From the ACLU: A summary of the major civil liberites decisions from the 2012 Supreme Court term

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Here are some of the major cases decided - each provides insight on the contemporary nature of civil liberty disputes in the 21st century:

Free Speech

- Agency for International Development v. Alliance for Open Society International, Inc.

. . . the Court struck down a requirement that organizations participating in a federally - funded program to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS must have a policy explicitly opposing prostitution and sex trafficking. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice Roberts drew a distinction between conditions that affect how federal funds are spent and conditions that reach beyond the funded program. Here, he found, the challenged condition crossed that line because it dictated what organizations could say in parts of their program that are entirely supported by private funds. Moreover, he explained, the government’s willingness to allow grant recipients to create affiliated entities that are not bound by the same condition is unsatisfactory in this context. If the affiliate’s speech can be attributed to the grant recipient, it is merely an invitation to hypocrisy by allowing the same organization to express differing views on the legalization of prostitution. If the affiliate’s speech cannot be attributed to the grant recipient, it does nothing to preserve the First Amendment rights of the grant recipient.

Probable Cause

- Florida v. Jardines.

. . . the Court held that the use of a drug - sniffing dog on the front porch of a home constitutes a search that violates the Fourth Amendment in the absence of consent or a warrant. The majority opinion, written by Justice Scalia, rested on traditional property notions. It also rejected the dissent’s reliance on the doctrine of implied consent. According to Justice Scalia, the doctrine of implied consent allows visitors to approach the front door without committing trespass but does not extend to an investigative
search by the police who are seeking evidence, not entry. Justice Kagan’s concurring opinion, joined by Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor, argued that the police conduct in this case violated the defendant’s reasonable expectation of privacy, as well as his property rights.

- Maryland v. King

. . . the Court upheld DNA testing of arrestees without the need for individualized suspicion. Writing for the majority, Justice Kennedy characterized DNA testing as an administrative tool for identifying the arrestee and thus legally indistinguishable from photographing and fingerprinting. Applying a rule of reasonableness, he then ruled that the state’s interest in proper identification outweighed the minimal intrusion of a DNA swab. Finally, Justice Kennedy emphasized that Maryland’s law prohibits the use of the DNA sample for any person other than identification. In dissent, Justice Scalia argued that the only sense in which the DNA sample is used for identification is to identify the arrestee as a suspect in an unrelated crime. Because this purpose is part of normal law enforcement it must, in his view, be supported by individualized suspicion linking the person arrested to the unsolved crime. Summing up, Justice Scalia wrote: “I doubt that the proud men who wrote the charter of or liberties would have been eager to open their mouths for royal inspection.”

Self Incrimination

- Salinas v. Texas.

. . . the Court ruled that a defendant who does not expressly invoke his Fifth Amendment rights when questioned by the police prior to arrest or other custodial interrogation cannot object when the prosecution comments at trial on his failure to respond to police questioning. Justice Alito’s plurality opinion was joined by Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Kennedy. In a concurring opinion, Justice Thomas and Justice Scalia would have gone further. In their view, the Fifth Amendment never prevents the prosecution from commenting on a defendant’s silence – including a defendant’s decision not to testify at trial – and the Court’s past decisions to the contrary were wrongly decided.

Double Jeopardy

- Evans v Michigan.

. . . the Court held that a trial court’s directed verdict of acquittal bars retrial under the Double Jeopardy Clause even if it is based on a misinterpretation of the governing statute or, as here, a misunderstanding of the elements of the offense. Writing for the majority, Justice Sotomayor explained that a jury verdict of acquittal based on legally erroneous instructions still triggers the Double Jeopardy Clause, and found no meaningful distinction for double jeopardy purposes between a jury verdict and a directed verdict.