The Justices, all nine of them, decided that these arguments weren't sufficient to override the freedom from unreasonable searches guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment.
The question before him was not whether the capital's rules on snacking in the subway were too harsh he sounded rather sympathetic to the girl's plight but whether they violated the constitution's fourth and fifth amendments (which bar "unreasonable searches" and guarantee "due process").
Lawyers for the homeless sued, charging that this seizing of property violated due process rights and guarantees against unreasonable searches and seizures under the Constitution.
The crucial issue, he said, is the threat to Fourth Amendment guarantees against unreasonable searches by screeners who overstep their limited authority.
The judge made clear that she was not striking down the program — which remains an important tool for law enforcement — but requiring the city to use that tool in a way that does not discriminate against African-Americans and Hispanics and that comports with constitutional guarantees against unreasonable search and seizure.
The daylong hearing, sometimes tense, ranged from seemingly technical concerns like whether the warrant was stapled to the sealed affidavit prosecutors used to obtain it, to sweeping arguments over whether the affidavit itself was so broad as to violate the Fourth Amendment's guarantees against unreasonable search and seizure.
In his concurrence, he indicated that his support was based on the Fifth Amendment's guarantee of the right against self-incrimination, not on the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Digital inspections raise constitutional questions about how robust the Fourth Amendment's guarantee "against unreasonable searches and seizures" should be on the border, especially in a time of terrorism.
Britain has no formal equivalent of America's constitutional guarantee against unreasonable search, although that concept is rooted in English common law.
The awkward squad can of course just be awkward, and being unreasonable is not a guarantee that you're going to change the world for the better.
