In Defense of the Supreme Court Decision in Alvarez-Machain

1992 ◽  
Vol 86 (4) ◽  
pp. 736-746 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malvina Halberstam
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Law ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Court Decision ◽  
Drug Enforcement ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Criminal Suspects ◽  
The Media

In United States v. Alvarez-Machain, the Supreme Court sustained the jurisdiction of a U.S. court to try a Mexican national, charged with various counts of conspiracy, kidnaping and the murder of a U.S. drug enforcement agent in Mexico, even though his presence in the United States was the result of abduction rather than extradition pursuant to the Extradition Treaty between the United States and Mexico. The Court did not hold, as widely reported in the media, that the Treaty permits abduction, that abduction is legal, or that the United States had a right to kidnap criminal suspects abroad. On the contrary, the Court acknowledged that the abduction may have been a violation of international law. It stated, “Respondent and his amici may be correct that respondent’s abduction was ’shocking’ and that it may be in violation of general international law principles.”

Sabbatino Resurrected: The Act of State Doctrine in the Revised Restatement of U.S. Foreign Relations Law

1985 ◽  
Vol 79 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-91 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malvina Halberstam
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Law ◽  
Foreign Relations ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Court Decision ◽  
Foreign State ◽  
The Supreme Court

Among the more controversial provisions of the Restatement of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States (Revised), are the sections dealing with the act of state doctrine in Tentative Draft No. 4. Section 428 provides: “Subject to §429, courts in the United States will refrain from examining the validity of an act of a foreign state taken in its sovereign capacity within the state’s own territory.” This provision, of course, is based on the Supreme Court decision in Sabbatino. The Court there stated, “the Judicial Branch will not examine the validity of a taking of property within its own territory by a foreign sovereign government” even if it is alleged that the taking is contrary to international law.

The Argument about Ethics, Fairness, or Right and Wrong

1988 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 367-375 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas M. Sawyer
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Court Decision ◽  
Appellate Court ◽  
Student Paper ◽  
The Supreme Court

Four of the five issues normally involved in an argument of policy can be persuasively argued on the basis of facts. However, the fourth issue, that of fairness, might better be argued by following the organizational plan of an appellate court decision. The Supreme Court decision in Teminello vs. the United States is offered as an example. The practicality of this plan is illustrated with a student paper.

scholarly journals Third Party Consent Searches Following the Search and Surveillance Act

2012 ◽  
Vol 43 (3) ◽  
pp. 447
Author(s):  
Sam McMullan
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Living Arrangements ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Court Decision ◽  
The Supreme Court

Many New Zealanders live in shared living arrangements. The result of this is that reasonable expectations of privacy are becoming more limited. State officials may conduct a lawful search where a person consents to such a search if that person has the authority to consent. Where people live in shared living arrangements, several people may have authority to consent to a search of the same property. This article explores the extent of a third party's power to consent to property searches where more than one person has authority to consent to a search under the Search and Surveillance Act 2012. It argues that the question of reasonable expectations of privacy should not be assessed by reference to property rights. It also considers the concept of "apparent" authority which has arisen in New Zealand from the Court of Appeal's decision in R v Bradley as well as the concept of a present and objecting occupant which has arisen in the United States in the Supreme Court decision of Georgia v Randolph.

Privacy and Constitutional Theory

2000 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-185 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott D. Gerber
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Court Decision ◽  
Constitutional Theory ◽  
Right To Privacy ◽  
Library Catalog ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
On Line

There has been a flood of scholarship over the years on whether there is a “right to privacy” in the Constitution of the United States. Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) was, of course, the Supreme Court decision that opened the floodgates to this river of commentary. A subject search for “privacy, right of” in the College of William and Mary's on-line library catalog located 360 book titles. A perusal of the leading law review bibliographic indices turned up still more. Whether the Constitution contains some sort of “right to be let alone” is plainly one of the central questions of contemporary constitutional discourse.

scholarly journals Resolving ALJ Removal Protections Problem Following Lucia

2020 ◽  
pp. 693
Author(s):  
Spencer Davenport
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Administrative Law ◽  
Central Issue ◽  
Court Decision ◽  
Peremptory Challenge ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
The Status

When the Supreme Court decided Lucia v. SEC and held that administrative law judges (ALJs) are Officers under the Constitution, the Court opened a flood of constitutional issues around the status of ALJs and related government positions. One central issue relates to ALJs’ removal protections. ALJs currently have two layers of protection between them and the President. In an earlier Supreme Court decision, the Court held that two layers of tenure protection between an “Officer of the United States” and the President was unconstitutional as it deprived the President the power to hold his officers accountable. As impartial adjudicators, ALJs need those layers of protection to ensure fair adjudicative hearings. Lucia now threatens ALJ protections. This Note argues that implementing a peremptory challenge system which would allow each party in an adjudicative hearing to remove the ALJ from hearing its case would create an avenue in which the Court could justify the removal issue. Such a proposal would fix executive oversight concerns about the President being unable to properly implement his policy. Additionally, peremptory challenges would allow litigants in front of an agency be able to remove ALJs they feel are predisposed to the agency. By addressing both constitutional issues, the Court may be more likely to find that the two layers of tenure protection in place are permissible for those in adjudicatory positions.

scholarly journals Sosa v Alvarez-Machain and The Alien Tort Claims Act

2006 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Hugh King
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Law ◽  
Supreme Court Decision ◽  
The United States ◽  
Federal Courts ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Lower Courts ◽  
First Time ◽  
Tort Claims

Since the seminal case of Filartiga v Pena-Irala in 1980, the controversial Alien Tort Claims Act has regularly been invoked in United States federal courts to sue foreign perpetrators of international human rights violations. In Sosa v Alvarez-Machain, decided in 2004, the United States Supreme Court for the first time ruled on the Act’s proper application. This article, after first identifying three different approaches taken towards the Act by federal courts over the last 25 years, examines the Supreme Court decision. While welcoming the Court’s affirmation of the Act as a mechanism for addressing certain international law violations, it critiques the Court’s conservative and problematic test to determine the extent of the international law violations falling within the Act’s ambit, and highlights many ambiguities in the decision with which lower courts will have to grapple.

Act of State and Department of State: First National City Bank v. Banco Nacional De Cuba

1972 ◽  
Vol 66 (4) ◽  
pp. 795-814 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andreas F. Lowenfeld
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Supreme Court ◽  
International Law ◽  
United States Supreme Court ◽  
The United States ◽  
United States Supreme ◽  
Recent Issue ◽  
Department Of State ◽  
The Supreme Court ◽  
Formal Communication

No recent issue has so divided lawyers and writers in the field of international law as the question whether courts of one nation should sit in judgment on the acts of other nations with respect to foreign held property—sometimes, always, or never. The United States Supreme Court in Banco Nacional de Cubav. Sabbatinosaid the answer was never—or at least hardly ever—thus upholding and reaffirming the “act of state doctrine”. The Congress in the Hickenlooper (or Sabbatino) Amendmentmade an effort to reverse that ruling, an effort that has proved largely unsuccessful. Now the State Department has taken its turn, arguing in a formal communication to the Supreme Court that when it perceives no objection to adjudication on foreign policy grounds, the courts should judge the validity of the foreign nation's acts under international law standards—at least as to counterclaims.

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