Mapp. v. Ohio Case

A Closer Look at Mapp v. Ohio

A 6-3 vote in support of vacating the conviction led to the final decision in the case. Additionally, according to five justices, states must exclude any proof obtained illegally under the fourth amendment. From that point forward, information obtained through illegal searches would not be allowed in court. However, the norm has been altered in other judgments, including U.S. v. Leon and Nix v. Williams from 1984. A closer examination of the Mapp v. Ohio case reveals that the final decision had the features of a summary judgment. Clark and Samenow (1929), discussed the components that make up a summary judgment that was also evident in the case. The first part of a summary judgment involves the presentation of pieces of evidence to support the facts. The Ohio court had to respond to the appeal. The second part is the presentation of the law. The attorney based his argument on the federal laws that would be violated if the decision was not overturned. The third part of this type of judgment entails the presentation of “even” if facts. In this case, the attorney argued that even if the Mapp was guilty of possession the pornographic materials, the procedure used to obtain the evidence was a violation of set-out guidelines ant the individual rights of privacy. The fourth part is the response by the other party where counter arguments are presented before proceeding to the last part of the judges making a decision.

The Flawed Interpretation of the US Constitution

The decision arrived at by the US Supreme Court cannot be considered as fully reflecting the requirements of the constitution. Although the decision protected the infringed rights of the victims, the move of overturning the initial ruling based on the possession of obscene materials was not right. It is evident that Mapp had broken the Ohio’s laws and the right thing would be to charge her accordingly. The liberal protections on the basis of the due process rights would only result in the provision of an environment where criminals would thrive. It is on this grounds that the case fails to be an accurate interpretation of the US Constitution and can, therefore, be deemed as flawed for those loopholes. This has been the major point of focus of the contentious debates on the Supreme Court’s ruling.

The Liberal Judicial Philosophy

The final ruling arrived at incorporated the liberal judicial philosophy which is the opposite of conservatism. This philosophy entails the support of laws which embrace the progression of ideas such as the civil rights, the separation of the state and the church, and the personal choices. Liberal judges also make their rulings on the basis of values and their personal beliefs which are always a challenge to the existing traditional laws. In this case, the ruling was factoring in the individuals’ rights which were not supposed to be infringed regardless of the cost implications. Thus, a violation of what could be perceived as a pillar of progressive society would render the ruling made by lower courts to be null and void. A judicial conference held in March 1960 unanimously agreed that the anti-obscenity rule should be overturned (Mitchell, 1993). Despite the fact that Berkman and Kearns referred on the 14th and the 4th amendment, the 1st and the 4th amendments were mostly focused on.

Important Precedents in the Mapp. v. Ohio Case

Important precedents in the Mapp. v. Ohio case were the Weeks v. U.S. (1914) where the 4th Amendment barred the use of evidence derived from an illegal search in the federal prosecution. This decision would be upheld in the Wolf v. Colorado (1949) where the state courts were also included in the decision of refraining from relying on evidence from search and seizures that were unreasonable (McKay, 1973). When considering the individual security violated by the police officers when entering Mapp’s house, the Palko v. Connecticut (1937) was a good point of reference (Mason & Stephenson, 2015). The controlling law in the decision arrived at was the exclusionary rule. This was mainly designed to deter the police officers’ misconduct through excluding incriminating evidence in the trials at the state level.

References

Clark, C. E., & Samenow, C. U. (1929). The Summary Judgment. The Yale Law Journal, 38(4), 423-471.

Mason, A. T., & Stephenson, G. (2015). American constitutional law: introductory essays and selected cases. Routledge.

McKay, R. B. (1973). Mapp v. Ohio, the Exclusionary Rule and the Right of Privacy. Ariz. L. Rev., 15, 327.

Mitchell, J. T. (1993). An Exclusionary Rule Framework for Protecting Obscenity. JL & Pol., 10, 183.