The 37th Amendment: A Novel

by Shelley, Susan

  Contents COVER

  COPYRIGHT

  TITLE PAGE

  DEDICATION

  PREFACE

  EPIGRAM

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  ONE NOTE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  MORE FROM THIS AUTHOR

  The 37th Amendment: A Novel

  © Copyright 2002, 2011 by Susan Shelley

  All Rights Reserved.

  Any resemblance to actual people or events is purely coincidental. This is a work of fiction.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the express written permission of the publisher.

  Permission is granted for the reproduction and transmission of brief excerpts in the context of a review or commentary.

  ExtremeInk Books

  Calabasas, California

  Books@ExtremeInk.com

  www.ExtremeInk.com/books

  THE 37TH AMENDMENT

  A NOVEL

  by SUSAN SHELLEY

  EXTREMEINK BOOKS

  Calabasas, California

  In loving memory of my parents,

  Dave and Estelle Shelley,

  who always lived in the future.

  PREFACE

  What exactly is “due process of law?”

  I started looking for the answer to that question in 1996, when I first decided to write a novel about a fictional constitutional amendment that stripped the guarantee of “due process of law” out of the U.S. Constitution in the name of public safety. The idea was to set the story in the future, forty years after the ratification of the amendment, to see how it all turned out.

  The premise fell apart as soon as I began the research.

  At one time, “due process of law” meant the ordinary procedures of the law, the opposite of arbitrary power. Later, it came to mean fundamental fairness in procedures and also in substance.

  At that point, it meant anything a judge wanted it to mean.

  For example, in 1954 it meant racial segregation of schools was unconstitutional (Brown v. Board of Education, Bolling v. Sharpe), and in 1967 it meant state laws banning interracial marriage were unconstitutional (Loving v. Virginia).

  The premise of the novel, that Americans would support the repeal of “due process of law” in the name of getting tough on crime, was impossible. Repealing “due process of law” would roll back a tidal wave of progress on civil rights. In case after case, the Supreme Court relied on the due process clauses of the Constitution to fill a gaping hole in the Fourteenth Amendment, which was carefully written in 1866 to protect racial segregation, not outlaw it.

  The U.S. Constitution has never been amended to ban racial discrimination, or gender discrimination.

  As I tried to construct the fictional events that would lead the country to amend the Constitution to remove “due process of law,” this was really in my way.

  The premise of the novel could only work if the Constitution was first amended to ban racial and gender discrimination.

  So that’s what I did. The story you’re about to read takes place in the year 2056, forty years after the Constitution was amended to remove the guarantee of due process of law, and forty-eight years after it was amended to ban racial and gender discrimination.

  The 37th Amendment was completed and published in 2002. The first edition included an essay on “How the First Amendment Came to Protect Topless Dancing,” which has now been expanded, updated, and published as a separate title. For readers who would like to know more about the Bill of Rights and the Supreme Court decisions that changed everything, How the First Amendment Came to Protect Topless Dancing includes extensive source notes and a bibliography, and it’s available in the Kindle Store at Amazon.com.

  Los Angeles

  August, 2011

  “The due process clauses ought to go.”

  Felix Frankfurter, 1924

  CHAPTER 1

  Los Angeles, California. Monday, February 21, 2056

  The blood on the windshield was the least of it, although from this angle, against the tall office buildings reflected in the tinted glass, the dark red droplets appeared enormous, covering some of the windows entirely and dripping in gruesome rivulets down the walls.

  Detective Calvin Whitfield’s eyes darted over the reflections in the windshield and he turned around to see the buildings for himself. Two stacks of brightly lit windows stared back at him. Someone working late might have seen it happen, he thought, then realized that the size of the buildings made them appear deceptively close. In fact, they were separated from the parking lot by two long blocks of single-story shops and overpriced restaurants. No help there.

  Detective Whitfield stepped away from the car and away from the thick puddle on the ground next to it. He scribbled on the screen of his notebook, too hard, and the stylus snapped in his hand. Swearing, he took another stylus from the pocket of his jacket and scribbled again. His wireless rang.

  “Whitfield,” he said absently into the microphone clipped to his collar.

  “Heads up, Cal, the mayor’s on her way over there.”

  “What?” Whitfield’s attention was jarred away from his notebook. “Why? What does she want?”

  “I don’t know, but traffic control has been told to accommodate the media.”

  Whitfield winced. “Any report yet on Szafara?”

  “Still in surgery.”

  “Did you reach his wife?”

  “She’s at the hospital.”

  “Thanks. Let me know when you hear something.”

  Whitfield reached down to his belt and pressed a key on the wireless to disconnect the call. His skin felt like bugs were crawling under it and he badly wanted a cigarette. A great time he picked to quit, he thought, two days before this lands on his desk, probably the worst violent crime Los Angeles had seen in five years. He unwrapped a stick of gum and shoved it into his mouth.

  Sixty feet away, a young woman was crumpled over a concrete parking block, her clothes soaked in blood, her body as twisted and broken as if she had fallen from a thirty-story building. Her handbag, lying on the ground beside her, held a wallet with $851 and a driver’s license that identified her as twenty-six-year-old Maria Sanders of Van Nuys. DNA tests would be needed to confirm that. Her face was smashed to a red jelly.

  Officer Karla McMahon, a beefy woman with crisply cut blonde hair, walked up to Whitfield and handed him a disk. “We’ve taken statements from three witnesses,” she said. “One woman says she saw a man, possibly in his thirties, Caucasian, medium height, dark curly hair, walking across the parking lot with a steel pipe in his hand. She said she assumed he was part of some construction crew.”

  “Did anybody see what happened to Officer Szafara?”

  “No. He was flagged down on the street by a woman who heard screaming. We took her statement. She didn’t see anything. A man who was across the street says he heard shots. Of course, he didn’t see anything either through this thing.” She waved her hand disgustedly at the decorative barricade constructed along the perimeter of the parking lot. From the inside it looked like eight-foot-tall sheets of plain painted plywood, but on the street side it was a trompe l’oeil scene of sidewalk cafes and leafy shad
e trees. The city offered generous tax breaks to parking lot operators who participated in the Beautify Los Angeles effort.

  McMahon looked down at her shoes, planted well into the puddle that had collected under Officer Szafara before the helicopter arrived. A slight shudder went through her. “Two bullets fired from Szafara’s service weapon,” she said, taking two steps to her left and scraping her shoes uselessly on the gravel surface. “The suspect may have been wearing body armor, because he managed to hit Szafara in the head with the same steel pipe he used on the victim. It appears he dropped the pipe where we found it and took off.”

  “Not on foot,” Whitfield said. “He would have been covered in blood. He must have had a car, maybe someone driving it for him.”

  “He might have stolen a car,” McMahon said. “I counted eight cars in this lot when I got here and not one of them was locked.”

  Whitfield looked at his watch. It was 10:15. “It’s been three hours,” he said. “Who uses this lot after 7:00 p.m.?”

  “The gym is open.” McMahon pointed over the barricade at a two-story glass storefront across the street. “The shops on this block all close at six,” she continued. “The two restaurants on this side have valet parking, but people can use this lot and walk if they want to. There’s a coffee shop on that side that’s open but most of their business is at lunchtime.”

  “Three hours,” Whitfield said. “Any of those people would have been back for their car before now unless they...” His words were pierced by the sound of sirens coming up the street. “That’s the mayor,” he said.

  “The mayor?” Officer McMahon looked skeptical.

  A chunky, redheaded woman suddenly ran up to them, waving an ID in a leather case. “Excuse me,” she said, breathing hard, “The mayor is on her way. Can you tell me who’s in charge here?”

  “I am,” Detective Whitfield said, without giving his name. “May I help you?”

  “I’m Ronni Richards,” the woman said, her eyes flitting over the scene. “Chief of Staff to Mayor Martinez. She’ll be making an announcement about a reward.”

  “I see,” Whitfield said.

  “Why are the cameras all the way across the street?” the woman asked.

  “We’re not letting any media on the scene until we’re finished.”

  “I see,” the woman said. “Well, we don’t need very much space. Are you finished with this area over here?” She pointed to an unoccupied corner at the back of the parking lot.

  Whitfield looked over the scene, crowded with officers taking measurements, taking pictures, collecting small samples and fragments of evidence and sorting it all into plastic bags. The staff from the coroner’s office was standing by, patiently waiting for the police to let them proceed. Whitfield smiled politely. “Officer McMahon, see what you can do to accommodate the mayor,” he said. McMahon nodded.

  “Can we move the coroner’s van?” the woman said in a manner that suggested it was not a question. “It would be perfect in the background against that wall. See how the police lights are reflecting in the windows?”

  “It might be best if the coroner’s van stays where it is,” Whitfield said.

  “No, that won’t work.” The woman pulled a wireless from her bag and keyed in a number. “It’s too far away, you won’t be able to read it.” She held the wireless to her ear. “Hello? Can you hear me? Good, bring everyone around to the Alameda side. Tell the police they’ll have to close the right-hand lane to traffic so the satellite trucks have someplace to park. There’s not much room here.”

  Whitfield turned away and walked to the extreme opposite end of the parking lot. He leaned against a white sedan and snapped open his notebook with such force that the stylus popped out, bounced twice and cartwheeled under the car.

  Whitfield leaned down awkwardly and felt around under the car without success. Then with an irritated groan he pulled a penlight from his jacket pocket, got down on his hands and knees on the dusty gravel, and aimed the light under the car. He caught his breath.

  There, curled up and shaking, was a small child, perhaps two years old, spattered with blood and staring wide-eyed into the narrow beam of light.

  Whitfield shifted slightly, the gravel crunching painfully under his knees. He waved his left arm in the direction of two officers nearby, held his index finger to his lips and pointed under the car. Officers Bahr and Setoyan got down on the ground and looked.

  “Oh, no,” Setoyan said quietly, “The poor little guy.”

  “I’ll call for an ambulance,” Bahr whispered, getting to his feet.

  “Tell them no siren,” Whitfield whispered back. He held a hand out to the child, who made a frightened sound and inched further away. “It’s okay,” he said gently.

  At the sound of his voice, the child unleashed a shrieking cry that brought Officer Bahr running back. “What happened?” he asked. Whitfield turned to speak to Bahr and saw the mayor, surrounded by TV lights, standing above the crowd on her portable platform and looking over in his direction. “Nothing happened,” he said, “I guess I scared him.” Whitfield stretched out flat on his stomach and made another attempt to reach the screaming child. He heard the crunch of footsteps approaching.

  “Maybe we should let Karla try,” Setoyan suggested. Whitfield slid out from under the car and saw that one set of feet belonged to Officer Karla McMahon. He stood up, brushing himself off. “There’s a little kid hiding under there,” he told McMahon. “Maybe a woman’s voice will calm him down.”

  McMahon leaned sideways and peered in the direction of the noise. “Is he hurt?” she asked.

  “Don’t know yet,” Whitfield said.

  McMahon got down on the ground and stuck her head under the car. “Hello,” she said uncomfortably. The screaming continued. “Hola!” she tried, without success.

  The reporter who had followed Officer McMahon across the parking lot stepped back and keyed a number into his wireless. “There’s a baby under the car,” he said. “Break everything down and set up over here.”

  Whitfield watched as one, then two, then three of the camera crews in front of the mayor picked up their equipment and headed in his direction.

  Mayor Taylor Martinez, gleaming in a cream silk suit, stood her ground on the portable platform and continued her polished and tightly-written impromptu remarks. She decried the savage crime that had disturbed a peaceful Monday evening in her city. She vowed that Los Angeles would never return to the era of random street violence. Her flawlessly made-up face was full of righteous concern. Even the hostile glances she threw at departing camera crews served to convey an impression of moral outrage.

  It was the silent arrival of the ambulance that finally persuaded the mayor to wrap it up. She mentioned the reward one more time and promised that the killer would not escape justice. The clatter of tripods collapsing followed hard on her words, bringing an irritated frown to her face. “What is happening over there?” she demanded. Without waiting for an answer she stepped down and stormed across the parking lot, trailed by her redheaded aide and the few remaining camera crews.

  Officers Bahr and Setoyan took three long strides forward and blocked the group from getting close to the car. The mayor glared at them. “What is going on here, officers?” she asked in a authoritative voice. Just then, a paramedic slid out from under the white sedan with the screaming toddler strapped to a small stretcher.

  “Oh, my goodness,” the mayor said, pushing past the officers, “Is he hurt?” The paramedic was wide-eyed to see the mayor of Los Angeles standing in front of him. “No, ma’am,” he stammered, “He doesn’t appear to be injured.”

  “But all this blood on his clothes. Oh!” The mayor’s face took on a softer expression. “The poor little thing,” she murmured, reaching out and gently taking the child’s hand. He gripped her finger. “There,” she said soothingly, her wide blue eyes fixed on his small face. The crying stopped. “There,” she said again. Deftly she unbuckled the straps on the stretcher, lifted the
little boy into her arms and turned to face the cameras.

  “No child,” she said, her voice trembling just slightly, “should ever have to witness what this child saw today. We will find the killer of this baby’s mother, and he will pay the ultimate penalty. And make no mistake. We will keep Los Angeles safe. We will never go back to the Los Angeles our grandparents knew. I tell you now, as we stand here today at the corner of 4th and Alameda, that we will not surrender this block, or the next block, or any block of any street to violent criminals and vicious predators.”

  Bystanders watching from an opening in the barricade broke out into applause. The mayor stroked the child’s back reassuringly.

  “I announce today,” she continued, “a $3 million reward for information leading to the arrest of the person or persons who killed this child’s mother, Maria Sanders, and seriously injured LAPD officer William Szafara, who is still in surgery at this hour and is in all our prayers tonight. Furthermore, I am today releasing emergency law enforcement funds to cover overtime and additional patrol officers until this killer is captured and brought to justice. I’ve just spoken to the governor and he has approved emergency surveillance at all California airports, on I-15 at the Nevada border, on I-5 at the Oregon and Mexico borders and at other locations where a fugitive might attempt to leave the state. This killer will not escape California and he will not escape justice.”

  Gently, the mayor cradled the blood-spattered toddler’s head against her shoulder. A storm of strobe lights bounced off the buildings.

  Los Angeles, California. Thursday, May 11, 2056

  “Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you.” Julia Thomsen was in an exceptionally good mood. Her fingers played expressively over imaginary piano keys on the Corvette’s dark blue leather dashboard. “Happy birthday, dear Ted, happy birthday to you.” She finished with a dramatic arpeggio, sweeping her hand from left to right across the dashboard and up into the open air.

  “Thank you.” Ted Braden’s voice was polite. He made an effort not to say anything about the fingerprints. No point in telling her again. He turned the radio on. “Sigalert on the eastbound 10 west of the 110 junction,” a static-covered voice reported.