Free Essay Sample: Preparedness and Prevention

There is tension between the attempts to protect the individual privacy of citizens and the need to ensure national security or law and order. The security needs predate technological advancement as well as advanced and much-evolved security threats. However, the regulations on the privacy of citizens and how one should collect data and store it in an investigation are still guided by the Constitution. For example, in the Bill of Rights, US Citizens are protected from unreasonable searches and seizures. Therefore the law enforcement or security forces would have to ensure that they observe the provisions of the constitution so that the people in the American public would still get to enjoy the constitutional provisions as well as stay within the constitutional provisions of remaining to be la-abiding citizens (Rossum, 2018).

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

Therefore, if the information is collected in a manner that violates the provision of protecting citizens against arbitrary searches or seizure of data illegally, then it would be considered inadmissible in court, hence ensuring that in every situation, the American citizens get to remain as the priority in the undertakings of the government (Mania & Laidler, 2004). Additionally, if the law enforcement and national security forces have to produce search warrants in the case, they need to collect materials that would be considered a source of information to a court. If this is not done, then any information that they collect will be considered illegal and cannot be used in a court case against the person in question.

I believe that the most important and needed resources in the Federal or National governments that would help in them being the first respondents is the availability of financial resources. Financial resources help the government to be able to successfully manage situations as they come, and also to react to the issues that may arise in the manner that they deem to be most fitting. For example, during crises, the National and Federal governments have to use the money at their disposal to address the issues that needed the government to act as first respondents (Bricker et al., 2013). I also believe that it is easier to manage the situations if the governments concerned have financial resources compared to them being equipped with other resources.

Financial resources are flexible and can, therefore, be converted into anything else that the Federal or National government may need at that particular time. For example, during the Covid 19 pandemic, which was unforeseen, the availability of financial resources is the only way that the national and federal governments can become active respondents to the situations that are presented by the pandemic. Had the government invested only in specific types of emergency response materials, then the pandemic would have affected the society in an even worse manner than has been witnessed. It is through the financial resources that the government has managed to buy the needed resources to fight this pandemic effectively, and also to help members of society who have been affected by the pandemic financially, a case in the example being the issue of stimulus checks to help people adjust to the loss of jobs due to the lockdown requirements of managing the pandemic.

References

Mania, A., & Laidler, P. (2004). Controversy over the USA PATRIOT Act. Pol. Q. Int'l Aff., 13, 52.

Rossum, R. A. (2018). American Constitutional Law, Volume II: The Bill of Rights and Subsequent Amendments. Routledge.

Bricker, L. R., Petermann, T. N., Hines, M., & Sands, J. (2013). The Legal Definitions of “First Responder.” NCHRP Research Results Digest, (385).