Mapp v. Ohio · ¶40

There are those who say, as did Justice (then Judge) Cardozo, that under our constitutional exclusionary doctrine “[t]he criminal is to go free because the constable has blundered.” People v. Defore, 242 N. Y., at 21, 150 N. E., at 587, In some cases this will undoubtedly be the result. But, as was said in Elkins, “there is another consideration — the imperative of judicial integrity.” 364 U. S., at 222. The criminal goes free, if he must, but it is the law that sets him free. Nothing can destroy a government more quickly than its failure to observe its own laws, or worse, its disregard of the chartei of its own existence. As Mr. Justice Brandéis, dissenting, said in Olmstead v. United States, 277 U. S. 438, 485 (1928): “Our Government is the potent, the omnipresent teacher. For good or for ill, it teaches the whole people by its example.... If the Government becomes a lawbreaker, it…

U. S. Reports, bound volume
U. S. Reports, volume 367, at 643 (Library of Congress) · transcription: Caselaw Access Project
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