The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution is clear: “Nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law.”
Note the choice of word — “person,” not citizen. That distinction is no accident. It means every human being on American soil (regardless of their country of origin, legal status, skin tone or number of tattoos, photoshopped in Times New Roman or otherwise) is entitled to due process under the law.
David Wilkerson
This is not some woke aberration. It is a bedrock principle of American democracy.
Everyone has to have their day in court. If we simply start lining people up because they were speaking Spanish and waiting for day-labor opportunities, we do not have a legal proceeding, we have a purge. It is not constitutional and it damned sure is not American.
We can, should and are debating the ideal responses to immigration, border security and crime. These are policy questions, subject to change, nuance and compromise. But what cannot be up for debate is the right to be heard and accurately identified, no matter your potential crime. That’s not some far leftist utopian dream; it is the constitutionally enshrined right that ensures we are guaranteed all our other rights.
There are those who are snorting as they read these words and officiously declaring this is ’merica, where illegal aliens don’t get those rights. Those people have gotten pretty good at ignoring the facts that fail to align with the shared world view they have accumulated largely through sound bites, tweets, memes and basic homegrown ignorance.
How do they think we figure out who is legal without checking first? That is due process.
“This is not a defense of lawlessness. It is, in fact, the opposite.”
This is not a defense of lawlessness. It is, in fact, the opposite.
Once someone has been afforded their legal right to effectively defend themselves, then a range of responses — including exoneration, incarceration or deportation — become viable options. Even the guiltiest among us deserve a legitimate trial lest we erode the very concept. That is the only way a just society both protects its people and honors its principles.
The real divide in our country is about whether justice is for everyone or just the favored. Whether we will uphold the rule of law or discard it for expedience. Demanding absolute control in the name of security at the expense of our humanity leads to neither more secure nor humane outcomes because … where does it end?
Any of us could be the next to be that most wretched of all species in a world with no legal protections for the accused: presumed guilty.
If freedom means anything, none of us is beneath the law’s protection. If in the pursuit of liberty we allow ourselves to delegitimize others by virtue of appearances and presumptions, then we have neither the security we sought nor the freedoms we claim to hold dear.
Because if anyone can be denied equal treatment under the law, then “legal” becomes nothing more than the whim of those in power. We cannot claim to be a nation of laws while allowing presumptions to decide who counts as a person.
Due process has to be for everyone or it’s just another privilege for the favored.
And privileges can be revoked when you fall out of favor.
David Wilkerson is a professional school counselor at Charlottesville (Va.) High School, a scholastic wrestling official, occasional actor, mediocre disc golfer and eternal lover of words.