Title: 
Headings: 

Content: In most countries stringent
actions such as wiretapping or holding a suspect in custody for more than
a short period of time must be sanctioned by independent judicial or executive
authorities. Should force be required it should be the minimal amount necessary
for self-defense or to insure an arrest. Punishment (if called for) should
only occur after a judicial process. The laws that police enforce and the
way they use their power in enforcing laws determined by a democratic process,
however indirectly. The idea of a democratic
police includes content as well as procedure. Thus for police to enforce
laws that support racial discrimination even if passed by a legislature,
is hardly democratic according to contemporary standards. It is easier to specify democratic
procedures than democratic content. But at the most general level such
content involves respect for the dignity of the person and the ideas associated
with universal citizenship, limits on the power of the state to intrude
into private lives and public accountability. In a democratic society police
must not be a law unto themselves. In spite of strong pressures and temptations
to the contrary, they are not to act in an explicitly political fashion,
nor to serve the partisan interests of the party in power, or the party
they would like to see in power.