holding that the constitutionality of a checkpoint stems, in part, from the fact that “[a]t traffic checkpoints the motorist can see that other vehicles are being stopped, he can see visible signs of the officers’ authority, and he is much less likely to be frightened or annoyed by the intrusion,” thus offering greater protection to drivers’ “liberty and privacy from arbitrary and oppressive interference by government officials.”
How later courts described this case
- holding that the constitutionality of a checkpoint stems, in part, from the fact that “[a]t traffic checkpoints the motorist can see that other vehicles are being stopped, he can see visible signs of the officers’ authority, and he is much less likely to be frightened or annoyed by the intrusion,” thus offering greater protection to drivers’ “liberty and privacy from arbitrary and oppressive interference by government officials.”
- finding that a search is a "substantial invasion of privacy" and, therefore, to protect individual's right to be free from "official arbitrariness," those effectuating the search must have probable cause
- holding Fourth Amendment violated if seizure occurred and force used to effect the seizure was unreasonable
- explaining that suspects’ statements were “central to ... consideration of whether a reasonable officer could have believed that the Plaintiffs had” committed a crime
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
Mr. Justice White,
with whom Mr. Justice Black-mun joins, concurring in the judgment. *
Given Almeida-Sanchez v. United States, 413 U. S. 266 (1973), with which I disagreed but which is now authoritative, the results reached in these cases were largely foreordained. The Court purports to leave the question open, but it seems to me, my Brother Rehnquist *915 notwithstanding, that under the Court’s opinions checkpoint investigative stops, without search, will be difficult to justify under the Fourth Amendment absent probable cause or reasonable suspicion. In any event, the Court has thus dismantled major parts of the apparatus by which the Nation has attempted to intercept millions of aliens who enter and remain illegally in this country.
The entire system, however, has been notably unsuccessful in deterring or stemming this heavy flow; and its costs, including added burdens on the courts, have been substantial. Perhaps the Judiciary should not strain to accommodate the requirements of the Fourth Amendment to the needs of a system which at best can demonstrate only minimal effectiveness as long as it is lawful for business firms and others to employ aliens who are illegally in the country. This problem, which ordinary law enforcement has not been able to solve, essentially poses questions of national policy and is chiefly the business of Congress and the Executive Branch rather than the courts.
I concur in the judgment in these two cases.
[This opinion applies also to No. 74-114, United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, ante, p. 873.]