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UNITED STATES v. BALSYS

Opinion of the Court

In 1927 (prior to our decision in Murdock), in a case involving
a request for habeas relief from a deportation order, we
declined to resolve whether “the Fifth Amendment guaran-
tees immunity from self-incrimination under state statutes.”
United States ex rel. Vajtauer v. Commissioner of Immigra-
tion, 273 U. S. 103, 113 (1927). Although we found that the
witness had waived his claim to the privilege, our decision
might be read to suggest that there was some tension be-
tween the reasoning of two of the cases discussed above,
Hale v. Henkel and Brown v. Walker, and the analyses con-
tained in two others, United States v. Saline Bank of Va., 1
Pet. 100 (1828), and Ballmann v. Fagin, 200 U. S. 186 (1906).
273 U. S., at 113. These last two cases have in fact been
cited here for the claim that prior to due process incorpora-
tion, the privilege could be asserted in a federal proceeding
based on fear of prosecution by a State.6 Saline Bank and
Ballmann are not, however, inconsistent with Murdock.

In Saline Bank, we permitted the defendants to refuse
discovery sought by the United States in federal court,
where the defendants claimed that their responses would re-
“The rule
sult in incrimination under the laws of Virginia.
clearly is, that a party is not bound to make any discovery
which would expose him to penalties, and this case falls
within it.”
1 Pet., at 104. But, for all the sweep of this
statement, the opinion makes no mention of the Fifth
Amendment, and in Hale v. Henkel, we explained that “the
prosecution [in Saline Bank] was under a state law which
imposed the penalty, and . . . the Federal court was simply

6 The language in Vajtauer that has been cited in support of this sugges-
tion says only that our conclusion that the witness waived his claim of
privilege “makes it unnecessary for us to consider the extent to which
the Fifth Amendment guarantees immunity from self-incrimination under
state statutes or whether this case is to be controlled by Hale v. Henkel,
201 U. S. 43; Brown v. Walker, 161 U. S. 591, 608; compare United States
v. Saline Bank, 1 Pet. 100; Ballmann v. Fagin, 200 U. S. 186, 195.”
273
U. S., at 113.