The "Right to Privacy" is a legal term created by the Supreme Court in its decision in the 1891 case Union Pacific Railway Co. v. Botsford, where it outlined the right to bodily integrity and linked it to the right to privacy: "[n]o right is held more sacred, or is more carefully guarded, by the common law, than the right of every individual to the possession and control of his own person, free from all restraint or interference of others…." Subsequent Supreme Court decisions also relied on the right to privacy to protect individuals against government intrusion into family relationships, and government-compelled medical treatment.

Justice Brandeis called it the "right to be let alone," and said it was "the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized men." To what was Brandeis referring? To the right to privacy — one of our most fundamental constitutional rights, and one on which many of our most dearly held reproductive freedoms are based. In particular, two United States Supreme Court decisions, Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade, paved the way for women's reproductive rights and freedom by establishing that the right to privacy included a woman's right to make her own private and personal decisions about her reproductive choices.

There is much more to this, however, suffice it to say, there are legal implications to certain terms and phrases in constitutional juris prudence, and as such, I forgive you for this since you are not a lawyer and should not be expected to know such things, however, as I hope I have made clear, to say that the Right to Privacy" does not exist, is simply put, false.

Actually, in order for a court to create a legal term (which I believe only the legislative branch is actually able to do), it would have to actually state "Right to Privacy" in their order or opinion.

That is not done in the case you cite. Sorry.

Therefore, there is no such right established. And this is different from the right to be secure in our homes against illegal search and seizure, before someone brings that up.

Further, the case you cite was actually one where the defendant wished to force the plaintiff in an injury suit to submit to surgical examination of their injuries.

The court held the opinion the right to one's person may be said to be a right of complete immunity. Just as you state. And this could be used in an argument for a person's right to choose, however, my belief is that this is shaky at best.

Because, in this case, the court essentially said that neither a party to an action nor the court has the right to order a violation of a person's body. It really says nothing about a person's right to privacy that does not involve a violation of their physical body. Sorry.

Nice of you to find a citation such as this. And, keep in mind that, while I personally believe that abortion is wrong, I will not foist that belief upon others nor support a law that would. It is my belief and my right to maintain that belief. So, I only argue this point from a point of law.

Please read the cases cited again, the Right to Privacy was defined therein, the one you should most likely focus your attention on is the Griswold case, in which the justices go to great length defining the very right that you deny exists. I care not about your personal opinion(s), nor do I choose to share mine with you, all I am doing is correcting your mistake, intentional or otherwise, in stating that there is no Right to Privacy. If you wish to argue that the court's argument that a woman's right to have an abortion should not fit be protected by our Right to Privacy laws, be my guest, but arguing that there is no fundamental right to privacy provided for by our constitution, is misleading, incorrect, faulty, specious, and now, corrected.

If you are going all technical and legal about it, we operate under the British Common Law system, under which judges have a great deal of power to interpret the law. The interpretation of an appellate or supreme court is equal to the law itself. Many legal terms were in fact created by courts, not legislatures.

I don't know about the Botsford case, but Griswold v. Connecticut does make explicit the implicit right to privacy in the Constitution. This is sometimes thought to be some sort of modern "activist judging," but in fact, judges have always had this power, going back over 1000 years in England. That is, our legal system is older by far than the Constitution, or the British pairlement. These institutions arose against the background of the common law system, and it was understood from the founding of this nation that the courts in America would exercise the same power as always (see Marbury v. Madison).

So read the Griswold case, and though you may not agree with it, it is just as much the law of the land as any Act of Congress.

This case cites the "right of marital privacy" which IS, in fact, guaranteed. This does not even touch on the right to privacy of an individual.

The case was actually filed based on several members of Planned Parenthood of Connecticut being arrested for violating Connecticut's previous law against contraceptives.

What the court found is that, since the people they were cited to have *counselled* were married, the right of marital privacy exists. And that right was deemed to supercede Connecticut's state law.

I really don't think we need to pursue this any further here. Please start another thread and give me a link to it so that we may discuss this if you wish. Please be advised that I have studied law and have passed the bar exam - with flying colors, I might add. So, I am very well versed in researching case law and reading decisions and laws. Just fair warning.

See my response to the Griswold case. It is about privacy between married persons and not the privacy of an individual. We should really take this elsewhere.

As for a legal term created by a court, you say there were "many". I say, I don't know one way or the other for sure, but I don't believe there were any.

Please cite one. That's all, just one. I just don't like anyone making absolute statements of fact that they do not know are true for certain.

Thanks!

Your argument that there is no fundamental Right to Privacy was day 2 of my consitutional law class.

That being said, as much as I like to argue with other lawyers, I do it for a living, and dont have the time or patience to try to convince someone of something as basic as the constitutional right to privacy. If you want to learn, read the Griswold.

The right of privacy has evolved to protect the freedom of individuals to choose whether or not to perform certain acts or subject themselves to certain experiences. This personal autonomy has grown into a 'liberty' protected by the due process clause of the 14th amendment. However, this liberty is narrowly defined, and generally only protects privacy of family, marriage, motherhood, procreation, and child rearing. Further extensions of this right of privacy have been attempted under the 1st, 4th, and 5th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, however a general right to personal autonomy has yet to take hold beyond limited circumstances.

The personal autonomy dimension of the right of privacy has been overwhelmingly developed in cases dealing with reproductive rights, and accordingly it is most firmly established in this area. The Supreme Court first recognized an independent right of privacy within the 'penumbra' (fringe area) of the Bill of Rights in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965). In this case, a right of marital privacy was invoked to void a law prohibiting contraception. Later cases expanded upon this fundamental right, and in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973) the right of privacy was firmly established under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment. The court classified this right as fundamental, and thus required any governmental infringement to be justified by a compelling state interest. Roe held that the state's compelling interest in preventing abortion and protecting the life of the mother outweighs a mother's personal autonomy only after viability. Before viability, it was held, the mother's liberty of personal privacy limits state interference due to the lack of a compelling state interest.

The personal autonomy aspect of the right of privacy has limits, although these are always changing. In 1986, for example, a law criminilizing same sex sodomy was upheld in Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186. The Court held that not all private consensual sexual activity is insulated from the state. At the time, the same sex activities in question were not granted inclusion in the due process protected categories of relationships. Today, however, it appears that opinions have changed. Bowers was overturned in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), thereby recognizing a shifting public opinion about same sex relationships. Indeed, the activities protected by this aspect of the right of privacy are constantly in flux, with limits simultaneously being expanded and restricted.

Brossignol,

Unlike you, I am not a lawyer, and have not passed the bar exam, but I have read some of the cases below and have also submitted (and won )petitions to a state appellate court, so I do know a little about the law. You should be able to find all the case listed here on the Internet.

Though as you stated in the other thread, the right to privacy was initial a marital right, it quickly became an individual right, as outlined below.



From class notes at the University of Texas.
Phl 347
Lecture 17: The Right to Privacy
Privacy in Marriage and Sexuality
Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)
Stanley v. Georgia(1969)
Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972)
Roe v. Wade (1973)
Bowers v. Hardwick(1986)
Griswold v. Connecticut
Connecticut statute made the use of contraceptives (even by married couples) illegal.
Court found that this was an unconstitutional violation of a constitutional right of "privacy".
No such right is explicitly mentioned anywhere in the Constitution.
J. Douglas's Decision
The "specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance."
"Various guarantees create zones of privacy": 1st, 3rd (quartering of soldiers), 4th, and 5th.
The Ninth Amendment
"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

Douglas concludes that the list of fundamental rights in the first 8 amendments is not to be taken as exhaustive.

The Tenth Amendment
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

The federal courts are part of the government of the United States. Are they delegated a power to enforce unenumerated rights?

The 14th Amendment, again
"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law..."

Two Key Provisions

The "privileges and immunities" clause.
The "due process" clause.
One or both of these can be interpreted as enabling the federal government to protect citizens against the violation of their fundamental rights (under the Bill of Rights) by the States: the "incorporation doctrine".

Different Bases for the Decision
Douglas: the penumbra of the 1st, 3rd, 4th and 5th amendments.
Goldberg, Warren, Brennan: 9th amendment.
Harlan: due process clause of the 14th amendment.
Griswold: protection of marital privacy
Douglas: "Would we allow the police to search the sacred precincts of marital bedrooms for telltale signs of the use of contraceptives? The very idea is repulsive to the notions of privacy surrounding the marriage relationship....We deal with a right of privacy older than the Bill of Rights. Marriage is a coming together, for better or worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred.
Goldberg et al.:"...the rights to marital privacy and to marry and raise a family are ...fundamental... The state interest in safeguarding marital fidelity can be served by a more narrowly tailored statute..."
Harlan: "The home derives its pre-eminence as the seat of family life... The right of privacy is not absolute. Thus, I would not suggest that adultery, homosexuality, fornicationn,m and incest are immune from criminal enquiry, however privately practiced... the intimacy of husband and wife is an essential and accepted feature of the institution of mariage, which the state has always fostered."
White:"I wholly fail to see how the ban on the use of contraceptives by married couples in any way reinforces the State's ban on illicit sexual relationships.
Black and Stewart, dissenting: the majority is claiming "the power to invalidate any legislative act which the judges find irrational, unreasonable or offensive.
Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972)
In this decision, a Rubicon is crossed: the right by unmarried couples to use contraceptives is held to be a fundamental one.
In Griswold, the ultimate locus of privacy was the nuclear family (united by marriage). In Baird, it is the individual's sexual privacy that is at stake.
Other related cases
Stanley v. Georgia (1969): right to privacy protects the individual's viewing of pornography in his own home.
Roe v. Wade (1973): right to privacy includes a woman's (even a minor woman's) right to terminate her pregnancy -- not a joint right, held by the couple involved.
Bowers v. Hardwick (1986)
Majority decided to uphold a Georgia statute making sodomy a crime.
Majority opinion: J. White
Dissenting: J. Blackmun
Is the freedom to commit sodomy a fundamental right?
A fundamental right must be "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition." (Moore v. E. Cleveland, 1977)
Proscriptions of sodomy have ancient roots: common law.
Forbidden by all 13 original states, by all but 3 of 37 states at time of the ratification of the 14th amendment.
Protected by privacy?
Otherwise illegal conduct is not immunized by occurring in the home: illegal drugs, firearms, stolen goods.
A rational basis (minimal scrutiny)?
Georgia holds that sodomy is immoral.
If this is not a rational basis, then all laws representing moral choices would be invalidated.
Blackmun's Dissent
Right to privacy is the key.
Privacy does not protect only the traditional nuclear family.
Privacy is protected, not for a social good, but because it includes a central part of an individual's life.
Individuals define themselves through intimate sexual relationships.
Is White's Position Consistent?
In Griswold, White accepted that the state must not insist that all sex be procreative.
What can be the rational moral objection to sodomy, once the sex/procreation link is severed?
Are Eisenstadt and Bowers consistent?
In Eisenstadt, the Court extended a zone of sexual privacy (concerning contraception) to include unmarried couples.
Yet, the Court refused to include sodomy within that protected zone.
What is the principle?
Lawrence v. Texas (2003)
Reverses the decision in Bowers v. Hardwick.

Kennedy's Opinion for the Court
1. Sodomy laws were not historically directed at homosexuals. They weren't generally enforced against consensual acts between adults in private. They were part of a general condemnation of non-procreative sex.

2. The nation's laws and traditions. The Court must also be sensitive to an emerging consensus: "an emerging awareness that liberty gives substantial protection to adult persons in deciding how to conduct their lives in matters pertaining to sex." Laws against sodomy have been repealed in 12 of the 25 states that had them. Only four states single out homosexual sodomy, as Texas does. Recent decisions, such as Casey and Romer v. Evans, through the traditional opposition against homosexuality into further doubt, as does the recent decision of the European Court of Human Rights.

3. Stare decisis (the power of precedent) is not absolute. Bowers v. Hardwick has been the subject of continuing opposition.

4. Kennedy does not reverse Bowers v. Hardwick on the question of whether there is a fundamental right to sodomy. Consequently, strict scrutiny is not triggered.

5. Nonetheless, Kennedy argues that the Texas statute fails to survive minimal scrutiny, because the law lacks a legitimate purpose. He quotes his own opinion in Planned Parenthood v. Casey: "Our obligation is to define the liberty of all, not to mandate our own moral codeÖ At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life."

"The fact that the governing majority in a State has traditionally viewed a particular practice as immoral is not sufficient reason for upholding a law prohibiting the practice."

O'Connor's Concurring Opinion
O'Connor stand by Bowers. However, she votes to invalidate the Texas sodomy statute on the grounds that it violates the equal protection clause.

"Moral disapproval of a group cannot be a legitimate government interest under the Equal Protection clause because legal classification must not be 'drawn for the purpose of disadvantaging the group burdened by the law.'"

In response to Texas's argument that it was disadvantaging conduct, not a group of persons, O'Connor replies that the "conduct is closely correlated with being homosexual."

Scalia's Dissent
1. In Casey, the Court took the widespread criticism of Roe as a decisive reason for not reversing it, lest the moral authority of the Court be successfully challenged. In this decision, the Court inconsistently takes widespread criticism of Bowers as reason in favor of reversing it.

2. State laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality and obscenity are sustainable only if Bowers' validation of laws based on moral choices is maintained. The Court's decision in this case "effectively decrees the end of all moral legislation."

3. O'Connor's position is illogical. A law against nudity targets "conduct that is closely correlated with being a nudist." Any law prohibiting any conduct would be unconstitutional, on O'Connor's reasoning, since that conduct would be "closely correlated" with the status of belonging to the group of people most inclined to engage in that conduct.

4. For these reasons, the Court's decision will in fact lead to the judicial imposition of homosexual marriage, as has happened in Canada. When Kennedy writes to the contrary, "Do not believe it."

The right of privacy has evolved to protect the freedom of individuals to choose whether or not to perform certain acts or subject themselves to certain experiences. This personal autonomy has grown into a 'liberty' protected by the due process clause of the 14th amendment. However, this liberty is narrowly defined, and generally only protects privacy of family, marriage, motherhood, procreation, and child rearing. Further extensions of this right of privacy have been attempted under the 1st, 4th, and 5th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, however a general right to personal autonomy has yet to take hold beyond limited circumstances.

The personal autonomy dimension of the right of privacy has been overwhelmingly developed in cases dealing with reproductive rights, and accordingly it is most firmly established in this area. The Supreme Court first recognized an independent right of privacy within the 'penumbra' (fringe area) of the Bill of Rights in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965). In this case, a right of marital privacy was invoked to void a law prohibiting contraception. Later cases expanded upon this fundamental right, and in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973) the right of privacy was firmly established under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment. The court classified this right as fundamental, and thus required any governmental infringement to be justified by a compelling state interest. Roe held that the state's compelling interest in preventing abortion and protecting the life of the mother outweighs a mother's personal autonomy only after viability. Before viability, it was held, the mother's liberty of personal privacy limits state interference due to the lack of a compelling state interest.

The personal autonomy aspect of the right of privacy has limits, although these are always changing. In 1986, for example, a law criminilizing same sex sodomy was upheld in Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186. The Court held that not all private consensual sexual activity is insulated from the state. At the time, the same sex activities in question were not granted inclusion in the due process protected categories of relationships. Today, however, it appears that opinions have changed. Bowers was overturned in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), thereby recognizing a shifting public opinion about same sex relationships. Indeed, the activities protected by this aspect of the right of privacy are constantly in flux, with limits simultaneously being expanded and restricted.

For the record, I am NOT an attorney. I did NOT go to any law school.

I studied the law, I interned at a firm for 2 summers and I took, and passed, the bar exam in Florida.

I think too many *lawyers* are limited by what they learn in law school. In fact, most lawyers don't really learn much of anything worthwhile in law school.

I have debated this issue before with attorneys who are far more *experienced* than I am and not one of them has ever proven that there is a right to individual privacy guaranteed by our Constitution. If there is, I challenge anyone to cite a single court case that supports this INDIVIDUAL right.

But, seeing as Mr. Lawyer here has given up, I don't expect much of a *fight*.

BTW, if you want to argue law with me, you had better be good. I have taken on many attorneys before and have NEVER lost.

Brossignol surprised me. I've met lawyers who disagreed with Griswold, but I have yet to meet one who didn't think it meant that a right to privacy had been created by it.

Ya. I guess it is different when one is versed in the law, but has not been subjected to the *teachings* of law professors.

Seriously. Can you cite anywhere in that entire case where the right to an individual's privacy is created or even upheld.

Because that entire case is about upholding (and not even creating) previously found right to marital privacy. How does that guarantee individual privacy?

I am confused. You did not go to law school, and yet you know that most lawyers didnt learn much of anything worthwhile in law school. How interesting. Sounds sort of like the Dubya supporters who said that Fahrenheit 9/11 was all lies, and yet hadnt seen it...

Either way, your logic is specious, you have fallen prey to pretty much all of the regurgitated Bush/Rove rhetoric in terms of his stated positions versus his actual actions, and much as it pains me, you are not the only Bush supporter who has tried to re-write recent history in a light most favorable to our liar-in-chief.

I would love to continue a discussion about law, or courts, or whatever, but a discussion about whether or not a Right to Privacy exists is not something that I would consider a good use of my time. The Supreme Court has already ruled on this topic, and no amount of spin or posturing on your part will rewrite their words.

From Landlord-Tenant law, the term (and concept) of "Implied Warrant of Habitability" was created by courts. I beleive the first court to do so was in the District of Columbia in 1970, but since then, many other state courts followed suit, followed by state legislatures.

Not in Griswold as explicit as you demand, but below is an excerpt from Roe v. Wade, relying on Griswold and others in saying that there is a "right of personal privacy," based in the Ninth and Forteenth Amendments, and also implicitly standing behind the First, Fourth and Fifth Amendments.

Note that Roe was unmarried.





The Constitution does not explicitly mention any right of privacy. In a line of decisions, however, going back perhaps as far as Union Pacific R. Co. v. Botsford, 141 U.S. 250, 251 (1891), the Court has recognized that a right of personal privacy, or a guarantee of certain areas or zones of privacy, does exist under the Constitution. In varying contexts, the Court or individual Justices have, indeed, found at least the roots of that right in the First Amendment, Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 564 (1969); in the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 8-9 (1968), Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 350 (1967), Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616 (1886), see Olmstead v. United States, 277 U.S. 438, 478 (1928) (Brandeis, J., dissenting); in the penumbras of the Bill of Rights, Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S., at 484-485; in the Ninth Amendment, id., at 486 (Goldberg, J., concurring); or in the concept of liberty guaranteed by the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment, see Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 399 (1923). These decisions make it clear that only personal rights that can be deemed "fundamental" or "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty," Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319, 325 (1937), are included in this guarantee of personal privacy. They also make it clear that the right has some extension to activities relating to marriage, Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1, 12 (1967); procreation, Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535, 541-542 (1942); contraception, Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U.S., at 453-454; id., at 460, 463-465 (WHITE, J., concurring in result); family relationships, Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 166 (1944); and child rearing and education, Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 535 (1925), Meyer v. Nebraska, supra.


This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment's concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is, or, as the District Court determined, in the Ninth Amendment's reservation of rights to the people, is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy. The detriment that the State would impose upon the pregnant woman by denying this choice altogether is apparent. Specific and direct harm medically diagnosable even in early pregnancy may be involved. Maternity, or additional offspring, may force upon the woman a distressful life and future. Psychological harm may be imminent. Mental and physical health may be taxed by child care. There is also the distress, for all concerned, associated with the unwanted child, and there is the problem of bringing a child into a family already unable, psychologically and otherwise, to care for it. In other cases, as in this one, the additional difficulties and continuing stigma of unwed motherhood may be involved. All these are factors the woman and her responsible physician necessarily will consider in consultation.


On the basis of elements such as these, appellant and some amici argue that the woman's right is absolute and that she is entitled to terminate her pregnancy at whatever time, in whatever way, and for whatever reason she alone chooses. With this we do not agree. Appellant's arguments that Texas either has no valid interest at all in regulating the abortion decision, or no interest strong enough to support any limitation upon the woman's sole determination, are unpersuasive. The Court's decisions recognizing a right of privacy also acknowledge that some state regulation in areas protected by that right is appropriate. As noted above, a State may properly assert important interests in safeguarding health, in maintaining medical standards, and in protecting potential life. At some point in pregnancy, these respective interests become sufficiently compelling to sustain regulation of the factors that govern the abortion decision. The privacy right involved, therefore, cannot be said to be absolute. In fact, it is not clear to us that the claim asserted by some amici that one has an unlimited right to do with one's body as one pleases bears a close relationship to the right of privacy previously articulated in the Court's decisions. The Court has refused to recognize an unlimited right of this kind in the past. Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905) (vaccination); Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927) (sterilization).


We, therefore, conclude that the right of personal privacy includes the abortion decision, but that this right is not unqualified and must be considered against important state interests in regulation.

I'll take your word for it. My belief was wrong. If you happen across the actual case, I would love to look it up. I could not find it based on keywords (too many results for "Implied Warrant of Habitability".

Thanks!!!!

In California the Case is "Green v. Superior Court" (1974), basing itself on the DC case. I'll have to look for more info later.

On point of law only, I disagree. Because 1) Union Pacific R. Co. v. Botsford had anything whatsoever to do with privacy rather than simply finding that a person's physical body is inviolate, and 2) that the Roe citation of the 14th amendment is correct. It is a very interesting interpretation that is not absolutely stated or anything even close.

There again, I am not arguing whethe a woman has this right. Clearly she does. I am only saying that my interpretation of the law is different. It is interesting how one's perception will allow for different interpretations.

Then again, as anyone who has ever tried a case before a judge knows, they always come up with new and interesting ways to surprise people with their decisions and interpretations.

Have you read Union Pacific R. Co. v. Botsford? Do you really think it is applicable here?

Forget what the courts say. What do you think?

Well, it's one thing to disagree with the Supreme Court's decision on "the right to privacy" and another to state that the right doesn't exist. The right exists becauses the Supreme Court says it does.

As to whether Union Pacific is applicable here, it is certainly a stretch. The originally poster on erroneously cited it as the origin of the constitutional right to privacy. Union Pacific at best offers that such a right is in common law only. It's not even a case that the Supreme Court would take today.

I think Griswold would be more the more appropriate precedent. And getting from Griswold to Roe is not so far. Though Griswold discusses a marital not a personal right, it is an easy shift to make.


Oh, and the first case on warrant of habitability is Pines v. Perssion , 14 Wis.2d 590, 596-97, 111 N.W.2d 409, 413 (1961), but I don't have a copy of it, so I don't know if it used that exact term or not. Other courts citing Pines do use the term. If you find one and want to talk about it, please post in full or link to it.

Except look at how many times that "right to privacy" claim has been disallowed in criminal situations.

Hypothetical: a cop walking through a neighborhood looks through a window of a house and sees drugs. Proabable cause. Defendant's attorney certainly tries to argue "right to privacy" and loses EVERY time.

I am glad we sort of agree on the Union Pacific case at least. Because that is a BIG stretch. I would say it is not even applicable.

There again, keep in mind, I am arguing only on my interpretation of the law rather than whether I believe any of these rights should or should not exist.

Well, when you are caught red-handed, you've got to come up with something :o

The Roe decision made clear that the right to privacy is not absolute, it has to be weighed against other factors. So what do you think abortion rights should be based on, if not the right to privacy?