Is a law unconstitutional as a whole or just specific parts?
Here’s an interesting question for any of you lawyers or law students. If Congress were to pass a law that had, say, 5 parts or legal effects contained within it and the law was challenged as unconstitutional because 1 of those parts was alleged to be a violation of the 4th Amendment would the Supreme Court be forced to invalidate the entire law to find the 1 part unconstitutional? By that I mean could they possibly find that 1 part unconstitutional and overrule it yet leave the remaining 4 other parts or effects standing?
Comment from Joel
Time February 28, 2009 at 00:13
I’ve heard it said there are 3 things you should never have to witness being made… soap, sausage and laws.
A law is either legal, or not legal in the same way sausage is either cooked or not cooked (can you say e-coli?) If it is not legal, it’s a pretty simple attack for any attorney to argue that any evidence gathered illegally is unusable in court and the defense gets to walk away squeaky clean.
Sometimes I wish that all legislators would just never show up for work. Good lord.. why do we need all these laws? There needs to be only 2 laws on the books. 1)Don’t harm or steal from another person. 2)Don’t let someone else harm or steal from you. (From the Cowboy Code of Ethics)