More Than Bias

Abstract This chapter examines how legal doctrine, rather than individual bias alone, produces and perpetuates police violence in the United States. It traces the evolution of excessive force jurisprudence from Monroe v. Pape to Graham v. Connor, showing how the Supreme Court’s shift from the Fourteenth Amendment’s structural framework to the Fourth Amendment’s “reasonableness” standard solidifies an individualist perspective on police violence that obscures its racial dimensions. The chapter demonstrates how vague constitutional standards enable police departments to create ambiguous use-of-force policies that federal courts then treat as authoritative interpretations of reasonableness—a dynamic the author and Newman term “legal endogeneity.” It argues that this process allows police institutions to define constitutional norms, thereby eroding accountability and reinforcing systemic harm, while also identifying community-led policy reforms to reshape these legal meanings from the ground up. Finally, the chapter concludes that exposing and disrupting the endogenous relationship between police policy and constitutional interpretation has the potential to transform Fourth Amendment deference into a pathway toward accountability and equitable public health outcomes.