It doesn't necessarily mean brown shirts are going around demanding papers. It means you live in a system where civil rights are valued less than the ability for police to conduct easy investigations.
Civil rights are supposed to bind police. They're supposed to make the job of the police harder. That is a primary purpose of them. When anyone talks about how much harder the police's job will be if we have to protect every little right by following every little procedure, that person is asking to live in more of a police state.