Court Opinion

ID: 8894483
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-11-26 23:44:15.02753+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:07:23.902354
License: Public Domain

TRASK, Circuit Judge
(concurring):
I join in the decision of the majority but follow a different course to the common conclusion.
First of all, it appears clear to me that the Charter of the United Nations is not self-executing and does not in and of itself create rights which are justicia-ble between individual litigants. Although under Article VI of the *101Constitution1 treaties are part of the supreme law of the land, it was early held that to be immediately binding upon our courts a treaty must be self-executing. Chief Justice Marshall enunciated this principle in Foster v. Neilson, 27 U.S. (2 Pet.) 253, 314, 7 L.Ed. 415 (1829):2
“Our constitution declares a treaty to be the law of the land. It is, consequently, to be regarded in courts of justice as equivalent to an act of the legislature, whenever it operates of itself, without the aid of any legislative provision. But when the terms of the stipulation import a contract — when either of the parties engages to perform a particular act, the treaty addresses itself to the political, not the judicial department; and the legislature must execute the contract, before it can become a rule for the court.”
Unless a treaty is self-executing, in order to be cognizable before the courts it must be implemented by legislation. Otherwise it constitutes a compact between sovereign and independent nations dependent for its recognition and enforcement upon the honor and the continuing self-interest of the parties to it. If, however, the treaty contains language which confers rights or obligations on the citizenry of the compacting nations then, upon ratification, it becomes a part of the law of the land under Article VI. In Head Money Cases, 112 U.S. 580, 5 S.Ct. 247, 28 L.Ed. 798 (1884), the Court said:
“A treaty, then, is the law of the land as an act of Congress is, whenever its provisions prescribe a rule by which the rights of the private citizen or subject may be determined. And when such rights are of a nature to be enforced in a court of justice, that court resorts to the treaty for a rule of decision for the case before it as it would to a statute.” 112 U.S. at 598-599, 5 S.Ct. at 254.
I find nothing in a reading of the Charter and nothing has been called to my attention which would persuade me to believe that the Charter itself creates individual rights which may be enforced in the courts.3 There is little definitive case law elucidating the issue of self-implementation vel non. The appellants have referred to some of the cases in which reference to the Charter has been made.4
*102Those cases are of questionable precedential value. Looking in the opposite direction we find cases that are subject to much the same criticism. The only-case which straightforwardly holds in broad terms that the Charter is not self-executing is Pauling v. McElroy, 164 F.Supp. 390 (D.D.C.1958), aff’d per curiam on other grounds, 101 U.S.App. D.C. 372, 278 F.2d 252, cert. denied, 364 U.S. 835, 81 S.Ct. 61, 5 L.Ed.2d 60 (1960). The District Court in Pauling stated:
“The provisions of the Charter of the United Nations, the Trusteeship Agreement for the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, and the international law principle of freedom of the seas relied on by plaintiffs are not self-executing and do not vest any of the plaintiffs with individual legal rights which they may assert in this Court. The claimed violations of such international obligations and principles may be asserted only by diplomatic negotiations between the sov-ereignties concerned.” 164 F.Supp. 393.
In Hitai v. Immigration & Naturalization Service, 343 F.2d 466, 468 (2d Cir. 1965), the court held that Article 55 of the Charter was not self-executing. Both from the standpoint of the inherent nature of treaty obligations and what appears to me to be a plain reading of the language of the Charter, I would hold it to be a compact between sovereign nations neither intending to impart justiciable rights to individuals nor implicitly doing so.
This position is fortified, it would seem, by the very fact that the Charter provided for a system of trusteeship. Chapter XI, which contains Article 73, is a mutual declaration of the members of their responsibilities for the administration of territories whose peoples have not yet attained a complete competence of self-government. Chapter XII and Chapter XIII then provide for the International Trusteeship System for the administration and supervision of those territories. Under those Articles a Trusteeship Agreement was executed between the Security Council of the United Nations and the United States, as administering authority effective July 18, 1947, for the Territory of the Pacific Islands.5 It provided the United States with the authority to enact a comprehensive system of government under Article 6.6
*103Congress has empowered the President with authority for the civil administration of the Territory until Congress itself should further establish a system of government. 48 U.S.C. § 1681. Under this statutory basis, a series of Executive orders delegated responsibility for government to the Department of the Interior, see Exec. Order No. 11,021, 3 C.F.R. 600 (1959-63 Comp.), 48 U.S.C. § 1681, and that Department eventually promulgated a single document combining previous orders into one basic order for the Government of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. Dept. of Interior Order No. 2918, Dec. 27, 1968, 34 Fed.Reg. 157 (1969). This consolidated order constituted a mini-organic act creating legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the Government with a Congress, a High Commissioner as the Chief executive, and a High Court of the Trust Territory with a Chief Justice and Associate Justices appointed by the Secretary of the Interior.
I agree with the federal appellees and with the court in Pauling v. McElroy, supra, that the Trusteeship Agreement is not self-executing.7 Yet, a series of actions all ultimately founded upon congressional authority have so executed the Agreement that its provisions may now properly be regarded as judicially enforceable. Thus, the Agreement was approved by the President pursuant to a joint resolution of Congress, see note 5 supra, and implemented by Executive orders promulgated pursuant to congressional authority, 48 U.S.C. § 1681. Finally, the Trust Territory Government, created by the Department of the Interior, has declared the Agreement “to be in full force and to have the effect of law in the Trust Territory.” 1 T.T.C. § 101(1).
The Trust Territory Code provides:
“The Trial Division of the High Court shall have original jurisdiction to try all causes, civil and criminal, including probate, admiralty, and maritime matters and the adjudication of title to land or any interest therein.” 5 T.T. C. § 53.
All decisions rendered in such matters are subject to review by the Appellate Division under 55 T.T.C. § 54(1)(a). It thus appears to me as it does to the majority that jurisdiction does lie with the High Court to determine the validity of the lease in accordance with its own law and any other law affecting the lease or the lands to which the lease is applicable. Based upon considerations of comity, I agree that this cause should initially be addressed to the High Court.

. “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.” U.S. Const, art. VI.

. The decision in Foster was overruled by United States v. Percheman, 32 U.S. (7 Pet.) 51, 8 L.Ed. 604 (1883), in an opinion also written by Chief Justice Marshall when new facts were brought to bear upon the controversy, but the legal principle announced in Foster was not undermined. See Valentine v. United States ex rel. Neidecker, 299 U.S. 5, 10, 57 S.Ct. 100, 81 L.Ed. 5 (1936); Head Money Cases, 112 U.S. 580, 598-599, 5 S.Ct. 247, 28 L.Ed. 798 (1884); L. Henkin, Foreign Affairs and the Constitution 156-58 (1972); Comment, Criteria for Self-Executing Treaties, 1968 U.Ill.L.F. 238, 239.

. The fact that a treaty was ratified by the President of the United States upon the advice and consent of two-thirds of the Senate, as was the United Nations Charter (Charter of the United Nations, June 26, 1945, 59 Stat. 1031, 1213, T.S.No.993 (effective Oct. 24, 1945)), makes it a commitment of the nation but does not necessarily impart rights and obligations to individual citizens.

. In concurring opinions in Oyama v. California, 332 U.S. 633, 649-650, 673, 68 S.Ct. 269, 92 L.Ed. 249 (1948), Justices Black, Douglas, and Murphy intimate that Articles 55 and 56 of the Charter support a position proscribing racial discrimination; a dissenting opinion in Hurd v. Hodge, 82 U.S.App.D.C. 180, 162 F.2d 233, 245 (1947), rev’d, 334 U.S. 24, 68 S.Ct. 847, 92 L.Ed. 1187 (1948), is much the same. In an appeal from a contempt-of-Congress conviction for the refusal of a United Nations’ employee to answer whether anyone had aided lier in obtaining employment, Article 105 was discussed but the actual decision was based upon other grounds. Keeney v. United States, 94 U.S.App.D.C. 366, 218 F.2d 843, 845 (1954). Diggs v. Shultz, 152 U.S.App.D.C. 313, 470 F.2d. 461 (1972), cert. denied, *102411 U.S. 931, 93 S.Ct. 1897, 36 L.Ed.2d 390 (1973), was a case in which the plain tiffs sought relief against the Secretary of the Treasury because of an official authorization of importation of metals contrary to the terms of a United Nations’ embargo in which the United States had joined. Relief was denied because of the nonjusticiability of the claim under the separation-of-powers doctrine, although the court did hold that the plaintiffs had standing to litigate the issue of the failure of the defendants to adhere to the Government’s treaty obligations. In Diggs, however, the relevant provision of the Charter, Article 41, had been implemented by Congress through the enactment of 22 U.S.C. § 287c, which authorizes the President to effectuate Article 41 sanctions and prescribes criminal penalties for those individuals disobeying such Presidential orders. Indeed, pursuant to this statutory authority, the President had issued Executive orders banning the importation of the items in question. Exec. Order No. 11,419, 3 C.F.R. 737 (1966-70 Comp.), 22 U.S.C. § 287c; Exec. Order No. 11,322, 3 C.F.R. 606 (1966-70 Comp.), 22 U.S.C. § 287c; see Diggs v. Shultz, 470 F.2d at 463.

. Trusteeship Agreement for the Former Japanese Mandated Islands, July 18, 1947, 61 Stat. 3301, T.I.A.S. No. 1665. The Agreement was approved by the President on July 18, 1947, pursuant to the authority of a joint resolution of Congress of the same date. 61 Stat. 397 (1947).

. Trusteeship Agreement, art. 12. Article 6 provides in pertinent part that the administering authority [the United States] shall:
“1. foster the development of such political institutions as are suited to the trust territory and shall promote the development of the inhabitants of the trust territory toward self-government or independence . . . ;
“2. promote the economic advancement and self-sufficiency of the inhabitants
“3. promote the social advancement of the inhabitants . . . ; and
*103“4. promote the educational advancement of the inhabitants . . . . ” 61 Stat. at 3302-3303.

. The language of the Agreement, and in particular that of Article 6, the specific provision at issue in this suit, evinces a series of general commitments undertaken by the United States in furtherance of particular social objectives. See note 6 supra. That these phrases may become workable through judicial construction, as the majority opines, does not detract from the probability that, had the drafters of the instrument intended the document to have the effect of a statute, more precise language delimiting the rights of Micronesians would have been employed. Compare Head Money Cases, 112 U.S. 580, 598-599, 5 S.Ct. 247, 28 U.Ed. 798 (1884); Hauenstein v. Lynham, 100 U.S. 483, 25 L.Ed. 628 (1879). Moreover, the Agreement, in Article 12, states:
“The administering authority shall enact such legislation as may be necessary to place the provisions of this agreement in effect in the trust territory.”
Since, under the Constitution of the “administering authority” (the United States), self-executing treaties are effective upon ratification, this provision, as drafted, would not have been necessary had the drafter^ intended the Agreement to be self-executing.