Also known as: privileges and immunities of citizenship · privileges or immunities clause · Privileges or Immunities Clause · 14th Amendment privileges or immunities
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A set of rights inherent in national citizenship that the Fourteenth Amendment protects against state abridgment. These rights include the ability of newly arrived residents to receive the same public benefits as longer-term residents without durational waiting periods or reductions tied to prior state levels.
Phuong Pham moved from State B to New York and applied for the state health access program six months later. The agency limited her to crisis services only because she had not yet lived in the state for twelve months. She sued, arguing that the durational limit prevented her from receiving the same comprehensive coverage available to longer-term residents.
Priscilla Parks moved from State B to Louisiana and applied for public assistance six months later. The agency limited her benefits to the lower amount from her prior state because she had not yet lived in Louisiana for twelve months. She sued, arguing that the durational limit prevented her from receiving the same benefits available to longer-term residents.
Evangelisto Ramos was charged with a serious criminal offense and tried in a Louisiana state court. At trial, the jury deliberated and returned a verdict of guilty by a vote of ten to two. Under Louisiana law at the time, non-unanimous verdicts were permitted in criminal cases, and only Louisiana and Oregon allowed such verdicts among the states. Ramos's conviction was upheld under the authority of Apodaca v. Oregon, in which the Supreme Court had held that the Sixth Amendment requires unanimous verdicts in federal criminal trials but permits non-unanimous verdicts in state trials. Subsequently, Louisiana voters approved a constitutional amendment requiring unanimous jury verdicts for criminal convictions. Ramos then challenged his conviction on direct review, arguing that the Sixth Amendment, as incorporated against the states, mandates unanimous verdicts in state criminal trials for serious offenses. The Louisiana Supreme Court rejected Ramos's argument, relying on the precedent established in Apodaca. The case reached the United States Supreme Court, which granted certiorari to consider whether Apodaca should be overruled. On April 20, 2020, the Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the Louisiana Supreme Court and remanded the case for further proceedings.
View caseParker Phillips relocated to a new state and applied for public assistance. The agency calculated benefits at the lower level from his prior state and imposed a one-year wait for full amounts. He sued, claiming the policy penalized his exercise of the right to travel by denying equal treatment to new residents.
In 2006 Congress enacted the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act. The statute requires sex offenders to register in the jurisdictions where they live, work, and attend school. It also directs the Attorney General to specify the applicability of its requirements to offenders convicted before the Act’s enactment and to prescribe rules for their registration. At the time of enactment the nation’s population of sex offenders exceeded 500,000, and Congress left the treatment of these pre-Act offenders to the Attorney General after concluding that immediate application would impose costly burdens on states and localities. The Attorney General first left pre-Act offenders unregulated for six months after enactment. An interim rule issued in 2007 then required all pre-Act offenders to follow the same registration rules as post-Act offenders. Subsequent Attorneys General issued varying guidelines, with one directing states to register only some pre-Act offenders, another requiring registration only for those convicted of a new felony after enactment, and still others differing on whether pre-Act offenders could receive credit for time already spent in the community. Herman Gundy pleaded guilty in 2005 to possessing child pornography. He was released from prison five years later. He was arrested in 2012 for failing to register as a sex offender under the rules then prescribed for pre-Act offenders and faced an additional ten-year prison term. Gundy was convicted in 2012. He argued in the district court that Congress had unconstitutionally delegated legislative power when it authorized the Attorney General to specify the applicability of SORNA’s requirements. The district court rejected the argument. The Second Circuit affirmed, relying on its precedent that SORNA does not unconstitutionally delegate legislative authority. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View casePilar Pena moved from State B to California and applied for the state health access program six months later. The agency limited her to crisis services only because she had not yet lived in the state for twelve months. She sued, arguing that the durational limit prevented her from receiving the same comprehensive coverage available to longer-term residents.
Adamson was tried and convicted by a jury in a California Superior Court of first-degree murder and first-degree burglary. The information charged him with prior convictions for burglary, larceny, and robbery. He answered that he had suffered those convictions, which under California Penal Code section 1025 barred the prosecution from alluding to them during the trial itself. Adamson did not testify. The prosecution introduced evidence that six of his fingerprints appeared on a freshly broken small door at the crime scene. He had later asked an unidentified person whether the latter would be interested in purchasing a diamond ring. Tops of women's stockings were found in his room though they did not match the lower portion recovered from under the victim's body. Under the California Constitution, article I, section 13, and Penal Code section 1323, the prosecutor commented to the jury on Adamson's failure to explain or deny the evidence against him. The trial court instructed the jury that it could consider that failure. Because Adamson had answered the prior-conviction charges affirmatively, California law would have permitted the prosecution to impeach him with those convictions on cross-examination had he taken the stand. The California Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and death sentence in People v. Adamson, 27 Cal. 2d 478, 165 P.2d 3. Adamson sought review in the United States Supreme Court, which granted certiorari under Judicial Code section 237 to consider his federal constitutional challenges to the California statute and its application at his trial.
View casePreston Pratt relocated to a new state and applied for public assistance. The agency calculated his benefits at the lower level from his prior state and imposed a one-year wait for full amounts. He sued, claiming the policy penalized his exercise of the right to travel by denying equal treatment to new residents.
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View casePierre Poulin moved from State B to Indiana and applied for public assistance six months later. The agency limited benefits to the lower amount from his prior state because he had not yet lived in Indiana for twelve months. He sued, arguing that the durational limit prevented him from receiving the same benefits available to longer-term residents.
Tyson Timbs pleaded guilty in Indiana state court to dealing in a controlled substance and conspiracy to commit theft. The trial court sentenced him to one year of home detention and five years of probation, which included a court-supervised addiction-treatment program. The sentence also required Timbs to pay fees and costs totaling $1,203. At the time of Timbs's arrest, the police seized his vehicle, a Land Rover SUV Timbs had purchased for about $42,000. Timbs paid for the vehicle with money he received from an insurance policy when his father died. The State engaged a private law firm to bring a civil suit for forfeiture of Timbs's Land Rover, charging that the vehicle had been used to transport heroin. After Timbs's guilty plea in the criminal case, the trial court held a hearing on the forfeiture demand. Although finding that Timbs's vehicle had been used to facilitate violation of a criminal statute, the court denied the requested forfeiture, observing that Timbs had recently purchased the vehicle for $42,000, more than four times the maximum $10,000 monetary fine assessable against him for his drug conviction. The Court of Appeals of Indiana affirmed that determination, but the Indiana Supreme Court reversed. The Indiana Supreme Court did not decide whether the forfeiture would be excessive. Instead, it held that the Excessive Fines Clause constrains only federal action and is inapplicable to state impositions. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseThe clause protects rights of national citizenship from state interference. One core protection is the right of new residents to equal treatment in public benefits without durational residency requirements.
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The clause supplies part of the textual basis for the right to travel. It prevents states from imposing waiting periods or reduced benefits that penalize new residents for exercising that right.
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No. The clause limits state action only. Challenges to federal conduct rely on other provisions such as the Fifth Amendment Due Process Clause.
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…as a basic constitutional freedom. This right is protected by the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV, § 2, by the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and by the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment as incorporated in the Fourteenth Amendment. The right to travel includes the right of a citizen of one…