Opinion ID: 796834
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Of the Equal Protection Clause Claims

Text: 48 Cross Sound also contends that the Ferry Law violates the Equal Protection Clause because it infringes upon its passengers' right to travel. 3 Freedom to travel throughout the United States has long been recognized as a basic right under the Constitution. Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 338, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972) (internal quotation marks omitted). Although [t]he textual source of the constitutional right to travel, or, more precisely, the right of free interstate migration, . . . has proved elusive, Att'y Gen. of N.Y. v. Soto-Lopez, 476 U.S. 898, 902, 106 S.Ct. 2317, 90 L.Ed.2d 899 (1986), it is apparent from prior cases that the right to travel occupies a position fundamental to the concept of our Federal Union . . . [and] has been firmly established and repeatedly recognized. Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 630, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969) (internal quotation marks omitted). The right to travel encompasses at least three different components: [i]t protects the right of a citizen of one State to enter and to leave another State, the right to be treated as a welcome visitor rather than an unfriendly alien when temporarily present in the second State, and, for those travelers who elect to become permanent residents, the right to be treated like other citizens of that State. Saenz v. Roe, 526 U.S. 489, 500, 119 S.Ct. 1518, 143 L.Ed.2d 689 (1999). The first of these components is at issue in this case. 49 Because laws involving the right to travel often make distinctions between in-state and out-of-state persons, the right achieves its most forceful expression in the context of equal protection analysis. Soto-Lopez, 476 U.S. at 902 n. 2, 106 S.Ct. 2317. When a local regulation infringes upon a constitutionally-protected right, we apply strict scrutiny, requiring the municipality to show that the regulation is narrowly tailored to serve a compelling governmental interest. See, e.g., Memorial Hosp. v. Maricopa County, 415 U.S. 250, 254, 94 S.Ct. 1076, 39 L.Ed.2d 306 (1974); Blumstein, 405 U.S. at 335, 92 S.Ct. 995. Otherwise, the regulation need survive only rational basis review. See, e.g., Fitzgerald v. Racing Ass'n of Cent. Iowa, 539 U.S. 103, 107, 123 S.Ct. 2156, 156 L.Ed.2d 97 (2003). As the Supreme Court has explained, a law implicates the right to travel when it actually deters such travel, when impeding travel is its primary objective, or when it uses any classification which serves to penalize the exercise of that right. Soto-Lopez, 476 U.S. at 903, 106 S.Ct. 2317 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). Cross Sound argues that the Ferry Law is invalid because it runs afoul of each of these categories. We disagree. 50 Initially, unlike laws that condition the availability of benefits on a person's residency within the state, see, e.g., id. at 911, 106 S.Ct. 2317 (invalidating state law that denied applicants for state employment additional points for service in armed forces if their entry into armed forces was from another state), the Ferry Law does not use any classification that penalizes a person for their exercise of the right to travel. To the extent that the law differentiates between ferries and excursion boats, it serves to regulate different industries differently and is not a penalty against ferry passengers, since other modes of transportation are readily available to them. Cf. Shapiro, 394 U.S. at 637, 89 S.Ct. 1322 (striking down state law denying welfare benefits to persons who had not resided for at least one year within the state because less drastic means were available to safeguard against fraudulent receipt of benefits in multiple jurisdictions). Moreover, the law does not distinguish between persons based upon geography. As we determined earlier, the Ferry Law is an evenhanded regulation that applies to in-state ferry providers and passengers as much as it does to out-of-state ones. Thus, if the right to travel is implicated at all, it can be only because the Ferry Law actually deters travel or because impeding travel is its primary objective. 51 While Cross Sound contends that the Ferry Law `actually deters' interstate travel by banning an entire mode of interstate transport (i.e., vehicular ferries and high-speed passenger ferries) from East Hampton, Plaintiff-Appellant's Br. at 45, it does not dispute that ferry operators remain free to travel unrestricted to other New York destinations outside of East Hampton, that they still may provide service to East Hampton on permitted types of ferries, or that they may reach points close to East Hampton using the restricted types of ferries and leave their passengers to complete the trip by other modes of transportation. As the District Court properly observed, `travelers do not have a constitutional right to the most convenient form of travel[, and] minor restrictions on travel simply do not amount to the denial of a fundamental right.' Town of E. Hampton, 406 F.Supp.2d at 242 (quoting Cramer v. Skinner, 931 F.2d 1020, 1031 (5th Cir.1991)); see Miller v. Reed, 176 F.3d 1202, 1205 (9th Cir.1999) (stating that burdens on a single mode of transportation do not implicate the right to interstate travel); City of Houston v. F.A.A., 679 F.2d 1184, 1198 (5th Cir.1982) (noting that passengers do not possess a constitutional right to the most convenient form of travel). The fact that the Ferry Law may make travel less direct for some passengers does not meet the threshold required for strict scrutiny review. See Kansas v. United States, 16 F.3d 436, 442 (D.C.Cir.1994) (explaining that something more than a negligible or minimal impact on the right to travel is required before strict scrutiny is applied) (internal quotation marks omitted). 52 Moreover, as we already have explained, the history behind the Ferry Law demonstrates that its purpose was not to impede travel but to protect the welfare of Town residents and the integrity of the local environment, and nothing in the record evinces a clear purpose to impede travel from out of state. Based upon the foregoing, the Ferry Law does not interfere with interstate travel so as to implicate a constitutionally-protected right. If every infringement on interstate travel violates the traveler's fundamental constitutional rights, any governmental act that limits the ability to travel interstate, such as placing a traffic light before an interstate bridge, would raise a constitutional issue. Cramer, 931 F.2d at 1031. We therefore apply rational basis review. 53 Under the rational basis standard, legislation is presumed to be valid and will be sustained if the classification drawn by the statute is rationally related to a legitimate state interest. City of Cleburne, Tex. v. Cleburne Living Ctr., Inc., 473 U.S. 432, 440, 105 S.Ct. 3249, 87 L.Ed.2d 313 (1985). A municipal regulation classification subject to rational basis review `must be upheld against equal protection challenge if there is any reasonably conceivable state of facts that could provide a rational basis for the classification.' Connolly v. McCall, 254 F.3d 36, 42 (2d Cir.2001) (quoting Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312, 320, 113 S.Ct. 2637, 125 L.Ed.2d 257 (1993)). We are satisfied that the Ferry Law rationally advances legitimate public safety ends by restricting the flow of traffic within East Hampton. Having determined that the Ferry Law does not impermissibly infringe upon the passengers' right to travel, East Hampton need not employ the least restrictive means to achieve those legitimate ends. Accordingly, we agree with the District Court that the Ferry Law does not violate the Equal Protection Clause.