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32 THE UNIVERSITY OF THE DISTRICf OF COLUMBIA LAW REVIEW
vember 1999; (2) A sense of greater license in the name of anti-terrorism as a
result of the September 11, 2001 attacks; and (3) An escalation in marketing by
the police armaments industry.125
For these reasons, the First Amendment Rights and Police Standards Act of
2004 is a major and timely legislative achievement that should serve as a model
bill for other cities in reining in preemptive and violent police abuses of
demonstrators.
Unlike the Chinese police in TIananmen Square or the police in Moscow or
Istanbul, the top priorities of the Metropolitan Police Department of the District
of Columbia and of police forces throughout the country should not be preventing
temporary blockages of building entrances and traffic. The top priorities
should include upholding the rule of law and the Constitution to which they have
sworn allegiance. As the United States Supreme Court declared in 1937:
The greater the importance of safeguarding the community from incitements
to the overthrow of our institutions by force and violence, the more
imperative is the need to preserve inviolate the constitutional rights of free
speech, free press and free assembly .... Therein lies the security of the
republic, the very foundation of constitutional government. 126
125 See, e.g., Eric Lipton, Security Nominee got Rich on Tasers: Kerik's Relationship With Stun­
Gun Firm Earned Him Millions, S.F. eHRON., Dec. 10, 2004, at A-B.
126 Dejonge v. Oregon, 299 U.S. 353,365 (1937).