Our country, America: “the land of the free”, is one of the most diverse countries anyone could ever visit, live in or hear about. Although it may appear as if every race has equal power and opportunities in the big picture, it does not seem to be the case when a close is taken at things like our judicial system. The amount of inequality that takes place in this country is atrocious. In her article The New Jim Crown, Michelle Alexander asks the question: “ how exactly does a formally colorblind criminal justice system achieve such racially discriminatory results? “ (p 100). She says that there are two reasons why such results occur. The first reason is because law enforcement agents have a lot more discretion than necessary when it comes to …show more content…
During the process, Armstrong’s lawyers offered two affidavits: “one was from a halfway house intake coordinator who testified that, in his experience treating crack addicts, whites and blacks dealt and used the drugs in similar proportions. The other one was from a defense attorney who had extensive experience in state prosecutions and he said that nonblack were trialed in state courts instead of federal courts” (p 113). The district court ruled that unless there was evidence of conscious bias on the part of the prosecutor, it could not allow any accusations stating that race was a factor during the decision-making process. This case challenges the 4th amendment, which protects citizens from unreasonable searches, seizures without warrant. This case challenges the Fourth Amendment because they randomly went to Mr. Armstrong’s hotel room and the Fourteenth Amendment because since the citizens automatically lost their right to have equal protection of the law. In my opinion, Alexander specifically used this case to show how race affected the outcome of this case. The ruling weakens due processing of the law because in the text it didn’t mention that the officers had a warrant. It also weakens the equal protection of Armstrong and his colleagues because he was wrongfully searched so since he was not protected by the amendments, his equal …show more content…
Elm, the Supreme Court ruled that any evidence, no matter how small or big, that could prove that a defendant was struck because of their race would be enough to satisfy the prosecutor’s point in saying that racial bias was involved in their case. This case supports her thesis because it shows how things little laws like the ones in this case had to be created. If we were really a colorblind society, not only would race not be a factor but also those restrictions would not have to me made because there would not be any racial bias in the first place. In this case, I would say that this case strengthens amendment fourteen. Since the racial bias was becoming a thing, the judicial system had to do things in order to make sure that every citizen was getting equal protection of the