> Leaving it up to local voters makes it sound like it's ok for a police dept to misbehave, eg harass minorities or evade accountability, as long as the majority voters in that city/county are ok with it.In the extremely unlikely event that a majority are ok with it, yes, that would be correct as far as local laws are concerned. That's what "freedom" means: it means people are free to make mistakes. Note, however, that if the corrupt local cops are violating state or federal law, they're still liable even if a majority of local voters are ok with it. I don't have a problem with, for example, local cops being prosecuted for violating a citizen's Constitutional rights.
However, I strongly doubt that a majority of voters in these localities are actually ok with police corruption. I think they either don't bother voting because they don't think it will make any difference, or don't know about the corruption because they haven't personally experienced the consequences. Even in a large city like, e.g., Chicago, the majority of voters will never have a personal encounter with a city cop.
> going to a couple levels in governance (state or federal) makes total sense given the systematic nature of some of the problems
You're assuming that the state and federal levels of government don't also have systematic problems that would prevent them from fixing corruption. That strikes me as a highly unlikely assumption.
In the extremely unlikely event that a majority are ok with it, yes, that would be correct as far as local laws are concerned. That's what "freedom" means: it means people are free to make mistakes. Note, however, that if the corrupt local cops are violating state or federal law, they're still liable even if a majority of local voters are ok with it. I don't have a problem with, for example, local cops being prosecuted for violating a citizen's Constitutional rights.
However, I strongly doubt that a majority of voters in these localities are actually ok with police corruption. I think they either don't bother voting because they don't think it will make any difference, or don't know about the corruption because they haven't personally experienced the consequences. Even in a large city like, e.g., Chicago, the majority of voters will never have a personal encounter with a city cop.
> going to a couple levels in governance (state or federal) makes total sense given the systematic nature of some of the problems
You're assuming that the state and federal levels of government don't also have systematic problems that would prevent them from fixing corruption. That strikes me as a highly unlikely assumption.