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james_davis_nicollUsing 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.
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.
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Date: 2008-10-29 07:14 pm (UTC)I got obsessed with this question for the usual unfathomable reasons last night... (This is homo-sapiens version of when the cat decides to run around the couch like a crazy beast for no reason, right?)
If that assumption fails for any East Coast state, it's North Carolina. The ACLU's map puts Raleigh within the 100-mile band, but it's a matter of deciding where a long, narrow bay turns into a river. If you take Washington NC as the "inmost point" of the bay, then Raleigh is 93 miles inland -- but Durham is 108 miles, meaning that the 100-mile boundary splits that metro region. With Charlotte and Greensboro, the majority of NC's big-city population is non-coastal. I suspect that the rest of the state is insufficient to sway the balance.
(Then there is the question of how you measure "distance to the coast". I know, it's not relevant to the ACLU's point. But it is amusing to note that Pittsburgh is 110 miles from Lake Erie... even though you can't get there by river. In terms of water travel, Pittsburgh is 1300 miles inland of New Orleans.)
Hey, that killed a lot of time.