The right to resist an unlawful arrest dates back to the Magna Carta, and ever since it has been one pillar of the general right to self-defense by law-abiding citizens. But an activist 3-2 ruling of the Indiana Supreme Court -- in a decision written by an appointee of Governor Mitch Daniels -- erased all that. Many other states have passed statutes abrogating it too.

The giants of Anglo-American jurisprudence -- from William Blackstone to Joseph Story -- must be rolling over in their graves. The U.S. Supreme Court, after all, has repeatedly embraced this fundamental right: " One has an undoubted right to resist an unlawful arrest, and courts will uphold the right of resistance in proper cases." United States v. Di Re, 332 U.S. 581 (1948).

This basic right is even more important in connection with an unlawful entry by officials into a home because "a man's home is his castle," as implicitly recognized by the Fourth Amendment.

While the police may easily arrest an individual in a public place, it takes a special warrant to enter his home to arrest him. A half-century ago the U.S. Supreme Court quoted William Pitt (after whom Pittsburgh is named) for his remarks in the British Parliament: "The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the Crown. It may be frail; its roof may shake; the wind may blow through it; the storm may enter; the rain may enter; but the King of England cannot enter -- all his force dares not cross the threshold of the ruined tenement!" Miller v. United States, 357 U.S. 301 (1958).

But three Justices on the Indiana Supreme Court overruled all that for the people of Indiana. Barnes v. State, 2011 Ind. LEXIS 353 (Ind. May 12, 2011). Noting that many States had already passed statutes to limit the longstanding right to resist an unlawful arrest, the Indiana Supreme Court erased that right by judicial fiat.

Bad facts make bad law; silly facts can be worse. A husband and wife had a routine spat and the husband was in the process of moving out when police officers arrived in response to the wife's 911 call. It should have been apparent that the dispute had been resolved with the man moving out, but the police would not let go. They ignored the husband's shouts to stay out of it, and insisted on barging into the apartment.

The husband was subsequently convicted of disorderly conduct (yelling at the police officer) and of violating Indiana Code § 35-42-2-1(a)(1)(B), which makes it illegal to have knowingly or intentionally touched the officer in a rude, insolent, or angry manner while the officer was engaged in the execution of his official duty.

The Court rejected the husband's defense that his conduct was a lawful response to a policeman's allegedly unlawful entry into his apartment, and the husband was deprived the ability to give such an instruction to his jury. Instead, the 3-2 Court held that "we decline to recognize the right of a homeowner to reasonably resist unlawful entry."