Legal Definitions - Privileges or Immunities Clause

The Privileges or Immunities Clause is a significant part of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It states that "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States."

In essence, this clause was designed to ensure that fundamental rights and protections inherent to U.S. citizenship could not be taken away or diminished by individual state governments. It aimed to guarantee that citizens would enjoy the same basic rights across all states, preventing states from treating their own citizens differently from those who had recently moved from another state, or from denying fundamental rights to any U.S. citizen.

However, shortly after its adoption, the U.S. Supreme Court severely limited the clause's scope in the 1873 *Slaughter-House Cases*. This ruling significantly reduced its effectiveness as a tool for protecting individual rights against state actions. As a result, many of the rights it was originally intended to safeguard are now primarily protected by other constitutional provisions, such as the Due Process Clause or the Equal Protection Clause.

Here are some hypothetical examples illustrating the types of situations the Privileges or Immunities Clause was intended to address:

• Example 1: Discriminatory Residency Requirements

  Imagine a state passes a law requiring new residents, who have recently moved from another state, to wait five years before they can vote in state elections or access certain state-funded social services, even if they are taxpayers. Long-term residents face no such restrictions.

  Explanation: This scenario illustrates how the Privileges or Immunities Clause was intended to prevent states from creating arbitrary distinctions between citizens based on their length of residency. The right to vote and access public services are considered fundamental privileges of citizenship. A law that "abridges" these privileges for new residents would have been a prime target for challenge under this clause, as it denies equal treatment to U.S. citizens simply because they exercised their right to move and reside in a new state.

• Example 2: Restrictions on Professional Practice

  Consider a state law that grants an exclusive license to a specific, politically connected corporation to operate all pharmacies within the state, effectively preventing any other qualified U.S. citizen from opening or working in a pharmacy, regardless of their training or experience.

  Explanation: The clause was meant to protect fundamental rights, which historically included the right to pursue a lawful calling or profession. A state law creating such a monopoly would arguably "abridge" the privilege of other U.S. citizens to engage in a common and legitimate occupation, a right considered essential to economic liberty and citizenship.

• Example 3: Unequal Access to Justice

  Suppose a state enacted a law stating that citizens who had recently moved from another state could not file lawsuits in state courts for the first two years of their residency, while established residents faced no such barrier.

  Explanation: Access to the courts to protect one's rights and resolve disputes is a fundamental privilege of citizenship. Such a law would directly "abridge" this privilege for a class of U.S. citizens based solely on their recent relocation, creating an unequal system of justice that the Privileges or Immunities Clause was designed to prevent.