WASHINGTON — In its latest ruling broadening the powers of police, the Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the mass search of passengers and their belongings on buses and trains, as long as officers receive a traveler's consent before inspecting his bags.
Officers cannot threaten anyone into cooperating, the court said.
On a 6-3 vote, the justices ruled constitutional a relatively new and, some say, ominous tactic in the war on drugs. A lower court that had declared the searches illegal called them better suited to "totalitarian states."
In the mid-1980s, in an aggressive move to stop drug trafficking on the East Coast, armed police officers in Broward County, Fla., began boarding interstate buses and trains at station stops. As they moved down the aisles, they asked to see the passengers' tickets and identification. Then, they asked to look in their bags or luggage.
Last year, the Florida Supreme Court ruled such mass searches of presumably innocent persons to be unconstitutional. "This is not Hitler's Berlin, nor Stalin's Moscow, nor is it white supremacist South Africa," where "badge-wielding police" can stop travelers at will, one Florida judge said.
But, in reversing that decision, the U.S. high court said such searches are constitutional as long as "a reasonable passenger would feel free" to say no to the police.
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, writing for the court, said sweep searches may be "distasteful" but they do not violate the Fourth Amendment's ban on "unreasonable searches and seizures" because they do not involve the use of force by police.
Federal agents have been using similar search tactics to arrest drug traffickers on Amtrak trains.
Thursday's Supreme Court outcome was no surprise to legal experts. In the five years since William H. Rehnquist became chief justice, the court has not ruled against the government in any significant case involving drugs or police searches.
Two years ago, the court, in a 5-4 vote, ruled that public employees in sensitive jobs may be required to undergo urine tests to detect drug use. Last year, also on a 5-4 vote, the court said police officers may randomly stop motorists at checkpoints to test their sobriety.
With the retirement of liberal Justice William J. Brennan Jr. and his replacement by David H. Souter, the margin in these cases has gone to 6 to 3 from 5 to 4.
