Hiibel v.Sixth Judicial District

One of the many perks of living in a different country than your homeland, is the naive state of mind one has towards the most mundane events. What I used to think as obvious is a controversy in the USA. Some battles still fought abroad are already won here.

I used to think that having to identify oneself when asked by a policeman is the rule. And indeed it is in France (article 78-1 of the Criminal Procedure Code). This article has no equivalent in the US legal system. Or should I write had? This June 21 Supreme Court decision made me wonder: do we have a public identity, that we have to keep public, and a private identity, that is protected by privacy law? If this is the case, what is part of our public identity, and what is our private identity?

First name and last name should be public, yet Mr. Hiibel refused to made them public. The Supreme Court decision would probably allow first name and last name to be kept private if publicizing them would be self-incriminating, thus violating the Fifth Amendment.

And we have not even touched the ID card subject in this decision! Even though I think that Mr. Hiibel "went overboard", I commend him to stand up for what he thought was right. I disagree with him, but he made me realize that I never questioned the reason of identifying oneself when asked by police.