Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-02-05284/USCOURTS-caDC-02-05284-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 530
Nature of Suit: Prisoner Petitions - Habeas Corpus
Cause of Action: 

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Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued December 2, 2002 Decided March 11, 2003

No. 02-5251

KHALED A. F. AL ODAH, ET AL.,

APPELLANTS

v.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ET AL.,

APPELLEES

Consolidated with

Nos. 02-5284, 02-5288

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(02cv00299)

(02cv00828)

(02cv01130)

–————

 Bills of costs must be filed within 14 days after entry of judgment.

The court looks with disfavor upon motions to file bills of costs out

of time.

USCA Case #02-5284 Document #737182 Filed: 03/11/2003 Page 1 of 27
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Thomas B. Wilner and Joseph Margulies argued the cause

for appellants. With them on the briefs were Neil H. Koslowe, Michael Ratner, Beth Stephens, and L. Barrett Boss.

William J. Aceves was on the briefs of amici curiae The

International Centre for the Legal Protection of Human

Rights and International Human Rights Organizations and

Law Scholars in support of appellants.

David P. Sheldon was on the brief of amicus curiae

National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers in support

of appellants.

Paul D. Clement, Deputy Solicitor General, U.S. Department of Justice, argued the cause for appellees. With him on

the brief were Roscoe C. Howard, Jr., U.S. Attorney, Gregory

G. Katsas, Deputy Assistant Attorney General, U.S. Department of Justice, Gregory G. Garre and David B. Salmons,

Assistants to the Solicitor General, Douglas N. Letter, Robert

M. Loeb and Katherine S. Dawson, Attorneys.

Daniel J. Popeo, Richard A. Samp and Paul D. Kamenar

were on the brief for amici curiae Washington Legal Foundation, et al., in support of appellees.

Before: RANDOLPH and GARLAND, Circuit Judges, and

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge RANDOLPH.

Concurring opinion filed by Circuit Judge RANDOLPH.

RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge: Through their ‘‘next friends,’’

aliens captured abroad during hostilities in Afghanistan and

held abroad in United States military custody at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba brought three actions contesting the legality and conditions of their confinement. The

ultimate question presented in each case is whether the

district court had jurisdiction to adjudicate their actions.

I.

The Constitution, as its preamble also declares, empowers

Congress to ‘‘provide for the common Defence.’’ U.S. CONST.

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art. I, § 8. To that end, the Constitution gives Congress the

power ‘‘To raise and support Armies,’’ ‘‘To provide and maintain a Navy,’’ ‘‘To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and

Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and

Water.’’ Id. To that end as well, the Constitution invests

the President with the ‘‘executive Power,’’ and makes him

‘‘Commander in Chief’’ of the country’s military. Art. II,

§§ 1 & 2; see Ex parte Quirin, 317 U.S. 1, 25-26 (1942).

In response to the attacks of September 11, 2001, and in

the exercise of its constitutional powers, Congress authorized

the President ‘‘to use all necessary and appropriate force

against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines

planned, authorized, committed, or aided’’ the attacks and

recognized the President’s ‘‘authority under the Constitution

to take action to deter and prevent acts of international

terrorism against the United States.’’ Authorization for Use

of Military Force, Pub. L. No. 107-40, 115 Stat. 224, 224

(2001). The President declared a national emergency, Proclamation No. 7453, Declaration of a National Emergency by

Reason of Certain Terrorist Attacks, 66 Fed. Reg. 48,199

(Sept. 14, 2001), and, as Commander in Chief, dispatched

armed forces to Afghanistan to seek out and subdue the al

Qaeda terrorist network and the Taliban regime that had

supported and protected it. During the course of the Afghanistan campaign, the United States and its allies captured the

aliens whose next friends bring these actions.

In one of the cases (Al Odah v. United States, No. 02-5251),

fathers and brothers of twelve Kuwaiti nationals detained at

Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo Bay brought an action in the

form of a complaint against the United States, President

George W. Bush, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld,

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard B. Myers,

Brig. Gen. Rick Baccus, whom they allege is the Commander

of Joint Task Force 160, and Col. Terry Carrico, the Commandant of Camp X-Ray/Camp Delta. None of the plaintiffs’

attorneys have communicated with the Kuwaiti detainees.

The complaint alleges that the detainees were in Afghanistan

and Pakistan as volunteers providing humanitarian aid; that

local villagers seeking bounties seized them and handed them

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over to United States forces; and that they were transferred

to Guantanamo Bay sometime between January and March

2002. A representative of the United States Embassy in

Kuwait informed the Kuwaiti government of their whereabouts. Invoking the Great Writ, 28 U.S.C. §§ 2241-2242;

the Alien Tort Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1350; and the Administrative

Procedure Act, the Al Odah plaintiffs claim a denial of due

process under the Fifth Amendment, tortious conduct in

violation of the law of nations and a treaty of the United

States, and arbitrary and unlawful governmental conduct.

They seek a declaratory judgment and an injunction ordering

that they be informed of any charges against them and

requiring that they be permitted to consult with counsel and

meet with their families.

Rasul v. Bush (No. 02-5288) is styled a petition for a writ of

habeas corpus on behalf of three detainees, although it seeks

other relief as well. The next friends bringing the petition

are the father of an Australian detainee, the father of a

British detainee, and the mother of another British detainee.

Respondents are President Bush, Secretary Rumsfeld, Col.

Carrico, and Brig. Gen. Michael Lehnert, who is alleged to be

the Commander of Joint Task Force 160. The petition claims

that the Australian detainee was living in Afghanistan when

the Northern Alliance captured him in early December 2001;

that one of the British detainees traveled to Pakistan for an

arranged marriage after September 11, 2001; and that the

other British detainee went to Pakistan after that date to visit

relatives and continue his computer education. The next

friends learned of their sons’ detention at Guantanamo Bay

from their respective governments. The Rasul petitioners

claim violations of due process under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, international law, and military regulations; a violation of the War Powers Clause; and a violation

of Article I of the Constitution because of the President’s

alleged suspension of the writ of habeas corpus. They seek a

writ of habeas corpus, release from unlawful custody, access

to counsel, an end to interrogations, and other relief.

Habib v. Bush (No. 02-5284) is also in the form of a petition

for writ of habeas corpus and is brought by the wife of an

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Australian citizen, acting as his next friend. Naming President Bush, Secretary Rumsfeld, Brig. Gen. Baccus, and Lt.

Col. William Cline as defendants, the petition alleges that

Habib traveled to Pakistan to look for employment and a

school for his children; that after Pakistani authorities arrested him in October 2001, they transferred him to Egyptian

authorities, who handed him over to the United States military; and that the military moved him from Egypt to Afghanistan and ultimately to Guantanamo Bay in May 2002. Australian authorities visited Guantanamo and issued a press

release confirming Habib’s presence there. The Habib petition, like the other two cases, invokes the Due Process Clause

of the Fifth Amendment and other constitutional provisions,

the Alien Tort Act, the Administrative Procedure Act, due

process under international law, and United States military

regulations. Habib seeks a writ of habeas corpus, legally

sufficient process to establish the legality of his detention,

access to counsel, an end to all interrogations of him, and

other relief.

The district court held that it lacked jurisdiction. Believing

no court would have jurisdiction, it dismissed the complaint

and the two habeas corpus petitions with prejudice. Rasul v.

Bush, 215 F. Supp. 2d 55, 56 (D.D.C. 2002). In the court’s

view all of the detainees’ claims went to the lawfulness of

their custody and thus were cognizable only in habeas corpus.

Id. at 62-64. Relying upon Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S.

763 (1950), the court ruled that it did not have jurisdiction to

issue writs of habeas corpus for aliens detained outside the

sovereign territory of the United States. Rasul, 215 F. Supp.

2d at 72-73.

II.

While these cases were pending, the Ninth Circuit affirmed

an order dismissing a habeas corpus petition for all Guantanamo detainees on the ground that those bringing the action –

clergy, lawyers, and law professors – were not proper ‘‘next

friends.’’ Coalition of Clergy, Lawyers & Law Professors v.

Bush, 310 F.3d 1153, 1165 (9th Cir. 2002). In the cases

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before us, the government does not question the ‘‘next friend’’

status of the individuals prosecuting the actions, at least

insofar as they seek writs of habeas corpus. There is a long

history, going back to the 1600s in England, of ‘‘next friends’’

invoking the Great Writ on behalf of prisoners who are

unable to do so because of their inaccessibility. Whitmore v.

Arkansas, 495 U.S. 149, 162 (1990). For the federal courts,

Congress codified the practice in 1948: a habeas corpus

petition now may be brought ‘‘by the person for whose relief

it is intended or by someone acting in his behalf.’’ 28 U.S.C.

§ 2242. The next friends in these cases have demonstrated

through affidavits that they are ‘‘truly dedicated to the best

interests of these individuals,’’ that they have a ‘‘significant

relationship’’ with the detainees, and that the named detainees are inaccessible. Whitmore, 495 U.S. at 163-64. We shall

therefore treat the cases as if the detainees themselves were

prosecuting the actions. Id. at 163.

In each of the three cases, the detainees deny that they are

enemy combatants or enemy aliens. Typical of the denials is

this paragraph from the petition in Rasul:

The detained petitioners are not, and have never

been, members of Al Qaida or any other terrorist

group. Prior to their detention, they did not commit

any violent act against any American person, nor

espouse any violent act against any American person

or property. On information and belief, they had no

involvement, direct or indirect, in either the terrorist

attacks on the United States September 11, 2001, or

any act of international terrorism attributed by the

United States to al Qaida or any terrorist group.

(As the district court pointed out, an affidavit from the father

of the Australian detainee in Rasul admitted that his son had

joined the Taliban forces. Rasul, 215 F. Supp. 2d at 60 n.6.)

Although the government asked the district court to take

judicial notice that the detainees are ‘‘enemy combatants,’’ the

court declined and assumed the truth of their denials. Id. at

67 n.12.

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This brings us to the first issue: whether the Supreme

Court’s decision in Johnson v. Eisentrager, which the district

court found dispositive, is distinguishable on the ground that

the prisoners there were ‘‘enemy aliens.’’ In the two and a

half years leading up to the 1950 Eisentrager decision, ‘‘German enemy aliens confined by American military authorities

abroad’’ filed more than 200 habeas corpus petitions invoking

the Supreme Court’s original jurisdiction. 339 U.S. at 768

n.1. The Court denied each petition, often with four Justices

announcing that they would dismiss for lack of jurisdiction.

Id.; see Charles Fairman, Some New Problems of the Constitution Following the Flag, 1 STAN. L. REV. 587, 593-600 (1949).

Justice Jackson, the author of the Eisentrager opinion, recused himself from each of the cases, doubtless because of his

service (after his appointment to the Court) as Representative and Chief Counsel at the Nazi war crime trials in

Nuremberg from 1945 to 1946. See Telford Taylor, The

Nuremberg Trials, 55 COLUM. L. REV. 488 (1955).

Eisentrager differed from the earlier World War II habeas

petitions. The case started not in the Supreme Court, but in

a district court; and the Germans seeking the writ had not

been convicted at Nuremberg. After Germany’s surrender

on May 8, 1945, but before the surrender of Japan, twentyone German nationals in China assisted Japanese forces

fighting against the United States. The Germans were captured, tried by an American military commission headquartered in Nanking, convicted of violating the laws of war, and

transferred to the Landsberg prison in Germany, which was

under the control of the United States Army. 339 U.S. at

765–66. One of the prisoners, on behalf of himself and the

twenty others, sought writs of habeas corpus in the United

States District Court for the District of Columbia, claiming

violations of the Constitution, other laws of the United States,

and the 1929 Geneva Convention. Id. at 767. The district

court dismissed for lack of jurisdiction, but the court of

appeals reversed. Eisentrager v. Forrestal, 174 F.2d 961

(D.C. Cir. 1949).

The Supreme Court, agreeing with the district court, held

that ‘‘the privilege of litigation’’ had not been extended to the

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German prisoners. 339 U.S. at 777-78. (Although Eisentrager discussed only the jurisdiction of federal courts, state

courts do not have jurisdiction to issue writs of habeas corpus

for the discharge of a person held under the authority of the

United States. Tarble’s Case, 80 U.S. (13 Wall.) 397 (1872).)

The prisoners therefore had no right to petition for a writ of

habeas corpus: ‘‘these prisoners at no relevant time were

within any territory over which the United States is sovereign, and the scenes of their offense, their capture, their trial

and their punishment were all beyond the territorial jurisdiction of any court of the United States.’’ 339 U.S. at 778.

Moreover, ‘‘trials would hamper the war effort and bring aid

and comfort to the enemy.’’ Id. at 779. Witnesses, including

military officials, might have to travel to the United States

from overseas. Judicial proceedings would engender a ‘‘conflict between judicial and military opinion’’ and ‘‘would diminish the prestige of’’ any field commander as he was called ‘‘to

account in his own civil courts’’ and would ‘‘divert his efforts

and attention from the military offensive abroad to the legal

defensive at home.’’ Id.

The detainees here are quite right that throughout its

opinion, the Supreme Court referred to the Eisentrager

prisoners as ‘‘enemy aliens.’’ The petitioners in Habib and

Rasul distinguish themselves from the German prisoners on

the ground that they have not been charged and that the

charges in Eisentrager are what rendered the prisoners

‘‘enemies.’’ For this they rely on Justice Brennan’s dissenting opinion in United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S.

259, 290-91 (1990). Brief for Appellants at 29 (No. 02-5284 et

al.). Eisentrager, Justice Brennan wrote, ‘‘rejected the German nationals’ efforts to obtain writs of habeas corpus not

because they were foreign nationals, but because they were

enemy soldiers.’’ 494 U.S. at 291 (Brennan, J., dissenting).

This seems to us doubly mistaken. In the first place, the

German prisoners were not alleged to be ‘‘soldiers.’’ They

were civilian employees of the German government convicted

of furnishing intelligence to the Japanese about the movement of American forces in China. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. at

765-66; Eisentrager, 174 F.2d at 962. In the second place, it

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was not their convictions – which they contested – that

rendered them ‘‘enemy aliens.’’ The Supreme Court made

this explicit: ‘‘It is not for us to say whether these prisoners

were or were not guilty of a war crime,’’ 339 U.S. at 786; ‘‘the

petition of these prisoners admits[ ] that they are really alien

enemies,’’ id. at 784. The Court’s description of the prisoners

as ‘‘enemy aliens’’ rested instead on their status as nationals

of a country at war with the United States. Id. at 769 n.2

(quoting Techt v. Hughes, 229 N.Y. 222, 229 (1920) (Cardozo,

J.)). (Although Germany surrendered in 1945, the state of

war with Germany did not end until October 19, 1951. Pub.

L. No. 82-181, 65 Stat. 451; see United States ex rel. Jaegeler

v. Carusi, 342 U.S. 347, 348 (1952) (per curiam).) This is the

time-honored meaning of the term. ‘‘Every individual of the

one nation must acknowledge every individual of the other

nation as his own enemy – because the enemy of his country.’’

The Rapid, 12 U.S. (8 Cranch) 155, 161 (1814); see Guessefeldt v. McGrath, 342 U.S. 308 (1952); Lamar v. Browne, 92

U.S. 187, 194 (1875); J. Gregory Sidak, War, Liberty, and

Enemy Aliens, 67 N.Y.U. L. REV. 1402, 1406 (1992); see also

The Alien Enemy Act of 1798, 50 U.S.C. §§ 21-24. Despite

the government’s argument to the contrary, it follows that

none of the Guantanamo detainees are within the category of

‘‘enemy aliens,’’ at least as Eisentrager used the term. They

are nationals of Kuwait, Australia, or the United Kingdom.

Our war in response to the attacks of September 11, 2001,

obviously is not against these countries. It is against a

network of terrorists operating in secret throughout the

world and often hiding among civilian populations. An ‘‘alien

friend’’ may become an ‘‘alien enemy’’ by taking up arms

against the United States, but the cases before us were

decided on the pleadings, each of which denied that the

detainees had engaged in hostilities against America.

Nonetheless the Guantanamo detainees have much in common with the German prisoners in Eisentrager. They too are

aliens, they too were captured during military operations,

they were in a foreign country when captured, they are now

abroad, they are in the custody of the American military, and

they have never had any presence in the United States. For

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the reasons that follow we believe that under Eisentrager

these factors preclude the detainees from seeking habeas

relief in the courts of the United States.

The court of appeals in Eisentrager had ruled that ‘‘any

person who is deprived of his liberty by officials of the United

States, acting under the purported authority of that Government,’’ and who can establish a violation of the Constitution,

‘‘has a right to the writ.’’ 174 F.2d at 963. This statement of

law, unconstrained by the petitioner’s citizenship or residence,

by where he is confined, by whom or for what, ‘‘necessarily’’

followed – thought the court of appeals – from the Fifth

Amendment’s application to ‘‘any person’’ and from the

court’s view that no distinction could be made between ‘‘citizens and aliens.’’ Id. at 963-65. As the Supreme Court

described it, the court of appeals thus treated the right to a

writ of habeas corpus as a ‘‘subsidiary procedural right that

follows from the possession of substantive constitutional

rights.’’ 339 U.S. at 781.

In answer the Supreme Court rejected the proposition

‘‘that the Fifth Amendment confers rights upon all persons,

whatever their nationality, wherever they are located and

whatever their offenses,’’ id. at 783. The Court continued:

‘‘If the Fifth Amendment confers its rights on all the world

TTT [it] would mean that during military occupation irreconcilable enemy elements, guerrilla fighters, and ‘werewolves’

could require the American Judiciary to assure them freedoms of speech, press, and assembly as in our First Amendment, right to bear arms as in the Second, security against

‘unreasonable’ searches and seizures as in the Fourth, as well

as rights to jury trial as in the Fifth and Sixth Amendments.’’

Id. at 784. (Shortly before Germany’s surrender, the Nazis

began training covert forces called ‘‘werewolves’’ to conduct

terrorist activities during the Allied occupation. See, e.g.,

http://www.archives.gov/iwg/declassified records/oss records

263 wilhelm hoettl.html.) The passage of the opinion just

quoted may be read to mean that the constitutional rights

mentioned are not held by aliens outside the sovereign territory of the United States, regardless of whether they are

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enemy aliens. That is how later Supreme Court cases have

viewed Eisentrager.

In 1990, for instance, the Court stated that Eisentrager

‘‘rejected the claim that aliens are entitled to Fifth Amendment rights outside the sovereign territory of the United

States.’’ Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. at 269. After describing the facts of Eisentrager and quoting from the opinion, the

Court concluded that with respect to aliens ‘‘our rejection of

the extraterritorial application of the Fifth Amendment was

emphatic.’’ Id. By analogy, the Court held that the Fourth

Amendment did not protect nonresident aliens against unreasonable searches or seizures conducted outside the sovereign

territory of the United States. Citing Eisentrager again, the

Court explained that to extend the Fourth Amendment to

aliens abroad ‘‘would have serious and deleterious consequences for the United States in conducting activities beyond

its borders,’’ particularly since the government ‘‘frequently

employs Armed Forces outside this country,’’ id. at 273. A

decade after Verdugo-Urquidez, the Court – again citing

Eisentrager – found it ‘‘well established that certain constitutional protections available to persons inside the United

States are unavailable to aliens outside of our geographic

borders.’’ Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U.S. 678, 693 (2001).

Although the Supreme Court’s statement in VerdugoUrquidez about the Fifth Amendment was dictum, our court

has followed it. In Harbury v. Deutch, 233 F.3d 596, 604

(D.C. Cir. 2000), rev’d on other grounds sub nom. Christopher

v. Harbury, 536 U.S. 403 (2002), we quoted extensively from

Verdugo-Urquidez and held that the Court’s description of

Eisentrager was ‘‘firm and considered dicta that binds this

court.’’ Other decisions of this court are firmer still. Citing

Eisentrager, we held in Pauling v. McElroy, 278 F.2d 252,

254 n.3 (D.C. Cir. 1960), that ‘‘non-resident aliens TTT plainly

cannot appeal to the protection of the Constitution or laws of

the United States.’’ The law of the circuit now is that a

‘‘foreign entity without property or presence in this country

has no constitutional rights, under the due process clause or

otherwise.’’ People’s Mojahedin Org. v. Dep’t of State, 182

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F.3d 17, 22 (D.C. Cir. 1999); see also 32 County Sovereignty

Comm. v. Dep’t of State, 292 F.3d 797, 799 (D.C. Cir. 2002).

The consequence is that no court in this country has

jurisdiction to grant habeas relief, under 28 U.S.C. § 2241, to

the Guantanamo detainees, even if they have not been adjudicated enemies of the United States. We cannot see why, or

how, the writ may be made available to aliens abroad when

basic constitutional protections are not. This much is at the

heart of Eisentrager. If the Constitution does not entitle the

detainees to due process, and it does not, they cannot invoke

the jurisdiction of our courts to test the constitutionality or

the legality of restraints on their liberty. Eisentrager itself

directly tied jurisdiction to the extension of constitutional

provisions: ‘‘in extending constitutional protections beyond

the citizenry, the Court has been at pains to point out that it

was the alien’s presence within its territorial jurisdiction that

gave the Judiciary power to act.’’ 339 U.S. at 771. Thus, the

‘‘privilege of litigation has been extended to aliens, whether

friendly or enemy, only because permitting their presence in

the country implied protection.’’ Id. at 777-78 (emphasis

added). In arguing that Eisentrager turned on the status of

the prisoners as enemies, the detainees do not deny that if

they are in fact in that category, if they engaged in international terrorism or were affiliated with al Qaeda, the courts

would not be open to them. Their position is that the district

court should have made these factual determinations at the

threshold, before dismissing for lack of jurisdiction. But the

Court in Eisentrager did not decide to avoid all the problems

exercising jurisdiction would have caused, only to confront the

same problems in determining whether jurisdiction exists in

the first place.

It is true that after deciding jurisdiction did not exist, the

Supreme Court, in part IV of its Eisentrager opinion, went on

to consider and reject the merits of the prisoners’ claims.

From this the detainees reason that the Court’s holding must

have been merely that the military courts, rather than the

civilian courts, had jurisdiction to try charges of war crimes,

not that the district court lacked jurisdiction to adjudicate the

habeas petition. We find it impossible to read the Court’s

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statements – many of which we have already quoted – about

the courts not being open to the prisoners as so limited. The

discussion in part IV of the Court’s opinion was extraneous.

The dissenting Justices viewed it as such, calling part IV

‘‘gratuitous,’’ ‘‘wholly irrelevant,’’ lending ‘‘no support whatever to the Court’s holding that the District Court was without

jurisdiction.’’ 339 U.S. at 792, 794 (Black, J., joined by

Douglas and Burton, JJ., dissenting). There is a ready

explanation for the Eisentrager Court’s method. Before Steel

Co. v. Citizens for a Better Environment, 523 U.S. 83 (1998),

the Supreme Court (and the lower federal courts) were not

always punctilious in treating jurisdiction as an antecedent

question to the merits. The Court in Steel Co. acknowledged

as much. See 523 U.S. at 101. Part IV of Eisentrager,

whether an advisory opinion (see 523 U.S. at 101) or an

alternative holding, does not detract from the central meaning of the decision that the district court did not have

jurisdiction to issue writs of habeas corpus.

We have thus far assumed that the detainees are not

‘‘within any territory over which the United States is sovereign,’’ Eisentrager, 339 U.S. at 778. The detainees dispute

the assumption. They say the military controls Guantanamo

Bay, that it is in essence a territory of the United States, that

the government exercises sovereignty over it, and that in any

event Eisentrager does not turn on technical definitions of

sovereignty or territory.

The United States has occupied the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base under a lease with Cuba since 1903, as modified in

1934. Lease of Lands for Coaling and Naval Stations, Feb.

23, 1903, U.S.-Cuba, T.S. No. 418 (6 Bevans 1113) (‘‘1903

Lease’’); Relations With Cuba, May 9, 1934, U.S.-Cuba, T.S.

No. 866 (6 Bevans 1161) (‘‘1934 Lease’’). In the 1903 Lease,

‘‘the United States recognizes the continuance of the ultimate

sovereignty of the Republic of Cuba’’ over the naval base.

1903 Lease, art. III. The term of the lease is indefinite.

1903 Lease, art. I; 1934 Lease, art. III (‘‘So long as the

United States of America shall not abandon the said naval

station at Guantanamo or the two Governments shall not

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agree to a modification of its present limits, the station shall

continue to have the territorial area that it now hasTTT.’’).

The detainees think criminal cases involving aliens and

United States citizens for activities at Guantanamo Bay support their position. But those cases arose under the special

maritime and territorial jurisdiction, see 18 U.S.C. § 7. In

United States v. Lee, 906 F.2d 117 (4th Cir. 1990) (per

curiam), a Jamaican national was charged with committing a

crime at Guantanamo. The indictment invoked the special

maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States

pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 7 and 18 U.S.C. § 3238. Id. at 117

n.1. Extension of federal criminal law pursuant to these

provisions does not give the United States sovereignty over

Guantanamo Bay any more than it gives the United States

sovereignty over foreign vessels destined for this country

because crimes committed onboard are also covered. See 18

U.S.C. § 7(8).

The text of the leases, quoted above, shows that Cuba – not

the United States – has sovereignty over Guantanamo Bay.

This is the conclusion of Cuban Am. Bar Ass’n v. Christopher, 43 F.3d 1412 (11th Cir. 1995). The Eleventh Circuit

there rejected the argument – which the detainees make in

this case – that with respect to Guantanamo Bay ‘‘ ‘control

and jurisdiction’ is equivalent to sovereignty.’’ Id. at 1425.

The Supreme Court reached the same conclusion in Vermilya-Brown Co. v. Connell, 335 U.S. 377, 381 (1948). In

holding that a naval base in Bermuda, controlled by the

United States under a lease with Great Britain, was outside

United States sovereignty, the Court took notice of the lease

with Cuba for the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base and the fact

that it granted the United States ‘‘substantially the same

rights as it has in the Bermuda lease.’’ Id. at 383. The

‘‘determination of sovereignty over an area,’’ the Court held,

‘‘is for the legislative and executive departments.’’ Id. at 380.

The contrary decision of the Second Circuit, on which the

detainees rely – Haitian Centers Council, Inc. v. McNary,

969 F.2d 1326 (2d Cir. 1992), vacated as moot, Sale v. Haitian

Centers Council, Inc., 509 U.S. 918 (1993) – has no precedential value because the Supreme Court vacated it. The

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decision was, in any event, at odds with the Supreme Court’s

reasoning not only in Vermilya-Brown, but also in Spelar v.

United States, 338 U.S. 217 (1949). The Second Circuit’s

result rested in very large measure on its extraterritorial

application of the Fifth Amendment to non-resident aliens,

see 969 F.2d at 1342-43, a position we rejected in People’s

Mojahedin Org. v. Dep’t of State, 182 F.3d at 22, and in

Harbury v. Deutch, 233 F.3d at 604, and a position we reject

again today. And the Second Circuit thought it important

that the United States controlled Guantanamo Bay. 969 F.2d

at 1342-44. But under Eisentrager, control is surely not the

test. Our military forces may have control over the naval

base at Guantanamo, but our military forces also had control

over the Landsberg prison in Germany.

We also disagree with the detainees that the Eisentrager

opinion interchanged ‘‘territorial jurisdiction’’ with ‘‘sovereignty,’’ without attaching any particular significance to either

term. When the Court referred to ‘‘territorial jurisdiction,’’ it

meant the territorial jurisdiction of the United States courts,

as for example in these passages quoted earlier: ‘‘in extending constitutional protections beyond the citizenry, the Court

has been at pains to point out that it was the alien’s presence

within its territorial jurisdiction that gave the Judiciary power to act’’ (339 U.S. at 771); and ‘‘the scenes of their offense,

their capture, their trial and their punishment were all beyond the territorial jurisdiction of United States courts’’ (id.

at 778). Sovereignty, on the other hand, meant then – and

means now – supreme dominion exercised by a nation. The

United States has sovereignty over the geographic area of the

States and, as the Eisentrager Court recognized, over insular

possessions, id. at 780. Guantanamo Bay fits within neither

category.

As against this the detainees point to Ralpho v. Bell, 569

F.2d 607 (D.C. Cir. 1977). After World War II, the United

Nations designated the United States as administrator of the

Trust Territory of Micronesia. Id. at 612. No country had

sovereignty over the region, but the court treated Micronesia

as if it were a territory of the United States, over which

Congress could and did exercise its power under Article IV of

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the Constitution. (The United States did not hold the Trust

Territory ‘‘in fee simple TTT but rather as trustee,’’ a difference the court considered irrelevant. Id. at 619.) The court

therefore described the residents of Micronesia as being ‘‘as

much American subjects as those in other American territories.’’ Id. In the Micronesian Claims Act, Congress established a commission to distribute a fund for claims against the

United States for damages suffered during World War II.

Because Congress intended the Micronesia Trust Territory to

be treated as if it were a territory of the United States, the

court held that the right of due process applied to the

commission’s actions. Id. at 629-30. Given the premises on

which the court acted, its holding is hardly surprising. ‘‘Fundamental personal rights’’ found in the Constitution apply in

territories. See, e.g., Balzac v. Porto Rico, 258 U.S. 298, 312-

13 (1922); see also Dorr v. United States, 195 U.S. 138, 148

(1904) (considering the law applicable in the Philippines); 48

U.S.C. § 1421b (Guam). Ralpho thus establishes nothing

about the sort of de facto sovereignty the detainees say exists

at Guantanamo. And its reasoning does not justify this court,

or any other, to assert habeas corpus jurisdiction at the

behest of an alien held at a military base leased from another

nation, a military base outside the sovereignty of the United

States.

III.

In addition to seeking relief explicitly in the nature of a

habeas corpus, the detainees sued for injunctions and declaratory judgments under the Alien Tort Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1350,

alleging that the United States is confining them in violation

of treaties and international law. The holding in Eisentrager – that ‘‘the privilege of litigation’’ does not extend to aliens

in military custody who have no presence in ‘‘any territory

over which the United States is sovereign’’ (339 U.S. at 777-

78) – dooms these additional causes of action, even if they

deal only with conditions of confinement and do not sound in

habeas. See Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 554-55 (1974);

Brown v. Plaut, 131 F.3d 163, 167 (D.C. Cir. 1997).

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At the time of Eisentrager, the writ of habeas corpus

extended to prisoners ‘‘in custody in violation of the Constitution or of a law or treaty of the United States,’’ 28 U.S.C.

§ 453 (1946). The current habeas statute, 28 U.S.C.

§ 2241(c)(3), is very much the same. The prisoners in Eisentrager alleged violations of the Constitution, federal laws, and

a treaty. So here. Each of the detainees alleges violations of

the Constitution, treaties, and laws of the United States. The

Alien Tort Act is a ‘‘law of the United States’’ and, the

detainees believe, so is some international law. As to the

latter, the theories are that federal common law incorporates

‘‘customary international law’’ and that the Alien Tort Act not

only provides jurisdiction but also creates a cause of action –

theories the Second Circuit promulgated in Filartiga v. PenaIrala, 630 F.2d 876, 885-87 (2d Cir. 1980). But as we have

decided, the detainees are in all relevant respects in the same

position as the prisoners in Eisentrager. They cannot seek

release based on violations of the Constitution or treaties or

federal law; the courts are not open to them. Whatever

other relief the detainees seek, their claims necessarily rest

on alleged violations of the same category of laws listed in the

habeas corpus statute, and are therefore beyond the jurisdiction of the federal courts. Nothing in Eisentrager turned on

the particular jurisdictional language of any statute; everything turned on the circumstances of those seeking relief, on

the authority under which they were held, and on the consequences of opening the courts to them. With respect to the

detainees, those circumstances, that authority, and those consequences differ in no material respect from Eisentrager.

IV.

We have considered and rejected the other arguments the

detainees have made to the court. The judgment of the

district court dismissing the complaint in No. 02-5251 and the

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petitions for writs of habeas corpus in Nos. 02-5284 and 02-

5288 for lack of jurisdiction is

Affirmed.*

* Although Judges Garland and Williams have not joined Judge

Randolph’s concurring opinion, they do not intend thereby to express any view about its reasoning. They believe the issues addressed need not be reached.

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RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge, concurring: I write separately to

add two other grounds for rejecting the detainees’ non-habeas

claims. But first some words are in order regarding the

Alien Tort Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1350:

The district courts shall have original jurisdiction of

any civil action by an alien for a tort only, committed

in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the

United States.

Three courts of appeals have decided that § 1350 not only

provides a federal forum but also creates a cause of action for

violations of the ‘‘law of nations.’’ The Second Circuit, in the

decision launching this development, held first, that § 1350

conferred jurisdiction over an action by citizens of Paraguay

against another citizen of that country for torts allegedly

committed in Paraguay; and second, that ‘‘customary international law’’ is part of federal common law. Filartiga v. PenaIrala, 630 F.2d 876 (2d Cir. 1980). The same court of appeals

later reiterated that § 1350 provided jurisdiction and gave

aliens – in this instance, Muslim and Croat citizens of BosniaHerzegovina – a cause of action against the leader of the

Bosnia Serbs for violations of ‘‘the law of nations’’ and

treaties. Kadic v. Karadzic, 70 F.3d 232, 241–44 (2d Cir.

1995); see Wiwa v. Royal Dutch Petroleum Co., 226 F.3d 88,

92–93 (2d Cir. 2000). The Ninth Circuit followed suit, holding

that § 1350 gave a district court jurisdiction over the estate

of the former Philippine President Marcos although all plaintiffs and defendants were Philippine nationals and although

the torts, alleged to violate international law, occurred entirely in the Philippines. Trajano v. Marcos (In re Estate of

Ferdinand E. Marcos Human Rights Litigation), 978 F.2d

493, 499 (9th Cir. 1992); see also Hilao v. Estate of Marcos

(In re Estate of Ferdinand E. Marcos, Human Rights Litigation), 25 F.3d 1467, 1473 (9th Cir. 1994); Martinez v. City of

Los Angeles, 141 F.3d 1373, 1383-84 (9th Cir. 1998). The

Eleventh Circuit joined these courts of appeals in holding that

§ 1350 not only confers jurisdiction, but also gives federal

courts the power to ‘‘fashion domestic common law remedies

to give effect to violations of customary international law.’’

Abebe-Jira v. Negewo, 72 F.3d 844, 847 (11th Cir. 1996).

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The meaning of § 1350 has been an open question in our

court. See Tel-Oren v. Libyan Arab Republic, 726 F.2d 774,

777 (D.C. Cir. 1984) (Edwards, J., concurring); id. at 800

(Bork, J., concurring); Sanchez-Espinoza v. Reagan, 770

F.2d 202, 20-07 (D.C. Cir. 1985). But what § 1350 does not

mean has been decided. In the Tel-Oren case both Judge

Bork and Judge Robb, in their separate concurring opinions,

rejected the Second Circuit’s Filartiga decision, Judge Bork

on the ground that § 1350 does not create a cause of action,

Judge Robb on the ground that Filartiga is ‘‘fundamentally

at odds with the reality of the international structure and

with the role of United States courts within that structure.’’

See 726 F.2d at 801 (Bork, J.); id. at 826 n.5 (Robb, J.).

Since then some of the opinions following Filartiga maintain

that Congress ratified its interpretation of § 1350. See, e.g.,

Kadic, 70 F.3d at 241; Hilao, 25 F.3d at 1475; Abebe-Jira, 72

F.3d at 848; see also William S. Dodge, The Historical

Origins of the Alien Tort Statute: A Response to the ‘‘Originalists,’’ 19 HASTINGS INT’L & COMP. L. REV. 221, 224, 256

(1996). The ratification argument rests on enactment of the

Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991, which provides a cause

of action for damages to anyone – aliens and citizens alike –

who suffered torture anywhere in the world at the hands of

any individual acting under the law of any foreign nation. 28

U.S.C. § 1350 note. The Torture Victim Act does not contain

its own jurisdictional provision. But it is clear that any case

brought pursuant to that statute would arise under federal

law and thus come within 28 U.S.C. § 1331, the grant of

general federal question jurisdiction. (I mean to imply nothing about the constitutionality of the statute.) The Alien Tort

Act is thus beside the point: it confers jurisdiction only over

suits by aliens and only for violations of treaties and the law

of nations. The House Report on the torture victim bill did

state that § 1350 ‘‘should remain intact to permit suits based

on other norms that already exist or may ripen in the future

into the rules of customary international law.’’ Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991, H.R. REP. NO. 102-367, pt. 1, at 4

(1991). But the statement of one congressional committee is

by no means a statement of ‘‘Congress,’’ as some have

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supposed; the wish expressed in the committee’s statement is

reflected in no language Congress enacted; it does not purport to rest on an interpretation of § 1350; and the statement

itself is legislative dictum.

The detainees, or at least some of them, nevertheless have

urged us to follow the Filartiga line of cases. I see a number

of problems in doing so, in addition to those mentioned by

Judges Bork and Robb in Tel-Oren. To hold that the Alien

Tort Act creates a cause of action for treaty violations, as the

Filartiga decisions indicate, would be to grant aliens greater

rights in the nation’s courts than American citizens enjoy.

Treaties do not generally create rights privately enforceable

in the courts. Without authorizing legislation, individuals

may sue for treaty violations only if the treaty is selfexecuting. See, e.g., Foster v. Neilson, 27 U.S. (2 Pet.) 253,

314 (1829) (Marshall, C.J.); McKesson HBOC, Inc. v. Islamic

Republic of Iran, 271 F.3d 1101, 1107 (D.C. Cir. 2001);

Princz v. Federal Republic of Germany, 26 F.3d 1166, 1174

n.1 (D.C. Cir. 1994); Holmes v. Laird, 459 F.2d 1211, 1220

(D.C. Cir. 1972); Tel-Oren, 726 F.2d at 808-10 (Bork, J.,

concurring). To illustrate, the detainees in this case claim

that the military is confining them in violation of the Geneva

Convention of 1949. But the second Geneva Convention, like

the first, see Eisentrager, 339 U.S. at 789 n.14, is not selfexecuting for the reasons stated by Judge Bork in Tel-Oren,

726 F.2d at 808-09, and by the Fourth Circuit in Hamdi v.

Rumsfeld, 316 F.3d 450, 468-69 (4th Cir. 2003). No American

citizen, therefore, has a cause of action under this treaty.

Yet on the basis of Filartiga, and the theory that the Alien

Tort Act itself creates a cause of action, aliens could bring

suit for its violation. Martinez, 141 F.3d at 1383-84, illustrates the point. The Ninth Circuit, relying on § 1350,

sustained such a suit, brought by an alien against the City of

Los Angeles for actions occurring in Mexico in violation of the

‘‘customary international law.’’ The court of appeals derived

this ‘‘customary international law’’ partly from the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. But the court

neglected to mention that this multilateral agreement creates

no judicially enforceable rights and that the Senate ratified

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the treaty on the basis that it ‘‘will not create a private cause

of action in U.S. courts.’’ S. EXEC. REP. NO. 102–23, at 9, 19,

23 (1992). I find it hard to believe the First Congress, which

enacted the Alien Tort Act in 1789, intended to extend to

aliens rights of actions withheld from the citizens of this

country.

Filartiga’s theory that federal common law incorporates

customary international law also raises many issues. The

theory was necessary to sustain the constitutionality of

§ 1350 as the Second Circuit interpreted and applied it.

Early in our history the Supreme Court held unconstitutional,

in violation of Article III, the conferring of federal jurisdiction over suits by an alien against an alien. Hodgson v.

Bowerbank, 9 U.S. (5 Cranch) 303, 304 (1809). In holding

that federal common law somehow incorporates customary

international law, the Filartiga court placed the case before it

on the ‘‘arising under’’ head of jurisdiction without mentioning

Hodgson. See Illinois v. City of Milwaukee, 406 U.S. 91, 100

(1972). This avoided the difficulty the Supreme Court’s

decision posed, but it created quite a few difficulties of its

own.

For one thing, Article I, section 8, clause 10 of the Constitution gives Congress the power to ‘‘define and punish TTT

Offenses against the Law of Nations.’’ The Framers’ original

draft merely stated that Congress had the power to punish

offenses against the law of nations, but when Gouverneur

Morris of Pennsylvania objected that the law of nations was

‘‘often too vague and deficient to be a rule,’’ the clause was

amended to its present form. III ELLIOT’S DEBATES IN THE

FEDERAL CONVENTION OF 1787 AS REPORTED BY JAMES MADISON

604 (James McClellan & M.E. Bradford eds., rev. ed. 1989).

I believe this clause in Article I, section 8, particularly in light

of the history just recounted, makes it abundantly clear that

Congress – not the Judiciary – is to determine, through

legislation, what international law is and what violations of it

ought to be cognizable in the courts. Yet under Filartiga, it

is the courts, not Congress who decide both questions. It is

no answer to say that early Supreme Court cases looked to

the ‘‘law of nations.’’ The ‘‘law of nations’’ may have been

part of the general federal common law in the days before

Erie R.R. v. Tompkins, 304 U.S. 64 (1938), but even then ‘‘the

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law of nations’’ did not present ‘‘any Federal question.’’ N.Y.

Life Ins. Co. v. Hendren, 92 U.S. 286, 286-87 (1875); see

Oliver Am. Trading Co. v. Mexico, 264 U.S. 440, 442-43

(1924). And for good reason. The political branches of our

government may influence but they by no means control the

development of customary international law. To have federal

courts discover it among the writings of those considered

experts in international law and in treaties the Senate may or

may not have ratified is anti-democratic and at odds with

principles of separation of powers. As Judge Robb put it, the

courts ‘‘ought not serve as debating clubs for professors

willing to argue over what is or what is not an accepted

violation of the law of nations.’’ Tel-Oren, 726 F.2d at 827

(Robb, J., concurring). Nothing in the Constitution expressly

authorizes such free-wheeling judicial power. After Erie

brought an end to ‘‘general federal common law,’’ federal

common law has been mostly interstitial or generated by the

need for uniformity throughout the States. See generally

HENRY J. FRIENDLY, BENCHMARKS 155-95 (1967). A federal

common law of customary international law is justified by

neither consideration. Congress, when it ratifies treaties,

often does so with reservations in order to avoid altering

domestic law. Yet treating customary international law as

federal law would alter domestic law because of the Supremacy Clause. All of these problems, and more, including the

lack of historical support for the Filartiga theory, are spelled

out in Curtis A. Bradley & Jack L. Goldsmith, Customary

International Law as Federal Common Law: A Critique of

the Modern Position, 110 HARV. L. REV. 815 (1997), and in a

later article by the same authors, Federal Courts and the

Incorporation of International Law, 111 HARV. L. REV. 2260

(1998). But see Harold Hongju Koh, Is International Law

Really State Law?, 111 HARV. L. REV. 1824 (1998).

As to the history of the Alien Tort Act, Judge Friendly

wrote: this ‘‘old but little used section is a kind of legal

Lohengrin; although it has been with us since the first

Judiciary Act, § 9, 1 Stat. 73, 77 (1789), no one seems to know

whence it came.’’ IIT v. Vencap, Ltd., 519 F.2d 1001, 1015

(2d Cir. 1975). The original version read:

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6

the district courts TTT shall also have cognizance,

concurrent with the courts of the several States, or

the circuit courts, as the case may be, of all causes

where an alien sues for a tort only in violation of the

law of nations or a treaty of the United States.

1 Stat. 73, 76-77 (1789). Two former members of our court

thought that § 1350 might have been meant to cover only

private, nongovernmental acts taken against aliens such as

piracy. Sanchez-Espinoza, 770 F.2d at 206 (Scalia, J.); TelOren, 726 F.2d at 813-14, 822 (Bork, J., concurring). ‘‘[M]ore

recent research of a competent scholar’’ (Erie R.R., 304 U.S.

at 72) has shed new light on the origin of § 1350 and the

purpose of the First Congress in enacting it. See Joseph

Modeste Sweeney, A Tort Only in Violation of the Law of

Nations, 18 HASTINGS INT’L & COMP. L. REV. 445 (1995).

Professor Sweeney marshals a vast amount of historical research on eighteenth century ‘‘prize law,’’ which allowed

private vessels having a marque to capture enemy ships.

When the Articles of Confederation were in effect, state

courts adjudicated claims by alien shipowners seeking the

return of their captured vessels and reparations for the

damages caused by the seizure. Adoption of the Constitution

and the passage of the First Judiciary Act gave the federal

courts exclusive jurisdiction in admiralty and thus exclusive

jurisdiction over suits brought to recover ships captured in

prize. There was still a question whether state courts had

jurisdiction over cases in which the alien sued not for return

of the ship, but only for reparations. It was only these cases,

Professor Sweeney postulates, that the Alien Tort Act’s author, Oliver Ellsworth, and his congressional colleagues, intended to cover by making clear that if the alien shipowner’s

suit sought only reparations, the state courts would have

jurisdiction concurrent with the federal courts. Hence the

words in the statute ‘‘for a tort only.’’ If Professor Sweeney

is correct, the Alien Tort Act today is moribund, as in fact it

had been for nearly two hundred years until the Second

Circuit resuscitated it.

In view of my doubts about Filartiga, and the Tel-Oren

majority’s rejection of it, we might go ahead in this case and

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7

decide what § 1350 does mean. But it is unnecessary to do

so, not only because Eisentrager disposes of the cases, but

also because the detainees’ treaty and international law

claims are barred by sovereign immunity. Before explaining

why, I need to add a disclaimer. At oral argument, the

question arose whether next friend status may be recognized

for suits under § 1350. ‘‘Some courts have permitted ‘next

friends’ to prosecute actions outside the habeas corpus context on behalf of infants, other minors, and adult mental

incompetents.’’ Whitmore v. Arkansas, 495 U.S. 149, 162 n.4

(1990). Here, the argument for the next friend device is that

the detainees are allegedly barred from talking with anyone

about bringing lawsuits on their behalf. The parties have not

briefed the questions this argument raises and I express no

opinion on its validity.

The United States or its officers may be sued only if there

is a waiver of sovereign immunity. See, e.g., Dep’t of Army v.

Blue Fox, Inc., 525 U.S. 255, 260 (1999). We have held that

the Alien Tort Act, whatever its meaning, does not itself

waive sovereign immunity. Industria Panificadora, S.A. v.

United States, 957 F.2d 886, 886 (D.C. Cir. 1992) (per curiam); Sanchez-Espinoza, 770 F.2d at 207; see Canadian

Transp. Co. v. United States, 663 F.2d 1081, 1092 (D.C. Cir.

1980). The detainees therefore rely on the waiver provision

in the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 702, which

states: ‘‘An action in a court of the United States seeking

relief other than money damages and stating a claim that an

agency or an officer or employee thereof acted or failed to act

in an official capacity TTT shall not be dismissed TTT on the

ground that it is against the United StatesTTT.’’

Although relying on the APA’s waiver for agencies, the

detainees do not identify which ‘‘agency’’ of the United States

they have in mind. They have sued the President in each

case, but the President is not an ‘‘agency’’ under the APA and

the waiver of sovereign immunity thus does not apply to him.

See Franklin v. Massachusetts, 505 U.S. 788, 800-01 (1992);

Armstrong v. Bush, 924 F.2d 282, 289 (D.C. Cir. 1991). This

leaves the military. The APA specifically excludes from its

definition of ‘‘agency’’ certain functions, among which is ‘‘miliUSCA Case #02-5284 Document #737182 Filed: 03/11/2003 Page 25 of 27
8

tary authority exercised in the field in time of war or in

occupied territory.’’ 5 U.S.C. §§ 551(1)(G), 701(b)(1)(G); see

id. §§ 553(a)(1) & 554(a)(4), exempting military ‘‘functions’’

from the APA’s requirements for rulemaking and adjudication; United States ex rel. Schonbrun v. Commanding Officer, 403 F.2d 371, 375 n.2 (2d Cir. 1968) (Friendly, J.). The

district court ruled, in an alternative holding, that because of

the military function exclusion, the APA does not waive

sovereign immunity. Rasul v. Bush, 215 F. Supp. 2d 55, 64

n.10 (D.D.C. 2002). I believe this is correct.

Each of the detainees, according to their pleadings, was

taken into custody by American armed forces ‘‘in the field in

time of war.’’ I believe they remain in custody ‘‘in the field in

time of war.’’ It is of no moment that they are now thousands of miles from Afghanistan. Their detention is for a

purpose relating to ongoing military operations and they are

being held at a military base outside the sovereign territory

of the United States. The historical meaning of ‘‘in the field’’

was not restricted to the field of battle. It applied as well to

‘‘organized camps stationed in remote places where civil

courts did not exist,’’ Kinsella v. United States ex rel. Singleton, 361 U.S. 234, 274 (1960) (Whittaker, J., joined by Stewart, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). To allow

judicial inquiry into military decisions after those captured

have been moved to a ‘‘safe’’ location would interfere with

military functions in a manner the APA’s exclusion meant to

forbid. We acknowledged as much in Doe v. Sullivan, 938

F.2d 1370, 1380 (D.C. Cir. 1991), when then-Judge Ruth

Bader Ginsburg stated for the court that the APA’s military

function exclusion applied to cases in which a court was asked

to ‘‘review military commands made TTT in the aftermath of

[ ] battle.’’ It is also of no moment that the detainees were

captured without Congress having declared war against any

foreign state. ‘‘Time of war,’’ as the APA uses it, is not so

confined. The military actions ordered by the President, with

the approval of Congress, are continuing; those military

actions are part of the war against the al Qaeda terrorist

network; and those actions constitute ‘‘war,’’ not necessarily

as the Constitution uses the word, but as the APA uses it.

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See Campbell v. Clinton, 203 F.3d 19, 29-30 (D.C. Cir. 2000)

(Randolph, J., concurring in the judgment); Mitchell v.

Laird, 488 F.2d 611, 613 (D.C. Cir. 1973). The detainees are

right not to contest this point. To hold that it is not ‘‘war’’ in

the APA sense when the United States commits its armed

forces into combat without a formal congressional declaration

of war would potentially thrust the judiciary into reviewing

military decision-making in places and times the APA excluded from its coverage.

I would therefore hold that the detainees cannot invoke the

APA’s waiver of sovereign immunity and that the district

court correctly dismissed their claims under the Alien Tort

Act for this additional reason.

I would also hold that the judicial review provisions of the

APA, including the waiver of sovereign immunity, do not

apply because the military decisions challenged here are

‘‘committed to agency discretion by law.’’ 5 U.S.C.

§ 701(a)(2). This exclusion applies when ‘‘a court would have

no meaningful standard against which to judge the agency’s

exercise of discretion.’’ Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U.S. 821, 830

(1985). The military’s judgment about how to confine the

detainees necessarily depends upon ‘‘ ‘a complicated balancing

of a number of factors which are particularly within its

expertise.’ ’’ Lincoln v. Vigil, 508 U.S. 182, 193 (1993) (quoting Heckler, 470 U.S. at 831). The level of threat a detainee

poses to United States interests, the amount of intelligence a

detainee might be able to provide, the conditions under which

the detainee may be willing to cooperate, the disruption visits

from family members and lawyers might cause – these types

of judgments have traditionally been left to the exclusive

discretion of the Executive Branch, and there they should

remain. See Nat’l Fed’n of Fed. Employees v. United States,

905 F.2d 400, 406 (D.C. Cir. 1990); Schonbrun, 403 F.2d at

375 n.2.

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