore the standard that Washington, Jefferson, and Madison thought important enough to include in their great handiwork. David A. Harris is Balk Professor of Law and Values at the University of Toledo College of Law. Were one compelled to choose between protecting the constitutional rights of motorists on New Jersey highways on the one hand and allowing consent searches on the other hand, there would be no question that the rights of motorists must prevail. This principle was explicitly upheld by State Police Superintendent Justin Dintino, Governor Jim Florio, and myself and was part of a message delivered in 1990 to the state police and to the public on Dintino's first day on the job. But our experience provides evidence that consent searches and protecting motorists' rights are not mutually exclusive, provided there is close regulation of the procedure.
Consent searches can further the objective of detecting and prosecuting crime.
They have produced significant evidence of serious crimes and, from time to time, have resulted in the confiscation of significant quantities of drugs and other contraband. A blanket prohibition of them would not only eliminate the possible interdiction of such contraband but could result in the exclusion of critical evidence in an important case when a police officer has acted properly and reasonably but only on the basis of consent. Blanket prohibitions are always risky business. Because consent searches are inherently coercive, however, scrupulous regulation of the process and scrupulous attention to police performance are essential. The standards set forth in a state police standard operating procedure promulgated by Dintino and myself in 1990 are still operative and viable today.