🚀 go-pugleaf

leichter@zodiac.rutgers.edu writes:
>[. . .]  I think you'd have to search long and hard for a judge who would rule
>that you had a right to keep information secret even against a properly
>executed warrant.  In fact, the courts tend to safeguard their right to compel
>testimony aggressively, as they view it as fundamental to their ability to
>conduct trials.  Those "sealed envelopes to your buddy in CA" can be opened
>under court order, or your buddy can be given the choice of telling what was
>in them or sitting in jail.  You never had some of the "rights" you seem to
>think you had.

>Try getting caught with duplicate sets of books some time.  You WILL reveal
>your income to the government so that it can adequately determine the taxes
>you owe.  You WILL provide enough information about your sources of income
>to satisfy the government.  Don't like it?  Afraid that revealing this much
>would give away criminal behavior on your part?  Or because you just think
>that it's your private business?  Well, that's really too bad for you.

1. The Fourth Amendment, as you point out, does provide that the
   Government can search my property and papers.  But it certainly
   doesn't say that I have to assist in deciphering them, if they
   happen to be enciphered.  The Fourth Amendment says nothing about
   the Government's right to information.

2. The Tenth Amendment (I believe), to deal with ambiguous cases in
   the Constitution and the law, specifically reserves to the people
   all rights not otherwise mentioned.  Therefore, any argument of the
   form, "The Constitution doesn't say that the Government can't do
   <X>, therefore it is allowed to do <X>," is automatically ruled
   out.  The Government CAN'T do <X> unless it says somewhere that it
   can.

3. Before there was an income tax, I think you would have had to search
   a long time to find a judge to say that the Government DID have the
   right to know all about your sources of income.

-- George Mitchell (george@tessi.com)