Surely, if the Constitution has a right to privacy, there must be a right to travel? Can the police really arbitrarily prevent people from doing so? Is there any precedent for such a ruling?

[Update a few minutes later]

Note, when I ask if there's a precedent, I'm referring to the ruling, not cops preventing people from traveling. As noted in comments, one would think that this would be covered by the Ninth Amendment.

There is no expressly stated right to travel in the Constitution. For that matter, there isn't a right to privacy either (nor to an education or health care or housing or a job or a host of other things). However, rights don't need to be explicitly stated in the Constitution. The much neglicted 9th Amendment states:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Unlike the abortive EU constitution, the US Constitution doesn't try to provide a laundy list of rights. Certain rights are enumerated, most notably in the Bill of Rights. Others are assumed as stated in the 9th Amendment. It shouldn't be difficult to assume a right to travel (at your own expense, of course).

I have no idea about the particulars of the Louisanna case. Did the local police close the bridge out of concerns for safety? If so, then there is no rational basis for a lawsuit (as if that was necessary to sue someone). We have roads closed all of the time when a winter storm hits. Was there some other reason for not letting people cross the bridge, such as trying to prevent "the wrong kind (read: color) of people" from coming into a town? In that case, it sounds like there could be racist motives behind the closure. However, there simply isn't enough info in the article to know for sure.

Here's a story that illuminates what the Gretna Police Department allegedly did. Supposedly a group of 200 people attempted to leave New Orleans.

With no food, no water and no transportation out of the city, about 200 of the former hotel guests wandered the streets and tried to set up a camp next to a police command center on Canal Street, where they hoped to get aid, protection and information, the couple said.

But officers told them they couldn't stay, they had no water for them, and they needed to get up on Highway 90, a bridge that spans the Mississippi River, and walk until they saw the rescue buses they promised would be waiting for them.

So late Wednesday afternoon, the group set out for a bridge called the Crescent City Connection, where they would find the help they so desperately needed. But when they arrived atop the highway, the paramedics said, they were met by more police officers, this time from neighboring Gretna, La., who weren't letting anyone pass.

"If I weren't there, and hadn't witnessed it for myself, I don't think I would have ever believed this," Bradshaw said.
The officers fired warning shots into the air and then leveled their weapons at members of the crowd, Bradshaw said. He approached, hands in the air, displaying his paramedic's badge.

"They told us that there would be no Superdomes in their city,'' the couple wrote. "These were code words that if you are poor and black, you are not crossing the Mississippi River -- and you weren't getting out of New Orleans.''

And when exhausted hurricane victims set up temporary shelters on the highway, Gretna police came back a few hours later, fired shots into the air again, told people to "get the f -- off the bridge" and used a helicopter to blow down all the makeshift shelters, the paramedics said.

When the officers had pushed the crowd back far enough, one of them took the group's food and water, dropped it in the trunk of a patrol car and drove away.

I'm not sure what you mean by a "right to travel", Rand, but if such a right existed (which it does not) it would merely prohibit a law preventing travel, and it would have the usual public safety and time, place and manner exceptions.

To quote the old saying, the right to free speech doesn't mean you can yell "Fire!" in a crowded movie theater. Similarly, any right to travel wouldn't mean you have the right to travel anytime, anywhere, and notwithstanding the judgement of emergency authorities that your doing so would endanger the public safety.

Can the police arbitrarily prevent people from traveling? No. But if they have a reason for preventing travel that a Court would respect, they can.

A more troubling case, really, is what happens here in SoCal when someone's house is damaged in an earthquake or mudslide, and the owner has to get permission from the authorities to go back in, and sometimes he can't. You'd think the California Constitution -- which unlike the US Constitution does have an explicit right to privacy -- would prohibit the law from preventing you from risking your own life on your own property at your own judgment. You'd think if you really want to go in to try to rescue your grandma's silver candlesticks (or something far more valuable) the police could call you crazy or refuse to come rescue you if you get stuck, but couldn't prevent you. And yet that's not how it is. Strange.

Actually, the Supreme Court has ruled that there is an interstate right to travel, as part of the "Privileges and Immunities Clause" of the 14th Amendment. The prior cases relating to the interstate right to travel that I am aware of do not seem at all analogous to the situation described here, however. It's also important to note that the court in this case found there was no federal Constitutional right to travel within a state (intrastate as opposed to interstate), and the 14th Amendment's Privileges and Immunities Clause only guarantees a right to interstate travel, to my knowledge.

I could see the outcome of this case changing on appeal if the procedural issues can be overcome, though. It would not be hard for an appellate court to determine that the right to interstate travel is burdened when one's right to intrastate travel is burdened, preventing you from going to another state (and that seems to be what happened in this case).

Sisyphus, I have been educated. Thank you. Your comments provoked a little googling, e.g. this interesting tidbit, which makes it clear I was wrong.

That is, there is a right to travel, based on the "Rights and Immunity Clause" (in Article IV, I think, not the 14th Amendment). I can't find any reference to intrastate travel, but since the right to interstate travel was seemingly founded on a pre-existing "natural" right to intrastate travel, it would seem a given.

Most interesting. It's amazing how much grist the Court can grind out of one small sentence.

In the post-9/11 world, while America fights the Global War on Terror against her most dangerous and determined foe ever, we can no longer afford the luxury of allowing people to just go wherever they want. We face a pervasive, cunning, omniscient enemy who will use every freedom we naively cling to against us, and our nation stands on the precipice of extinction if those who would surrender by giving our enemies such openings prevail.

Some would insist we should just assume that any given person walking the street is not carrying a thermonuclear weapon, but woe to us if we should discover our error by mushroom clouds rising above Chicago. No longer can the clear imperatives of national survival be deferred or disputed by clinging to obsolete notions of liberty, or the unrealistic (nay, negligent!) foolishness of those who secretly want America to fail.

That is why I, in conjunction with President Bush, Conservatives for Liberty, and the Republican Freedom PAC, am calling for every single person in America to be assigned an NSA case officer to review and approve all physical motion. As these officers will not be unionized, and will provide no service to those they monitor, that should allay any fears of the program becoming a "Big Government" operation. Now, if you don't mind, PAPIERS BITTE! SCHNELL!

Naturally Swideriski makes this about Bushitler, instead of being about local authorities' response to Hurricane Katrina.

I think it obvious from the various accounts of the Katrina aftermath that the purpose of blocking the bridges out of New Orleans was to keep the "wrong" kind of people out of the neighboring communities. The story mentioned by Karl here was actually about a group of European tourists who were trying to get out of the city following the flooding. And yes, the cops stole their water and food at gun point.

The manner in which the bridges and causeway was closed off so quickly makes it clear that this had been a contingency plan for some time. They weren't about to allow those thugs and hoodlams from New Orleans to run about their streets in the aftermath of disaster.

You can expect to see similiar actions following a major earthquake in Southern California.

McGehee: "Naturally Swideriski makes this about Bushitler, instead of being about local authorities' response to Hurricane Katrina."

I wasn't referring to specific events, just taking the opportunity to remind of certain people's attitudes toward the Constitution in the years following 9/11. "In the post-September 11th world,..." became a standard preface to defending the indefensible, and a magic Omni-defense talisman for all who, like Rand, seemed to crave the starkness of a Total War that never existed. To hear that he is concerned about local police violating freedom of movement was irresistably amusing.

I am sure Brian wants the plebes disarmed so they have to bow down and lick boot when their water and food is stolen at gunpoint under color of authority.

I today ran into a state trooper in a gun store bragging about how he got even with people who pushed him around and disrespected him when he was younger.

Since we were in a neutral setting, I gave him a little lecture on professionalism as a representative of the state and that he should not sully the public trust with his personal vendettas while wearing the uniform. I reminded him that he was a representative of the governor and that his was a higher calling. When you wear a uniform in service of our nation or one of its political subdivisions, you should put on the ideas that uniform represents along with the cloth.

It was a useless conversation, he did not get it. There are two kinds of cops, the ones who do it for service and those who do it as a power trip.

Since we were in a neutral setting, I gave him a little lecture on professionalism...

You did? I suppose when you're camping in the desert and come across a rattlesnake you poke it with a stick to make it rattle, too.

In the post-9/11 world...

Brian, can you do this in the deep movie-trailer guy voice, like in the Geico commercial?

"You did? I suppose when you're camping in the desert and come across a rattlesnake you poke it with a stick to make it rattle, too."

Well, in the woods I have on rare occasion, especially when backed up with a 1911 I have never had to use on a reptile of any flavor. People don't get bit poking rattlesnakes with long sticks, they get bit doing truly stupid shit like trying to pick them up or sticking their hands in places they should not have or using short sticks. Sometimes it is good to have one rattle when you have control of the situation, it lets you know what they can do and lets you learn what they really sound like. And it also teaches you they can only strike so far, generally no more than 2/3rds their body length. Rattlers are pretty timid by an large. They tend to play possum or flee most of the time. They like to avoid biting stuff they can't eat if they can help it. If you spend any time in the woods, you would proabally shit the bed if you knew haw many dozens of times you have been within a couple of feet of one and never knew it.

Still, I have worn two uniforms in my life and will not hesitate lecturing someone who wears one on professionalism when I see it lacking. Particularly when I can pick up the phone and call a friend of mine I like to call the Governor's chief of staff if the situation warrants.

PS I can email you one of the pics of my rattler finds if you like.

Mike: "I am sure Brian wants the plebes disarmed so they have to bow down and lick boot when their water and food is stolen at gunpoint under color of authority."

If you know of any case in which anyone defended themselves against robbery by the NOPD after Katrina and lived to tell about it, feel free to share it with the rest of the class.

"I gave him a little lecture on professionalism"

Commendable either way, but possibly unwise depending on the state.

"There are two kinds of cops, the ones who do it for service and those who do it as a power trip."

And then the third and vast majority, who do it as a job or career. They are not on a mission.

Fair enough, Mike. I was only pulling your chain a little.

I've spent plenty of time in the desert. Mostly Joshua Tree, a little Death Valley. But my heart is more in the mountains, really. This season I managed to climb all three big peaks in SoCal (Gorgonio, 11500', San Jacinto, 10800', and Baldy, 10100') in one day each. Not too bad for an old fart.

I recall once running down a trail in the hills above Berkeley, where I was going to school, and seeing a stick. I jumped over it, and as I did it wriggled away. I think it was a small rattler. Heart got going a bit there...

"If you know of any case in which anyone defended themselves against robbery by the NOPD after Katrina and lived to tell about it, feel free to share it with the rest of the class."

How about Athens, Tennesee? It certainly has been done:

http://www.constitution.org/mil/tn/batathen.htm

I still notices you gave not protest to disarming the plebes. I guess some animals are more equal in your mind. Molon Lave!

"Commendable either way, but possibly unwise depending on the state."

Perhaps but I have a friend or two in high places if he decided to get cute with me. In addition to the above contact, my landlord's best friend is the AG an he is the retired assistant AG. I am not worried about a renegade state trooper when I am in the right. Know your limitations and pick you battles.

Mike,

I've done something similar. The officer was hired to handle security for an event, and he thought that meant sitting his ass in a chair and literally altering the layout of security system for his own comfort. When I explained to him how he violated security; he tried to convince me that he had the situation in hand. When I ran a demonstration proving he didn't have a hand on anything other than his pecker, that's when he tried to arrest me. A different law enforcement agency, that was head of overall security, witnessed the whole event and sent the disgrace home. I simply continued with my duties.

Of course, what our anonymous fellow thinks is "speaking truth to power" means posting anonymously on web sites.

Mike: "How about Athens, Tennesee? It certainly has been done"

No, "it" has not been done. You implied that all it would take is a local "pleb" having guns to prevent the heavily armed, armored, and mobile NOPD from robbing them after their homes and everything they own is destroyed, but then how do you go about justifying this opinion? By talking about something dozens of "hardened" WW2 veterans working together did in response to events they fully expected.

Both your original comment and this rationalization are totally ridiculous--There were plenty of people wandering around Katrina-ravaged New Orleans with guns, and any who fired them at NOPD ended up being chased down like game.

Libertarian fantasies of people spontaneously coming together for mutual defense did not materialize in any significant way, and nobody armed or not was going to jeopardize the lives of their families taking on half a dozen kevlar-vested, trigger-happy cops whose buddies were, for all they knew, just a walkie talkie squawk away. Guns do not give power to the powerless, they reinforce existing power: The veterans in your example were already powerful by virtue of their training, their commitment to democracy, and their solidarity with each other. A gun in the hands of a powerless person is an instrument of chaos.

Mike: "I still notices you gave not protest to disarming the plebes."

Why should I have to state the obvious just to fend off your ludicrous straw men? The 2nd Amendment prohibits disarmament, and various levels of community weaponry are a necessary hedge against government power. But that doesn't mean I can't hold gun activists in contempt, sanctimoniously declaring themselves "defenders of liberty" while voting for terrorists.

Mike: "Know your limitations and pick you battles."

This implies that it matters whether you win. In many cases, the fight is the victory, and only possible by ignoring your limitations. Power is something you give other people, not something they can take.