New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-06-30
THE LIBERTY OF THE CITIZEN.

There is a difference between soldiers
in time of war and invasion, and police
menin time of peace, in this, that while
the former are in the land of their
enemies, the latter are in the land of their
friends. The difference ought to origin
ate striking dissimilarity OF conduct
for while the soldier should accept every
citizen of hostile territory as an enemy
the policeman should treat every citizen
within his Jurisdiction as a friend. And
this suggests that while raids are emil
nently proper in military campaigns, they
are eminently improper in legal advances.
| 1t matters but little how the enemy is
| sublued in hostile conflicts, but it is the
very essence of liberty that the citizen
should enjoy his freedom, except when
intercepted by due process of law. And
it is the duty Of every freeman to assist
his fellow citizen against illegal or arbi-
trary arrest, for if he allows the safety of
one man to be violated with impunity, he
can never presume upon his own security
against the same injustice. Oppression
! strikes the weak first, and then it fells
the strong. If the mighty assist the
lowly to maintain their rights, the favor
will be returned; but if the weak are OPP
pressed with the connivance of the Strong,
in the day when the mighty man falls the
lowly man will rejoice that oppression
has at last reached the citizen who did
not raise his voice to arrest its usurpa-
tons, because he considered himself ex-
empt from its operations.
When the policeman raids upon the
gamblers or upon the prostitutes, and ar
rests them upon mere suspicion and with
out affidavit he violates the law and i'm
perils the liberty of every citizen, for if he
may do this thing to one class of people
he may do it to another. All the excuse
he will need to offer will be the excuse
which he offers at the Recorders Court,
that he suspected the party of evil do
| iugs. He is not paid to arrest people on
suspicion, but his duty is to take in charge
'LAAO o'tSAI 10 AAC SehL4
an affidavit against as really guilty of some
ottense. The plan of soaring the real of
Tenders by summarily gobbling up party
/ of innocent people, may be labor-saving
| process, but it is not legalized method
Of impOunding human beings. The law
rescribes very plain way to fetch the
/ guilty into limbo, and this is the only way
that the police ought to adopt in perform
ing their duty. They are paid, not only
to protect the law, but to observe it, and
when their disposition is such that they
can not resist the desire to make a raid
upon crime by capturing regiment OF
presumptive offenders, they are unfit to
wear the badge Of peace officers.
What is not strictly lawful can not be
right; and no officer is justified in making
an arrest under the excuse Of preventing
a crime, for, peradventure, the suspicion
may be erroneous and great injustice may
result to an innocent man. The police
are paid to arrest guilty people, and it s
their business to be watchful at all tines
in order to stop the commission q Of
lenses. This can be done by watching
for the opportune moment VIXEN the
person is actually offending, or % near to
it that an affidavit to that effect may be
sustained before an upright iDdge. Mayor
Monroe illustrated the impolcy of striking
prematurely and on suspicion when he ar
ranged his rowdies SO asto kill or capture
the gentlemen who proposed to hold a
constitutional convention in this city in
1866, and Justice Evans exemplifed it
@hen he sent Peter Munday down for
punishment on Suspicion of being a sus-
picions character. All these strained
and perverted exercises of force and
Judgment are reprehensible in the highest
degree because they bring the law and
its officer both into contempt, the one as
the voice and the other as the agent OF
injustice. In fact the officer transforms
himself intoa criminal, for he violates by
hiS own act the very law which he pre-,
tends to enforce.
Judge Cooley ventilated these abomina
tons on Wednesday in the case of Nun,
day, and denounced in very round terms
the unjust and oppressive practices which
have grown into use in this city, wherein
the police have made raids upon the in
nocent for the purpose of intimidatine
the guilty. 1t is seldom that the REPUB
LIcAN finds occasion to compliment judge
Cooley, but as We make it rule to dc
justice to all men who pursue the right
let our testimony be given in this cast
that the Judge indicated the law ant
upheld the liberty of the people in this
instance to our entire satisfaction.