In the case of Texas v. Brown (1982), the U.S Supreme Court ruled on a Fourth Amendment issue regarding search and seizure procedures during traffic stops. The defendant, Brown, was stopped at a routine license checkpoint where police noticed he had an opaque party balloon filled with what appeared to be drugs in his car. Police seized this without obtaining a warrant and it was later confirmed to contain heroin. Brown argued that this constituted an unlawful search and seizure under the Fourth Amendment as there was no probable cause for searching his vehicle beyond the initial traffic stop reason. The court held in a 6-3 decision that because balloons are commonly used to transport illegal narcotics, coupled with other suspicious behavior by Brown such as trying to hide it from view when approached by officers, there were enough grounds for probable cause which justified immediate action without needing a warrant due to exigent circumstances - thus not violating any constitutional rights of protection against unreasonable searches or seizures.

In the dissenting opinion for Texas v. Brown, Justice Thurgood Marshall argued that the majority's decision was a significant departure from established Fourth Amendment jurisprudence. He contended that the police officer did not have probable cause to search Leon Brown's car simply because he saw an opaque party balloon tied in a knot fall from his pocket during a routine traffic stop. According to Marshall, this reasoning dangerously expanded law enforcement powers and eroded individual privacy rights protected by the Constitution. The justice emphasized that balloons are common items often used innocently and their mere presence should not justify an invasive search without additional evidence of wrongdoing or criminal intent. Furthermore, he criticized the Court for ignoring its own precedent requiring more than just ambiguous circumstances to establish probable cause for warrantless searches under exigent conditions exception.