Ng Fung Ho v. White, 259 U.S. 276 (1922)
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Ng Fung Ho v. White
No. 176
Argued March 17, 20, 1922
Decided May 29, 1922
259 U.S. 276
CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
Syllabus
1. Congress has power to order at any time the deportation of aliens whose presence in the country it deems hurtful, and may do so by appropriate executive proceedings. P. 280.
2. The Chinese Exclusion Act of May 5, 1892, as amended, makes it unlawful for a Chinese laborer not in possession of a certificate of residence to remain in the United States, irrespective of the legality of his entry. P. 281.
3. A Chinese person thus unlawfully in the United States is subject to executive deportation under the General Immigration Act of February 5, 1917, § 19, without giving it a retroactive effect, although he entered the country before it was passed, because the act applies to any alien who "shall be found" here in violation of any federal law, as well as those who shall have entered unlawfully. P. 280.
4. Persons of Chinese blood who have been admitted into the country by the immigration authorities and afterwards arrested and held for deportation, who claim to be citizens of the United States in virtue of the citizenship of their father (Rev.Stats. § 1993), and who support the claim by evidence both before the immigration officer and upon petition for habeas corpus, are entitled, under the Fifth Amendment, to a judicial hearing of the claim in the habeas corpus proceeding. P. 282.
266 F. 765 affirmed in part and reversed in part.
The petitioners, Chinese held for deportation under warrants issued by the Secretary of Labor pursuant to the Immigration Act of 1917, obtained from the district court a writ of habeas corpus. That court subsequently ordered the writ quashed and the petitioners remanded to custody. The present review is directed to a judgment of the circuit court of appeals affirming the action of the district court as to all of the petitioners except one, whom it ordered released.