UPDATE: ICE = & America is Losing Its Soul in Brown-Skinned Screams and White-Skinned Silence 11JUL25

 

VICIOUS, violent, mostly illegal ice & hsi raids committed by masked thugs hiding badges and too often without agency I.D. on their military combat style uniforms are becoming the norm in Democratic majority states with occasional actions in gop / greed over people-republican party majority states. American citizens are seized and detained ( and sometimes deported ) along with immigrants because they look foreign, i.e. they are not White or at least not White enough. States and NGOs are fighting the ne0-nazi, fascist drumpf / trump administration in the courts with success but the scotus is indicating they are not going to stop the destruction of our democratic Republic and the establishment of an authoritarian theocratic oligarchy. Here is a commentary on the state of affairs in our country from John Palovitz.....

America is Losing Its Soul in Brown-Skinned Screams and White-Skinned Silence

America is dying.

I’m not referring to the systemic collapse of our Republic or the slow suffocation of Democracy here, though these are certainly not unlikely outcomes at this point.

This is far deeper than the seats of power or a congressional alignment, more than the structural implosion of this nation.

The greatest, most grievous failure of America in this moment isn’t legislative but moral.

The soul of this place is dying in screams and silences.

The brown-skinned screams rise from our collective home:

The anguished cries of a young mother being violently torn from her children in the carpool line.

The guttural howl of a farm worker choking on tear gas as his face is driven into the earth he had been faithfully tending.

The desperate, terrified wails of a baby left orphaned in a grocery store parking lot as his shellshocked abuela is tossed into an unmarked van.

The frantic pleas of a father of four dragged from his worksite by lawless masked mercenaries.

The weary moans of devoted fathers, loving husbands, and beloved uncles shackled in a stifling Florida death camp.

The unheeded shrieks of neighbors watching a pillar of the community kidnapped from his lonchera.

This horrific noise is the soundtrack of waking nightmares; the raw-throated echoing of the vilest of history repeating. They are sounds that shake decent human beings to their core.

But those screams are only half of this tragedy.

Equally devastating is the white-skinned silence; the contagious moral laryngitis breaking out in people of profound privilege who avert their eyes and cover their ears.

It is the breathtaking quiet of human beings who have retreated into the cloistered places of temporary comfort and imagined safety; those who quickly scroll away from the videos because they do not want to hear the screams, because that would leave them culpable for their inaction and their stilled voices.

White America, we need to lean into the screams of brown-skinned people, to invite them inside, to let them break our hearts and boil our blood, until the fury within us rises and erupts in a fierce and sustained roar that violently disrupts the inhumanity that will not stop unless we make it stop.

Friends, what exactly are you waiting for?
How much suffering do you need to see?
What terrible sounds will finally awaken your voices?
What line still needs to be crossed for you to declare it unacceptable?

What good is it if we claim morality or conscience, if these result in us saying nothing while our neighbors are brutalized?

How real is our professed faith if it yields no measurable opposition to the greatest violations of human life?

How much is your patriotism worth if the disregard for the elemental liberties of this nation leaves you speechless?

Your silence won’t save you, anyway; it will only postpone your suffering as you abdicate the elemental parts of your humanity during the interim. That is a coward’s path and one I refuse to take.

The only way we can endure as a nation is if we all find the courage to speak with clarity, if we allow ourselves to be heard here and now.

The cost of using your voice is nothing compared to the price of your silence.

Let your life say something before it’s too late.

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THE 5TH AMENDMENT OF THE U.S. CONSTITUTION: DUE PROCESS

 

Amdt5.5.1 Overview of Due Process

Fifth Amendment:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

The Fifth Amendment provides that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.1 Generally, due process guarantees protect individual rights by limiting the exercise of government power.2 The Supreme Court has held that the Fifth Amendment, which applies to federal government action, provides persons with both procedural and substantive due process guarantees. If the federal government seeks to deprive a person of a protected life, liberty, or property interest, the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause requires that the government first provide certain procedural protections.3 Procedural due process often requires the government to provide a person with notice and an opportunity for a hearing before such a deprivation.4 In addition, the Supreme Court has interpreted the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause to include substantive due process guarantees that protect certain fundamental constitutional rights from federal government interference, regardless of the procedures that the government follows when enforcing the law.5 Substantive due process has generally dealt with specific subject areas, such as liberty of contract, marriage, or privacy.

The Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause protects all persons within U.S. territory, including corporations,6 aliens,7 and, presumptively, citizens seeking readmission to the United States.8 However, the states are not entitled to due process protections against the federal government.9 The clause is effective in the District of Columbia10 and in territories that are part of the United States,11 but it does not apply of its own force to unincorporated territories.12 Nor does it reach enemy alien belligerents tried by military tribunals outside the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.13 The Clause restrains Congress in addition to the Executive and Judicial Branches and cannot be so construed as to leave Congress free to make any process ‘due process of law’ by enacting legislation to that effect.14

Due process cases may arise under both the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. Both amendments use the same language but have a different history.15 The Supreme Court has construed the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause to impose the same due process limitations on the states as the Fifth Amendment does on the federal government.16 Fourteenth Amendment due process case law is therefore relevant to the interpretation of the Fifth Amendment. Except for areas in which the federal government is the actor, much of the Constitution Annotated's discussion of due process appears in the Fourteenth Amendment essays.17

Footnotes

1.  Jump to essay-1U.S. Const. amend. V.
2.  Jump to essay-2Due Process, Black’s Law Dictionary 610 (10th ed. 2014).
3.  Jump to essay-3See Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 481 (1972) (citing Cafeteria & Restaurant Workers Union v. McElroy, 367 U.S. 886, 895 (1961)).
4.  Jump to essay-4Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U.S. 78, 110 (1908); Jacob v. Roberts, 223 U.S. 261, 265 (1912).
5.  Jump to essay-5E.g., Zablocki v. Redhail, 434 U.S. 374, 386–87 (1978) (citing Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1 (1967)).
6.  Jump to essay-6Sinking Fund Cases, 99 U.S. 700, 719 (1879).
7.  Jump to essay-7Wong Wing v. United States, 163 U.S. 228, 238 (1896).
8.  Jump to essay-8United States v. Ju Toy, 198 U.S. 253, 263 (1905); cf. Quon Quon Poy v. Johnson, 273 U.S. 352 (1927).
9.  Jump to essay-9South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U.S. 301, 323–24 (1966).
10.  Jump to essay-10Wight v. Davidson, 181 U.S. 371, 384 (1901).
11.  Jump to essay-11Lovato v. New Mexico, 242 U.S. 199, 201 (1916).
12.  Jump to essay-12Pub. Util. Comm’rs v. Ynchausti & Co., 251 U.S. 401, 406 (1920).
13.  Jump to essay-13Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 763 (1950); In re Yamashita, 327 U.S. 1 (1946).
14.  Jump to essay-14Murray’s Lessee v. Hoboken Land & Improvement Co., 59 U.S. (18 How.) 272, 276 (1856). See also Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Chief Justice Lemuel Shaw’s opinion in Jones v. Robbins, 74 Mass. (8 Gray) 329 (1857).
15.  Jump to essay-15French v. Barber Asphalt Paving Co., 181 U.S. 324, 328 (1901).
16.  Jump to essay-16Cf. Arnett v. Kennedy, 416 U.S. 134 (1974); Heiner v. Donnan, 285 U.S. 312, 326 (1932) (The restraint imposed upon legislation by the due process clauses of the two amendments is the same.); Morehead v. New York ex rel. Tipaldo, 298 U.S. 587, 610 (1936).
17.  Jump to essay-17See Amdt14.S1.3 Due Process Generally.