> This applies to constitutional law only. Any state or municipality can legislate more specific requirements for policing if they choose, because that’s how federalism works.
When it comes to restricting police powers, they actually cannot. That was a key determination in Scalia's majority opinion in Castle Rock v. Gonzalez.
People are always shocked by this, because it goes against how they understand the legal system to work. And they're right to be surprised, because it is a truly incomprehensible ruling when you pick it apart. But it's right there in the text of the ruling. And it has been treated as binding precedent and applied as such by lower courts in the years since.
I don't think that's what Castle Rock v. Gonzalez means. It pretty narrowly addresses "legitimate claim of entitlement" related to enforcement of a restraining order. Scalia specifically held that "enforcement of the restraining order was not mandatory under Colorado law," which means that a state COULD mandate enforcement, but that Colorado had not.
That said, I still think it was a shitty way to slice due process law.
> I don't think that's what Castle Rock v. Gonzalez means. It pretty narrowly addresses "legitimate claim of entitlement" related to enforcement of a restraining order. Scalia specifically held that "enforcement of the restraining order was not mandatory under Colorado law," which means that a state COULD mandate enforcement, but that Colorado had not.
That's actually not true! Read the ruling itself and you'll see. Or if you can't read the ruling, read the legal analysis of it.
The ruling is incredibly broad and exhaustive. It basically said "Colorado didn't, but even if they had, they couldn't because that would be unconstitutional, and even if it weren't, the Due Process clause wouldn't apply, and even if it did, the value would be $0".
It basically preempted five levels of rebuttals to the law, making it difficult or impossible to overturn it without directly abandoning stare decisis.
Scalia'a argument for why the law was unconstitutional basically boils down to "police have always enjoyed near-unlimited freedom, and this law is too recent in the scale of US history, so it contradicts historical precedent". Which is another way of saying that states can't pass laws to restrict police discretion, because any law that is passed is by definition... "recent".
The ruling did that because the Colorado law was quite explicit in how it mandated a right to enforcement, so there was no other way to overturn the law.
And as if that's not enough, the precedent applied is quite clear: courts including in New York City have specifically used Castle Rock to rule that police do not have a duty to protect, serve, prevent crime, or intervene in a crime that is taking place, even if they were specifically dispatched to arrest that particular criminal for that particular crime. (Yes, that last part was an NYC court ruling that cited Castle Rock as precedent).
Great. Get rid of 'Police' departments and create a new form of community protection with no long history and none of that baggage :) problem solved. Thanks Scalia for encouraging 'defund the Police' as the ONLY solution to the problem!
That's interesting. I've read a few summaries of the decision but not the original text. I'd be curious to see how the court would respond to a state like Texas or Arizona challenging Castle Rock on something like immigration enforcement.
When it comes to restricting police powers, they actually cannot. That was a key determination in Scalia's majority opinion in Castle Rock v. Gonzalez.
People are always shocked by this, because it goes against how they understand the legal system to work. And they're right to be surprised, because it is a truly incomprehensible ruling when you pick it apart. But it's right there in the text of the ruling. And it has been treated as binding precedent and applied as such by lower courts in the years since.