Many Americans still burdened with constitutional rights

[james_davis_nicoll]

Using data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, the ACLU has determined that nearly 2/3 of the entire US population (197.4 million people) live within 100 miles of the US land and coastal borders.

The government is assuming extraordinary powers to stop and search individuals within this zone. This is not just about the border: This " Constitution-Free Zone" includes most of the nation's largest metropolitan areas.

Is the claim that "nearly 2/3 of the entire US population (197.4 million people) live within 100 miles of the US land and coastal borders" correct? That would seem to require that the rest of the country contains slightly over 1/3rd of the population and since my incredibly untrustworthy eye thinks the first area is much smaller than the second, it implies even lower population densities than I expected for the interior regions.

Comments

[netmouse.livejournal.com]

Yes, looking at the Time magazine population map someone posted, it looks pretty accurate. And as a native Michigander, I have no idea why you *wouldn't* count the Great Lakes, including Lake Michigan. You can get there by boat from the Atlantic Ocean, it just takes some meandering and a trip through the locks. That's what gave Chicago and Detroit many of the advantages of any other port city.

[kightp.livejournal.com]

FWIW, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and its sub-agencies (one of which is my employer), generally considers the Great Lakes to be part of the US "coastline," along with the Pacific, Atlantic and Gulf coast states, because everything from economics to freight transport to resource use is more similar than not.