George Washington University Law Professor Jonathan Turley set the record straight after Democrat Pennsylvania Congressional candidate Chris Rabb claimed that the nation’s founders didn’t understand the concept of police.
Turley took to social media to address a claim made by Rabb during an interview Wednesday with Fox News Channel Host Sean Hannity. In his post, Turley declared the Democrat’s claim “utterly absurd”:
“U.S. House nominee Chris Rabb insisted that the Framers had no idea of what ‘policing’ was and thus abolishing prisons is just part of the evolving meaning of that term. It is utterly absurd.
“In the 1600s, colonies organized the ‘night watch’ forces that were the precursors to formal police departments. The British governors also enforced criminal laws through their own forces. Constables were prevalent.
“The ultimate example is John Morton (1724–1777) who served as a local county sheriff and justice of the peace between 1757 and 1774. He signed the Declaration of Independence.”
When asked by Hannity if he would “like to abolish prisons and abolish the police,” Rabb didn’t directly answer, but instead responded by claiming that the Founders were ignorant of concept of policing:
“What’s interesting about that statement is: long before there was any notion of policing, we had Founders that did not even understand that term. Policing is something that evolved over time.”
“And 99% of what police do are not going after the bad guys,” Rabb added, claiming that communities can be kept safe “in different ways” without police. People were kept safe “long before the police ever existed,” Rabb said.
The Democrat House candidate also said that he would “absolutely” like to eliminate cash bail and establish a wealth tax.
One area where Rabb agreed with Hannity was in his support of the Second Amendment right to bear arms, though Rabb said that his “people” needed to be armed for protection from police Klansmen:
“Listen, my people are from the South, alright. So, the only way we could protect ourselves was to arm ourselves, because we couldn’t trust the police because they were largely part of the Klan. So, yes, all of my people were armed. I have no problem with that.”
