Source: https://www.scribd.com/document/223725176/Wilmer-Scholars-of-Constitutional-Law-and-Legal-History-Amicus-Brief
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Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1', '§ 8', '§ 9', '§ 10', '§ 8', '§ 9', '§ 1', '§ 9', '§ 499']

Wilmer, Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History Amicus Brief | Amicus Curiae | U.S. State
Description: Amicus brief by Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History in support of neither party, represented by pro bono amicus counsel Wilmer Hale. Tuaua v. United States is a federal lawsuit brou...
Amicus brief by Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History in support of neither party, represented by pro bono amicus counsel Wilmer Hale. Tuaua v. United States is a federal lawsuit brought by Leneuoti Tuaua, the Samoan Federation of America, and others born in American Samoa who believe that so long as American Samoa is a part of the United States, people born in American Samoa have a right to U.S. citizenship under the Constitution. Plaintiffs are represented by Neil Weare, President of We the People Project, a national organization dedicated to achieving equal rights and representation for the nearly 5 million Americans living in U.S. territories and the District of Columbia; Arnold & Porter, LLP, an international law firm; and Charles V. Ala'ilima, a prominent American Samoan attorney.
No. 13-5272
LENEUOTI FIAIA TUAUA, et al.,
for the District of Columbia, No. 1:12-cv-01143 (Leon, J.)
BRIEF OF AMICI CURIAE SCHOLARS OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW
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All parties, movants-intervenors, and amici curiae in this case and the case
below are listed in the Certificate as to Parties, Rulings, and Related Cases in
Plaintiffs-Appellants’ brief, with the exception of the following additional amici
curiae appearing in this case:
As amici curiae in support of neither party, Professor Sanford V. Levinson,
The University of Texas at Austin School of Law; Professor Bartholomew H.
Sparrow, The University of Texas at Austin; and Professor Andrew Kent, Fordham
As amici curiae in support of Plaintiffs-Appellants, former Governor Carl
Gutierrez of Guam; former Governor Pedro Roselló of Puerto Rico; former
Governor Charles W. Turnbull of the U.S. Virgin Islands; Professor Holly Brewer,
the University of Maryland; Professor Linda Bosniak, Rutgers School of Law;
Professor Kristin Collins, Boston University, currently visiting at Yale Law
School; Professor Rose Cuison-Villazor, University of California at Davis School
of Law, currently visiting at the University of California at Berkeley’s Center for
the Study of Law and Society; Professor Stella Elias, the University of Iowa
College of Law; Professor Linda Kerber, the University of Iowa College of Law;
Professor Bernadette Meyler, Stanford Law School; Professor Nathan Perl-
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Rosenthal, the University of Southern California; Professor Michael D. Ramsey,
the University of San Diego School of Law; Professor Lucy E. Salyer, the
University of New Hampshire; Professor Rogers Smith, the University of
Pennsylvania; and Professor Charles R. Venator-Santiago, the University of
As movant-amicus curiae in support of Plaintiffs-Appellants, former
Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Insular Affairs Tony Babauta.
Reference to the ruling under review is made in the Certificate as to Parties,
Rulings, and Related Cases in Plaintiffs-Appellants’ brief.
This case was not previously before this Court or any court other than the
district court below. Counsel for amici are unaware of any related cases currently
pending in this Court or any other court.
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CERTIFICATE AS TO PARTIES, RULINGS, AND RELATED
CASES .............................................................................................................. i
I. THE INSULAR CASES DO NOT CONTROL THIS CASE ........................................... 4
A. The Insular Cases Do Not Decide The Citizenship
Clause’s Scope ...................................................................................... 5
1. Downes v. Bidwell ....................................................................... 5
2. Other Insular Cases decisions .................................................. 10
II. THE INSULAR CASES SHOULD NOT BE EXTENDED BEYOND THEIR
HOLDINGS ....................................................................................................... 14
A. The Supreme Court Is Hesitant To Extend The Insular
Cases .................................................................................................... 14
B. The Insular Cases Ought Not Be Extended Here ............................... 16
1. The Insular Cases’ territoriality analysis is
irrelevant to the Citizenship Clause, which defines
its own geographic scope .......................................................... 17
2. The territorial incorporation doctrine attributed to
constitutional analysis and ought not be expanded ................... 22
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3. The Insular Cases rest on antiquated notions of
racial inferiority of territorial residents and the
“felt needs” of a bygone era of imperial expansion .................. 24
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Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona, Inc., 133 S. Ct. 2247
(2013) ............................................................................................................... 9
Armstrong v. United States, 182 U.S. 243 (1901) ................................................... 10
Balzac v. Porto Rico, 258 U.S. 298 (1922) .................................................. 10, 11, 15
Banner v. United States, 428 F.3d 303 (D.C. Cir. 2005) ......................................... 20
*Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S. 723 (2008) ............................. 13, 15, 16, 21, 23, 24
De Lima v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 1 (1901) .................................................................... 10
Dooley v. United States, 182 U.S. 222 (1901) ......................................................... 10
Dooley v. United States, 183 U.S. 151 (1901) ......................................................... 10
Dorr v. United States, 195 U.S. 138 (1904) ...................................................... 10, 11
*Downes v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 244 (1901) .. 5, 6, 7, 8, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27
Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393 (1856) .......................................... 19
Examining Board of Engineers, Architects & Surveyors v. Flores de
Otero, 426 U.S. 572 (1976) ..................................................................... 12, 18
Fleming v. Page, 50 U.S. (9 How.) 603 (1850) ....................................................... 22
Fourteen Diamond Rings v. United States, 183 U.S. 176 (1901) ............................ 10
Goetze v. United States, 182 U.S. 221 (1901) ......................................................... 10
Hawaii v. Mankichi, 190 U.S. 197 (1903) ............................................................... 10
Huus v. New York & Porto Rico Steamship Co., 182 U.S. 392 (1901) ................... 10
Kepner v. United States, 195 U.S. 100 (1904) ......................................................... 10
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Lacap v. INS, 138 F.3d 518 (3d Cir. 1998) ................................................................ 4
Loughborough v. Blake, 18 U.S. 317 (1820) ........................................................... 22
McKeel v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 722 F.2d 582 (9th Cir. 1983) ......................... 21
Neely v. Henkel, 180 U.S. 109 (1901)...................................................................... 11
Nichols v. United States, 511 U.S. 738 (1994) .......................................................... 9
Nolos v. Holder, 611 F.3d 279 (5th Cir. 2010) .......................................................... 4
Ocampo v. United States, 234 U.S. 91 (1905) ......................................................... 10
Porto Rico v. Rosaly y Castillo, 227 U.S. 270 (1913) ............................................. 11
Rabang v. Boyd, 353 U.S. 427 (1957) ............................................................... 15, 16
Rabang v. INS, 35 F.3d 1449 (9th Cir. 1994) .............................................. 4, 5, 7, 21
Rassmussen v. United States, 197 U.S. 516 (1905) ................................................. 10
Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1 (1957) ............................................................................ 14
Seminole Tribe of Florida v. Florida, 517 U.S. 44 (1996) ........................................ 9
Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. 36 (1872) ....................................................... 20, 23
Torres v. Puerto Rico, 442 U.S. 465 (1979) ...................................................... 14, 15
Trono v. United States, 199 U.S. 521 (1905) ........................................................... 10
United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. 259 (1990) .......................... 12, 13, 14
Valmonte v. INS, 136 F.3d 914 (2d Cir. 1998) .......................................................... 4
Weems v. United States, 217 U.S. 349 (1910) ......................................................... 10
amend. XIV, § 1, cl. 1 .................................................................................... 17
art. I, § 8 ........................................................................................................... 6
art. I, § 9 ................................................................................................... 10, 20
art. I, § 10 ....................................................................................................... 20
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Fed. R. App. P. 29 ...................................................................................................... 1
D.C. Circuit Rule 29 .................................................................................................. 1
Amendments to the Military Base Agreement, Jan. 7, 1979, United
States-Philippines, 30 U.S.T. 863, T.I.A.S. No. 9224 ................................... 21
Treaty of Peace Between the United States and Spain (Dec. 10, 1898) .................. 21
33 Cong. Rec. 700 (1900) ........................................................................................ 28
Baldwin, Simeon E., The Constitutional Questions Incident to the
Acquisition and Government by the United States of Island
Territory, 12 Harv. L. Rev. 393 (1899) ......................................................... 26
*Burnett, Christina Duffy, A Convenient Constitution?
(2009) ............................................................................................. 4, 22, 29, 30
Burnett, Christina Duffy, A Note on the Insular Cases, in FOREIGN IN A
DOMESTIC SENSE: PUERTO RICO, AMERICAN EXPANSION, AND
THE CONSTITUTION 389 (Burnett & Marshall eds., 2001) ............................... 5
*Burnett, Christina Duffy, Empire and the Transformation of
Citizenship, in COLONIAL CRUCIBLE: EMPIRE IN THE MAKING OF
THE MODERN AMERICAN STATE 332 (McCoy & Scarano eds.,
2009) ........................................................................................................ 20, 29
*Burnett, Christina Duffy, The Constitution and Deconstitution of the
United States, in THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE AND AMERICAN
EXPANSION, 1803–1898, at 181 (Levinson & Sparrow eds.,
2005) ............................................................................................ 19, 26, 28, 29
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Burnett, Christina Duffy & Burke Marshall, Between the Foreign and
the Domestic: The Doctrine of Territorial Incorporation,
Invented and Reinvented, in FOREIGN IN A DOMESTIC SENSE:
PUERTO RICO, AMERICAN EXPANSION, AND THE CONSTITUTION 1
(Burnett & Marshall eds., 2001) ...................................................................... 9
Go, Julian, Modes of Rule in America’s Overseas Empire: The
Philippines, Puerto Rico, Guam, and Samoa, in THE LOUISIANA
PURCHASE AND AMERICAN EXPANSION, 1803–1898, at 209
(Levinson & Sparrow eds., 2005) .................................................................. 27
*Kent, Andrew, Boumediene, Munaf, and the Supreme Court’s
Misreading of the Insular Cases, 97 Iowa L. Rev. 101 (2011) ....... 7, 8, 11, 28
*LAWSON, GARY & GUY SEIDMAN, THE CONSTITUTION OF EMPIRE:
TERRITORIAL EXPANSION & AMERICAN LEGAL HISTORY (2004) ...... 14, 23, 30
Decolonization by Associated Statehood: Puerto Rico’s Legal
Status Reconsidered, 50 B.C. L. Rev. 1123 (2009) ....................................... 24
MCKEE, THOMAS HUDSON, THE NATIONAL CONVENTIONS AND
PLATFORMS OF ALL POLITICAL PARTIES, 1789 TO 1900 (3d rev.
& enlarged ed. 1900) ..................................................................................... 28
OPPENHEIM’S INTERNATIONAL LAW (Jennings & Watts eds., 9th ed.
1996) .............................................................................................................. 21
Porto Rican Bill Passed By House, Chi. Daily Trib.,
Apr. 12, 1900, at 1 ......................................................................................... 16
Problem of War Tax, Chi. Daily Trib., Apr. 2, 1900, at 7 ....................................... 16
Rivera Ramos, Efrén, Puerto Rico’s Political Status, in THE
LOUISIANA PURCHASE AND AMERICAN EXPANSION, 1803–1898,
at 165 (Levinson & Sparrow eds., 2005) ....................................................... 27
*SPARROW, BARTHOLOMEW H., THE INSULAR CASES AND THE
EMERGENCE OF AMERICAN EMPIRE (2006) .................................... 6, 11, 26, 27
of Political Apartheid, 29 U. Pa. J. Int’l L. 283 (2007) ..................... 22, 25, 29
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Vest, Senator G.G., Objections to Annexing the Philippines, 168 N.
Am. Rev. 112 (1899) ..................................................................................... 28
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Amici curiae are Christina Duffy Ponsa, Professor of Law at Columbia Law
School; Gary S. Lawson, Philip S. Beck Professor of Law at Boston University
School of Law; Sanford V. Levinson, W. St. John Garwood and W. St. John
Garwood, Jr. Centennial Chair and Professor of Government at The University of
Texas at Austin School of Law; Bartholomew H. Sparrow, Professor of
Government at The University of Texas at Austin; and Andrew Kent, Professor of
Law at the Fordham School of Law. Amici are scholars of constitutional law and
centuries. In particular, amici have written and edited collected works about the
Supreme Court’s early-twentieth-century decisions in the Insular Cases, on which
the district court relied.
Pursuant to D.C. Circuit Rule 29(d), counsel certifies that this separate brief
in support of neither party is necessary because amici, based on their academic
expertise and scholarly research, have distinct insight into the Insular Cases’
history and relevance to the constitutional status of U.S. territories. Amici have a
Pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 29(c)(5), amici certify that
no party’s counsel authored this brief in whole or in part, and that no one other
than amici and their counsel made any monetary contribution toward this brief’s
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significant interest in aiding this Court’s understanding of the Insular Cases, those
decisions’ approach to territoriality, and the scope of that approach’s application.
As amici explain, the Insular Cases do not extend or apply, either as governing
precedent or persuasive authority, to the question in this case: Whether the
Fourteenth Amendment guarantees birthright citizenship to people born in
American Samoa. The district court erred in deciding otherwise.
On February 4, 2014, this Court granted amici’s Motion for Leave To
Participate as Amici Curiae (filed January 29, 2014), which listed Christina Duffy
Ponsa and Gary S. Lawson as amici and noted that this amicus brief “may be
joined by other professors and scholars of constitutional law and legal history.” As
amici’s Notice of Additional Amici Curiae (filed May 9, 2014) reports, Plaintiffs-
Appellants have consented to, and Defendants-Appellees take no position on,
participation by the additional amici: Sanford V. Levinson, Bartholomew H.
Sparrow, and Andrew Kent.
In concluding that those born in American Samoa lack birthright citizenship,
the district court relied heavily on several misunderstandings about the Supreme
Court’s early-twentieth-century decisions in the Insular Cases. Although amici
take no position on the ultimate question of whether the Fourteenth Amendment
Citizenship Clause requires birthright citizenship for those born in American
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Samoa, and hence file this brief in support of neither party, amici disagree with the
district court’s suggestion that the Insular Cases require or support its ruling or
should be extended to apply to this case.
As the brief explains, none of the Insular Cases resolved a claim under the
Citizenship Clause. Nor does their reasoning logically extend to the question.
Downes v. Bidwell, the landmark Insular Cases decision, concerned the materially
different Uniformity Clause, and its divergent opinions in any event lack
precedential import. Later Insular Cases concerned constitutional provisions that,
unlike the Citizenship Clause, do not specify their own geographic reach.
The Insular Cases should not be considered even persuasive authority for
analyzing the Citizenship Clause. That Clause differs in text, history, and function
from the Clause at issue in Downes. More broadly, the Insular Cases’ approach to
the constitutional status of the U.S. territories lacks any grounding in constitutional
text, structure, or history. The Insular Cases, rather, reflected the assumptions of
the time that the United States, like the great European powers of that era, must
(despite being constrained by a written Constitution) be capable of acquiring
overseas possessions without admitting their “uncivilized” and “savage”
inhabitants of “alien races” to equal citizenship. That reasoning, even if it were
constitutionally relevant, is the product of another age. It has no place in modern
jurisprudence even if (as amici doubt) it had any validity in earlier times.
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I. THE I NSULAR CASES DO NOT CONTROL THIS CASE
As one amicus has explained, “The standard account of the Insular Cases
has long overstated their holding with respect to constitutional extraterritoriality.”
A Convenient Constitution? Extraterritoriality After
Boumediene, 109 Colum. L. Rev. 973, 984 (2009). In particular, several courts
have mistakenly assumed that the Insular Cases dictate the geographic scope of
every constitutional provision.
In fact, that overstates both the Insular Cases’
holdings and the necessary import of their reasoning.
The district court here fell victim to this misunderstanding, stating that “[t]he
Supreme Court famously addressed the extent to which the Constitution applies in
territories in a series of cases known as the Insular Cases.” JA47 (emphasis
added). The movants-intervenors in this case go so far as to claim that Downes v.
Amicus Professor Christina Duffy Ponsa was formerly Christina Duffy
E.g., Rabang v. INS, 35 F.3d 1449, 1452 (9th Cir. 1994) (“In the Insular
Cases the Supreme Court decided that the territorial scope of the phrase ‘the
United States’ as used in the Constitution is limited to the states of the Union.”
(emphasis added) (footnote omitted)); Valmonte v. INS, 136 F.3d 914, 917 (2d Cir.
1998) (indicating that the Insular Cases were authoritative on “the territorial scope
of the term ‘the United States’ in the … Fourteenth Amendment” (emphasis
added)); Lacap v. INS, 138 F.3d 518, 519 (3d Cir. 1998) (following Rabang v.
INS); Nolos v. Holder, 611 F.3d 279, 282-284 (5th Cir. 2010) (following Rabang v.
INS and Valmonte).
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Bidwell, the most important of the Insular Cases,
“held that the Citizenship Clause
of the Fourteenth Amendment does not extend birthright citizenship to U.S.
nationals born in unincorporated territories,” Motion To Intervene (D.C. Cir. Dkt.
#1458364) at 1-2 (Sept. 26, 2013) (emphasis added), even though no claim of
citizenship was before the Supreme Court in Downes.
This Court should not accept that invitation to error. As amici explain, the
Insular Cases decided far less than these overbroad descriptions suggest.
A. The I nsular Cases Do Not Decide The Citizenship Clause’s Scope
As a threshold matter, the Insular Cases do not hold anything about the
Fourteenth Amendment Citizenship Clause. Not one of the Insular Cases
resolved a Citizenship Clause claim.
1. Downes v. Bidwell
Downes v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 244 (1901), the seminal Insular Cases decision
on which the district court (JA48) and other courts, e.g., Rabang v. INS, 35 F.3d at
1452-1453, have relied, simply does not control here.
Christina Duffy Burnett, A Note on the Insular Cases, in FOREIGN IN A
DOMESTIC SENSE: PUERTO RICO, AMERICAN EXPANSION, AND THE CONSTITUTION
389, 389 (Burnett & Marshall eds., 2001).
Burnett, A Note on the Insular Cases, supra, at 389-390 (although scholars
differ about which decisions constitute the Insular Cases, there is “nearly universal
consensus that the series [begins with 1901 decisions and] culminates with Balzac
v. Porto Rico in 1922”).
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First, Downes did not involve a claim under the Citizenship Clause.
Downes instead concerned the Uniformity Clause, which provides that “all Duties,
Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.” U.S. Const.
art. I, § 8; see 182 U.S. at 247-249 (solo opinion of Brown, J.). The Court
adjudged only that Congress could impose a tariff on products shipped from Puerto
Rico to ports in the mainland United States without running afoul of that Clause.
Downes, 182 U.S. at 287; id. at 288 (White, J., concurring in judgment); id. at 345
(Gray, J., concurring in judgment). But, contrary to movants-intervenors’ claim,
Downes did not—and, given the narrow issue presented there, could not—consider
or decide whether the Citizenship Clause applies to the territories.
Second, the five Justices in the Downes majority agreed only on the
judgment, not on a rationale. They issued multiple, splintered opinions, which
arrived at the judgment by different paths. See 182 U.S. at 244 n.1 (opinion
syllabus) (Justice Brown delivered an opinion “announcing the conclusion and
judgment of the court in this case,” but in light of Justice White’s and Justice
Gray’s separate opinions concurring in the judgment, “it is seen that there is no
opinion in which a majority of the court concurred”); BARTHOLOMEW H. SPARROW,
THE INSULAR CASES AND THE EMERGENCE OF AMERICAN EMPIRE 87 (2006) (“[N]o
single opinion among the five opinions in Downes attracted a majority on the
bench.”).
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Justice Brown, who announced the Court’s judgment, posited that the phrase
“throughout the United States” in the Uniformity Clause included only “the states
whose people united to form the Constitution, and such as have since been
admitted to the Union upon an equality with them,” along with those very few
territories, like the District of Columbia, that were once part of the States. 182
U.S. at 277, 260-261 (solo opinion of Brown, J.). That position commanded only
one vote: Justice Brown’s. Id. at 247; id. at 244 n.1 (syllabus).
As one amicus has
explained, “The other eight [J]ustices [in Downes] rejected Brown’s radical
view[.]” Andrew Kent, Boumediene, Munaf, and the Supreme Court’s Misreading
of the Insular Cases, 97 Iowa L. Rev. 101, 157 (2011).
Justice White, joined by two other Justices, took a drastically different tack.
He led by acknowledging that because “[e]very function of the government” is
“derived from the Constitution, it follows that that instrument is everywhere and at
all times potential in so far as its provisions are applicable.” Downes, 182 U.S. at
289 (White, J., concurring in judgment). In his view, “the determination of what
particular provision of the Constitution is applicable … involves an inquiry into the
The Ninth Circuit decision upon which the other court of appeals decisions
rely, see supra note 3, misperceives Justice Brown’s opinion as having
commanded a majority. Rabang v. INS, 35 F.3d at 1452-1453 (stating that “[i]n
the Insular Cases the Supreme Court decided” that the constitutional phrase “the
United States” was “limited to the states of the Union” (latter two emphases added)
(footnote omitted), and citing only pages from Justice Brown’s Downes opinion).
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situation of the territory and its relations to the United States.” Id. at 293. He
noted, however, that such an inquiry is not necessary for every constitutional
provision. Id. at 294.
Conducting that inquiry for Puerto Rico, Justice White concluded that the
Uniformity Clause’s applicability there turned on a novel distinction: whether “that
island ha[d] been incorporated into the United States.” Id. at 288 (emphasis
added). Justice White reasoned from a premise imputed from the law of nations in
that era (which, in his view, sanctioned colonial expansion) but ungrounded in our
Constitution: that “wherever a government acquires territory”—whether by
discovery, treaty, or conquest—“the relation of the territory to the new government
is to be determined by the acquiring power.” Id. at 300. Because, in Justice
White’s view, neither the treaty of cession nor any subsequent congressional action
had expressed an intent to “incorporate” Puerto Rico into the United States, he
reasoned that Puerto Rico remained a mere “possession” of the United States, and
that the Uniformity Clause therefore “was not applicable to Congress in legislating
for Porto Rico.” Id. at 340.
Justice Gray agreed in substance with Justice White, but wrote separately to
emphasize the necessity of military governance of newly conquered territories. Id.
at 345-346 (Gray, J., concurring in judgment); see Kent, supra, at 158.
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Thus, the five Justices in the Downes majority reached their shared judgment
by way of divergent theories of the Constitution. See Christina Duffy Burnett &
Burke Marshall, Between the Foreign and the Domestic: The Doctrine of
Territorial Incorporation, Invented and Reinvented, in FOREIGN IN A DOMESTIC
SENSE, supra, at 1, 7 (“[N]ot one [of the Downes opinions] garnered a majority in
its reasoning.” (emphasis added)). Such a decision, lacking a majority rationale, is
precedential only as to the case’s precise facts. See Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council
of Ariz., Inc., 133 S. Ct. 2247, 2258 n.8 (2013); Seminole Tribe of Fla. v. Florida,
517 U.S. 44, 66 (1996); Nichols v. United States, 511 U.S. 738, 745-746 (1994).
Those facts—concerning tariffs, the Uniformity Clause, and Puerto Rico—are
absent in this case concerning birthright citizenship, the Citizenship Clause, and
The Downes opinions’ various references to citizenship (on which the
district court relied (JA48)) are therefore pure dicta and—as Section II.B further
explains—are not even persuasive. In particular, the majority Justices’ dim views
of territorial inhabitants as potential citizens rested on repudiated notions of racial
inferiority that ought not be perpetuated. See infra Section II.B.3 (discussing these
underpinnings of the Insular Cases).
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2. Other I nsular Cases decisions
None of the other Insular Cases addressed the Citizenship Clause. The other
decisions handed down the same day as Downes concerned statutory interpretation
of tariff laws then in force. De Lima v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 1 (1901); Goetze v.
United States, 182 U.S. 221 (1901); Dooley v. United States, 182 U.S. 222 (1901);
Armstrong v. United States, 182 U.S. 243 (1901); Huus v. New York & P.R. S.S.
Co., 182 U.S. 392 (1901); see also Dooley v. United States, 183 U.S. 151 (1901)
(concerning a tariff law’s constitutionality under U.S. Const. art. I, § 9); Fourteen
Diamond Rings v. United States, 183 U.S. 176 (1901) (applying De Lima). Later
decisions commonly grouped under the Insular Cases rubric also resolved issues
unrelated to Fourteenth Amendment birthright citizenship. E.g., Hawaii v.
Mankichi, 190 U.S. 197 (1903) (holding grand- and petit-jury requirements
inapplicable in the then-territory of Hawaii); Dorr v. United States, 195 U.S. 138
(1904) (holding jury-trial right inapplicable in Philippines); Rassmussen v. United
States, 197 U.S. 516 (1905) (holding jury-trial right applicable in Alaska); Ocampo
v. United States, 234 U.S. 91 (1905) (holding grand-jury right inapplicable in
Philippines); Balzac v. Porto Rico, 258 U.S. 298 (1922) (holding jury-trial right
inapplicable in Puerto Rico); Kepner v. United States, 195 U.S. 100 (1904)
(construing statutory double-jeopardy prohibition in Philippines); Trono v. United
States, 199 U.S. 521 (1905) (same); Weems v. United States, 217 U.S. 349 (1910)
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(construing statutory cruel-and-unusual-punishment prohibition in Philippines);
Porto Rico v. Rosaly y Castillo, 227 U.S. 270 (1913) (holding Puerto Rico
government immune from suit).
The district court, citing Dorr and Balzac, stated that “the Insular Cases held
that only certain ‘fundamental’ constitutional rights are extended to [an
unincorporated territory’s] inhabitants.” JA47. That overstates the holdings of
Dorr and Balzac. The Supreme Court in those cases noted that congressional
power to make laws for unincorporated territories is “subject to such constitutional
restrictions upon the powers of that body as are applicable to the situation,” Dorr,
195 U.S. at 143 (emphasis added); offered the example of “certain fundamental
personal rights,” like due process, as among those restrictions that must apply even
in unincorporated territories, Balzac, 258 U.S. at 312-313; and ruled that the jury-
trial right was not among those applicable restrictions, Dorr, 195 U.S. at 149;
Balzac, 258 U.S. at 304-305. But beyond that, the Court “still left open which
constitutional provisions and which individual protections applied to the residents
of the unincorporated territories.” SPARROW, supra, at 149, 190.
Moreover, neither Dorr nor Balzac holds that a constitutional provision that
applies to the territories by its plain terms—as Plaintiffs-Appellants assert for the
Moreover, these cases were not resolved based on the citizenship status of
the individuals involved. E.g., Balzac, 258 U.S. at 307-308 & n.1; see also Neely
v. Henkel, 180 U.S. 109, 122 (1901); Kent, supra, at 113 n.48 (on Neely).
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Citizenship Clause (Br. 17-29)—is inapplicable because it does not rank among a
judicially discerned subset of “fundamental” rights. As the Supreme Court stated
in Examining Board of Engineers, Architects & Surveyors v. Flores de Otero, 426
U.S. 572, 589 n.21 (1976), Dorr decided only “that the Constitution, except insofar
as required by its own terms, did not extend to the Philippines” (emphasis added).
Despite the district court’s suggestion (JA47), United States v. Verdugo-
Urquidez, 494 U.S. 259, 268 (1990), is not to the contrary. True, the Court in
Verdugo-Urquidez cited Dorr, Balzac, and Flores de Otero for the proposition that
“[o]nly ‘fundamental’ constitutional rights are guaranteed to inhabitants of
[unincorporated] territories.” Id. In context, however, that statement is best read
as assuming the proposition only arguendo. The Court went on to reason that “[i]f
that is true with respect to territories ultimately governed by Congress,
respondent’s claim that the protections of the Fourth Amendment extend to aliens
in foreign nations is even weaker.” Id. (emphases added). Tellingly, the Court’s
next sentence more precisely stated the Insular Cases’ import, but only to support
a much narrower proposition established by Dorr’s and Balzac’s actual holdings,
clarifying that the Verdugo-Urquidez majority did not intend to resolve definitively
the Insular Cases’ meaning: “And certainly, it is not open to us in light of the
Insular Cases to endorse the view that every constitutional provision applies
wherever the United States Government exercises its power.” Id. at 268-269
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(emphasis added). The concurring opinion of Justice Kennedy, whose vote was
crucial to the Verdugo-Urquidez majority, also mentioned and approved of only
this narrower proposition. Id. at 277-278 (Kennedy, J., concurring). And Justice
Kennedy’s later opinion for the Court in Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S. 723, 758-
759 (2008), further cabined the Insular Cases’ application. See infra p. 15.
In any event, the territorial incorporation doctrine was unnecessary to the
Court’s decision in Verdugo-Urquidez.
First, Verdugo-Urquidez did not involve any U.S. territory, incorporated or
unincorporated. Rather, it concerned the Fourth Amendment’s applicability in
Mexico, a foreign country. 494 U.S. at 261-262. Indeed, Verdugo-Urquidez
emphasized the distinction between presence outside U.S. territory and presence
within it, noting that “aliens receive constitutional protections when they have
come within the territory of the United States and developed substantial
connections with this country.” Id. at 271 (emphases added).
Second, Verdugo-Urquidez, like Dorr and Balzac, involved a constitutional
provision whose text does not prescribe its geographic scope. Whatever atextual
territoriality doctrines might be appropriately applied to such provisions, they
cannot apply to the Citizenship Clause, as Section II.B.1 explains. The Citizenship
Clause’s “own terms,” not any atextual territoriality doctrine from the Insular
Cases, determine the Clause’s applicability to those born in American Samoa.
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II. THE I NSULAR CASES SHOULD NOT BE EXTENDED BEYOND THEIR
A. The Supreme Court Is Hesitant To Extend The I nsular Cases
The Supreme Court in recent decades has declined to rely on an expansive
reading of the Insular Cases. See GARY LAWSON & GUY SEIDMAN, THE
CONSTITUTION OF EMPIRE: TERRITORIAL EXPANSION & AMERICAN LEGAL HISTORY
196 (2004) (“[T]he incorporation doctrine [of the Insular Cases] has seemed on
shaky ground in the [Supreme] Court on several recent occasions.”).
In Reid v. Covert, 354 U.S. 1, 14 (1957) (plurality opinion), for example,
four Justices of the Supreme Court expressed their “judgment that neither the
[Insular Cases] nor their reasoning should be given any further expansion.” And
in Torres v. Puerto Rico, 442 U.S. 465, 475 (1979), Justice Brennan wrote,
concurring in the judgment, that “[w]hatever the validity of the old cases such as
Downes v. Bidwell; Dorr v. United States; and Balzac v. Puerto Rico in the
particular historical context in which they were decided, those cases are clearly not
authority for questioning the application of [the Bill of Rights] to the
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in the 1970’s” (citations omitted). Moreover, as
Section I.A.2 explained, although the Court in Verdugo-Urquidez briefly discussed
the Insular Cases and the territorial incorporation doctrine, it did not rely upon that
doctrine to decide the claim, which involved events in Mexico, not in any U.S.
territory. 494 U.S. at 268-269, 261-262.
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The most recent Supreme Court opinion to discuss the Insular Cases—
Boumediene, in 2008—acknowledged those decisions but emphasized that their
holdings must be examined with precision. “‘[T]he real issue in the Insular
Cases,’” Boumediene explained, “‘was not whether the Constitution extended to
the Philippines or Porto Rico when we went there, but which of its provisions were
applicable by way of limitation upon the exercise of executive and legislative
power in dealing with new conditions and requirements.’” 553 U.S. at 758
(quoting Balzac, 258 U.S. at 312). The Court then cautioned that the United
States’ relationship to putatively “unincorporated” territories may over time
“strengthen in ways that are of constitutional significance,” id., and quoted Justice
Brennan’s earlier skepticism about the Insular Cases’ continued vitality, see id.
(quoting Torres, 442 U.S. at 475-476 (Brennan, J., concurring in judgment)). The
Court concluded by describing “[t]his century-old doctrine” not as dispositive, but
as merely “inform[ing] our analysis in the present matter.” Id. at 759. Because the
Court held that the Suspension Clause’s habeas-corpus guarantee extends to
Guantanamo Bay—a location outside U.S. de jure sovereignty—any broad reading
of the Insular Cases as limiting the Constitution’s application to a subset of U.S.
sovereign territory cannot be sustained.
Although Rabang v. Boyd, 353 U.S. 427, 432 (1957), cited Downes on
congressional power, its treatment of Downes conflicts with the Supreme Court’s
recent, narrower understandings of the Insular Cases and of congressional power
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As these later decisions illustrate, the Supreme Court has expressed
considerable skepticism about the Insular Cases and their continued utility for
analyzing the application of constitutional provisions to U.S. territories. Lower
courts should therefore be hesitant to extend the Insular Cases, particularly to this
situation, which is not covered by those decisions’ holdings or reasoning.
B. The I nsular Cases Ought Not Be Extended Here
Hesitance to expand the Insular Cases’ application is entirely appropriate,
both in general and for this case. The district court, however, erroneously
extended territoriality doctrines of the Insular Cases to the Citizenship Clause.
JA47-51 & n.14. Those territoriality doctrines are irrelevant to the Citizenship
Clause, are generally unpersuasive as a matter of constitutional analysis, and rest
on assumptions that have no place in modern jurisprudence.
in Boumediene, 553 U.S. at 758, 764-766. Rabang is also not instructive: It did
not concern the Citizenship Clause; instead, the “sole issue for decision” was
statutory—“whether the petitioner [was] deportable as an alien within the meaning
of the 1931 Act.” 353 U.S. at 429, 431-432 (emphasis added). Moreover, Rabang,
like the other courts that rely on Downes, misdescribed Justice Brown’s solo
opinion as the Court’s opinion. Id. at 432; see supra note 6. And Rabang, 353
U.S. at 432 & n.12, relied upon a questionable 1902 legal analysis, which was
driven by the same constitutionally ungrounded “felt needs” as the Insular Cases
themselves, see infra Section II.B.3: The author of that legal analysis was
compelled by political superiors to abandon his initial, “diametrically opposite”
view that the Constitution applied automatically to Puerto Rico. Porto Rican Bill
Passed By House, Chi. Daily Trib., Apr. 12, 1900, at 1; Problem of War Tax, Chi.
Daily Trib., Apr. 2, 1900, at 7.
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1. The I nsular Cases’ territoriality analysis is irrelevant to the
Citizenship Clause, which defines its own geographic scope
The Citizenship Clause states, “All persons born or naturalized in the
States and of the State wherein they reside.” U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1, cl. 1.
As its text illustrates, the Citizenship Clause defines its own geographic scope—
those born “in the United States” (and subject to its jurisdiction) are citizens. If
that geographic phrase includes the U.S. territory of American Samoa, Plaintiffs-
Appellants’ birthright citizenship cannot be negated on the atextual ground that
American Samoa is “unincorporated.” And if that geographic phrase does not
include American Samoa, nothing is added to that conclusion by the Insular Cases
or any territoriality analysis therein.
Thus, while amici take no position on whether the Citizenship Clause
encompasses American Samoa, they do submit that the Insular Cases provide no
persuasive guidance on that issue.
The district court correctly recognized that the question is “whether
American Samoa qualifies as a part of the ‘United States’ as that is used within the
Citizenship Clause.” JA46. Unfortunately, instead of considering appropriate
indicia of constitutional meaning—for example, how the phrase “United States”
was understood when the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified—the district court
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relied heavily on the Insular Cases, even though it had to acknowledge that those
cases did not concern the Citizenship Clause. JA47.
That reliance was mistaken. The Insular Cases have nothing useful to say
about the scope of the Citizenship Clause. Dorr, Balzac, and the other post-
Downes cases considering the application of constitutional rights in the territories
considered constitutional provisions, such as the Sixth Amendment Jury Trial
Clause, that—unlike the Citizenship Clause—do not textually specify their own
geographic scope. And the Supreme Court has recognized that the Constitution’s
“own terms” may “require[]” that a particular provision apply to a territory despite
its putatively “unincorporated” status. Flores de Otero, 426 U.S. at 589 n.21.
Whatever atextual doctrines might be needed to determine the geographic scope of
the Jury Trial Clause, they are not needed here.
Downes, it is true, held that a similar geographic phrase in the Uniformity
Clause—“throughout the United States”—excluded Puerto Rico. But neither that
result nor the various Downes opinions’ reasoning ought be transposed to the
Citizenship Clause. Downes, as Section I.A explained, lacked a majority rationale
and is precedential only as to its precise facts. Moreover, the Uniformity Clause
and the Citizenship Clause might be construed differently for several reasons.
As an initial matter, the provisions were enacted nearly a century apart, in
distinct historical contexts that may correspond to different original meaning.
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Historical evidence shows that at the time of the Founding, when the Uniformity
Clause was enacted, the phrase “United States” was generally understood as a
collective of individual States, whereas after the Civil War, when the Citizenship
Clause was enacted, the phrase tended to be used to denote the nation as a unitary
entity—including “territories subject to its sovereignty.” See Christina Duffy
Burnett, The Constitution and Deconstitution of the United States, in THE
LOUISIANA PURCHASE AND AMERICAN EXPANSION, 1803–1898, at 181, 181-182
(Levinson & Sparrow eds., 2005) (citing Civil War historian James M.
McPherson’s work for this proposition, and explaining that just before the Insular
Cases, the Founding-era conception “reemerged” among expansionists).
Therefore, even one were to accept Justice Brown’s dubious conclusion that
“United States” in the Uniformity Clause applies only to States, Downes, 182 U.S.
at 251 (solo opinion of Brown, J.), it would not follow that the same limitation
inheres in the term “United States” in the Citizenship Clause.
In addition, the Uniformity Clause and the Citizenship Clause were adopted
in distinct legal contexts. The Citizenship Clause was adopted in response to the
infamous decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393, 403-405
(1856), which held that the descendants of African slaves could not become U.S.
citizens because they were considered “a subordinate and inferior class of beings.”
Scholars explain that the Citizenship Clause was designed to repudiate Dred
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Scott’s narrow and racist vision of U.S. citizenship, and instead to guarantee U.S.
citizenship to all those born on U.S. soil (and within U.S. jurisdiction). See
Christina Duffy Burnett, Empire and the Transformation of Citizenship, in
332, 338-340 (McCoy & Scarano eds., 2009).
Finally, the Citizenship Clause and the Uniformity Clause have distinct
functions that may imply different interpretations. This Court has said that the
Uniformity Clause’s “purpose has been divined from the Framers’ concern that
Congress ‘would use its power over commerce to the disadvantage of particular
States.’” Banner v. United States, 428 F.3d 303, 310 (D.C. Cir. 2005) (per curiam)
(emphasis added). Other provisions of the original Constitution similarly shield
States from export taxes and duties laid by the federal government or other States.
U.S. Const. art. I, §§ 9, 10; see Downes, 182 U.S. at 278 (solo opinion of Brown,
J.). By contrast, the Citizenship Clause guarantees birthright citizenship to
individuals. The Supreme Court has explained that the Clause mentions “State[s]”
only to clarify that U.S. citizenship exists “without regard to … citizenship of a
particular State.” Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. 36, 73 (1872). Thus, a doctrine
that favors States over territories (or “incorporated” territories destined for
statehood over “unincorporated” territories) makes less sense for the Citizenship
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The district court did not grapple with these potentially meaningful
distinctions. Instead, like other courts of appeals, the district court simply invoked
an observation in Justice Brown’s Downes opinion that a comparison of the
Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendment’s language indicates that “there may be
places within the jurisdiction of the United States that are no part of the Union”—
places to which the Fourteenth Amendment Citizenship Clause does not apply.
Rabang v. INS, 35 F.3d at 1453 (quoting Downes, 182 U.S. at 251 (solo opinion of
Brown, J.)); see JA47-49. But even if that were true, it does not follow that U.S.
territories are among those places. Instead, that set of places could include sites
over which the United States exercises control that are not within U.S. sovereign
territory, such as overseas military bases,
American embassies abroad,
foreign territory under temporary military occupation.
In sum, this dictum from
Downes does not answer the question presented here.
Examples may include Guantanamo Bay Naval Station, see Boumediene,
553 U.S. at 765 (“Cuba retain[s] ‘ultimate sovereignty’ over Guantanamo” but the
United States controls it), and former military bases in the Philippines, see
Amendments to the Military Base Agreement, Jan. 7, 1979, United States-
Philippines, 30 U.S.T. 863, 863-864, T.I.A.S. No. 9224 (mentioning bases under
“Philippine sovereignty,” but U.S. “command and control”).
See 1 OPPENHEIM’S INTERNATIONAL LAW § 499 & n.4 (Jennings & Watts
eds., 9th ed. 1996); McKeel v. Islamic Republic of Iran, 722 F.2d 582, 588 (9th Cir.
1983) (a U.S. embassy “remains the territory of the receiving state”).
Examples may include Cuba during U.S. military occupation following the
Spanish-American War, see Treaty of Peace Between the United States and Spain,
arts. 1-3 (Dec. 10, 1898); and Germany just after World War II, see Boumediene,
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2. The territorial incorporation doctrine attributed to the
I nsular Cases is unpersuasive as a matter of constitutional
In analyzing the Constitution more generally, there are broader reasons not
to expand the application of the “territorial incorporation” doctrine attributed to
Justice White’s Downes opinion.
As an initial matter, the distinction between “incorporated” and
“unincorporated territories” was “unprecedented” in American constitutional law
when Downes was decided. Burnett, Convenient Constitution, supra, at 982. The
territorial incorporation doctrine departed substantially from the Supreme Court’s
precedent, which had evinced a broad conception of the Constitution’s application
to and in the territories. Juan R. Torruella, The Insular Cases: The Establishment
of a Regime of Political Apartheid, 29 U. Pa. J. Int’l L. 283, 286 (2007) (“[T]he
Insular Cases … squarely contradicted long-standing constitutional precedent.”);
see Downes, 182 U.S. at 353-369, 359 (Fuller, J., dissenting) (citing numerous
Supreme Court decisions “[f]rom Marbury v. Madison to the present day”
establishing that constitutional limits apply with respect to the territories); e.g.,
Loughborough v. Blake, 18 U.S. 317, 319 (1820) (“[The United States] is the name
553 U.S. at 762 (German nationals, whom a U.S. military commission convicted,
were never “‘within any territory over which the United States is sovereign’”). See
also Fleming v. Page, 50 U.S. (9 How.) 603, 614 (1850) (port of Tampico
conquered during war with Mexico remained a “foreign country,” not “part of the
United States,” although “undoubtedly” under U.S. dominion).
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given to our great republic, which is composed of States and territories.”);
Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. at 72 (explaining that the Citizenship Clause
repudiated the proposition that those born “in the District of Columbia or in the
Territories, though within the United States, were not citizens” (emphasis added)).
Moreover, the territorial incorporation doctrine finds no justification in the
Constitution’s text or structure. As one amicus has explained, “[T]here is nothing
in the Constitution that even intimates that express constitutional limitations on
national power apply differently to different territories once that territory is
properly acquired.” LAWSON & SEIDMAN, supra, at 196-197.
The territorial incorporation doctrine, which empowered Congress to rule
certain territories differently as a constitutional matter, is in tension with a system
of constitutional government that vests Congress only with limited, enumerated
powers. Justice Harlan’s Downes dissent contended that the territorial
incorporation doctrine “produce[s] the same results as those which flow from the
theory that Congress may go outside of the Constitution in dealing with newly
acquired territories, and give[s] [those territories] the benefit of that instrument
only when and as [Congress] shall direct.” 182 U.S. at 389 (Harlan, J., dissenting).
Under that view, the territorial incorporation doctrine in essence permits “the
political branches … the power to switch the Constitution on or off at will,”
Boumediene, 553 U.S. at 765, by affording them sole discretion to decide whether
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or not to “incorporate” a territory. That is inconsistent with the notion that “the
National Government is one of enumerated powers to be exerted only for the
limited objects defined in the Constitution.” Downes, 182 U.S. at 389 (Harlan, J.,
dissenting). “The Constitution grants Congress and the President the power to
acquire, dispose of, and govern territory, not the power to decide when and where
its terms apply.” Boumediene, 553 U.S. at 765.
The territorial incorporation doctrine has been the target of withering
criticism since it was announced. Justice Harlan, dissenting in Downes, wrote that
“this idea of ‘incorporation’ has some occult meaning which my mind does not
apprehend.” 182 U.S. at 391 (Harlan, J., dissenting). And in recent years, “no
current scholar, from any methodological perspective, [has] defend[ed] The Insular
Cases.” Gary Lawson & Robert D. Sloane, The Constitutionality of
Decolonization by Associated Statehood: Puerto Rico’s Legal Status Reconsidered,
50 B.C. L. Rev. 1123, 1146 (2009). This Court ought to follow the Supreme
Court’s and modern scholars’ lead by declining to extend this “occult” and
constitutionally unfounded doctrine.
3. The I nsular Cases rest on antiquated notions of racial
inferiority of territorial residents and the “felt needs” of a
bygone era of imperial expansion
The Insular Cases ought not be extended for yet another reason: They
cannot be disentangled from anachronistic and extra-constitutional considerations
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that are fundamentally at odds with present-day understandings. The Insular
Cases’ reasoning (particularly the territorial incorporation doctrine) reflected a
turn-of-the-century enthusiasm for imperial expansion and a hesitation to admit
supposedly “uncivilized” members of “alien races” except as colonial subjects.
See Torruella, supra, at 286 (“[T]he Insular Cases’ … skewed outcome was
strongly influenced by racially motivated biases and by colonial governance
theories that were contrary to American territorial practice and experience.”).
The majority Justices’ opinions in Downes illustrate this point. On the very
same pages of Justice Brown’s opinion that the district court cited (JA48 (citing
Downes, 182 U.S. at 279-280, 282 (solo opinion of Brown, J.))), Justice Brown
argued that “differences of race” raised “grave questions” about the rights that
ought be afforded to territorial inhabitants. See also 182 U.S. at 287 (describing
territorial inhabitants as “alien races, differing from us” in many ways). Similarly,
in the passage the district court quoted (JA48) from Justice White’s Downes
opinion, 182 U.S. at 306 (White, J., concurring in judgment), Justice White
described the situation of acquiring an island territory “peopled with an uncivilized
race, yet rich in soil” whose inhabitants were “absolutely unfit to receive”
citizenship. Justice White elsewhere quoted approvingly from treatise passages
explaining that “if the conquered are a fierce, savage and restless people,” the
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conqueror may “govern them with a tighter rein, so as to curb their impetuosity,
and to keep them under subjection.” Id. at 302 (internal quotation marks omitted).
The quoted passage (JA48) from Justice White’s Downes opinion further
reveals that opinion’s imperialist underpinnings. Justice White’s concern was that
the “right” of the United States to acquire territories “could not be practically
exercised” if acquisition automatically extended the Constitution’s protections to
the new territory’s inhabitants. Downes, 182 U.S. at 306 (White, J., concurring in
judgment). He derived this national right not from our written Constitution, but
from “principle[s] of the law of nations” that would permit colonial powers to
conquer and rule territorial inhabitants as subjects. Id. His doctrine, therefore,
facilitated American imperial expansion by allaying American anxieties about the
constitutional consequences of their acquisitions. Burnett, Constitution and
Deconstitution, supra, at 183.
Scholars have explained that the Insular Cases generally, not just Downes,
“reflected many of the attitudes that permeated the expansionist movement of the
Imperial expansion in that era served economic and strategic purposes: The
island territories offered new markets for American goods and coaling stations and
bases for a larger U.S. Navy to protect the nation’s expanding maritime commerce.
See SPARROW, supra, at 64-65. Yet enthusiasm for territorial acquisition coexisted
with anxieties about its potential constitutional consequences. See, e.g., Simeon E.
Baldwin, The Constitutional Questions Incident to the Acquisition and Government
by the United States of Island Territory, 12 Harv. L. Rev. 393, 406, 408 (1899).
The territorial incorporation doctrine served imperialist aims to obtain expansion’s
benefits while avoiding troublesome constitutional restraints.
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United States during the nineteenth century.” Efrén Rivera Ramos, Puerto Rico’s
Political Status, in LOUISIANA PURCHASE, supra, at 165, 165; see SPARROW, supra,
at 10, 14, 57-63. That “ideological outlook” included “Manifest Destiny, Social
Darwinism, the idea of the inequality of peoples, and a racially grounded theory of
democracy that viewed it as a privilege of the ‘Anglo-Saxon race.’” Rivera
Ramos, supra, at 170.
These concepts of “inferior[ity] … justified not treating
[territorial inhabitants] as equals,” and the Insular Cases’ classification of some
territories as “unincorporated … owed much to racial and ethnic factors.” Id. at
171, 174. The use of “racial schemes for classifying overseas colonial subjects”—
from “Anglo-Saxons … at the top of the ladder, while beneath them were an array
of ‘lesser races’ down to the darkest, and thereby the most savage, peoples”—
“served to slide the new ‘possessions’ … into the category of ‘unincorporated.’”
Julian Go, Modes of Rule in America’s Overseas Empire: The Philippines, Puerto
Rico, Guam, and Samoa, in LOUISIANA PURCHASE, supra, at 209, 217.
Justice Harlan, dissenting in Downes, identified that outlook in Justice
Brown’s opinion, and decried the assumption that such “‘principles of natural
justice inherent in Anglo-Saxon character’” would mitigate the risks of denying
constitutional protections in the territories. 182 U.S. at 381 (Harlan, J., dissenting)
(quoting id. at 280 (solo opinion of Brown, J.)). The Framers, Justice Harlan
noted, “well remembered that Anglo-Saxons across the ocean had attempted, in
defiance of law and justice, to trample upon the rights of Anglo-Saxons on this
continent, and had sought, by military force, to establish a government that could
at will destroy the privileges that inhere in liberty.” Id.
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Indeed, American imperialist views of the era distinguished between
territorial expansion on the continent, “where the likelihood of white migration”
made the territories “seem plausible candidates for statehood,” and expansion to
“distant places densely populated by unfamiliar races,” which were not seen as
“candidates for admission” into the Union. Burnett, Constitution and
Deconstitution, supra, at 183. In January 1900, one Senator, for example,
described the people of the Philippines as “children” who were “not capable of
self-government. How could they be? … Savage blood, oriental blood, Malay
blood … are these the elements of self-government?” 33 Cong. Rec. 708 (1900).
Another Senator wrote, “The idea of conferring American citizenship upon the
half-civilized, piratical, muck-running inhabitants of [the Philippines] … and
creating a State of the Union from such materials, is … absurd and indefensible[.]”
Senator G.G. Vest, Objections to Annexing the Philippines, 168 N. Am. Rev. 112,
112 (1899), quoted in Kent, supra, at 119 n.68. The official Democratic Party
platform of 1900 proclaimed, “The Filipinos cannot be citizens without
endangering our civilization[.]” THOMAS HUDSON MCKEE, THE NATIONAL
CONVENTIONS AND PLATFORMS OF ALL POLITICAL PARTIES, 1789 TO 1900, at 333
(3d rev. & enlarged ed. 1900), quoted in Kent, supra, at 128 n.110. These
“prejudices toward the inhabitants of [the ‘unincorporated’] territories” informed
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the contemporaneous decision to deny them statutory citizenship. Burnett, Empire
and the Transformation of Citizenship, supra, at 337.
The Insular Cases reflected this view of “the American nation as a divisible
entity,” with areas inhabited by non-white populations considered to be
“unbearable burdens” or “problem regions.” Burnett, Constitution and
Deconstitution, supra, at 183. “[O]n the eve of the Insular Cases,” Judge Torruella
has explained, “the nation was divided …. [between] those of the view that the
inhabitants of the new territories were unfit to become citizens …, a position that
was largely racially motivated …. [and] those who adhered to the century-old
tradition and practice that the Constitution automatically attached to all territories
over which the United States gained sovereignty.” Torruella, supra, at 299-300.
Lamentably, the “racism and arrogance of the time” prevailed in the Insular Cases,
as the Justices relied upon “widely held views about the supposed inability of non-
Anglo-Saxon peoples to govern themselves without the guiding hand of white
father.” Burnett, Convenient Constitution, supra, at 992.
Thus, “[t]he doctrine of ‘territorial incorporation’ that emerged from The
Insular Cases is transparently an invention designed to facilitate the felt needs of a
particular moment in American history”—specifically, the impulse to compete
with the powers of Europe in the worldwide scramble for colonies, unimpeded by
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the strictures of our written Constitution. LAWSON & SEIDMAN, supra, at 197.
“Felt needs generally make bad law, and The Insular Cases are no exception.” Id.
In sum, much of the reasoning that informed the Insular Cases is “now
recognize[d] as illegitimate,” Burnett, Convenient Constitution, supra, at 992, and
this Court ought not expand their application. This Court should be particularly
hesitant to apply the Insular Cases to Fourteenth Amendment birthright
citizenship, which (as discussed) concerns a constitutional provision designed to
repudiate racist notions like those that the Insular Cases reflected.
Amici respectfully urge this Court to reconsider the district court’s mistaken
reliance on the Insular Cases, and to decide that they do not govern or persuade on
the constitutional question in this case.
/s/ Paul R.Q. Wolfson
USCA Case #13-5272 Document #1492589 Filed: 05/12/2014 Page 40 of 42
Pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32(a)(7)(C), I hereby
certify that this brief complies with the type-volume limitation of Federal Rules of
Appellate Procedure 32(a)(7)(B)(i) and 29(d).
1. Exclusive of the exempted portions of the brief as provided in Federal
Rule of Appellate Procedure 32(a)(7)(B)(iii), the brief contains 6,993 words.
2. Pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32(a)(5)(A), the brief
has been prepared in proportionally spaced typeface using Microsoft Word 2010 in
14-point Times New Roman font. As permitted by Federal Rule of Appellate
Procedure 32(a)(7)(C), I have relied upon the word count feature of this word
processing system in preparing this certificate.
USCA Case #13-5272 Document #1492589 Filed: 05/12/2014 Page 41 of 42
I hereby certify that on this 12th day of May, 2014, I electronically filed the
foregoing Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars of Constitutional Law and Legal History
in Support of Neither Party with the Clerk of the Court for the United States Court
of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit using the appellate CM/ECF
system. Counsel for all parties to the case are registered CM/ECF users and will
be served by the appellate CM/ECF system.
USCA Case #13-5272 Document #1492589 Filed: 05/12/2014 Page 42 of 42
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