Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-06-05209/USCOURTS-caDC-06-05209-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued September 14, 2007 Decided April 24, 2009

No. 06-5209

SHAFIQ RASUL, ET AL.,

APPELLANTS/CROSS-APPELLEES

v.

RICHARD MYERS, AIR FORCE GENERAL, ET AL.,

APPELLEES/CROSS-APPELLANTS

Consolidated with

06-5222

On Remand from the United States Supreme Court

Eric L. Lewis, A. Katherine Toomey, Michael Ratner,

and Shayana Kadidal were on the supplemental briefs for

appellants/cross-appellees.

Michael F. Hertz, Acting Assistant Attorney General,

and Robert M. Loeb and Matthew M. Collette, Attorneys, were

on the supplemental briefs for appellees/cross-appellants.

Before: HENDERSON and BROWN, Circuit Judges, and

RANDOLPH, Senior Circuit Judge.

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 1 of 17
2

 We explained that the Westfall Act makes the Federal Tort 1

Claims Act (FTCA), 28 U.S.C. §§ 2679 et seq., the exclusive remedy

Opinion for the Court filed PER CURIAM.

Concurring opinion filed by Circuit Judge BROWN.

PER CURIAM: The Supreme Court vacated our decision

in Rasul v. Myers, 512 F.3d 644 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (Rasul I), and

remanded the case for further consideration in light of

Boumediene v. Bush, 128 S. Ct. 2229 (2008). Rasul v. Myers,

129 S. Ct. 763 (2008). We do not believe Boumediene changes

the outcome in Rasul I. We therefore reinstate our judgment,

but on a more limited basis. 

We have before us four British nationals who brought an

action alleging that they were illegally detained and mistreated

at the United States Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from

2002 until their release in 2004. They named as defendants

former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and ten senior

U.S. military officials. The complaint was in seven counts.

Counts 1, 2, and 3 invoked federal jurisdiction under the Alien

Tort Statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1350, and alleged violations of

international law. Count 4 alleged violations of unspecified

provisions of the Geneva Convention. Counts 5 and 6 asserted

Bivens claims for violations of the Fifth and Eighth

Amendments to the Constitution. See Bivens v. Six Unknown

Agents of Fed. Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971).

Count 7 alleged a violation of the Religious Freedom

Restoration Act (RFRA), 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000bb et seq. 

We affirmed the district court’s dismissal of Counts 1 to

4 and Counts 5 and 6 and reversed its denial of the motion to

dismiss Count 7. Rasul I, 512 F.3d at 672. We agreed that the

district court had no jurisdiction over Counts 1 to 4. As to 1

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 2 of 17
3

for any damages action for torts committed by a federal official “while

acting within the scope of his office or employment.” 28 U.S.C. §

2679(b)(1). The Alien Tort Statute and Geneva Convention claims in

Counts 1 to 4 were premised on alleged tortious conduct within the

scope of defendants’ employment. Rasul I, 512 F.3d at 660, 663.

Since plaintiffs failed to exhaust their administrative remedies as

required by the FTCA, see McNeil v. United States, 508 U.S. 106, 113

(1993), the district court lacked jurisdiction over Counts 1 to 4.

Counts 5 and 6, we ruled against plaintiffs on the merits and

held, in the alternative, that even if plaintiffs had rights under

the Due Process Clause and the Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Clause and even if those rights had been violated, qualified

immunity shields the defendants because the asserted rights

were not clearly established at the time of plaintiffs’ detention.

Id. at 665–67. As to Count 7, we held that plaintiffs were not

among the protected “person[s]” for whom RFRA, 42 U.S.C.

§ 2000bb-1(a)–(b), creates a private right of action to remedy

unjustifiable government burdens on the exercise of religion. Id.

at 672.

Plaintiffs do not attempt to show how Boumediene bears

on Counts 1 to 4, and we can see nothing in the Supreme Court’s

decision that could possibly affect our disposition of those

Counts. We shall therefore reinstate our judgment on Counts 1

to 4. With respect to the remaining three Counts, plaintiffs

argue that Boumediene vitiates our analysis. The gist of their

argument is that Boumediene prescribes a multi-factor,

“functional” test to determine whether aliens in their

predicament can invoke constitutional rights, and that the rights

they assert pass the test. By extension, they argue that if RFRA

mirrors a previous version of the constitutional right of free

exercise, then the same functional approach governs RFRA’s

extraterritorial reach.

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The main question in Boumediene was whether a

provision in the Military Commissions Act, Pub. L. No.

109–366, 120 Stat. 2600 (2006) (codified in part at 28 U.S.C.

§ 2241 & note), depriving federal courts of habeas corpus

jurisdiction over petitions filed by Guantanamo detainees,

violated the clause of the Constitution governing suspension of

the writ, ART. 1, § 9, cl. 2. 128 S. Ct. at 2237. Holding that the

Suspension Clause extended to Guantanamo, the Court struck

down the jurisdiction-stripping provision of the Military

Commissions Act as an unconstitutional suspension of the writ.

Id. The Court acknowledged that it had never before determined

that the Constitution protected aliens detained abroad, id. at

2262, and explicitly confined its constitutional holding “only”

to the extraterritorial reach of the Suspension Clause, id. at

2275. The Court stressed that its decision “does not address the

content of the law that governs petitioners’ detention.” Id. at

2277 (emphasis added). With those words, the Court in

Boumediene disclaimed any intention to disturb existing law

governing the extraterritorial reach of any constitutional

provisions, other than the Suspension Clause. See, e.g., Johnson

v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 763 (1950) (holding that aliens detained

on a U.S. military base outside sovereign U.S. territory have no

due process rights); United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 494

U.S. 259 (1990) (holding that the Fourth Amendment does not

protect nonresident aliens against unreasonable searches or

seizures conducted outside sovereign U.S. territory); Pauling v.

McElroy, 278 F.2d 252, 254 n.3 (D.C. Cir. 1960); People’s

Mojahedin Org. of Iran v. U.S. Dep’t of State, 182 F.3d 17, 22

(D.C. Cir. 1999); see also Kiyemba v. Obama, 555 F.3d 1022,

1026 (D.C. Cir. 2009) (holding that alien detainees at

Guantanamo cannot invoke the Due Process Clause).

Plaintiffs nevertheless maintain that Boumediene has

eroded the precedential force of Eisentrager and its progeny.

Whether that is so is not for us to determine; the Court has

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 4 of 17
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reminded the lower federal courts that it alone retains the

authority to overrule its precedents. See Rodriguez de Quijas v.

Shearson/Am. Express, Inc., 490 U.S. 477, 484 (1989). A panel

of this court is under another constraint: we must adhere to the

law of our circuit unless that law conflicts with a decision of the

Supreme Court. See LaShawn A. v. Barry, 87 F.3d 1389, 1395

(D.C. Cir. 1996) (en banc). 

There is another reason why we should not decide

whether Boumediene portends application of the Due Process

Clause and the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause to

Guantanamo detainees – and it is on this ground we will rest our

decision on remand. The doctrine of qualified immunity shields

government officials from civil liability to the extent their

alleged misconduct “does not violate clearly established

statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person

would have known.” Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818

(1982). Our initial opinion followed the requirement of Saucier

v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194 (2001), that courts must first determine

whether the alleged facts make out a violation of a constitutional

right; if the plaintiff satisfies this first step, then the court must

determine whether the asserted right was “clearly established”

at the time of the violation. Id. at 201. After our initial decision,

the Supreme Court handed down Pearson v. Callahan, 129 S.

Ct. 808 (2009). Pearson ruled that the Saucier sequence is

optional and that lower federal courts have the discretion to

decide only the more narrow “clearly established” issue “in light

of the circumstances in the particular case at hand.” Id. at 818.

Considerations of judicial restraint favor exercising the

Pearson option with regard to plaintiffs’ Bivens claims in

Counts 5 and 6. The immunity question is one that we can

“rather quickly and easily decide,” Pearson, 129 S.Ct. at 820 —

and already have. See Rasul I, 512 F.3d 665–67. We thus

follow the “older, wiser judicial counsel ‘not to pass on

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 All four plaintiffs were released more than four years before

2

the Supreme Court decided Boumediene, and months before the Court

held even that statutory habeas corpus jurisdiction extended to

Guantanamo. See Rasul v. Bush, 542 U.S. 466, 483–84 (2004). We

do not require government employees to anticipate future

developments in constitutional law. See Anderson v. Creighton, 483

U.S. 635, 639 (1987); Butera v. District of Columbia, 235 F.3d 637,

652 (D.C. Cir. 2001).

We wrote in Rasul I that no one had reason to suppose that 3

Guantanamo was within the territorial sovereignty of the United

States. 512 F.3d at 666–67. The agreement giving the United States

questions of constitutionality . . . unless such adjudication is

unavoidable.’” Pearson, 129 S.Ct. at 821 (quoting Scott v.

Harris, 550 U.S. 372, 388 (2007) (Breyer, J., concurring)

(quoting Spector Motor Service, Inc. v. McLaughlin, 323 U.S.

101, 105 (1944))). In view of Saucier, constitutional

adjudication was “unavoidable” when we rendered our initial

decision, but given Pearson that is no longer true.

Our vacated opinion explained why qualified immunity

insulates the defendants from plaintiffs’ Bivens claims. Rasul I,

512 F.3d at 665–67. Boumediene does not affect what we wrote.

No reasonable government official would have been on notice

that plaintiffs had any Fifth Amendment or Eighth Amendment

rights. Id. at 666. At the time of their detention, neither the 2

Supreme Court nor this court had ever held that aliens captured

on foreign soil and detained beyond sovereign U.S. territory had

any constitutional rights — under the Fifth Amendment, the

Eighth Amendment, or otherwise. The Court in Boumediene

recognized just that: “It is true that before today the Court has

never held that noncitizens detained by our Government in

territory over which another country maintains de jure

sovereignty have any rights under our Constitution.” 128 S. Ct.

at 2262. 

3

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an indefinite lease recognized that the lessor, the Republic of Cuba,

retained ultimate sovereignty. See Agreement Between the United

States and Cuba for the Lease of Lands for Coaling and Naval

Stations, Feb. 23, 1903, U.S.-Cuba, T.S. No. 418, art. III. The

Supreme Court recognized this in Vermilya-Brown Co. v. Connell, 335

U.S. 377, 381 (1948). See also Immigration and Nationality Act, 8

U.S.C. § 1101(a)(38). In fact, before Boumediene, it was clearly

established that “[w]ho is the sovereign, de jure or de facto, of a

territory is not a judicial, but is a political question, the determination

of which by the legislative and executive departments of any

government conclusively binds the judges . . . of that government.”

Oetjen v. Cent. Leather Co., 246 U.S. 297, 302 (1918) (quoting Jones

v. United States, 137 U.S. 202, 212 (1890)); Vermilya-Brown, 335

U.S. at 380; see also Lin v. United States, No. 08-5078, slip op. at 8–9

(D.C. Cir. April 7, 2009).

Eisentrager and Verdugo-Urquidez were thought to be

the controlling Supreme Court cases on the Constitution’s

application to aliens abroad. Eisentrager rejected a habeas

petition brought by German nationals imprisoned at a United

States military base in Germany. 339 U.S. at 778. The Court

held that these alien prisoners, who “at no relevant time were

within any territory over which the United States is sovereign,”

were not entitled to invoke the protection of the writ or the Fifth

Amendment. Id. The Court referred nine times to the decisive

fact that the alien prisoners were, at all relevant times, outside

sovereign U.S. territory. See id. at 777–78. 

“[E]mphatic” is how the Court later described its

rejection of the claim that aliens outside the sovereign territory

of the United States are entitled to due process rights.

Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. at 269 (citing Eisentrager, 339

U.S. at 770). Following Eisentrager, the Court in

Verdugo-Urquidez concluded that the Fourth Amendment did

not protect nonresident aliens against unreasonable searches or

seizures conducted outside the sovereign territory of the United

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 7 of 17
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States. Id. at 274–75. The majority noted that although

American citizens abroad can invoke some constitutional

protections, id. at 270 (citing Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957)

(plurality opinion)), aliens abroad are in an altogether different

situation. Id. at 271. The long line of cases dealing with

constitutional rights of both lawful resident aliens and illegal

aliens establishes “only that aliens receive constitutional

protections when they have come within the territory of the

United States and developed substantial connections with this

country.” Id. (citing Plyler v. Doe, 257 U.S. 202, 212 (1982)

(The provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment “are universal in

their application, to all persons within the territorial

jurisdiction . . . .”) (emphasis added in Verdugo-Urquidez);

Kwong Hai Chew v. Colding, 344 U.S. 590, 596 n. 5 (1953)

(“The Bill of Rights is a futile authority for the alien seeking

admission for the first time to these shores. But once an alien

lawfully enters and resides in this country he becomes invested

with the rights guaranteed by the Constitution to all people

within our borders.”) (emphasis added in Verdugo-Urquidez)).

Those cases could not help an alien who, like Verdugo-Urquidez

and plaintiffs in this case, had at no relevant time been in the

country and had “no previous significant voluntary connection

with the United States,” id.

As Rasul I, 512 F.3d at 666, points out, the law of this

circuit also holds that the Fifth Amendment does not extend to

aliens or foreign entities without presence or property in the

United States. See People’s Mojahedin, 182 F.3d at 22; 32

County Sovereignty Comm. v. U.S. Dep’t of State, 292 F.3d 797,

799 (D.C. Cir. 2002); see also Jifry v. FAA, 370 F.3d 1174, 1182

(D.C. Cir. 2004), cert. denied, 543 U.S. 1146 (2005); Pauling,

278 F.2d at 254 n.3. We applied this line of authority to

Guantanamo during plaintiffs’ detention. In Al Odah v. United

States, 321 F.3d 1134 (D.C. Cir. 2003), we held that federal

habeas jurisdiction does not extend to Guantanamo and noted

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 8 of 17
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When the United States acquired new territories like those

4

involved in the Insular Cases, either through the treaty power or the

war power, the ties to the “former sovereign [were] dissolved.” Dorr,

195 U.S. at 141 (quoting Am. Ins. Co. v. 356 Bales of Cotton, 26 U.S.

511, 542 (1828) (Marshall, C.J.)). The agreement between the United

States and Cuba expressly disavows such a dissolution of ties to Cuba:

“[T]he United States recognizes the continuance of the ultimate

sovereignty of the Republic of Cuba over the above described areas of

land and water. . . .” Agreement Between the United States and Cuba

for the Lease of Lands for Coaling and Naval Stations, Feb. 23, 1903,

U.S.-Cuba, T.S. No. 418, art. III.

that “[w]e cannot see why, or how, the writ may be made

available to aliens abroad when basic constitutional protections

are not.” Id. at 1141. The Supreme Court reversed that decision

(on statutory grounds) only after plaintiffs’ release. Rasul, 542

U.S. at 483–84.

Discounting the precedents we have just described,

plaintiffs say their position follows from the century-old Insular

Cases. A series of Supreme Court decisions from De Lima v.

Bidwell, 182 U.S. 1 (1901), to Balzac v. Porto Rico, 258 U.S.

298 (1922), extended “fundamental personal rights” to

inhabitants of the “unincorporated” U.S. territories, such as

Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines. See generally Dorr v.

United States, 195 U.S. 138 (1904). The United States

maintained complete sovereignty over these territories, and 4

Congress governed the territories pursuant to its Art. IV, § 3,

power to regulate “Territory or other Property belonging to the

United States.” See Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. at 268; Reid,

354 U.S. at 13 (plurality opinion); Eisentrager, 339 U.S. at 780

(distinguishing In re Yamashita, 327 U.S. 1 (1946), on the

ground of “our sovereignty at that time over these insular

possessions”). Neither factor applies to Guantanamo. The

Insular Cases therefore could not have “clearly established” that

constitutional rights extend to aliens held at Guantanamo. 

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 There is an alternative ground for dismissing plaintiffs’ 5

Bivens claims. As Judge Brown noted in her initial concurrence,

federal courts cannot fashion a Bivens action when “special factors”

counsel against doing so. Rasul I, 512 F.3d at 672–73 (Brown, J.,

concurring) (quoting Chappel v. Wallace, 462 U.S. 296, 298 (1983)).

The danger of obstructing U.S. national security policy is one such

factor. See Sanchez-Espinoza v. Reagan, 770 F.2d 202, 209 (D.C. Cir.

1985). Sanchez-Espinoza held that “the special needs of foreign

affairs must stay our hand in the creation of damage remedies against

military and foreign policy officials for allegedly unconstitutional

treatment of foreign subjects causing injury abroad.” Id. We see no

basis for distinguishing this case from Sanchez-Espinoza. See Rasul

I, 512 F.3d at 673 (Brown, J., concurring). Plaintiffs’ Bivens claims

are therefore foreclosed on this alternative basis, which is also

unaffected by the Supreme Court’s Boumediene decision.

In short, there was no authority for — and ample

authority against — plaintiffs’ asserted rights at the time of the

alleged misconduct. The defendants are therefore entitled to

qualified immunity against plaintiffs’ Bivens claims.

5

This leaves the RFRA claim in Count 7. Our vacated

opinion held as a matter of statutory interpretation that plaintiffs

were not protected “person[s]” within the meaning of RFRA, 42

U.S.C. § 2000bb-1(a). Boumediene could not possibly have

altered – retroactively – the meaning of RFRA. We will

summarize our analysis in Rasul I. 

In enacting RFRA, Congress intended to incorporate the

standard governing free exercise claims that prevailed before the

Supreme Court’s 1990 decision in Employment Division v.

Smith, 494 U.S. 872 (1990). See City of Boerne v. Flores, 521

U.S. 507, 515 (1997). The aim was to restore what, in

Congress’s view, is the free exercise right the Constitution

guaranteed — in both substance and scope. We therefore held

that the term “person” as used in RFRA should be read

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11

 In the alternative, for the reasons stated in Judge Brown’s 6

initial concurring opinion, defendants are entitled to qualified

immunity against plaintiffs’ RFRA claim. See Rasul I, 512 F.3d at

676 & n.5. (Brown, J., concurring).

consistently with similar language in constitutional provisions,

as interpreted by the Supreme Court at the time Congress

enacted RFRA. Rasul I, 512 F.3d at 670–72. Congress

legislated against the background of precedent establishing that

nonresident aliens were not among the “person[s]” protected by

the Fifth Amendment, Eisentrager, 339 U.S. at 783, and were

not among “the people” protected by the Fourth Amendment,

Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. at 269. See also Cuban Am. Bar

Ass'n v. Christopher, 43 F.3d 1412, 1428 (11th Cir. 1995)

(Cuban and Haitian refugees at Guantanamo Bay lack First

Amendment rights). Reading RFRA in line with these

precedents, we held that plaintiffs are not protected “person[s]”

under this statute. Rasul I, 512 F.3d at 672. We reinstate that

judgment today.6

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s

dismissal of Counts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 of plaintiffs’ complaint

and reverse the district court’s denial of defendants’ motion to

dismiss Count 7.

So ordered.

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BROWN, Circuit Judge, concurring: I join the majority 

opinion in full as to the plaintiffs’ Bivens claims and to the 

extent it disposes of plaintiffs’ Religious Freedom Restoration 

Act (“RFRA”) claims under the doctrine of qualified 

immunity. I write separately because I disagree that the term 

“person” limits the scope of the RFRA. 

I 

The majority reinstates its initial holding that plaintiffs 

cannot bring a RFRA claim because they are not “person[s]” 

within the meaning of that statute. See Maj. Op. 10–11 

(summarizing its analysis from Rasul v. Myers, 512 F.3d 644, 

668 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (Rasul I)). Yet, “[a] fundamental canon 

of statutory construction is that, unless otherwise defined, 

words will be interpreted as taking their ordinary, 

contemporary, common meaning.” Perrin v. United States, 

444 U.S. 37, 42 (1979). RFRA does not define “person,” so 

we must look to the word’s ordinary meaning. There is little 

mystery that a “person” is “an individual human being . . . as 

distinguished from an animal or a thing.” WEBSTER’S NEW 

INTERNATIONAL DICTIONARY 1686 (1981). Unlike the 

majority, I believe Congress “[did not] specifically intend[] to 

vest the term ‘persons’ with a definition . . . at odds with its 

plain meaning.” Rasul v. Rumsfeld, 433 F. Supp. 2d 58, 67 

(D.D.C. 2006). 

The majority does not point to a single statute defining 

“person” so narrowly as to exclude nonresident aliens from its 

ambit, and nothing in RFRA’s history suggests Congress 

focused on the term’s scope here. RFRA originally provided 

that “[g]overnment shall not substantially burden a person’s 

exercise of religion” unless such a burden is “the least 

restrictive means of furthering [a] compelling governmental 

interest.” 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-1 (1994) (emphasis added). It 

defined “exercise of religion” as “the exercise of religion 

under the First Amendment to the Constitution.” Id. 

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 12 of 17
2 

§ 2000bb-2(4) (emphasis added). The reference to the “First 

Amendment” made it clear that persons who did not have 

First Amendment rights were not protected by RFRA. Given 

this clear textual basis, the term “person” did no work as a 

limiting principle—“First Amendment” did the job. 

In the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons 

Act (“RLUIPA”) of 2000, Pub. L. No. 106-274, 114 Stat. 803, 

Congress amended RFRA’s definition of “exercise of 

religion” to cover “any exercise of religion, whether or not 

compelled by, or central to, a system of religious belief,” and 

removed the term “First Amendment.” See id. §§ 7(a), 

8(7)(A), 114 Stat. 806, 807. This change was meant to 

“clarify[ ] issues that had generated litigation under RFRA” 

by providing that “[r]eligious exercise need not be 

compulsory or central to the claimant’s religious belief 

system.” H.R. REP. NO. 106-219, at 30 (1999); see also 

Adkins v. Kaspar, 393 F.3d 559, 567–68 & n.34 (5th Cir. 

2004) (citing pre-RLUIPA cases requiring “the religious 

exercise burdened to be ‘central’ to the religion”). Congress 

wanted to expand RFRA’s protections to a broader range of 

religious practices, see Navajo Nation v. U.S. Forest Serv., 

479 F.3d 1024, 1033 (9th Cir. 2007); there is no indication it 

wanted to broaden the universe of persons protected by 

RFRA. However, by removing the term “First Amendment” 

from RFRA, Congress inadvertently deleted the textual hook 

precluding persons who did not have First Amendment rights 

from asserting RFRA claims. 

The panel majority attempts to cure the problem created 

by Congress’s careless amendment by constricting the 

meaning of the term “person.” This boils down to a claim 

that, by removing the term “First Amendment” from RFRA’s 

definition of “exercise of religion,” Congress sub silentio 

changed RFRA’s definition of “person.” But this transforms 

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 13 of 17
3 

statutory interpretation into a game of whack-a-mole: a 

deleted textual hook does not simply re-appear in another 

statutory term. 

Finding no other support for its constricted definition of 

“person,” the majority turns to decisions interpreting 

constitutional provisions: Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 

763 (1950) (Fifth Amendment), and United States v. VerdugoUrquidez, 494 U.S. 259 (1990) (Fourth Amendment). 

Eisentrager rejected this circuit’s conclusion that the breadth 

of the term “person” in the Fifth Amendment expanded the 

coverage of the Due Process Clause beyond its traditional 

limits. Nevertheless, nowhere in its extensive discussion did 

the Court rely on the definition of “person.”1

 Its holding 

turned on the conventional understanding of the Fifth 

Amendment, the “full text” of that Amendment, and the 

foreign policy complexities of allowing aliens to assert 

constitutional rights. Id. at 782–83.2

 Moreover, Eisentrager 

interpreted the Due Process Clause; RFRA implements the 

Free Exercise Clause. The term “person” does not appear in 

the Free Exercise Clause, see U.S. CONST. amend. I 

(“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of 

 

1

 Similarly, none of the other Fifth Amendment cases cited in the 

majority’s initial opinion, Rasul I, 512 F3d at 668, rely on the 

definition of “person.” See Jifry v. FAA, 370 F.3d 1174, 1182–83 

(D.C. Cir. 2004) (not mentioning the term “person” in holding 

nonresident aliens with insufficient contacts do not have Fifth 

Amendment rights); People’s Mojahedin Org. of Iran v. U.S. Dep’t 

of State, 182 F.3d 17, 22 (D.C. Cir. 1999) (same for foreign 

entities). 

2

 In fact, the Eisentrager Court repeatedly used the term “person” in 

its common meaning. See id. at 768 n.1 (citing cases brought on 

behalf of “persons,” referring to “German enemy aliens”); id. at 783 

(“The Court of Appeals has cited no authority whatever for holding 

that the Fifth Amendment confers rights upon all persons . . . .”). 

USCA Case #06-5209 Document #1177375 Filed: 04/24/2009 Page 14 of 17
4 

religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . . .”), and 

thus the definition of “person” cannot be the reason aliens 

held abroad do not have free exercise rights. 

Verdugo is even less helpful to the majority. Unlike 

Eisentrager, Verdugo did rely on a definitional analysis, 

explaining that the Fourth Amendment did not apply to 

nonresident aliens outside of our borders, in part, because “the 

people” referred to in the Amendment identifies a “class of 

persons who are part of a national community or who have 

otherwise developed sufficient connection with this country to 

be considered part of that community.” 494 U.S. at 265 

(emphasis added). While “the people” are merely a “class of 

persons,” the relevant inquiry for RFRA purposes is “who are 

‘persons’?” The answer is obvious—“persons” are individual 

human beings, of whom the American people are just one 

class. 

II 

While the majority’s approach is untenable, the plaintiffs 

still do not prevail. RFRA’s proscription that “[g]overnment 

shall not substantially burden a person’s exercise of religion” 

and RLUIPA’s new definition of “exercise of religion” as 

“any exercise of religion, whether or not compelled by, or 

central to, a system of religious belief,” leave no textual basis 

for prohibiting suits brought by non-resident aliens held at 

Guantanamo, or foreign nationals who work for American 

officials on NATO military bases, or, arguably, jihadists our 

soldiers encounter on foreign battlefields.3

 While “statutory 

 

3

 The term “government” provides no limiting basis since RFRA 

defines this term as including an “official (or other person acting 

under color of law) of the United States, or of a covered entity.” 42 

U.S.C. § 2000bb-2(1). Defendants, the Secretary of Defense and 

high-ranking military officers, are unquestionably officials of the 

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language represents the clearest indication of Congressional 

intent,” we may go beyond the text in those “rare cases” 

where a party can show that “the literal application of a 

statute will produce a result demonstrably at odds with the 

intentions of its drafters.” Nat’l Pub. Radio, Inc. v. FCC, 254 

F.3d 226, 230 (D.C. Cir. 2001). 

The unusual drafting history of RFRA and RLUIPA 

make this one of those rare cases. RFRA originally only 

provided for suits for violation of First Amendment rights, 

which did not include intrusions on the free exercise of those 

in plaintiffs’ position. See Cuban Am. Bar Ass’n, Inc. v. 

Christopher, 43 F.3d 1412, 1428 (11th Cir. 1995). There is 

no doubt that RLUIPA’s drafters, in changing the definition 

of “exercise of religion,” wanted to broaden the scope of the 

kinds of practices protected by RFRA, not to increase the 

universe of individuals protected by RFRA. See H.R. REP. 

NO. 106-219, at 30; Adkins, 393 F.3d at 567–68 & n.34; 

Navajo Nation, 479 F.3d at 1033. Literal application of 

RFRA would force us to hold Congress’s careless drafting 

inadvertently expanded the scope of RFRA plaintiffs. Such a 

result is “demonstrably at odds with the intentions of 

[RLUIPA’s] drafters.” See Nat’l Pub. Radio, 254 F.3d at 230. 

III 

Accepting plaintiffs’ argument that RFRA imports the 

entire Free Exercise Clause edifice into the military detention 

context would revolutionize the treatment of captured 

combatants in a way Congress did not contemplate. In 

 

United States. Moreover, as the majority points out, since 

defendants are officials of the United States, it is irrelevant whether 

Guantanamo Bay Naval Base is a “covered entity.” Rasul I, 512 

F.3d at 667 n.19. 

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drafting RFRA, Congress was not focused on how to 

accommodate the important values of religious toleration in 

the military detention setting. If Congress had focused 

specifically on this challenge, it would undoubtedly have 

struck a different balance: somewhere between making 

government officials’ wallets available to every detainee not 

afforded the full panoply of free exercise rights and declaring 

those in our custody are not “persons.” It would not have 

created a RFRA-like damage remedy, but it likely would have 

prohibited, subject to appropriate exceptions, unnecessarily 

degrading acts of religious humiliation. It would have sought 

to deter such acts not by compensating the victims, but by 

punishing the perpetrators or through other administrative 

measures. See, e.g., Ronald W. Reagan National Defense 

Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2005, Pub. L. No. 108-375, 

§§ 1091 to 1092, 118 Stat. 1811, 2068–71 (2004) (to be 

codified at 10 U.S.C. § 801 note) (creating an administrative 

regime to prevent unlawful treatment of detainees); Detainee 

Treatment Act of 2005, Pub. L. 109-148, § 1003(a), 119 Stat. 

2739 (to be codified at 42 U.S.C. § 2000dd) (“No individual 

in the custody or under the physical control of the United 

States Government, regardless of nationality or physical 

location, shall be subject to cruel, inhuman, or degrading 

treatment or punishment.”). Judicial interpretation without 

text is at best a stop-gap; at worst, a usurpation. In 2000, 

when Congress amended RFRA, jihad was not a prominent 

part of our vocabulary and prolonged military detentions of 

alleged enemy combatants were not part of our consciousness. 

They are now. Congress should revisit RFRA with these 

circumstances in mind. 

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