American Passage_ The History of Ellis I - Vincent J. Cannato [203]
The Court relied on the plenary power doctrine that had long given the executive branch tremendous latitude in its treatment of aliens. In familiar language, the Court reiterated that “an alien who seeks admission to this country may not do so under any claim of right. Admission of aliens to the United States is a privilege granted by the sovereign United States Government.”
The War Brides Act of 1945 may have superseded some aspects of immigrant law, but it did not override national security concerns. Though the plenary power doctrine was well-trod legal ground, the Court also outlined the little-known history of recent presidential proclamations and regulations that led to Knauff ’s exclusion. The paper trail began with FDR’s May 1941 declaration of an “unlimited national emergency” in dealing with the threat posed by the European war, even if America still technically remained on the sidelines.
Congress then allowed the president to impose additional restrictions upon those entering the country during times of national emergency. This was followed by Presidential Proclamation 2533 in November 1941, which ordered that no alien should be allowed to enter the country if his presence was “prejudicial to the interest of the United States.” This was followed by a Justice Department regulation that allowed the attorney general to deny a hearing to an excluded alien if the evidence was confidential.
Justice Robert Jackson, who had served as chief prosecutor during the Nuremberg Trials, delivered the dissenting opinion. He called Ellen’s exclusion without a hearing “abrupt and brutal.” The Court, Jackson wrote, basically told Kurt Knauff, an American citizen and army veteran, that “he cannot bring his wife to the United States, but he will not be told why. He must abandon his bride to live in his own country or forsake his country to live with his bride.”
While much of the majority decision followed precedent on immigration law, it showed how much Roosevelt’s administration had expanded executive power, both before and during wartime. No one, though, seemed to comment on the oddity that the authority for the denial of a hearing to Ellen Knauff and other aliens was based on the unlimited national emergency declared by FDR in 1941. Was the government implying that this emergency was still in effect nine years later during peacetime?
Having lost in the Supreme Court, Ellen Knauff now headed back to Ellis Island to await deportation. Twice in the spring of 1950, she had her deportation stayed by the courts. The second time, Justice Jackson stayed her deportation just twenty minutes before Knauff ’s flight back to Germany was set to take off from Idlewild Airport. Yet the reprieve did not mean freedom. Knauff was returned to detention at Ellis Island.
In the meantime, her case had aroused such interest among the public that Knauff was not out of options. A young woman in her thirties, Knauff made a convincing and sympathetic victim. After all, Ellen was the war bride of an American GI, a woman who had lost family members in the Holocaust, and someone who worked for the U.S. military as a civilian in occupied Germany. Newspapers like the St. Louis Post-Dispatch took up her case.
Congress also took notice. Her cause was taken up by Senator Langer, who had previously fought for the rights of German enemy aliens, and Congressman Francis Walter, an anti-Communist Democrat who would later chair the House Un-American Activities Committee. Both introduced bills in Congress to free Knauff.
In the spring of 1950, Ellen was invited to Washington to testify before a congressional committee investigating her case. “That whole day was a true American fairy tale,” Ellen later wrote. “A prisoner on Ellis Island woke up one fine morning to be flown to Washington, D.C., to be heard before a congressional subcommittee in an effort to make truth prevail.” The Justice Department was invited to present its evidence against Knauff, but refused