Thread: Legislative immunity

Originally Posted by tgbyhn

Article I, Section 6, US Constitution: " They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place."

For a misdemeaor, they cannot be arrested until the session concludes. For what you described - arrest immunity is not applicable - they'd be arrested, charged, and put on trial, whether Congress is in session or not.

That was directed to Gun Grape as I wanted to see where the line was drawn in his state. The legislative immunity I posted was for STATE legislatures. However many federal congressmen cut their teeth on the state level then bring their entitlement mentality to the federal level. "too important to prosecute" is no defense in my book.

First paragraph of the link.."An Arkansas legislator leads officers on a high-speed chase through two counties and doesn't get taken into custody. A Georgia lawmaker claims he couldn't be prosecuted on a DUI charge."

Running from the cops (high speed chase) is a felony and so is DUI so why did these two guys skate when they committed their crimes? They clearly should have been arrested and jailed right then and there, not later. Nor do the immunity laws address the myriad of misdemeanors that legislators get away with. There needs to be one set of laws for everyone or there is no justice for anyone.

Without aggravating circumstances for vehicular fleeing, it's a gross misdemeanor under Arkansas law. DUI is a misdemeanor in Florida until you rack up your third or fourth one.

There's certainly cases of outrageous abuse by elected officials to avoid arrest/prosecution for minor crimes. Consider the world of public and elected officials however. In government and politics, ruining people is a sport. DC especially. There's already an enormous amount of abuse of the system against people in government and politics. It's a trade-off.

I support legislative immunity for the very reason it was instituted. Unscrupulous politicians could conspire with police to arrest and detain legislators to prevent them from voting on important legislation.

Abuse of the privilege is inevitable, but one does not end a practice simply because some abuse it.

One solution is to make it public record every time a legislator invokes the privilege and let the public decide whether it was legitimate. In the case of DUI, make it a law that the officer transport the legislator to his/her destination.

Originally Posted by JAD_333

I support legislative immunity for the very reason it was instituted. Unscrupulous politicians could conspire with police to arrest and detain legislators to prevent them from voting on important legislation.

Abuse of the privilege is inevitable, but one does not end a practice simply because some abuse it.

One solution is to make it public record every time a legislator invokes the privilege and let the public decide whether it was legitimate. In the case of DUI, make it a law that the officer transport the legislator to his/her destination.

What pisses me off with this immunity is that those who write the laws should be OK breaking them, while the ordinary plebs will get sanctioned.

For legislators I would make the fines 2x then for the regular peeps