Unit 5 Assignment

Kyle W. Emery

Kaplan University

1. What is due process? Due process, in legal terms and context, means that any legal proceedings must follow laws and rules, so as not to infringe on a person’s individual rights guaranteed by the constitution as they proceed through the legal system. According to Schmalleger (2015) due process is “guaranteed by the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution.” (p.g. 21) The Fourteenth Amendment ensures that each individual state abides by due process and provides it to any and all U.S. citizens entering state jurisdiction.

2. Why is due process such a central notion in American criminal justice? Schmalleger (2015) identifies the two fundamental goals of the criminal justice system; “The need to enforce the law and to maintain public order and (2) the need to protect individuals from injustice, especially at the hands of the criminal justice system.” (p.g. 22) These two goals are intertwined to each other. How does the criminal justice system maintain peace and order, yet not infringe on individual’s rights? Due process was one of the answers to this question. Due process allows the criminal justices system to conduct the job of maintaining order and peace, through a type of “checks and balances” system and by making sure that the individual’s rights are honored throughout the entire process. An example of this is the due process model, which is the second principle of ensuring that the two fundamental goals of the criminal justice system succeed.

3. What would our justice system be like without due process? It is hard to say what our justice system would be like without due process, however based on historical evidence of police state countries, and other dictatorships that do not provide some sort of fair criminal justice process, it is easy to infer what could happen. Without a process ensuring a fair trial by a group of one’s peers, courts can be held in favor of the prosecution. Fair treatment of prisoners would not be guaranteed, which would allow those residing over the incarcerated to do unspeakable things. An example of this, is the Russian gulags, where prisoners are brutally beaten and tortured in sub-human conditions. Even closer to home, Guantanamo bay holds suspected terrorists, most without conviction in a U.S. court, who are again beaten and tortured for information. This begs the question of who do we provided legal rights and due process to? Are U.S. citizens the only people that should be afforded these rights? Without due process, no one is guaranteed a fair and safe process through the criminal justice system, and our country may very well become reminiscent of a Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia.

4. Would you want to live in a society that did not guarantee due process rights? No, I would not like to live in a society that did not recognize or guarantee due process rights. The United States of America was founded on the basic and simple principle that everyone is born with unalienable rights that should not, and cannot be taken away. Nearly a quarter of a millennium later these rights, while modernized, still stand true. One of the hardest and most important aspects for any country to accomplish is the safety, security, and public order of its citizens. Due process ensures that the criminal justice system does not encroach or infringe on individual’s rights while maintaining order and safety, whether intentionally or not.