Police officers are called upon to enforce all of the laws passed by federal, state, and local officials.  This means that every law, no matter how trivial, is enforced at gunpoint and enforced selectively.  Indeed, members of minority groups like African-Americans and Hispanics are often targeted by police.

The high-profile death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020 and the resulting protests made more Americans aware of police brutality and police harassment than ever before.  Libertarians have been aware of the problem since the party was founded in 1971 and have sought reforms that are suddenly being proposed by politicians from other parties, though a bit late.

The following reforms would go a long way to protecting the civil liberties and human rights of all Americans, and especially members of minority communities.

• End the War on Drugs, especially marijuana prohibition.  Drug laws give police excuse to search peoples’ homes, cars, and bodies whenever they have “suspicion” that the person has some drugs.  This often leads to unnecessary violence.  This is a violation of the 4^th Amendment and must end.
• End mandatory minimum sentences.  Drug offenses are punished by very long, mandatory sentences at the federal level and in many states.  African-Americans are arrested more frequently and usually receive much harsher sentences than white people, though whites and blacks use drugs at about the same rate.
• End the militarization of police.  Under Section 1033, a federal law, surplus military equipment like tanks, grenade launchers, etc. are available to local police departments.  Police have gone from being “peace officers” to being warriors, thus making the average citizen seem like an “enemy” to be fought instead of a neighbor to be protected.
• End “no-knock” warrants.  Police often serve search warrants in the middle of the night and just storm into people’s homes without knocking, waiting, and properly identifying themselves.  This leads to danger for both police and residents, as people being wakened out of a sound sleep can’t expect to know that police are entering their homes.
• Promote “de-escalation” of tense situations.  Police must be trained to talk to people and listen and try to resolve situations without violence.  Too often, police encounters lead to needless death or injury because officers are told to “control” every situation, even ones they should just walk away from.
• End “qualified immunity” for police officers and other government officials (like prosecutors) who violate peoples’ rights.  Federal courts have limited the right of people to sue for violation of their civil rights by police.  This must change.
• Move investigations of police misconduct away from the local police and prosecutors and instead to the state Attorney General’s office.  Police shouldn’t be investigating themselves, since they usually find that they didn’t do anything wrong.
• Require police officers to buy liability insurance in order to work as an officer. This means that their record would have to pass the test of an objective insurance company, so no officer could work if he had too many instances of misconduct on his record.  The added bonus would be that insurance companies would pay to settle claims against police, not taxpayers. And since they don’t want to pay those claims, insurance companies will be very careful regarding whom they insure.
• Stop involving police in situations like traffic enforcement, code enforcement, wellness checks, and other situations that don’t involve dangerous criminals.  Unarmed community service officers or mental health professionals can be sent on calls like this, in most instances.  And in the case of traffic stops, most of them can just be eliminated.  Police are often stopping people for revenue purposes for the local city government, not for safety concerns.
• Limit police unions to collective bargaining for wages and financial benefits only. There should be no contracts that limit investigation and discipline of officers who engage in misconduct.

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