Judge rules drivers can flash lights to warn of police presence
Source: Atlanat Journal-Constitution
The judge says not allowing drivers to flash their lights in warning violates First Amendment rights.
US District Judge Henry Autrey in St. Louis wrote, "Detaining, ticketing, or arresting someone for the content of their speech is illegal."
The suit came after Michael Elli was given a ticket in Ellisville, Missouri when he flashed his lights to warn drivers about police ahead.
The charges were dropped but that didn’t stop the ACLU from filing a lawsuit over the incident.
<snip>
Read more: http://www.ajc.com/news/news/crime-law/judge-rules-drivers-can-flash-lights-warn-police-p/ndGXF/
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
bananas
(27,509 posts)
mercymechap
(579 posts)ticket, I will certainly warn them.
Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)I was driving on a divided highway with good visibility but with no buildings, cars or people around, and no speed limit posted. The cops waved me off to a side street and told me I was going 45 in a 35 zone, and charged me $120 for that. Plus, I lost my insurance discount for 3 years, which cost me another $120.
mercymechap
(579 posts)needs money, they will stop you when you may only be doing 5 miles over the limit and claim you were doing 15 over the limit.
I asked the cop if I could see the radar, and he said he had already erased it... I didn't know what to do, so I just took the ticket, so now, I will help anyone I can to avoid getting a ticket.
TygrBright
(20,758 posts)
Prisoner_Number_Six
(15,676 posts)-forty two years ago. I believe I've saved my fellow citizens many thousands of dollars in fines and wasted time (those useless mandatory day-long driver "education" classes are a royal pain in the ass) over the years. And any copper who doesn't like it can kiss my rosy red.
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)for the last 27 years. Just a couple flashes lets those coming the other direction know a pig is ahead.
Maynar
(769 posts)doing exactly that, warning folks. Lied my way out of the ticket. Not my proudest moment, certainly. [/baggage]
Stil glad to aid my fellow man.
dotymed
(5,610 posts)
cthulu2016
(10,960 posts)Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Seriously, wouldn't sending a warning - "cops ahead, check yourself"- be considered a public service? A small one perhaps, but it counts.
awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)It is all about revenue generation
BGFisher200
(13 posts)the local radio station would point out where the cops were sitting during the rush hour traffic reports. That didn't last very long, I suspect the local police complained to the radio station.
dotymed
(5,610 posts)the local newspaper informs its readers about where and when police checkpoints will be set up. I believe the practice has been
challenged in court and won. I agree with the practice.
DesMoinesDem
(1,569 posts)Newspapers usually inform the public about these.
happyslug
(14,779 posts)Prior to the 1830s, you did not have Police in the US. You did have Sheriff Deputies but they duties was tied in with serving papers for the County Courts and holding execution sales of property to pay Judgement. Most Sheriff were paid by the job, i.e. if you wanted the Sheriff is serve papers you had to pay him. If you wanted the Sheriff to hold someone for trial, he had to be paid (Through if it was a criminal charge, the Defendant was the one who had to pay for the housing and food the Defendant received while in jail).
Constable also existed, but tied in with Justice of the Peace Courts, and did what the Sheriff Deputies did, but given the limits of most Justice of the Peace Jurisdictions, anyone jailed had to deal with the Sheriff and his rules (including paying the sheriff for being held in jail).
Now, towns and cities would have night watchmen to patrol the streets, but they had no power of arrest except to make a Citizen's arrest if he saw someone commit a felony.
AS to "Police", the attitude in the US was the same as in Britain, we valued out liberty to much to permit such a institution, instituted by the French King under the Bourbon Kings.
Side Note: George Washington had a problem with holding British Prisoners of War during the Revolution. Most ended up being held by the State's Militia, but that quickly found out not to work, the Militiamen all wanted to go home and farm not watch British POWs. Thus Washington had to created the US Military Police to guard these prisoners and do other Police work within the Army's camp. In many ways the US Army MPs are the first Police Force in the US.
Now, tied in with this is that if you wanted to bring a Criminal Charge against someone, you had to hire an attorney to do so. The States all had Attorney Generals, but that was an attorney for the State for crimes against the state such as failing to pay taxes, treason, armed rebellion etc. Murder was NOT a crime against the State, it was a crime against an individual and that person's heir were the one who had to bring the Criminal Action. The Same with other crimes, the victim of those crimes had to bring the Criminal Action, not the Attorney General.
Now, in Britain starting in the 1600s, many towns hired an attorney to act as the attorney of any victim in that town in criminal proceedings. This expanded to the US in the 1700s. In the 1790s New York (and later New Jersey) formalized this practice in form of the First District Attorneys. Pennsylvania seems to have followed the practice in the early 1790s but then did not appoint any new DAs till the 1840s (A DA was appointed in the 1790s, when he stop being the DA is unknown, but no new ones were made till the 1840s).
Anyway, in the 1840s you had a surge in crime and DAs were adopted in almost every state. Later on the Concept of a District Attorney spread to England in the form of the "Queen's Attorney" as opposed to the Attorney General. (Yes DAs spread from the US to England, not England to the US). Technically DAs are lieutenants of the Attorney General, but being locally elected local DAs only call in the Attorney General in cases were it would be a conflict of interest for the local DA to deal with a criminal case.
This adoption of District Attorneys was a huge increase in costs, but people demanded it and it was accepted. Now, at the same time a movement began, first in England, then the US to adopt something like the French Police, but in urban areas only. The Police in the US were to watch the new immigrants and most themselves were new immigrants for they were the only people willing to work for the low wages offered. In some cities the Police were started from scratch, but in most cities they tended to be an expansion of the old night watchmen programs. One of the funding of nightwatchmen was they could charge people out late at night and take them to court for violating curfew. Nightwatchmen, being lowly paid, had always been known to accept "direct payment of the fine" i.e. a bribe, rather then take an offender to Jail. This continued with the transition to Police. Thus police were nicknamed "Coppers" later shorten to "Cops" for you could hear one approaching by the jingling of all of the copper pennies they took as bribes.
Side Note: On the net you will hear stories that Police were called "Coppers" do to wearing Copper buttons. The problem with that stories is early Police Uniforms did NOT have Copper Buttons. The early Police had to buy and maintain their own uniforms, thus purchased bone as button material for it was a lot cheaper then copper.
While low pay (and Bribes) were enough to pay for urban police forces, it was the intention of people forming these urban police forces that fines would be what paid the actual Police Salary. This ended up failing, for the upper middle class always made sure they were never charged with a fine (and police officers, being political appointees, quickly learned who NOT to ticket if they wanted to keep their jobs) and the poor did not have the money to pay the fine (and in many cases would leave the city rather then risk going to jail for not paying outstanding fines). Thus taxes had to be used to pay the Police, and the push was to keep such cost low by paying the Police Officers low salaries.
Now, the Upper Middle Class started to read stories of outlaws doing outstanding crimes against other Upper Middle Class people and started to demand "Protection" in the 1840s and finally accepted that they had to pay taxes to get such police protection. Thus Urban police forces started to see an increase in pay in the 1800s, especially as what we call Newspapers started to appear in the 1830s, and throughout the US in the 1850s (tied in with the invention of Pulp paper in 1801, but Pulp paper, while way cheaper then linen paper it replaced took a while to take off, the delay was similar to the use of Computers, first electronic computer invented in 1944, but most households only had one starting in the 1990s, it takes take for a new technology to replace older technology).
Anyway, one of the side affects of pulp paper is the pulp novel of the mid to late 1800s, where bad guys did horrible crimes and stopped by the good guys. Like the stories in Newspapers made more horrible to expand the number of people buying papers, such pulp novels quickly learn the more evil the bad guys were the more pulp novels they could sell.
The side affect of this, is like watching TV in the late 20th century. The more you watch TV, the greater was your perception that crime was out of control in the late 20th century. The same in the 1800s, the more you read about crime, the higher your perception that crime was out of control and the more you wanted Police.
Now, the majority of Americans lived in rural areas til the 1920 census. In Rural America they was a demand for police but no one could figure out a way to pay for them. Texas had its Texas Rangers, but these started out as Troops for the Independent Republic of Texas, then Texas State Troops that Congress never approved of, nor rejected. Then slowly reduced to corporal's guard around the Governor by 1900 (and reform in the 1930s as set forth below). The adventures of the Texas Rangers occurred mostly in the pulp novels of the time period, but they did exist but not many.
In the mid to late 1800s businesses started to demand police protection against strikers. In many urban areas the urban police agreed to be the police for these businesses. One problem was they only existed in urban areas and the states refused to make state wide police, for they did NOT want to pay for such police (mostly do to a refusal to raise taxes to pay for such police). Into this gap, private law enforcement firms stepped in, the most famous the Pinkerton, whose main job was anti-union activities (But quickly learned that good press in the papers and novels added to their bottom line so made sure they were the "good guys" in such stories even if they were the side that threw the bombs that killed children).
Side note: The Pinkertons on hearing that Jesse James may be visiting this mother, threw a bomb into her house, killing Jesse James 8 year old half brother and maiming his mother. Jesse James and the rest of the Gang was NOT in the house, and recently it was found that Allen Pinkertons plan for that attack was to burn the house down with everyone in it. The Pinkertons never recovered their public reputation from that bombing, but the Pinkertons may have liked the reputations for it helped them get jobs with anti-union businesses for Pinkerton's ability to raise 1000 men on 48 hours notice who would kill striking union members. See the Homestead Strike of 1892 for details on the Pinkertons reputation at that time.
Burgoyne book on the Homestead Strike of 1892
http://upress.pitt.edu/BookDetails.aspx?bookId=34354
Chapter IV where Burgoyne goes into details of the Pinkertons of his time period (the 1890s):
http://digital.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=pittpress;cc=pittpress;idno=31735041196951;rgn=full%20text;didno=31735041196951;view=image;seq=0065;node=31735041196951%3A1.11
Pinkerton's burning of the home of Jesse James's Mother
http://articles.latimes.com/1992-09-27/news/mn-210_1_jesse-james
Now, the Pinkertons were not the only private police force used in the late 1800s. Pennslyvnaia also had what was called the "Coal and Iron Police" which at least one historian called the only real terrorist group to ever have existed in the US. These were paid by private companies, mostly Iron, Steel and Coal companies to beat up workers. They were Police under oath, i.e. had all the power of any other Police officer but paid by private companies.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_and_Iron_Police
http://www.mcintyrepa.com/coalandironpolice.htm
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5661
The reputation of the Coal And Iron Police were so bad that a reform governor invented what was knows as the first "Modern" State police in 1903, the Pennsylvania State Police, but it was viewed not much better then the Coal and Iron Police by workers and hopelessly underfunded.
Now, starting during the Civil War, a movement arouse in the US to adopt traffic rules. One person advocating such a program remember a traffic jam in the 1850s involving less then six vehicles were involved, but no one knew which side of the road to stay on and who to yield to whom. It was a mess. This was complicated by the huge numbers of Germans entering the US since the 1700s. In England wagons were single or in tandem (one in front of anther). Given that horse were trained to permit rider on their back only from their left side, which carried a saber in the days of old, such wagons would pass each other on each others right side. Europe by the 1700s had adopted teams of horses as the norm. Riders still operated on the front horse and mounted on that horse's left side, but had a horse to their right side unlike single and tandem wagons which had no horse to the right of the lead horse. Thus the use of teams, horses side by side, forced wagons to pass each other on their left side, the side the rider on the left lead horse could see how close the two teams of horses were. Thus by the time of Napoleon (who made it the rule), Europe were passing each other on each other's left side (i.e. they rode on the right side of the road), while England retained the older tradition of passing each other on each other's Right side (thus driving on the left side of the road).
These two traditions came into conflict in the US. In rural areas not much of a problem, but in urban areas an increasing problem by the 1850s. Napoleon was still the big name when it came to anything military, so the Army adopted wagons to the right. The German immigrants also rode on the right. Other people in the US often rode on the left. Finally stating in the 1960s a movement was started to get everyone to ride on the right. This included, in urban areas, giving the power to the police to give tickets to anyone NOT riding on the right. These three movements made the US an on the right road country (similar pressure existed in Europe, but England, being an island did not have the same level of teamsters as the US or the Continent stayed with riding on the left).
Giving tickets became a huge source of revenue for urban police forces, but in rural areas the Justice of the Peace would generally not fine someone for riding on the wrong side of the road, if the road was empty, thus giving traffic tickets in rural america before the advent of the automobile did not pay for the police, and without the revenue from tickets, rural police could not be paid.
That was the Police Situation around 1919 when Oregon passed the first Gasoline tax in the US (Britain had passed one over a decade earlier but 1919 is the first US State). By the mid 1920s gasoline taxes were bringing in money to pay for improved roads, being demanded by drivers on those roads. Some of this money went to fund various state's Highway Patrol, whose orders were to keep the the newly paved roads clear. The Automobile also permitted Police officers to cover more territory and thus go from one area to the next to give out more tickets.
Rural America embraced the Automobile before Urban America. Most people living in the cities did not own a car till the 1950s, most rural residents had cars starting in the 1920s (tied in with the massive increase in wealth in Rural America do to high price of farm products, driven by the European push to NOT trade with the previous main source of food for much of Europe, Russia. Stalin ended this by dumping Russian and Ukrainian grain on the European market, dropping the price of food, then the dust bowl hit). Now the late 1920s and the 1930s was rough on Rural America, but rural america was on a boom from 1912 to 1928. During this period rural america is where car makers aimed their products. IT was the main area buying cars (the second market for cars were upper middle class living in the urban areas, i.e. people making the equivalent of more then $75,000 today).
Now, tied in with Rural America's buying cars, was upper Middle Class people moving to what was to become suburbia. While most people still lived inside urban cores in the 1920s, the people outside those cores but in the same county or region tended to have automobiles.
All of these new cars on the road, the invention of driver's licenses (more to give police a name and number to send tickets to, then anything else, without a license the officer has to take the offender to a local Justice of Peace to arraign bond and that could take 3-6 hours, 2-6 hours the Police officer would be writing more tickets).
Yes, driver's license were invented so Police Officers could give more tickets. Most people just paid the tickets, and those that protested the ticker tended to be scheduled so that the officer was in court only one day (i.e. all of the people he gave tickets to had to show up for a hearing on the same day, thus the officer had only to spend one day in court, no matter how many tickets he wrote, unlike when an officer gave a ticket to someone without a license, where he had to take that offender to a JP and arraign him, thus tying up that officer 2-6 hours just for one ticket).
The Gasoline tax provided a base of funding for State Police, who then could use that base to write tickets to people with licenses. People without licenses were taken to jail and subject to severe punishment, so to encourage them and others to get a license. It is the license that permitted Police to give out scores of tickets per day, and then have most of those tickets PAID with the officer spending the minimum amount of time in the judicial system.
Urban police picked up on this, but quickly found out that the people in urban areas with cars tended to be well connected politically, so most urban police forces developed a culture of NOT giving tickets. On the other hand suburban police forces quickly found out they could give such tickets, mostly to people going through their suburb to another suburb, and it did not matter who these victims where, they had no connection with the suburb that was paying their salary, Thus a lot of suburbs embraced giving tickets to pay for their police.
Now the state police situation is "different". I live in Pennsylvania, a state that claims to have the oldest State Police in the Country founded in 1903. Its main purpose was "riot" control in rural areas (Mostly helping to put down coal strikes). They had a bad reputation in Pennsylvania, so in 1926 when a decision was made to have police on state highways, the State of Pennsylvania founded a new State Police Agency, called the "Pennsylvania Highway Patrol". Its main source of revenue was giving out tickets on state highways. In 1937 it was merged with the State Police under the Name "Pennsylvania State Motor Police", which changed its name to "Pennsylvania State Police" in 1947.
On the surface it looks like the Old State Police took over the Highway Patrol. The old Highway Patrol had badges, the State Police do not, their uniform is their "Badge" a policy adopted by the State Police in 1903. The State Police main function was to beat up on striking miners, the Highway Patrol never did that. The post 1947 State Police do not have badges, wear the Smokey the Bear hats of the State Police (not the police cap of the old Highway Patrol) but also go around in Cars and primary patrol State highways (while State Police still patrol strikes, they do not have the reputation of beating up strikers like the State Police of 1903-1937). Thus, while the uniform, ranks, and over all structure is the same as the pre-1937 State Police, the post 1947 State Police often reflects the traditions of the old highway Patrol more then the old State Police. i.e. the Pennsylvania State Police main job is to write tickets so that they are no cost to the State. In many ways the larger organization (the old Highway Patrol) decided to leave the tradition of the smaller organization alone and adjust to it for all of that was unimportant to them, but on the important items, how they were PAID, the traditional of the Highway Patrol was maintained.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_State_Police
This same situation occurred in other states, for example Taxas reformed its State Police Force in 1937 to maintain the "Tradition" of the Texas Rangers (as portrayed in dime novels and movies) while adopting a modern state police, whose main source of income is giving out tickets.
The duties of the Texas Ranger Division consist of conducting criminal and special investigations; apprehending wanted felons; suppressing major disturbances; the protection of life and property; and rendering assistance to local law enforcement in suppressing crime and violence.
More on the Texas Rangers:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Ranger_Division
State Police duties in Texas is done by the Texas Highway Patrol NOT the Texas Rangers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Highway_Patrol
Now, Most State Police have other functions then writing tickets, but the State does NOT want to raise taxes for that purpose thus most state police forces tend to be ticket writing and thus revenue enhancing units. Suburban Police, and small cities (and larger towns) also tends to be such units. Inner City police (and many Suburban) police forces tend NOT to be ticket writing units, it is NOT in their tradition for by the time urban dewellers started to own cars (the 1950s) these police forces had a long tradition of NOT giving out tickets, for tickets had been the source of most of the corruption Police were noted for around 1900. This does NOT mean you will not get a ticket in an urban areas, like suburbs, small cities and larger towns they are exceptions. It also does not mean if you really deserve one, a City Police will NOT give you a ticket.
I once read of a suburb that had a revenue problem, it had reduced the number of police officers the year before and in protest the rest of the force stopped writing tickets. This lead to a huge short fall in revenue for that suburb for they had come to depend on the revenue from tickets to balance their budget. The suburb did not want to raise taxes to balance the budget but Police force made its point. The following year they return to writing tickets, and the suburb re-hired the police they had laid off.
Thus it is NOT all police forces that want to give tickets, but except for inner city police forces the tendency is to give them. Someone has to pay for the police and except for urban taxpayers, most taxpayers do not want to.
merrily
(45,251 posts)parking meter as a good deed? That does not even raise any kind of safety issue.
7962
(11,841 posts)
ret5hd
(20,491 posts)merrily
(45,251 posts)That's why I get rid of it so fast.
(I think I just made that up. If not, sorry whoever said it already.)
Kelvin Mace
(17,469 posts)may prevent a murder, given the police's violent proclivities.
I see what you did there. 
