The Other Thing SCOTUS Did This Week

Not recommended.

NOTE: My title is not to imply that the current hot topic with SCOTUS is not important, or somehow less important than this topic.  However, I think the other sources on marriage equality have done a pretty good job of covering the issues, and while I do have an opinion on the topic, well, that's not what I've chosen to write about today.

...and I use the word "write" pretty loosely.  If that isn't apparent to you by now, you obviously aren't familiar with my work.

...and I use the word "work" pretty loosely.

ANYWAY.

What I'm writing about today is Florida v. Jardines, the recent SCOTUS decision that held that a dog sniff is a search for purposes of the Fourth Amendment.  Justice Scalia wrote the opinion for the majority.

A lot of people have pretty strong feelings about Justice Scalia, and not all of them are good.  What I have always appreciated about Scalia, though, is that it's never a boring read.  Well, sort of.  Yes, I tuned out a good bunch of the arcane references in the putting-the-GPS-device-on-a-car-Batman-style case, but there were some good tidbits there and I didn't finish confused about the holding, even if I did not immediately understand the reasons why.

But even when Scalia writes a scathing dissent in a decision that rights all the wrongs of a million years of pain and villiany, boy howdy, it's fun to read.  I don't listen to talk radio in large part because the same old flamethrower language is used in uncreative ways.  There's no wit, it's just stuff that will deliberately draw the response of "YEAH!!!" or "FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, HOW CAN SOMEONE BELIEVE THAT?!"  There's no in between, no new material, it's completely uncreative on every level.

When Scalia takes up his venom pen, the spiteful words are almost like music.  Clearly a master craftsman at work.  In fact, his dissents are even more clear than his opinions, and more fun to read.

Then there's the rare opinion, a 5-4 majority where, not only is Scalia on the side you wouldn't expect, he's writing the opinion.  Of course, this isn't as rare as one might think, considering Scalia's "founding fathers" approach to certain issues puts him in the same camp as the left, even if for completely different reasons.  If that makes any sense, especially coming from someone who claims to be neither Democrat or Republican, and therefore, arguably, does not have a full grasp of what it means to be on the left or the right.

...Just checking; yes, I did remember the "not recommended" warning at the top.  You can't blame me if you're still reading, though clearly you need to raise your expectations of what you ingest with your eyes, even if this is just the Internet.

In Jardines, I got to a chunk that I was so giddily stunned over that I had to post it right away (or as right away as one can get while including all the garbage I just posted only to get to this point):

We have accordingly recognized that “the knocker on the front door is treated as an invitation or license to attempt an entry, justifying ingress to the home by solicitors, hawkers and peddlers of all kinds.” Breard v. Alexandria, 341 U. S. 622, 626 (1951). This implicit license typically permits the visitor to approach the home by the front path, knock promptly, wait briefly to be received, and then (absent invitation to linger longer) leave. Complying with the terms of that traditional invitation does not require fine-grained legal knowledge; it is generally managed without incident by the Nation’s Girl Scouts and trick-or-treaters. Thus, a police officer not armed with a warrant may approach a home and knock, precisely because that is “no more than any private citizen might do.” Kentucky v. King, 563 U. S. ___, ___ (2011) (slip op., at 16).

But introducing a trained police dog to explore the area around the home in hopes of discovering incriminating evidence is something else. There is no customary invitation to do that. An invitation to engage in canine forensic investigation assuredly does not inhere in the very act of hanging a knocker. To find a visitor knocking on the door is routine (even if sometimes unwelcome); to spot that same visitor exploring the front path with a metal detector, or marching his bloodhound into the garden before saying hello and asking permission, would inspire most of us to—well, call the police. The scope of a license—express or implied—is limited not only to a particular area but also to a specific purpose. Consent at a traffic stop to an officer’s checking out an anonymous tip that there is a body in the trunk does not permit the officer to rummage through the trunk for narcotics.

Florida v. Jardines, ___ S. Ct. ____ (2013) (emphasis added).

I put in bold three nuggets in particular that I find compelling in their clarity and simplicity.  Let me explain them when they don't need explaining, and as a result, make them more complicated!

Nugget #1: Girl Scouts and trick-or-treaters understand the custom use for knocking on the door of a stranger.  It's not some difficult concept that requires any legal analysis.

Nugget #2: If you saw someone trying to search your lawn or your patio with a dog or a metal detector, we can all agree that's a little creepy.

Nugget #3: It's pretty easy to see if there is a body in the trunk, so no excuse to go rummaging through the trunk once you open it and in fact see there is not a body in the trunk.

The point is, these examples are incredibly clear, and they have the effect of being so clear that one finds it nearly impossible to disagree.  And I hope we can all agree that clarity in any writing--but especially legal writing--is a good thing.  I guess one might say it follows--I do, but others would very likely disagree--that there is at least one good thing about Justice Scalia.