Does the 5th Amendment only apply to federal government The 5th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States says No person shall be held to answer for a... crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury..., nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law... First of all, most sources* seem to indicate that this only applies to federal government and that this particular law doesn't forbid citizens from committing murder (though other laws obviously do). Why is that? The Amendment doesn't say that it's only talking about federal government. In fact, the way its worded implies that it applies to anyone. It says that no person shall be held to answer for a... crime period. It doesn't say that no person shall be held to answer of a... crime by federal government. Why doesn't this amendment apply to citizens instead of only federal government? Second of all, if it does only apply to federal government, does that mean that government can declare it legal for citizens to kill a particular person? If not, how does the Fifth Amendment make that illegal if it only applies to federal government? Or if the Fifth Amendment is not the law that forbids government from doing as I described, what law does (if any)? In other words, what law makes it illegal for government to declare it legal for citizens to kill a certain person without that person being sentenced to death under the "due process of he law"? If it is the Fifth Amendment, how does it forbid government from so doing if the law applies to federal government only? * https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/fifth_amendment https://system.uslegal.com/u-s-constitution/amendment-v/background/applicability-of-the-fifth-amendment-to-the-states/
The Fifth Amendment, and all the other amendments in the "Bill of Rights" (numbers 1-10) were universally understood when passed to be restrictions on the Federal Government only. The courts treated them that way through the end of the US Civil War. This was made definite in the US Supreme Court case Barron v. Baltimore, 32 U.S. (7 Pet.) 243 (1833) Since the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment the courts have decided that most of the provisions of the bill of rights also apply to actions by the states. A few do not apply, such as the requirement that indictments be by a grand jury, and the Third Amendment ban on quartering soldiers in private dwellings. This was done through a somewhat roundabout mechanism -- the Supreme Court decided that the protections of the Bill of Rights were included in the Due process clause of the 14th. As a result not all the provisions were made applicable at the same time. (Most were held to be incorporated during the period from 1925-1985. Gitlow v. New York, 268 U.S. 652 (1925) thru Roberts v. United States Jaycees, 468 U.S. 609 (1984)). Modern legal opinions sometimes discuss incorporation as if it was a fact from the passage of the 14th in 1868. But the actual gradual process is clear in the case law. For example, the Sixth Amendment right to counsel in criminal cases was first incorporated in Powell v. Alabama, 287 U.S. 45 (1932), but only for death penalty cases, and only if "special circumstances" existed, such as a defendant who was illiterate, far from home and support, or feeble-minded. Later cases gradually found "special circumstances" in more and more fact patterns, and in Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963) the Court extended the right to all felony cases. It has later been extended to misdemeanor cases if jail time is a possible result. A similar history could be spelled out for the Fifth Amendment's protection against self-incrimination, or for the Fourth's against search and seizure, particularly the "exclusionary rule". I, and a number of legal scholars who have better rights to an opinion, think that the 14th's "Privileges and Immunities" clause would have been a more sensible means to this end, but for various reasons that isn't how it was done. Justice Thomas seems to be trying to reverse this -- he has made comments in a number of opinions of late that various things should be protected under the Privileges and Immunities clause of the 14th, rather than the Due Process clause.. Even if the Court adopts this theory, it probably won't change many outcomes. That is how the Fifth, and other Bill of rights Provisions like the Fourth (search and seizure) and the First (free speech and religion) have been applied to restrict the states. None of these provisions directly restrict private individuals. In some cases, courts have said that while individuals may not be forbidden to do things that are forbidden to governments under the Bill of Rights, the courts will not help you do such things, such as by enforcing contracts to do them. No person shall be held to answer for a... crime "held to answer" here means prosecuted in court. Only governments do that. That provision forbids criminal court cases that do not start with a grand Jury indictment. it is one of the few Bill of Rights provisions which the Supreme Court has held do not apply to the states. But in any case it is purely procedural. It doesn't say that crimes may not be prosecuted, nor that they must. It says only "if you want to try someone for a crime, this is a step you must go through." The other provisions of the Fifth all do apply to the states, such as the ban on double jeopardy, and the protection against self-incrimination. does that mean that government can declare it legal for citizens to kill a particular person? No. That would violate the Fifth Amendment's Due Process clause if don3 by the Federal Government, and the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process clause and its Equal Protection clause if done by a state. It would probably also violate the provision against Bills of Attainder, and perhaps the provision against cruel and unusual punishment. Once upon a time, several hundred years before the US was founded, the government of England did just that. It was called "outlawry". For certain crimes, the punishment was to be put "outside the law". An "outlaw" (in this older sense) was not protected by the law. Anyone could kill an outlaw, or steal from one, and the legal system would do nothing about it. The US has never used outlawry.
Federal facilities are required to adhere to the flag code. Non-federal governmental entities are not, and the explanation is more complicated. In theory, the federal government should have very little power over the decision-making of state governments -- this is a principle of federalism and is expressly stated in the 10th Amendment. In practice, however, the federal government has a lot of power over state governments. Congress can condition the allotment of federal monies to states, i.e. block grants, as long as such a condition meets the five point test spelled out in South Dakota v. Dole. The most stringent of these points is that the condition "must not be coercive" so as to apply "irresistible pressure", creating a false choice where accepting money is the only realistic option (thus complying with the conditions). I couldn't find a clause within USC Title 4, Chapter 1 for withholding funds from states in the event of noncompliance, similar to one that exists for the national drinking age. Therefore states (state, county, municipal all treated as an extension of state power under the US Constitution) are not required to to adhere to the flag code. Theoretically, Congress could pass a new law that would condition the receipt of some federal funds on the states' compliance with the flag code. But the new low could face additional hurdles, since the condition must be "directly related to one of the main purposes for which... [the funds] are expended" (quoting from Dole). This restriction is the reason why states were given the right to opt out of the Obamacare medicare expansion without losing their pre-existing Medicaid funding (567 U. S. ____ (2012) at 51), and is also the reason why the recent "Sanctuary Cities Ban" is having legal trouble. It would be unlikely that any law like this would hold up. It's also worth noting that most states have their own flag law, which makes this whole discussion of the federal law's effect on state facilities. As you noted, since US v. Eichman, all criminal penalties for violating any flag code have been unenforceable against individuals. My best guess is that the proper method of enforcement in federal buildings is simply administrative action, since violating the code can provide cause for firing federal employees under Chapter 75 of the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978.
In the United States, the government has, multiple times, destroyed homes while trying to catch a fugitive. And the homeowner sometimes makes a claim in federal court that this is an unconstitutional taking without compensation in violation of the 5th Amendment. In Lech v. Jackson, the 10th Circuit decided that the police and city were not liable for destroying a house while trying to arrest a criminal who had fled there. The Supreme Court declined to hear the case. But in Baker v. City of McKinney, Texas, less than 3 months ago, a district court declined to dismiss a case in which police destroyed a home to catch a fleeing criminal. Allegedly, in this case the police were given a key to the door, a garage door opener, and the code to the back gate by the homeowner - and instead of using those, they used explosives on the garage door and used a BearCat to knock down the fence and the front door. I'm not sure to what extent those facts, perhaps showing that the scale of the destruction was unnecessary, matter. To the best of my knowledge the case is still ongoing.
The courts do not supersede your constitutional rights, although you may believe that you have a constitutional right that isn't actually there. This article discusses the position that "due process forbids convicting an individual of a crime unless the government proves the elements of the charged offense beyond a reasonable doubt". This standard is actually not stated anywhere in the US Constitution, but it has been assumed as an implicit meaning of "due process". It sounds like you were charged with a crime, and there is most likely an applicable statute in your state that is analogous to RCW 26.50.110 in Washington. So you have the right to a trial and the prosecution would have the obligation to prove all of the elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. It also appears that you did violate the applicable law and you were willing to plead guilty, as urged by your attorney. You are correct that you don't technically have to prove your innocence, but there is a practical problem that if the prosecution provides some weak evidence that you violated the law, then the jury might decide that your failure to refute the evidence means that there is no reasonable doubt. The problem is that there is a tendency for jurors to think that the defendant has to create a doubt. States differ somewhat in how they explain the burden of proof to jurors, and you might fare better in a state where the instruction is that "you must be firmly convinced". Since the attorney seems to have said that "the constitution doesn't apply to this", this is a puzzle. I would not assume (though it is possible) that the attorney was incompetent. It is possible that he was speaking of a non-criminal matter, and it is possible that you were talking at cross purposes. There is no legal situation where "the constitution doesn't apply to this", but perhaps "that constitutional limitation doesn't apply to this specific situation". Regardless of what the attorney said, your attorney doesn't violate your rights, even if he gives you bad advice. The actual court might, and then you would have a cause for an appeal. Similarly, if the district attorney reasonably believes that you are a danger to society and is prosecuting you, that is not a violation of your constitutional rights. An improper conviction would be a violation of those rights, although it might take an appeal to get the court to recognize that fact.
In Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233, SCOTUS held that A corporation is a &quot;person&quot; within the meaning of the due process and equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment Citizens United v. FEC, 558 U.S. 310 and numerous preceding cases find that &quot;the First Amendment applies to corporations&quot;. Corporations also enjoy the right to contract (protected by the Contract Clause), meaning that the government cannot willy-nilly invalidate a contract because one of the parties is a corporation, see Trustees of Dartmouth Coll. v. Woodward, 17 U.S. 518. (But, of course, any government can regulate any contract by process of law). In general, under 1 USC 1, In determining the meaning of any Act of Congress, unless the context indicates otherwise...the words “person” and “whoever” include corporations, companies, associations, firms, partnerships, societies, and joint stock companies, as well as individuals We know that corporations do not have the right to vote. Second Amendment corporate rights are district-specific at present: Seventh Circuit courts view firearms sellers like booksellers — as holders of constitutional rights. While gun sellers are subject to much stricter regulation than are booksellers, they are both protected by the Bill of Rights. Conversely, in the courts of the Fourth Circuit, gun sellers have no Second Amendment rights. Third Amendment rights are unknown. Engblom v. Carey, 677 F.2d 957 which is binding only in a few states, is the entirety of 3rd Amendment case law and does not enter the relevant legal territory. In Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U.S. 385, the court held that The Fourth Amendment protects a corporation and its officers from compulsory production of the corporate books and papers for use in a criminal proceeding against them when the information upon which the subpoenas were framed was derived by the Government through a previous unconstitutional search and seizure, planned and executed by its officials under color of a void writ, provided the defense of the Amendment be seasonably interposed, and not first raised as a collateral issue at the trial of the indictment. The article &quot;A Corporation's Right to a Jury Trial under the Sixth Amendment&quot;, 27 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 375 explores the question of Sixth Amendment rights of corporations esp. the right to trial by jury – the summary is that this has yet to be clearly determined. US v. Troxler Hosiery Co., 681 F.2d 934 finds such a right as does United States v. R. L. Polk and Co., 438 F.2d 377 A corporation does not have the same right not to incriminate itself as does a natural person, but it does enjoy the same rights as individuals to trial by jury. However, corporate trial-by-jury rights are buried deep in questions about the &quot;seriousness&quot; of the prosecution. Muniz v. Hoffman, 422 U.S. 454 held that &quot;Petitioners are not entitled to a jury trial under 18 U.S.C. § 3692&quot;, but this is about a specific statute and a question of whether the offense is petty, and the broad constitutional question remains. The right to an attorney seems to be secure, see this opinion by Merrick Garland, and citations therein.
There are literally hundreds of such laws. Most of them (perhaps all, if we exclude firearms-related crimes in Title 26) are contained in Title 18 of the US Code, part I. The problem is that your definition of "public insurrection" is too broad, since it would include lying to federal agents (a crime), insofar as the reason for 18 USC 1001 is to prevent impeding federal investigations by giving them false information. Assaulting a federal agent impedes government and is a crime. There is pretty much a federal version of any state-level crime of violence. There is the riot act, and a specific law against insurrection and rebellion. Chapter 115 is probably the most relevant: this is where the various "overthrowing the government" laws are.
It isn't a double negative, although it is a bit of an usual phrasing. The context that you are overlooking is that the United States Constitution does not say who is or is not allowed to vote because that authority is not vested in the federal government. There is no affirmative right to vote in the United States Constitution, there is merely a right not to be denied the right to vote for certain particular reasons. Responsibility for determining who is allowed to vote is vested in state governments. The right to vote for the House of Representatives is derivative of that decision pursuant to Article I, Section 2, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution which states: The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States, and the Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature. The 19th Amendment prohibits state's from denying the right to vote on account of sex, but does not prohibit states from denying the right to vote on account of other grounds not specified in the 19th Amendment, such as property ownership, education, criminal record, possession of identification, etc. When the 19th Amendment was ratified, in 1920, some states (e.g. Colorado) already allowed women to vote, while others did not. Similarly, when the 15th Amendment was ratified some states prevented people from voting based upon race and others did not. And, so on. In practice, the modern trend is for states to enact laws allowing all U.S. citizens age eighteen or over to vote, subject primarily to limitations that vary quite a bit based upon criminal record or incarceration status. But, historically, when the power to set the franchise was vested in the states, race, gender, property ownership, age (in excess of eighteen), poll tax payments, and "civics" tests, have all been used at sometime or another to limit the right to vote. There is, however, some incentive for states not to be restrictive, because certain kinds of restrictions reduce the population of the state under the U.S. Constitution for purposes of allocated members of Congress and electoral votes. This is set forth in Section 2 of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution (ratified in 1868) which states: Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State. (Incidentally, there are no longer any people who qualify as "Indians not taxed" in the U.S. due to federal legislation that was adopted after 1868.) This set a presumptive baseline that males twenty-one years of age not disqualified by a criminal record are allowed to vote, but with a penalty for not doing so imposed at the state level in apportionment rather than in the form of a prohibition against doing so, before express prohibitions against certain kinds of restrictions of the franchise were adopted in the 15th, 19th, 24th and 26th Amendments. It is also useful to compare the examples of the 15th Amendment (ratified 1870), the 24th Amendment (ratified 1964) and the 26th Amendment (ratified 1971), which are parallel to the 19th Amendment and wouldn't make sense against a backdrop that the population, by default, is allowed to vote. Article XV (Amendment 15 - Rights of Citizens to Vote) The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. and Amendment XXIV (Amendment 24 - Abolition of the Poll Tax Qualification in Federal Elections) The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. and Amendment XXVI (Amendment 26 - Reduction of Voting Age Qualification) 1: The right of citizens of the United States, who are 18 years of age or older, to vote, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of age. affects 15 2: The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
No. Arizona tried passing a law that, among other things: criminalized failure to comply with federal alien registration requirements, criminalized working without being authorized to work in the United States, and authorized state officers to arrest aliens without a warrant if they had probable cause that the alien had committed a crime that made them deportable. All three provisions were struck down in Arizona v. United States. The federal government has &quot;occupied the field&quot; on most immigration issues. That means they've regulated it so extensively that there is zero room for states to act independently. One of Arizona's laws that was struck down exactly duplicated a federal criminal statute, but even that went too far by allowing the state to apply its own enforcement priorities and prosecute cases the federal government would not. If a state made it a crime to be unlawfully present (which is not a federal crime), that intrudes even further on the federal immigration scheme. This doesn't mean a state can't alert the federal government to people who are unlawfully present. It doesn't necessarily mean state officers can't arrest for federal immigration crimes: a previous Ninth Circuit decision held that Arizona officers could arrest for federal immigration crimes on the same basis that they could arrest for state crimes, and the Supreme Court in Arizona v. US explicitly didn't address the question. However, if state officers make an arrest for a federal crime, the federal government still gets to decide whether or not to prosecute. What you're asking about would remove that federal control, so it is preempted by federal law.