Opinion ID: 4553022
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Origins of the Public Charge Ground

Text: The public charge ground has its roots in concerns that arose in the late nineteenth century that foreign nations were addressing poverty within their own borders by funding passage to the United States for their poorer citizens. See 13 CONG. REC. 5,109 (1882). As one of the primary immigrant-receiving states, 42 New York in particular was concerned that, upon arrival, these non-citizens “bec[a]me at once a public charge . . . get[ting] into our poor-houses and almshouses.” Id. In response to the costs of supporting new arrivals and other expenditures associated with its role overseeing the immigration process, New York attempted to impose various taxes and bonds on arriving immigrants, as well as the shipping companies providing their transport. See id. at 5,107. The Supreme Court, however, repeatedly struck down these state statutes as unconstitutional, on the grounds that the Constitution vested the power to “regulate commerce with foreign nations,” U.S. CONST. art. I, § 8, cl. 3, in Congress. See, e.g., Henderson v. Mayor of New York, 92 U.S. 259, 270 (1875). New York thus turned to Congress for assistance, lobbying for the enactment of two provisions that ultimately became law with the Immigration Act of 1882: the public charge ground of exclusion and the immigrant fund. The inaugural public charge statute directs immigration inspectors to board arriving ships and refuse permission to land to any passenger who is “unable to take care of himself or herself without becoming a public charge[.]” Immigration Act of 1882, Pub. L. No. 47-376, § 2, 22 Stat. 214, 214. While denying entry to those who could not care for themselves, the Act simultaneously established an “immigrant 43 fund,” which was to be used, inter alia, “for the care of immigrants arriving in the United States, [and] for the relief of such as are in distress.” Id. § 1. By these provisions, the Act established a scheme that distinguished between those arriving immigrants who were “unable to take care of [themselves]” and those who were merely “in distress.” Id. §§ 1, 2. The former were to be excluded; the latter provided with financial support. Representatives from New York spoke in favor of this two-part design, applauding the effort to exclude those who would depend on public assistance while offering words of praise for the immigrants who may arrive in need of some aid but ultimately go on to “learn our language, adapt themselves readily to our institutions, and become a valuable component part of the body-politic.”13 CONG. REC. 5,108 (statement of Rep. Van Voorhis). Early interpretations of the term “public charge” from this era come principally from state courts and treat the term as somewhat interchangeable with “pauper,” distinguishable from those who were simply poor by the permanence of the condition. For example, the Massachusetts Supreme Court explained that a bond could be required for arriving immigrants who had “been paupers in a foreign land; that is, for those who have been a public charge in another country; and not merely destitute persons, who, on their arrival here, 44 have no visible means of support[.]” City of Boston v. Capen, 61 Mass. 116, 121 (Mass. 1851). The court affirmed that the bond was necessary only from “those who, by reason of some permanent disability, are unable to maintain themselves” and who “might become a heavy and long continued charge to the city, town, or state, in this country[.]” Id. at 122; see also State v. The S.S. Constitution, 42 Cal. 578, 582 (Cal. 1872); City of Alton v. Cty. of Madison, 21 Ill. 115, 116 (Ill. 1859). Congress amended the immigration laws in 1891, making slight revisions to the public charge ground of exclusion while adding for the first time a public charge ground of deportation. See Immigration Act of 1891, Pub. L. No. 51-551, §§ 1, 11, 26 Stat. 1084, 1084, 1086. Under the terms of the 1891 Act, “[a]ll idiots, insane persons, [and] paupers or persons likely to become a public charge” were to be excluded from admission, id. § 1, while a non-citizen who became “a public charge within one year after his arrival in the United States” could be deported, id. § 11. In 1907, Congress again made modest revisions to the public charge ground, amending the law to exclude “paupers; persons likely to become a public charge; [and] professional beggars[.]” Immigration Act of 1907, Pub. L. No. 59-96, § 2, 34 Stat. 898, 899. A few years after the 1907 Act, the Supreme Court 45 weighed in on the meaning of “public charge” in its first and (as of yet) only interpretation of the term. In Gegiow v. Uhl, 239 U.S. 3 (1915), the Court considered the case of two Russian immigrants who had been found likely to become public charges because they arrived with little money; were bound for Portland, Oregon, where work was scarce; and had no one legally obligated to support them. Id. at 8. In its analysis, the Court emphasized that “public charge” was listed alongside “paupers” and “professional beggars” in the statute, reasoning that the term should “be read as generically similar to the others mentioned before and after.” Id. at 10. Accordingly, the Court concluded that a “public charge,” like the other categories of persons mentioned, must be defined by some kind of “permanent personal objections.” Id. Because the Russian immigrants had been deemed likely public charges based on the Portland labor market, rather than on any intrinsic and problematic characteristics of their own, the Court reversed the determination. Citing Gegiow, we declared ourselves “convinced” in a subsequent decision that “Congress meant [public charge] to exclude persons who were likely to become occupants of almshouses for want of means with which to support themselves in the future.” Howe v. United States ex rel. Savitsky, 247 F. 292, 294 (2d 46 Cir. 1917). The Ninth Circuit adopted our interpretation in Ng Fung Ho v. White, 266 F. 765, 769 (9th Cir. 1920), rev’d in part on other grounds, 259 U.S. 276, 285 (1922). Other circuits adopted a somewhat broader interpretation of the term as encompassing “not only those persons who through misfortune cannot be selfsupporting, but also those who will not undertake honest pursuits, and who are likely to become periodically the inmates of prisons[,]” Lam Fung Yen v. Frick, 233 F. 393, 396 (6th Cir. 1916) (internal quotation marks omitted); see United States ex rel. Medich v. Burmaster, 24 F.2d 57, 59 (8th Cir. 1928). But those interpretations as well emphasized the habitual and persistent nature of the dependency that would render one a public charge.