Ex parte Hamaguchi

• Decision Date: 06 April 1908
• Docket Number: 3,260.
• Citation: 161 F. 185
• Parties: Ex parte HAMAGUCHI.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Oregon

161 F. 185

Ex parte HAMAGUCHI.

No. 3,260.

United States Circuit Court, D. Oregon.

April 6, 1908

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

Veazie & Veazie, for petitioner.

W. C Bristol, U.S. Atty., for Inspector Barbour.

WOLVERTON District Judge.

The principal insistence of counsel for petitioner against deportation is: That 'petitioner is held and sentenced on the charge of entering the United States without inspection'; that 'the law contains no provisions against entering the United States at a border point without inspection'; and that 'it (the law) contains no provision against entering contrary to the rules of the Department. It prescribes no penalty for infraction of a rule of the Department.'

Counsel are, I think, proceeding upon a mistaken premise, in that they base their defense upon the assumption that the petitioner is being held solely because he entered the United States without inspection. On the contrary, he is being held for deportation by reason of his being in the United States unlawfully. But of this later.

It is essential that reference be made to some provisions of the law, and to certain rules and regulations of the Department of Commerce and Labor adopted with a view to making the law effective. By section 1 of the immigration act of Congress of February 20, 1907 (chapter 1134, 34 Stat. 898 (U.S. Comp. St Supp. 1907, p. 389)), a tax of $4 is imposed upon every alien entering the United States, and adequate provisions are made for its collection. It is further provided, however, as follows:

'That whenever the President shall be satisfied that passports issued by any foreign government to its citizens to go to any country other than the United States or to any insular possession of the United States or to the Canal Zone are being used for the purpose of enabling the holders to come to the continental territory of the United States to the detriment of labor conditions therein, the President may refuse to permit such citizens of the country issuing such passports to enter the continental territory of the United States from such other country or from such insular possessions or from the Canal Zone.'

By sections 12, 13, 14, and 16 provision is made requiring manifests, a listing, examination by health officers, and due inspection at the port of arrival, of all aliens entering the United States by water transportation. Section 20 provides:

'That any alien who shall enter the United States in violation of law * * * shall, upon the warrant of the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, be taken into custody and deported to the country whence he came.

'Sec. 21. That in case the Secretary of Commerce and Labor shall be satisfied that an alien has been found in the United States in violation of this act, * * * he shall cause such alien * * * to be taken into custody and returned to the country whence he came, as provided by section twenty of this act.

'Sec. 22. That the Commissioner-General of Immigration * * * shall establish such rules and regulations * * * and shall issue from time to time such instruction, not inconsistent with law, as he shall deem best calculated for carrying out the provisions of this act; * * * all under the direction or with the approval of the Secretary of Commerce and Labor.' 'Sec. 32. That the Commissioner-General of Immigration, under the direction or with the approval of the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, shall prescribe rules for the entry and inspection of aliens along the borders of Canada and Mexico, so as not to unnecessarily delay, impede, or annoy passengers in ordinary travel between the United States and said countries, and shall have power to enter into contracts with transportation lines for the said purpose.'

'Sec. 35. That the deportation of aliens arrested within the United States after entry and found to be illegally therein, provided for in this act, shall be to the trans-Atlantic or trans-Pacific ports from which said aliens embarked for the United States; or, if such embarkation was for foreign contiguous territory, to the foreign port at which said aliens embarked for such territory.

'Sec. 36. That all aliens who shall enter the United States except at the seaports thereof, or at such place or places as the Secretary of Commerce and Labor may from time to time designate, shall be adjudged to have entered the country unlawfully and shall be deported as provided by sections twenty and twenty-one of this act: Provided, that nothing contained in this section shall affect the power conferred by section thirty-two of this act upon the Commissioner-General of Immigration to prescribe rules for the entry and inspection of aliens along the borders of canada and Mexico.'

By executive order issued March 14, 1907, in pursuance of the authority extended to the President, it is directed that Japanese and Korean laborers, skilled and unskilled, who have received passports to go to Mexico, Canada, or Hawaii, and come therefrom, shall be refused permission to enter the continental territory of the United States; and the Secretary of Commerce and Labor is authorized to take such measures, and to make and enforce such rules and regulations, as shall be found necessary to carry the order into effect. Immigration regulations were adopted July 1, 1907. Rule 1 relates to the collection of the head tax, and provides, among other things, that:

'The head tax payable on account of aliens entering the United States from foreign contiguous territory shall be levied and collected * * * at Canadian border ports according to the terms of an agreement between the Commissioner-General of Immigration and certain transportation companies, embodied in rules 24 and 25 hereof.'

Rule 24 provides that:

'In accordance with section 36, the following are named as Canadian border ports of entry for aliens; and any alien who enters the United States across such border at any other point shall be deemed to have entered the country unlawfully, and shall be arrested and deported under sections 20, 21, and 35 of said act, in the manner provided by rule 34'-- among which ports is designated Blaine, Wash.

And rule 25 that:

'In view of the agreement between the various steamship and railroad companies in the Dominion of Canada and the Commissioner-General of Immigration of the United States of America, inspection and entry of aliens into the United States from foreign countries, through Canadian territory, under the immigration act, will be accomplished in accordance with the following provisions: (a) All aliens arriving in Canada, destined to the United States, shall be inspected at any one of the following ports: (Naming Vancouver, B.C., among others.) And the holders of certificates, duly signed by the United States Commissioner of Immigration for Canada, shall be entitled to admittance to the United States, at any one of the places of entry along the border thereof named in rule 24, without further examination by the United States immigration officers as to their right to enter, upon their identification and their surrender of said certificates to such officials.' By subdivision 'f' all aliens of a class, etc., are required to apply at a border port within one year after their arrival in Canada, provided, however:

'That aliens destined in good faith to Canada, and who shall have settled at some point in the Dominion of Canada, who shall apply as above (that is, at a border port) for admission to the United States within one year after arrival in Canada, shall be examined by the boards of special inquiry located at any one of the following points: (Blaine being designated among others.) That the decisions of the said boards of special inquiry shall have the same force and effect as decisions rendered by boards of special inquiry at seaports of the United States.'

Sections 20 and 21 of the immigration act clearly authorize deportation of any alien who shall enter or be found in the United States in violation of law or of said act. The act, it will be seen, itself specifically provides for inspection at water ports of entry; but, as it relates to border ports, it authorizes the Commissioner-General of Immigration to prescribe rules for both entry and inspection, and also to enter into contracts with transportation lines for such purpose. In pursuance of this authority, rules 24 and 25 were adopted, by the former of which Blaine, Wash., is designated as a border port of entry from Canada. By the latter, if an alien arrives in Canada whose destination is the United States, inspection is required to be had at certain ports in Canada, and, if the applicant is entitled to admission into the United States, he receives a certificate from the United States Commissioner of Immigration for Canada, which he is required to present at the border port, and upon doing so his lawful entry may be effected without further identification or examination. But if the alien was destined to Canada, and applies at a border port for admission to the United States, he is required to submit to inspection by a board of special inquiry located at one of certain designated ports, among which Blaine, Wash., is specified. So that such an alien entering by way of Blaine, Wash., would very naturally apply at that particular port for inspection.

The applicant either came to Canada destined to the United States, or he came destined to Canada. If destined to the United States, he should have applied for inspection at one of the ports...