Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/385/276/case.html
Timestamp: 2017-06-27 06:59:38
Document Index: 88708722

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 106', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 242', '§ 106']

Woodby v. INS (full text) :: 385 U.S. 276 (1966) :: Justia US Supreme Court Center Log In
› Woodby v. INS
Woodby v. INS 385 U.S. 276 (1966)
U.S. Supreme CourtWoodby v. INS, 385 U.S. 276 (1966)Woodby v. Immigration and Naturalization ServiceNo. 40Argued November 17, 1966Decided December 12, 1966*385 U.S. 276CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
(c) In denaturalization and expatriation cases, the Government has been required by the Court to establish its allegations by clear, Page 385 U. S. 277 unequivocal, and convincing evidence, and that burden of proof is likewise appropriate in deportation proceedings. Pp. 385 U. S. 285-286.
In Sherman (No. 80), the petitioner is a resident alien who entered this country from Poland in 1920 as a 14-year-old boy. In 1963, the Immigration and Naturalization Service instituted proceedings to deport him upon the ground that he had reentered the United States in 1938, following a trip abroad, without inspection as an Page 385 U. S. 278 alien. [Footnote 1] After a hearing before a special inquiry officer, the petitioner was ordered to be deported, and the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed his appeal. [Footnote 2]
The Government's evidence showed that the petitioner had obtained a passport in 1937 under the name of Samuel Levine, representing himself as a United States citizen. Someone using this passport sailed to France in June, 1937, proceeded to Spain, returned to the United States in December, 1938, aboard the S.S. Ausonia, and was admitted without being examined as an alien. To establish that it was the petitioner who had traveled under this passport, the Government introduced the testimony of Edward Morrow, an American citizen who had fought in the Spanish Civil War. Morrow was at first unable to remember the name Samuel Levine or identify the petitioner, but eventually stated that he thought he had known the petitioner as "Sam Levine," had seen him while fighting for the Loyalists in Spain during 1937 and 1938, and had returned with him to the United States aboard the S.S. Ausonia in December, 1938. Morrow conceded that his recollection of events Page 385 U. S. 279 occurring 27 years earlier was imperfect, and admitted that his identification of the petitioner might be mistaken.
Upon petition for review, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit originally set aside the deportation order upon the ground that the Government has the burden of proving the facts supporting deportability beyond a reasonable doubt. [Footnote 3] The court reversed itself, however, upon a rehearing en banc, holding that the Government need only prove its case with "reasonable, substantial, Page 385 U. S. 280 and probative evidence." [Footnote 4] We granted certiorari, 384 U.S. 904.
At the administrative hearing, the petitioner admitted that she had engaged in prostitution for a brief period in 1957, some months after her husband had deserted her, but claimed that her conduct was the product of circumstances amounting to duress. Without reaching the validity of the duress defense, the special inquiry officer and the Board of Immigration Appeals concluded that the petitioner had continued to engage in prostitution after the alleged duress had terminated. The hearing officer and the Board did not discuss what burden of proof the Government was required to bear in establishing deportability, nor did either of them indicate the degree of certainty with which their factual conclusions were reached. The special inquiry officer merely asserted that the evidence demonstrated that the petitioner was Page 385 U. S. 281 deportable. The Board stated that the evidence made it "apparent" that the petitioner had engaged in prostitution after the alleged duress had ended, and announced that "it is concluded that the evidence establishes deportability. . . ."
the court thought, "Congress has spoken. . . ." 350 F.2d at 900. This view was based upon two provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act which use the language "reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence" in connection with deportation orders. The provisions in question are § 106(a)(4) of the Act, which states that a deportation order, "if supported by reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence on the record considered as a whole, shall be conclusive," [Footnote 6] and § 242(b)(4) of the Act, which provides, inter alia, that "no decision of deportability shall be valid unless it is based upon reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence." [Footnote 7] Page 385 U. S. 282
The section is entitled "Judicial Review of Page 385 U. S. 283 Orders of Deportation and Exclusion," and, by its terms, provides "the sole and exclusive procedure for" the "judicial review of all final orders of deportation." Subsection 106(a)(4) is a specific directive to the courts in which petitions for review are filed. [Footnote 12]
It is hardly less clear that the other provision upon which the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit relied, § 242(b)(4) of the Act, is also addressed to reviewing courts, and, insofar as it represents a yardstick for the administrative factfinder, goes, not to the burden of proof, but rather to the quality and nature of the evidence upon which a deportation order must be based. [Footnote 13] The provision declares that "reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence" shall be the measure of whether a deportability decision is "valid" -- a word that implies scrutiny by a reviewing tribunal of a decision already reached by the trier of the facts. The location of this Page 385 U. S. 284 provision in a section containing provisions dealing with procedures before the special inquiry officer has little significance when it is remembered that the original 1952 Act did not itself contain a framework for judicial review -- although such review was, of course, available by habeas corpus or otherwise. See Marcello v. Bonds, 349 U. S. 302. And whatever ambiguity might be thought to lie in the location of this section is resolved by its legislative history. The Senate Report explained § 242(b)(4) as follows:
The petitioners urge that the appropriate burden of proof in deportation proceedings should be that which the law imposes in criminal cases -- the duty of proving the essential facts beyond a reasonable doubt. The Government, on the other hand, points out that a deportation Page 385 U. S. 285 proceeding is not a criminal case, and that the appropriate burden of proof should consequently be the one generally imposed in civil cases and administrative proceedings -- the duty of prevailing by a mere preponderance of the evidence.
In denaturalization cases, the Court has required the Government to establish its allegations by clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence. [Footnote 16] The same burden has been imposed in expatriation cases. [Footnote 17] That standard of proof is no stranger to the civil law. [Footnote 18] Page 385 U. S. 286
It is so ordered. Page 385 U. S. 287
"* * * *" "(4) . . . the petition shall be determined solely upon the administrative record upon which the deportation order is based and the Attorney General's findings of fact, if supported by reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence on the record considered as a whole, shall be conclusive. . . ."
Before § 242(b) was enacted, the immigration laws contained no detailed provision concerning the burden of proof in deportation cases. Kessler v. Strecker, 307 U. S. 22, 307 U. S. 34 (1939). In Wong Yang Sung v. McGrath, 339 U. S. 33 (1950), this Court extended the provisions Page 385 U. S. 288 of the Administrative Procedure Act to deportation proceedings. Congress immediately exempted such proceedings from the Administrative Procedure Act, and, in 1952, established in § 242(b) an exclusive procedural system for deportation proceedings.
In essence, that section, § 242(b), provides for notice and a hearing before a "special inquiry officer" of the Immigration Service; sets the standard of proof in such cases as "reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence"; and authorizes the Attorney General to issue regulations. In issuing those regulations, the Attorney General established a Board of Immigration Appeals. The Board's relationship to the orders of the special inquiry officer is similar to the relationship an agency has to the orders of a hearing examiner under the Administrative Procedure Act. The section also specifically provides that the regulations shall include requirements that "no decision of deportability shall be valid unless it is based upon reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence," and that this standard shall be the "sole and exclusive procedure for determining the deportability of an alien under this section." This was the first time in our history that Congress had expressly placed a specific standard of proof on the Government in deportation cases. And the language Congress used made it clear that this standard related to the "burden of proof" as well as "the quality and nature of the evidence." The requirement of "reasonable" evidence cannot be meant merely to exclude "unreasonable" or "irrational" evidence, but carries the obvious connotation from history and tradition of sufficiency to sustain a conclusion by a preponderance of the evidence. [Footnote 2/1] Congress in overruling Wong Yang Sung, Page 385 U. S. 289 supra, carved deportation proceedings from the judicial overtones of the Administrative Procedure Act and established a built-in administrative procedure.
". . . the petition (for review) shall be determined solely upon the administrative record upon which the deportation order is based, and the Attorney Page 385 U. S. 290 General's findings of fact, if supported by reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence on the record considered as a whole, shall be conclusive."
The Court now extends the standard of Schneiderman v. United States, 320 U. S. 118 (1943), in denaturalization cases, i.e., "clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence," to deportation cases. But denaturalization and expatriation are much more oppressive cases than deportation. They deprive one of citizenship which the United States had previously conferred. The Schneiderman rule only follows the principle that vested rights can be canceled only upon clear, unequivocal, and convincing proof; it gives stability and finality to a most precious right -- citizenship. An alien, however, does not enjoy citizenship, but only a conditional privilege extended to him by the Congress as a matter of grace. Both Page 385 U. S. 291 petitioners, the record shows, knew this, yet they remained in this country for years -- 46 in the case of Sherman and 10 in that of Woodby. Still, neither made any effort to obtain citizenship.
By treating these two cases as raising only a single issue, the Court ignores some aspects of Woodby which greatly trouble me. Woodby sought review of the final deportation order against her more than six months after entry of that order. Section 106(a)(1) of the Act specifically limits the jurisdiction of the Court of Appeals to consideration of petitions for review "filed not later than six months from the date of the final deportation order." The legislative history of that provision makes it clear that Congress intended it to be strictly enforced in order to alleviate the spectacle of aliens subject to deportation orders and able to remain in this country for long periods of time by employing dilatory legal tactics. See H.R.Rep. No. 565, 87th Cong., 1st Sess. Since there is no time limit on petitions for rehearing or reconsideration, 8 CFR §§ 242.22, 103.5, permitting review of a final order of deportation merely because a timely petition for review of an administrative refusal to reopen the proceedings has been filed would negate the congressional purpose behind the insistence on timely filing in § 106(a)(1). Lopez v. United States Department of Justice, 356 F.2d 986, cert. denied, 385 U.S. 839. [Footnote 2/2] Page 385 U. S. 292