Opinion ID: 431115
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Constitutional Rights of Excludable Aliens

Text: 23 Any analysis of the constitutional rights of aliens in the immigration context must begin by taking note of the fundamental distinction between the legal status of excludable or unadmitted aliens and aliens who have succeeded in effecting an entry into the United States, even if their presence here is completely illegal. The Supreme Court originally indicated that the powers of the political branches with respect to the exclusion and expulsion of aliens are equally broad, see Fong Yue Ting, 149 U.S. at 713-14, 13 S.Ct. at 1022, but it soon recognized that an alien who has entered the country, and has become subject in all respects to its jurisdiction, and a part of its population is entitled to due process under the fifth amendment and cannot be deported without giving him all opportunity to be heard upon the questions involving his right to be and remain in the United States. Kaoru Yamataya v. Fisher [The Japanese Immigrant Case ], 189 U.S. 86, 101, 23 S.Ct. 611, 615, 47 L.Ed. 721 (1903). 12 While resident aliens, regardless of their legal status, are therefore entitled to at least limited due process rights, aliens who have never been naturalized, nor acquired any domicile of residence within the United States, nor even been admitted into the country pursuant to law stand in a very different posture: As to such persons, the decisions of executive or administrative officers, acting within powers expressly conferred by congress, are due process of law. Nishimura Ekiu, 142 U.S. at 660, 12 S.Ct. at 339. 24 In the eighty years since the Court first recognized this distinction between the rights of excludable and deportable aliens, it has become engrained in our law. Thus, in Leng May Ma v. Barber, 357 U.S. 185, 78 S.Ct. 1072, 2 L.Ed.2d 1246 (1958), the court emphasized that 25 our immigration laws have long made a distinction between those aliens who have come to our shores seeking admission ... and those who are within the United States after an entry, irrespective of its legality. In the latter instance the Court has recognized additional rights and privileges not extended to those in the former category who are merely on the threshold of initial entry. 26 Id. at 187, 78 S.Ct. at 1073 (quoting Shaughnessy v. United States ex rel. Mezei, 345 U.S. 206, 212, 73 S.Ct. 625, 629, 97 L.Ed. 956 (1953)); see also Kwong Hai Chew v. Colding, 344 U.S. 590, 600, 73 S.Ct. 472, 479, 97 L.Ed. 576 (1953) ( 'excludable' aliens ... are not within the protection of the Fifth Amendment); Bridges v. Wixon, 326 U.S. 135, 161, 65 S.Ct. 1443, 1455, 89 L.Ed. 2103 (1945) (Murphy, J., concurring) (The Bill of Rights is a futile authority for an alien seeking admission for the first time to these shores.). This principle was reiterated by the Court last Term in Landon v. Plasencia, 459 U.S. 21, 32, 103 S.Ct. 321, 329, 74 L.Ed.2d 21 (1982), in which Justice O'Connor noted that 27 an alien seeking admission to the United States requests a privilege and has no constitutional rights regarding his application, for the power to admit or exclude aliens is a sovereign prerogative.... [H]owever, once an alien gains admission to our country and begins to develop the ties that go with permanent residence his constitutional status changes accordingly. 28 Aliens seeking admission to the United States therefore have no constitutional rights with regard to their applications and must be content to accept whatever statutory rights and privileges they are granted by Congress. The INA does in fact contain a number of provisions that collectively guarantee at least limited due process protection for excludable aliens. Under 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1226(a), an alien seeking entry is entitled to a hearing on the validity of his application for admission before an immigration judge. At the hearing the alien is permitted the assistance of counsel, id. Sec. 1362, and has the right to present evidence in his own behalf, to examine and object to evidence against him, and to cross-examine witnesses presented by the government. 8 C.F.R. Sec. 236.2(a). If the immigration judge determines that the alien is not entitled to admission, this decision may be appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA). 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1226(b); 8 C.F.R. Sec. 236.7. An alien may also challenge a final order of exclusion in the federal courts by filing a petition for a writ of habeas corpus. 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1105a(b). 29 The process of determining the merits of an alien's application for admission is frequently a lengthy one, particularly when the alien is able to hire a skilled immigration lawyer. Louis III, 544 F.Supp. at 978. Because the carriers that bring aliens seeking admission to this country can rarely afford to wait until this process is concluded, Congress recognized that it was necessary to permit aliens to make a temporary, unofficial entry into the United States pending the resolution of their applications. See Shaughnessy v. United States ex rel. Mezei, 345 U.S. 206, 215, 73 S.Ct. 625, 631, 97 L.Ed. 956 (1953); 8 U.S.C. Sec. 1223(a) (removal of alien from vessel or aircraft for examination by immigration officials shall not be considered a landing); id. Sec. 1225(b) (alien who does not appear to examining immigration officer to be clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to land may be detained for further inquiry); id. Sec. 1182(d)(5)(A) (granting authority to the Attorney General to parole aliens seeking admission into the United States, but providing that such parole of such alien shall not be regarded as an admission of the alien). 30 The Supreme Court has consistently rejected claims that the parole or detention of an excludable alien has any effect on his status under the law. Thus, in Leng May Ma, Justice Clark noted that [f]or over a half century this Court has held that the detention of an alien in custody pending determination of his admissibility does not legally constitute an entry though the alien is physically within the United States. 357 U.S. at 188, 78 S.Ct. at 1074. Likewise, he explained that [t]he parole of aliens seeking admission is simply a device through which needless confinement is avoided while administrative proceedings are conducted. It was never intended to affect an alien's status.... Id. at 190, 78 S.Ct. at 1075; see also Mezei, 345 U.S. at 215, 73 S.Ct. at 631 (alien permitted to enter pending a decision on admissibility is treated as if stopped at the border); Kaplan v. Tod, 267 U.S. 228, 230-31, 45 S.Ct. 257, 257-58, 69 L.Ed. 585 (1925); United States v. Ju Toy, 198 U.S. 253, 263, 25 S.Ct. 644, 646, 49 L.Ed. 1040 (1905); Nishimura Ekiu, 142 U.S. at 661, 12 S.Ct. at 339. This principle--the entry doctrine fiction--has been recognized as well by the fifth circuit. Ahrens v. Rojas, 292 F.2d 406, 410-11 (5th Cir.1961). 31 There is no question that the Haitian plaintiffs in this case are excludable aliens and have not been formally admitted into the United States. Louis III, 544 F.Supp. at 998. Since an alien's legal status is not altered by detention or parole under the entry doctrine fiction, it seems clear that plaintiffs here can claim no greater rights or privileges under our laws than any other group of aliens who have been stopped at the border. The district court, however, concluded that the entry doctrine and the precedents cited above were inapplicable because the Haitian plaintiffs here are challenging their continued incarceration pending a determination of admissibility, rather than seeking to compel the government to grant them admission in a legal sense. Louis III, 544 F.Supp. at 998. Likewise, the panel distinguished Mezei and other immigration decisions on the grounds that those cases concerned immigration procedures rather than the discretionary exercise of the Executive's parole power. Jean, 711 F.2d at 1484-85. The panel also considered the entry doctrine inapplicable because its purpose [is] to limit the procedural rights of an excludable alien 'regarding his application' for admission, id. at 1484 (quoting Plasencia, 459 U.S. at 31, 103 S.Ct. at 329), and therefore concluded that the Haitian plaintiffs had equal protection rights on the basis of their physical presence within the territorial limits of the United States. See id. 1484-85. 13 32 Although the distinction between parole and admission drawn by the panel and the district court is not an implausible one, we conclude that it cannot be reconciled with the Supreme Court's jurisprudence in this area. In particular, we believe that the Court's decision in Mezei is controlling on this issue and that a close examination of the facts at issue in Mezei forecloses us from relying on the arguments that the panel and the district court found persuasive. Thus, we cannot accept appellees' argument that Mezei is not on point because the alien was challenging non-admissibility, not incarceration. The gravamen of Mezei's complaint was clearly not the government's right to exclude him--a permanent exclusion order had already been entered in his case, and he did not contest it in his habeas petition--but the power of the government to continue to detain him without a hearing pending his deportation. See Mezei, 345 U.S. at 207, 73 S.Ct. at 627. Justice Clark stated explicitly in his majority opinion that [t]he issue is whether the Attorney General's continued exclusion of respondent without a hearing amounts to an unlawful detention, so that courts may admit him temporarily to the United States on bond until arrangements are made for his departure abroad. Id. (emphasis added). 33 Mezei thus did not concern admission or exclusion per se, but the rights of an alien when challenging his continued detention pending the enforcement of an exclusion order that has been entered against him. Since the Supreme Court applied the entry doctrine fiction under these circumstances, see id. at 215, 73 S.Ct. at 631, squarely rejecting the territorial argument advanced by the second circuit majority, 14 the doctrine's applicability clearly is not limited to challenges relating to the admission decision itself. 15 See also Pierre v. United States, 547 F.2d 1281, 1283, 1289-90 (5th Cir.) (entry doctrine fiction applied to aliens seeking parole pending decision on petition for asylum), vacated and remanded to consider mootness, 434 U.S. 962, 98 S.Ct. 498, 54 L.Ed.2d 447 (1977); Ahrens v. Rojas, 292 F.2d at 408-11 (entry doctrine bars excludable alien from claiming fifth amendment right to a hearing on the revocation of his parole). We therefore conclude that Mezei compels us to hold that the Haitian plaintiffs in this case cannot claim equal protection rights under the fifth amendment, even with regard to challenging the Executive's exercise of its parole discretion. 16 34 We realize, of course, that Mezei --like its predecessor, Knauff --has been heavily criticized by academic commentators, 17 As an intermediate appellate court, however, we cannot properly question the continued authority of this Supreme Court precedent--a precedent that the Court cited without reconsideration as recently as last Term. See Plasencia, 459 U.S. at 32, 103 S.Ct. at 329. With regard to the key issue here--whether the grant or denial of parole is an integral part of the admissions process--Mezei is fully in accord with other, less controversial precedents. As far back as 1896 the Supreme Court approved the validity of detention 35 as part of the means necessary to give effect to the provisions for the exclusion or expulsion of aliens.... Proceedings to exclude or expel would be vain if those accused could not be held in custody pending the inquiry into their true character, and while arrangements were being made for their deportation. 36 Wong Wing v. United States, 163 U.S. 228, 235, 16 S.Ct. 977, 980, 41 L.Ed. 140 (1896); see also Carlson v. Landon, 342 U.S. 524, 538, 72 S.Ct. 525, 533, 96 L.Ed. 547 (1952) (Detention is necessarily a part of this deportation procedure. Otherwise aliens arrested for deportation would have opportunities to hurt the United States during the pendency of deportation proceedings.). 18 37 These decisions reflect policy imperatives and fundamental principles of national sovereignty that cannot be easily dismissed, regardless of the individual merits of the Court's decisions in Knauff and Mezei. 19 The reason that Congress has passed legislation regulating the admission of aliens is its concern about how their entry will affect the economic, political, and social well-being of this nation. The grant of parole is subject to certain restrictions and is theoretically of a short-term character, 20 but it does permit the physical entry of the alien into the midst of our society and implicates many of the same considerations--such as employment and national security concerns--that justify restrictions on admission. Parole is an act of extraordinary sovereign generosity, since it grants temporary admission into our society to an alien who has no legal right to enter and who would probably be turned away at the border if he sought to enter by land, rather than coming by sea or air. Judge Learned Hand emphasized this point in his dissent to the second circuit's decision in Mezei, stating: 38 I do not believe that an alien so situated can force us to admit him at all. Suppose ... that the respondent had refused to let him leave the ship. I do not see what legal process Mezei could have invoked to get ashore before she left; nor do I see what theory supports the claim that, because we did not impose upon him this harsher alternative, but ex gratia, allowed him to land until his case was decided, we must grant him even a limited version of that entry which the statute denies him. For we must remember that the order [releasing Mezei upon bond] does give him a privilege of entry.... Moreover, although that privilege is hedged about in various ways, he will be able nevertheless to mingle with the mass of citizens.... 39 United States ex rel. Mezei v. Shaughnessy, 195 F.2d 964, 970-71 (L. Hand, J., dissenting) (1952). We follow Judge Hand and the Supreme Court in concluding that since the immediate implications of parole and legal admission are identical in a number of important respects, excludable aliens cannot challenge either admission or parole decisions under a claim of constitutional right. 40 Of course, there are certain circumstances under which even excludable aliens are accorded rights under the Constitution. Appellees seize on these exceptions as a basis for denying the validity of the entry doctrine fiction entirely, asserting that [t]he critical factor in determining whether the Fifth Amendment applies is not the citizenship or immigration status of the person, but the mere fact of government action.... [T]he Constitution limits the power of government whenever, wherever, and upon whomever the government acts. If this view were correct, all aliens in all circumstances would presumably be entitled to the full range of constitutional protections. This is clearly not the case. Instead, the courts have made it plain that the degree of constitutional protection accorded an alien in a particular situation is to be determined by such factors as the legal status of the alien and the context of the government action he seeks to challenge. For example, those with the status of deportable aliens are constitutionally entitled to rights in the deportation context that are inapplicable to exclusion proceedings. Illegal or resident aliens may also claim other rights under the fifth and fourteenth amendments. See, e.g., Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202, 102 S.Ct. 2382, 72 L.Ed.2d 786 (1982); Hampton v. Mow Sun Wong, 426 U.S. 88, 96 S.Ct. 1895, 48 L.Ed.2d 495 (1976); Graham v. Richardson, 403 U.S. 365, 91 S.Ct. 1848, 29 L.Ed.2d 534 (1971); Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U.S. 356, 6 S.Ct. 1064, 30 L.Ed. 220 (1886). 21 41 The courts have also recognized that aliens can raise constitutional challenges to deprivations of liberty or property outside the context of entry or admission, when the plenary authority of the political branches is not implicated. Aliens seized by United States officials for suspected involvement in criminal activity are entitled to the same constitutional rights that normally apply in such proceedings. See, e.g., Wong Wing, 163 U.S. at 238, 16 S.Ct. at 981 ([A]liens shall not be held to answer for a capital or other infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.); 22 United States v. Henry, 604 F.2d 908, 914 (5th Cir.1979) ([A]n alien who is within the territorial jurisdiction of this country, whether it be at the border or in the interior, in a proper case and at the proper time, is entitled to those protections guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment in criminal proceedings which would include the Miranda warning.). The courts have further ruled that aliens who are the victims of unconstitutional government action abroad are protected by the Bill of Rights if the government seeks to exploit fruits of its unlawful conduct in a criminal proceeding in the United States. United States v. Demanett, 629 F.2d 862, 866 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 450 U.S. 910, 101 S.Ct. 1347, 67 L.Ed.2d 333 (1980); United States v. Toscanino, 500 F.2d 267, 280 (2d Cir.1974); cf. United States v. Tiede, 86 F.R.D. 227, 242-44 (U.S. Ct. for Berlin 1979) (protections of Bill of Rights apply to friendly aliens in the American sector of West Berlin). The Supreme Court has also recognized that even non-resident aliens are entitled to the protection of the fifth amendment's prohibition on unlawful takings. Russian Volunteer Fleet v. United States, 282 U.S. 481, 489, 491-92, 51 S.Ct. 229, 232, 75 L.Ed. 473 (1931). 42 These authorities, however, do not mandate the conclusion that excludable aliens such as the Haitian plaintiffs can claim equal protection rights under the fifth amendment with regard to parole. Russian Volunteer Fleet can be distinguished because it clearly does not implicate in any way the powers of the national government over immigration. When the government seizes the property of foreign nationals within this country, its actions do not fall within a sphere of plenary executive and legislative authority, and it therefore cannot claim that the aliens involved are entitled only to the degree of due process that Congress is prepared to extend them as a matter of grace. 43 Similar considerations apply in the context of criminal prosecutions. When the government subjects an alien to the criminal process it is plainly no longer seeking to effectuate its power to control admission into the United States by removing the alien from this country. The arrests of the aliens in Wong Wing and Henry may have grown out of the Executive's efforts to control the entry of foreigners into the United States, 23 but the decision by government officials to subject them to criminal prosecution or punishment, rather than deportation, completely changed the nature of the proceedings. From that point forward any action taken by the government derived not from its power to control admission into this country, but from the powers of the Executive over law enforcement. The government's actions in prosecuting Henry and imprisoning Wong Wing therefore fell outside the plenary power to control immigration that justifies the extraordinary executive and congressional latitude in that area. This critical distinction was emphasized by the Court in Wong Wing: 44 No limits can be put by the courts upon the power of congress to protect, by summary methods, the country from the advent of aliens.... But to declare unlawful residence within the country to be an infamous crime, punishable by deprivation of liberty and property, would be to pass out of the sphere of constitutional legislation, unless provision were made that the fact of guilt should first be established by a judicial trial. 45 163 U.S. at 237, 16 S.Ct. at 981 (emphasis added). Similarly, the fifth circuit in Henry stressed that the excludable alien in that case was entitled to the rights guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment, including the Miranda warning, only when the questioning of the immigration officials became an interrogation that was custodial in nature in which information was sought for the purpose of using it against him in a criminal proceeding. 604 F.2d at 914 (emphasis added). 46 These holdings reflect the Supreme Court's recognition of a significant distinction between the degree of due process protection implicated by statutory provisions that contemplate only the exclusion or expulsion of [aliens] and those which provide for their imprisonment at hard labor, pending which their deportation is suspended. Wong Wing, 163 U.S. at 236, 16 S.Ct. at 980. This principle is also reflected in Supreme Court decisions holding that the full panoply of due process rights is not applicable in deportation proceedings because they are not criminal in character. See, e.g., Galvan v. Press, 347 U.S. 522, 531, 74 S.Ct. 737, 742, 98 L.Ed. 911 (1954); Fong Yue Ting, 149 U.S. at 730, 13 S.Ct. at 1028. 24 47 Some courts and commentators have suggested that when an exercise of the government's power to exclude results in an indefinite detention of an excludable alien, at some point the continued imprisonment becomes punishment, regardless of the legal justifications or fictions involved. These authorities contend that at this juncture the government should be required to make some justification to continue to detain the alien. See, e.g., Rodriguez-Fernandez v. Wilkinson, 654 F.2d 1382, 1387 (10th Cir.1981); Soroa-Gonzalez v. Civiletti, 515 F.Supp. 1049, 1056 n. 6 (N.D.Ga.1981); Fernandez-Roque v. Smith, 91 F.R.D. 239, 243 (N.D.Ga.1981), appeal dismissed, 671 F.2d 426 (11th Cir.1982); Note, Constitutional Limits on the Power to Exclude Aliens, 82 Colum.L.Rev. 957, 980 (1982); Note, The Constitutional Rights of Excluded Aliens: Proposed Limitations on the Indefinite Detention of the Cuban Refugees, 70 Geo.L.J. 1303, 1306 (1982). In Rodriguez-Fernandez, for example, the tenth circuit ruled that detention of excludable aliens is permissible during proceedings to determine eligibility to enter and, thereafter, during a reasonable period of negotiations for their return to the country of origin.... After that time, the alien is entitled to release unless the government can demonstrate that the detention is still temporary pending expulsion, and not simply incarceration as an alternative to departure. 654 F.2d at 1389-90. 25 48 We could distinguish Rodriguez-Fernandez from this case on the grounds that the former involved an alien against whom an exclusion order had already been entered and who was clearly unable to return to his country of origin. 26 Indeed, the tenth circuit placed no time limits on the government's ability to detain excludable aliens pending the admission decision. Id. at 1389. Nevertheless, we detect two significant problems that prevent us from endorsing the tenth circuit's reasoning. The first--which is controlling from our point of view--is that it cannot be reconciled with the Supreme Court's decision in Mezei, which held that an excludable alien could not challenge his continued detention without a hearing. The second difficulty is that if the prospect of indefinite detention is held to be sufficient to require the government to meet some judicially-imposed standard to continue to detain an alien, the plenary authority of the political branches in the exclusion area is largely rendered nugatory. The prospect of indefinite confinement, after all, can be raised by the refusal of an excludable alien to return home, or the refusal of his country of origin or any other country to accept him. 49 This is the critical flaw with the second circuit's decision in Mezei and the tenth circuit's decision in Rodriguez-Fernandez, each of which based the alien's right to challenge his continued confinement on whether or not he had a foreseeable chance of being able to go elsewhere. At first glance, this is an attractive solution. It seems both humane and eminently realistic, because it does not turn on legal fictions and distinctions that appear to lack practical substance. Unfortunately, this approach would ultimately result in our losing control over our borders. A foreign leader could eventually compel us to grant physical admission via parole to any aliens he wished by the simple expedient of sending them here and then refusing to take them back. In the probable absence of any reliable information about such aliens beyond what they cared to provide, could the government meet its burden under some judicially-imposed standard of showing that indefinite detention was justified? It seems unlikely. 50 Mindful of the Supreme Court's warning that [a]ny rule of constitutional law that would inhibit the flexibility of the political branches of government to respond to changing world conditions should be adopted only with the greatest caution, Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U.S. 67, 81, 96 S.Ct. 1883, 1892, 48 L.Ed.2d 478 (1976), we conclude that we must resist the temptation to tamper with the authority of the Executive by ruling that excludable aliens have constitutional rights in this area, even with regard to their applications for parole.