Breaking news flashed across the country when the Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari for United States v Microsoft on October 16th. The court’s pending decision will resolve divided lower court rulings on a fundamental privacy dispute.

Imagine living in a country where transporting property from one place to another could result in your property being seized by the government. The process of civil asset forfeiture makes it so the mere suspicion of a crime is enough for law enforcement officials to take and keep possessions. Law enforcement officials in this are able to keep a portion of the assets that they confiscate so the system is frequently abused.

Hot dogs are becoming the unlikely symbol for overcriminalization in the United States of America. More specifically, the heavily codified permit system which profits the state and harms small business owners. On September 9th of this year a man was selling hot dogs on the street in Berkeley without a permit when campus authorities approached him and took money straight from the vendor’s wallet. While law enforcement said that the money was evidence, the action is representative of the larger issue at hand.

As we conclude this month that marked the sixteenth anniversary of September 11th, we must carry with us the lesson that the attack brought to our collective quest for freedom. Terrorism is a threat we all fear. While we must try to prevent American citizens from being murdered by terrorists, we must also guard against the eroding of our rights. The USA Patriot Act has most affected freedom at home. In memory of the victims of 9/11, we should consider the lessons that the attacks and the fallout taught us about the whimsical nature of freedom.

On June 23rd, the Illinois General Assembly passed a major Civil Asset Forfeiture reform bill, which is currently awaiting Governor Bruce Rauner’s signature. If vetoed, the bill is still likely to be enacted since it received full support in the senate and all but one vote in the house which is more than enough for a veto override. HB 303, if passed, would effectively reform the state’s Civil Asset Forfeiture laws by shifting the burden of proof from the citizens to the government and instead increasing it “from probable cause to a preponderance of evidence.”