Julia Pierson is gone from her job as head of the Secret Service.

She’d come in to change the culture of an agency beset by scandals involving agents consorting with hookers. Now, though, she’s resigned, the person responsible for a new scandal involving the protection of the White House, where the president and his family live.

A man jumped the fence and got into the mansion, running past and/or through several perimeters. What’s more, now we have learned that an armed man masquerading as a security guard at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention rode an elevator with President Obama.

OK, so now we’re searching for a new permanent director of the agency charged with protecting the president.

What’s next for security at the White House?

Here’s my suggestion for what should not happen at the People’s House: Do not lock the place down and make it next to impossible for tourists to walk through it and enjoy the majesty of the place.

The knee-jerk reaction is predictable. Some might want to essentially shut down the White House to the public. They’ll suggest searching tourists as they enter the place. One thing that can be done easily is to boost the height of the fences surrounding the White House. That’ll get done; no problem there.

Let us remember, as Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson noted this afternoon, the White House is a symbol of First Amendment guarantees, where people can assemble and perhaps ask questions of their head of state — the president — on questions that concern them.

Shutting the White House off from the people to whom the house belongs would be the wrong course as this necessary review of security takes hold.