(1) Cruel and Unusual Punishments:
The Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides:
“Excessive bail shall not be required nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”
Punishments of the utmost cruelty, and therefore unthinkable in America, have become usual. Great numbers of persons arrested, both aliens and citizens, have been threatened, beaten with blackjacks, or actually tortured * * *
(2) Arrests without Warrant:
The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution provides:
“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
Many hundreds of citizens and aliens alike have been arrested in wholesale raids, without warrants or pretense of warrants. They have then either been released, or have been detained in police stations or jails for indefinite lengths of time while warrants were being applied for. This practice of making mass raids and mass arrests without warrant has resulted directly from the instructions, both written and oral, issued by the Department of Justice at Washington.
(3) Unreasonable Searches and Seizures:
The Fourth Amendment has been quoted above.