Opinion ID: 326898
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The administrative inspection analogy is inapposite.

Text: 43 In Almeida the government attempted to justify its roving patrol searches under the administrative inspection doctrine. However, the Court, including Justice Powell, found Colonnade Catering Corp. v. United States, 1970, 397 U.S. 72, 90 S.Ct. 774, 25 L.Ed.2d 60, and United States v. Biswell, 1972, 406 U.S. 311, 92 S.Ct. 1593, 32 L.Ed.2d 87, inapposite because they approved warrantless administrative inspections of commercial enterprises engaged in businesses, the sale of liquor and guns respectively, which were closely regulated by the government. Similarly the Court, including Justice Powell, found Camara v. Municipal Court, 1967, 387 U.S. 523, 87 S.Ct. 1727, 18 L.Ed.2d 930, and See v. City of Seattle, 1967, 387 U.S. 541, 87 S.Ct. 1737, 18 L.Ed.2d 943, of no avail because in those cases the Court said that it would uphold administrative inspections to enforce community health and welfare regulations where made under a warrant supported by particular physical and demographic characteristics of the area to be searched. 44 However, Justice Powell saw in the latter two cases an analogy to the problem of enforcing the immigration laws in a border area (emphasis ours 413 U.S. at 281, 93 S.Ct. 2535) that led him to postulate the existence of a functional equivalent of probable cause that might justify a roving patrol search. 11 The government argued in Almeida that roving patrol checks of automobiles were the only feasible means of apprehending illegal aliens who crossed the border surreptitiously. 12 Recognizing the seriousness and legitimacy of the law enforcement problem and the necessity of safeguarding Fourth Amendment interests, Justice Powell proposed a resolution to balance these two contending forces. 45 By analogy to Camara, Justice Powell hypothesized a functional equivalent of probable cause for roving searches based on (1) a long history of judicial and public acceptance of the type of search; (2) the need to conduct such a search given the absence of alternatives for vindicating the public interest; and (3) the limited invasion of privacy occasioned by inspections which are neither personal in nature nor aimed at the discovery of evidence of crime. 413 U.S. at 278, 93 S.Ct. at 2542. Camara, supra, 387 U.S. at 537, 87 S.Ct. 1727. Justice Powell found the first two criteria satisfied in the roving patrol context. 13 However, because roving patrol searches, and checkpoint operations for that matter, are both personal and crime-investigative, Justice Powell abstracted the broader criterion of a limited invasion of privacy. Finding support in the facts that roving patrols, though not border searches per se, were incidental to the protection of the border and that they involved searches of automobiles rather than persons or buildings, Justice Powell concluded that roving patrols can be considered a modest intrusion on Fourth Amendment interests, 413 U.S. at 279, 93 S.Ct. 2535. He thus concluded that there exists a constitutionally adequate equivalent of probable cause for roving vehicular searches in border areas. 46 Given an adequate equivalent of probable cause, Justice Powell would validate roving patrol searches if they are judicially authorized in advance by an appropriately drawn area warrant. Conceding that the standards defining cause for issuance of such unprecedented area warrants are relatively unstructured, Justice Powell proposed four relevant factors: 47 (i) the frequency with which aliens illegally in the country are known or reasonably believed to be transported within a particular area; (ii) the proximity of the area in question to the border; (iii) the extensiveness and geographic characteristics of the area, including the roads therein and the extent of their use (footnote omitted) and (iv) the probable degree of interference with the rights of innocent persons, taking into account the scope of the proposed search, its duration, and the concentration of illegal alien traffic in relation to the general traffic of the road or area. 48 413 U.S. at 283-84, 93 S.Ct. at 2545. 49 Were we to accept Justice Powell's premise that an appropriately drawn area warrant would justify a roving patrol, and the government's corollary that an appropriately drawn area warrant would justify a fixed checkpoint, we would still conclude on the facts of the cases now before us that Justice Powell's proposed standards are not satisfied here. 14 However, we conclude that Justice Powell's premise and the government's corollary themselves are unsatisfactory. 50 We cannot accept the notion that an area warrant can constitutionally authorize immigration checkpoint operations in the interior of the United States because we think that the analogy to the administrative inspection cases is inapt and because we think that the concept of an area warrant, under these circumstances, is contrary to certain fundamental precepts of the Fourth Amendment, as revealed by its antecedent history. 51 What troubles us most about the administrative inspection analogy, proposed by Justice Powell for roving patrols in border areas and now urged by the government for fixed checkpoints, is the government's suggestion that somehow the asserted need to conduct such immigration seizures and searches establishes adequate cause to disrupt the normal flow of traffic on a major highway. The notion that law enforcement needs alone justify such intrusions was put to rest by the majority in Almeida: 52 It is not enough to argue, as does the Government, that the problem of deterring unlawful entry by aliens across long expanses of national boundaries is a serious one. The needs of law enforcement stand in constant tension with the Constitution's protections of the individual against certain exercises of official power. It is precisely the predictability of these pressures that counsels a resolute loyalty to constitutional safeguards. 53 413 U.S. at 273, 93 S.Ct. at 2540. Under Camara, to be sure, the absence of workable alternatives, coupled with a comparatively unobtrusive regulatory inspection, may render such an inspection constitutionally reasonable if conducted under a suitable area warrant. However, Camara was a different case from the ones now before us in just two crucial respects. 54 First, there was no doubt in Camara that the only way to discover certain dilapidations that violated the housing codes, such as faulty internal wiring, was to conduct routine periodic building inspections. 387 U.S. at 535-37, 87 S.Ct. 1727. In contrast, the influx of illegal aliens could conceivably be stemmed in various ways. It is not our business to tell the executive how to enforce the laws, nor to tell the Congress what laws to enact. But when, as in this case, the government chooses to pitch its case upon an alleged unavoidable necessity if the laws are to be successfully enforced, we feel compelled to comment on the claimed necessity. 55 Efforts at the border to repel aliens who attempt entry by stealth and subterfuge can, given additional manpower, be intensified. We note that given the present border patrol manpower, there are simply two few fingers to plug the many leaks in the dike, and we do not underestimate the cost of intensifying the line watch patrols on the physical border. Nonetheless, the mere fact that protecting a constitutional right will impose a heavy burden on the federal fisc is not a proper ground for our failing to protect that right. Checkpoint operations must meet constitutional standards regardless of their utility in carrying forward the difficult mission of the Border Patrol. Bowen, supra, 500 F.2d at 963. 56 Nor are the government's alternatives exhausted with intensifying the line watch. The major forces that bring aliens to this country from Mexico are economic. Here they can get jobs, and jobs at higher wages than they can earn at home. At the same time, and because they are in this country illegally, they cannot complain about the working conditions or wages on the jobs that they obtain in this country. This produces an almost irresistible economic incentive to American employers to employ them. They are cheap and docile labor. We know that in many cases the terms and conditions under which they are employed are deplorable. In this respect they compete, and compete unfairly, with American labor. Congress could, if it would, neutralize these forces by imposing sanctions on employers who hire illegal aliens. 15 57 There are other actions that might be taken. The I-151, or green card program, and the I-186 temporary border pass card program could be eliminated. Congress could require that every alien entering from Mexico have a valid passport and entry visa. This might interrupt or reduce the extensive shopping that card holders now do in American border cities, but it is an alternative open to the Congress if it finds the illegal alien problem as serious as government counsel tells us that it is. 58 So, too, the Congress could abolish the alien commuter system, which is an obvious subterfuge, that was before the Court in Saxbe v. Bustos, 1974, 419 U.S. 65, 95 S.Ct. 272, 42 L.Ed.2d 231. See Note, Bustos v. Mitchell (Saxbe v. Bustos): The Dilemma of Commuting Alien Laborers, 5 Calif.West.Int'l L.J. 184 (1974). We do not purport to have explored other possibilities. We mention the foregoing only because the government is here claiming necessity as a reason for abandoning constitutional protections. We are not persuaded by the government's argument that operation of the San Clemente checkpoint, and others like it, is the only way to deter the entry of illegal aliens from Mexico. This is not to say, we repeat for emphasis, that even if it were the only way, it would be constitutionally permissible. 59 Moreover, the inspection authorized in Camara was not in the nature of a criminal investigation. There the Court distinguished the administrative inspection for housing code violations, for which an area warrant could issue on less than probable cause to believe that a particular dwelling violated the minimum standards, from a search in a criminal investigation. 60 In cases in which the Fourth Amendment requires that a warrant to search be obtained, probable cause is the standard by which a particular decision to search is tested against the constitutional mandate of reasonableness. To apply this standard, it is obviously necessary first to focus upon the governmental interest which allegedly justifies official intrusion upon the constitutionally protected interests of the private citizen. For example, in a criminal investigation, the police may undertake to recover specific stolen or contraband goods. But that public interest would hardly justify a sweeping search of an entire city conducted in the hope that these goods might be found. Consequently, a search for these goods, even with a warrant, is reasonable only when there is probable cause to believe that they will be uncovered in a particular dwelling. 61 Unlike the search pursuant to a criminal investigation, the inspection programs at issue here are aimed at securing city-wide compliance with minimum physical standards for private property. The primary government interest at stake is to prevent even the unintentional development of conditions which are hazardous to public health and safety. . . . 62 . . . (B)ecause the inspections are neither personal in nature nor aimed at the discovery of evidence of crime, they involve a relatively limited invasion of the urban citizen's privacy. 387 U.S. at 534-35, 537, 87 S.Ct. at 1734. 63 That the border patrol checkpoint operations are both personal in nature and aimed at the discovery of evidence of a crime is beyond dispute. Inherent in the government's argument here, and in its argument in Almeida (413 U.S. at 278, 93 S.Ct. 2535 (Powell, J., concurring)), is the fallacy that its practice of simply deporting aliens rather than prosecuting them gives its operations a quasi-administrative aspect. Although most aliens are simply deported, it is nonetheless true that the government does seek to prosecute virtually all smugglers of illegal aliens. Baca, R.T. 462-65. See Baca, supra, 368 F.Supp. at 406 (particular attention paid to smuggling operations). Furthermore, border patrol agents are armed with service revolvers. Baca R.T. 255, 289. They are law enforcement officers and cannot rationally be viewed as administrative personnel. Id. at 256. The very facts of the three appeals now before us attest to their criminal law enforcement duties and activities. The checkpoints perform primarily crime-investigative rather than administrative functions. 64 Precisely because the checkpoint operations are part of a crime investigation scheme rather than a regulatory scheme, we think what Mr. Justice Clark said in his dissent to Camara and See with respect to the administrative inspection warrants there approved applies to the San Clemente checkpoint warrant of inspection. It sets up a newfangled 'warrant' system that is entirely foreign to Fourth Amendment standards. 387 U.S. at 547, 87 S.Ct. at 1741. 65 The San Clemente warrant of inspection is an area or general warrant with many of the objectionable features of the infamous writs of assistance which were anathema to the colonists of Massachusetts in 1761. 16 The writs of assistance were warrants empowering British customs officials and their deputies to search at will in the port of Boston wherever they suspected that they might find imported goods on which no customs duty had been paid, and to break open receptacles or packages suspected of containing such smuggled goods. N. Lasson, History and Development of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution 54 (1937). See generally Horace Gray, Writs of Assistance contained in Appendix I to Quincy's Massachusetts Reports 1761-1772. 66 The primary vices of the writs of assistance, and their precursors, the general writs originating with the Court of Star Chamber, were (1) that the warrants could be issued without sufficient cause; (2) that persons and places were not particularly specified; and (3) that the warrants left too much to the discretion of the bearer. Lasson, supra, at 26. Even before the writs of assistance controversy, Sir Matthew Hale, Lord Chief Justice of the Court of King's Bench from 1671 to 1676, had denounced both blank warrants to apprehend all persons suspected of having committed a given crime and general warrants to search any suspected place for stolen goods. Presaging modern constitutional principles, Hale insisted that valid warrants must specify with particularity the person to be seized or the place to be searched and must establish probable cause therefor to the satisfaction of a magistrate. Sir Matthew Hale, History of the Pleas of the Crown, vol. I at 576-77, 580, vol. II at 110, 112-14, 149-51 (1736). See also Lasson, supra, at 35-36. 67 Articulating his objections to the general warrants in his treatise, Hale wrote: 68 (T)hese warrants are judicial acts, and must be granted upon examination of the fact. And therefore, I take those general warrants dormant, which are made many times before any felony committed, are not justifiable, for it makes the party to be in effect the judge; and therefore searches made by pretense of such general warrants give no more power to the officer or party, than what they may do by law without them. II Hale, supra, at 150. 69 In retrospect, the United States Supreme Court has noted that the writs of assistance issued in Massachusetts in 1761 were considered  'the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most destructive of English liberty, and the fundamental principles of law, that ever was found in an English law book;' since they placed 'the liberty of every man in the hands of every petty officer.'  Boyd v. United States, 1886, 116 U.S. 616, 625, 6 S.Ct. 524, 529, 29 L.Ed. 746. 17 70 The unmistakably parallel vice of the inspection warrant for the San Clemente checkpoint is that, without having issued on probable cause or even founded suspicion focussed on any particular person or vehicle, the warrant purports to authorize agents to do that which they clearly could not do without the warrant: namely, to stop vehicles without cause or founded suspicion. The warrant purports to delegate to the border patrol agent on the point the unfettered discretion to stop any or all cars and to divert them for detention and questioning at secondary. This, we conclude, such a warrant cannot constitutionally do. Cf. Bowen, supra, 500 F.2d at 963-64. The antecedent history of the Fourth Amendment teaches us the dangers of giving judicial sanction to a general area warrant, particularly when it is used for criminal investigative purposes. Like the writs of assistance used to enforce the British colonial customs system, the present day border patrol checkpoints and area warrant partake too much of burning a barn to roast an egg. Lasson, supra, at 68 n. 60. 71