John Marshall Harlan II

“ Justice Miller, however, eschewed reliance on the Commerce Clause and the Import-Export Clause and looked rather to the nature of the federal union:
'The people of these United States constitute one nation. * * * This government has necessarily a capital established by law * * *. That government has a right to call to this point any or all of its citizens to aid in its service * * *. The government, also, has its offices of secondary importance in all other parts of the country. ”

“ Corfield was concerned with a New Jersey statute restricting to state citizens the right to rake for oysters, a statute which the court upheld. In analyzing the Privileges and Immunities Clause of the Constitution, Art. IV, § 2, the court stated that it confined 'these expressions to those privileges and immunities which are, in their nature, fundamental,' and listed among them 'The right of a citizen of one state to pass through, or to reside in any other state, for purposes of trade, agriculture, professional pursuits, or otherwise * * *.' Id., at 380-381. ”

“ This survey of the various bases for grounding the 'right to travel' is conclusive only to the extent of showing that there has never been an acknowledged constitutional right to be free from private interference, and that the right in question has traditionally been seen and applied, whatever the constitutional underpinning asserted, only against governmental impediments. ”

“ The Constitutional Convention was called to establish a nation, not to reform the common law. Even the Bill of Rights, designed to protect personal liberties, was directed at rights against governmental authority, not other individuals. It is true that there is a very narrow range of rights against individuals which have been read into the Constitution. In Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U.S. 651, 4 S.Ct. 152, 28 L.Ed. 274, the Court held that implicit in the Constitution is the right of citizens to be free of private interference in federal elections. United States v. ”

“ Justice Miller asserts that this approach is 'neither novel nor unsupported by authority,' because it is, fundamentally, a question of the exercise of a State's taxing power to obstruct the functions of the Federal Government: ' (T) he right of the States in this mode to impede or embarrass the constitutional operations of that government, or the rights which its citizens hold under it, has been uniformly denied.' 6 Wall., at 44-45.
Later cases, alluding to privileges and immunities, have in dicta included the right to free movement. See Paul v. ”

“ More recent cases discussing or applying the right to interstate travel have always been in the context of oppressive state action. See, e.g., Edwards v. People of State of California, 314 U.S. 160, 62 S.Ct. ”