The Fifth Amendment Protects Everyone, Not Just Citizens

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Paul's picture

Only in fantasy land, does the Fifth Amendment protect anyone. Back here on Earth, the rulers do what they please.

Suverans2's picture
    "Here’s the Fifth Amendment in pertinent part: “Nor shall any person … be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.”

    Notice that the amendment does not say: “Nor shall any citizen … be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.” It says person." ~ Jacob Hornberger

Yes, it does say "person", Jacob. But notice, too, that it does not say: "Nor shall any man ... be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.” It says person.

    person In law, man and person are not exactly-synonymous terms. Any human being is a man, whether he be a member of society or not, whatever may be the rank he holds, or whatever may be his age, sex, &c. A person is a man considered according to the rank he holds in society, with all the rights to which the place he holds entitles him, and the duties which it imposes. 1 Bouv. Inst. n. 137. ~ John Bouvier's 1856 A Law Dictionary
    This word "person" and its scope and bearing in the law, involving, as it does, legal fictions and also apparently natural beings, it is difficult to understand; but it is absolutely necessary to grasp, at whatever cost, a true and proper understanding of the word in all the phases of its proper use… The words persona and personae did not have the meaning in the Roman which attaches to homo, the individual, or a man in the English; it had peculiar references to artificial beings, and the condition or status of individuals… A person is here not a physical or individual person, but the status or condition with which he is invested… not an individual or physical person, but the status, condition or character borne by physical persons… The law of persons is the law of status or condition.
    A moment's reflection enables one to see that man and person cannot be synonymous, for there cannot be an artificial man, though there are artificial persons. Thus the conclusion is easily reached that the law itself often creates an entity or a being which is called a person; the law cannot create an artificial man, but it can and frequently does invest him with artificial attributes; this is his personality… that is to say, the man-person; and abstract persons, which are fiction and which have no existence except in law; that is to say, those which are purely legal conceptions or creations. ~ American Law and Procedure, Vol 13, page 137, 1910

"A person is here not a physical or individual person, but the status or condition with which he is invested…", that "status or condition" is citizen.