Controversy continues to surround the ATF.
Some critics say that its agents are not sufficiently
trained to carry out the types of operations its
administrators seem to favor. Others contend
that it lacks a coherent mission and that many
of its duties, such as enforcement of alcohol
regulations, are better suited to other agencies.
The move toward a compl ete split between
the agencies was expected to take some time.
Information on the ATF is available online at
www.aft.gov.
FURTHER READINGS
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives Web
site. “History of ATF from Oxford Univ. Press, Inc.
1789–1998 U.S.” Available online at .
gov/about/atfhistory.htm; website home page: http://
www.atf.gov (accessed December 9, 2009).
Reavis, Dick J. 1998. The Ashes of Waco: An Investigation.
New York: Syracuse Univ. Press.
U.S. Government Printing Office Web site. Available online
at (accessed July 4, 2009).
CROSS REFERENCES
Alcohol; Branch Davidian Raid; Explosives; Gun Control;
Weapons.
ALDERMAN OR ALDERWOMAN
A public officer of a town or city council or a local
legislative body who is elected to the position by
the persons he or she represents.
ALEATORY CONTRACT
A mutual agreement between two parties in which
the performance of the contractual obligations of

trial, accused of libelous attacks on the adminis-
tration of New York Governor William Cosby.
Alexander served as codefense lawyer at this trial,
and
ALEXANDER HAMILTON pleaded the case. Zenger
was acquitted, and the success of this defense was a
triumph for the principles of a free press.
Alexander died in Albany, New York, on
April 12, 1756.
ALIAS
[Latin, Otherwise called.] A term used to indicate
that a person is known by more than one name.
Alias is a short and more popular phrase for
alias dictus. The abbreviation a.k.a., also known
as, is freque ntly used in connection with the
description of a person sought by law
James Alexander 1691–1756
1664 British bought
New Amsterdam
from Dutch; renamed
it New York
1691 Born,
Scotland
1715 Immigrated to America;
became surveyor
general for New Jersey
1723–27
Attorney
General
of New Jersey

218 ALDERMAN OR ALDERWOMAN
enforcement officers to disclose the names that
the person has been known to use. A fictitious
name assumed by a person is popularly termed an
alias.
ALIAS WRIT
A second writ, or court order, issued in the same
case after an earlier writ of that kind has been
issued but has not been effective.
ALIEN AND SEDITION ACTS
In 1798 the Federalist-controlled Congress passed
four acts to empower the president of the United
States to expel dangerous aliens from the country;
to give the president authority to arrest, detain, and
deport resident aliens hailing from enemy countries
during times of war; to lengthen the period of
naturalization for immigrants; and to silence
Republican criticism of the Federalist Party. Also
an act passed by Congress in 1918 during World
War I that made it a crime to disrupt military
recruiting or enlistments, to encourage support for
Germany and its allies or disrespect for American
war efforts, or to otherwise bring the U.S. govern-
ment, its leaders, or its symbols into disrepute.
The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798
Passions over the French Revolution split early
American politics. Having endured Shays’s Rebel-
lion and the
WHISKEY REBELLION, Federalists
saw much to fear in the French Revolution. On

friends there.”
Congress responded to these concerns by
enacting the Alien and Sedition Acts, the
popular names for four laws passed in 1798.
On June 18 Congress passed the
NATURALIZATION
Act, which extended from five to 14 years the
period of residence required for alien immi-
grants to become full U.S. citizens (1 Stat. 566).
On June 25 Congress passed the Alien Act,
which authorized the president to expel,
without a hearing, any alien the president
deemed “dangerous to the peace and safety”
of the United States or whom the president
suspected of “treasonable or secret” inclinations
(1 Stat. 570). On July 6 Congress passed the
Alien Enemy Act, which authorized the presi-
dent to arrest, imprison, or banish any resident
alien hailing from a country against which the
United States had declared war (1 Stat. 577).
None of these first three acts had much
practical impact. The Naturalization Act con-
tained a built-in window period that allowed
resident
ALIENS to become U.S. citizens before
the fourteen-year requirement went into effect.
President Adams never invoked the Alien Act,
and the passing of the war scare in 1789
rendered the Alien Enemies Act meaningless.
However, the Sedition Act deepened parti-

Before becoming president, Jefferson joined
Madison in voicing opposition to the Sedition
Act by drafting the Virginia and Kentucky
Resolutions. Jefferson was responsible for
drafting the two Kentucky Resolutions, while
Madison penned the one Virginia
RESOLUTION.
The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions con-
demned the Sedition Act as a violation of the
Free Speech Clause to the
FIRST AMENDMENT of
the U.S. Constitution. The resolutions also
argued that Congress had exceeded its powers
by passing the law in the first place, because
Congress may only exercise those powers
specifically delegated to it, and nowhere in
Article I of the Constitution is authority given
to the legislative branch to regulate political
speech. The Kentucky state legislature passed its
two resolutions on November 16, 1798, and
November 22, 1999, whereas Virginia passed its
one resolution on December 24, 1798.
Sedition Act of 1918
Concern over disloyalty during wartime provid-
ed the backdrop for the second Sedition Act in
U.S. history. In April 1917 the United States
entered
WORLD WAR I when Congress declared
war against Germany and its allies. A month
later, the Selective Service Act reinstated the

the Sedition Act to make sure that only those
individuals who created a “clear and present
danger” of immediate criminal activity were
convicted (
ABRAMS V. UNITED STATES, 250 U.S. 616,
1180, 40 S. Ct. 17, 63 L. Ed. 1173 [1919]).
FURTHER READINGS
Miller, John Chester. 1951. Crisis in Freedom: The Alien and
Sedition Acts. Boston: Little, Brown.
Moore, Wayne D. 1994. “Reconceiving Interpretive Auton-
omy: Insights from the Virginia and Kentucky Resolu-
tions.” Constitutional Commentary 11 (fall).
Smith, James Morton. 1967. Freedom’s Fetters: The Alien and
Sedition Laws and American Civil Liberties. Ithaca, NY:
Cornell Univ. Press.
CROSS REFERENCES
Aliens “Aliens and Civil Rights” (Sidebar); Espionage;
Freedom of Speech.
ALIEN ENEMY
In international law, a foreign-born citizen or
subject of a nation or power that is hostile to the
United States.
An alien enemy is an individual who, due to
permanent or temporary allegiance to a hostile
power, is regarded as an enemy in wartime.
Under federal law, an alien enemy is a native,
citizen, or subject of a foreign nation, state, or
sovereign with which the United States is at war.
Such a person is considered an alien enemy as
long as the United States remains at war as

treatment of such
ALIENS mirrors treatment
permitted by federal law for aliens who are
citizens of foreign nations. In the wake of the
SEPTEMBER 11TH ATTACKS, Congress passed the
Authorization for the Use of Military Force
JOINT
RESOLUTION
, Pub. L. No. 107-40, 115 Stat. 224,
permitting the president to use force to detain
and try non-citizens in the
WAR ON TERRORISM.On
November 13, 2001, President
GEORGE W. BUSH
issued a military order [66 Fed. Reg. 57,831–
57,836 (2001)] setting forth the military’s policy
for the treatment of non-citizens in the war on
TERRORISM. The order applies to individuals who
are or were members of the terrorist organization
al Qaeda; have engaged in, aided or abetted, or
conspired to commit acts of international
terrorism; or have harbored such a non-citizen.
FURTHER READINGS
Green, Leslie C. 1999. Essays on the Modern Law of War.
2d ed. Ardsley, N.Y.: Transnationals.
Fehlings, Gregory. 2002. “Storm on the Constitution: The
First Deportation Law.” Tulsa Journal of Comparative
and International Law 63.
Levie, Howard S. 1993. Terrorism in War: The Law of War
Crimes. Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.: Oceana.

detention camps
because it considered
them alien enemies
while the country was
at war with Japan.
NATIONAL ARCHIVES
AND RECORDS
ADMINISTRATION
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3
RD E DITION
ALIENATE 221
that parcel, such as the right to modify or even
demolish the house on the parcel of land, to the
buyer. Those rights now belong to the buyer.
ALIENATION CLAUSE
A provision in a document permitting or forbid-
ding a person from transferring property that is
the subject of the document.
In a fire insurance policy, an
ALIENATION CLAUSE
prohibits the alienation of the insured premises
while the policy is in effect. If the insured violates
this provision, the policy is void.
ALIENATION OF AFFECTION
The removal of love, companionship, or aid of an
individual’s spouse.
Historically,
ALIENATION OF AFFECTION furn-
ished grounds for an action against the indi-
vidual who interloped in a marital relationship.

The United States welcomes a large number of
aliens every year. Millions of foreign-born
persons travel, work, and study in the country,
and hundreds of thousands more choose to
immigrate and become U.S. citizens. All of
them are subject to federal immigration law. At
the simplest level, the law serves as a gatekeeper
for the nation’s borders: It determines who may
enter, how long they may stay, and when they
must leave. In totality, of course, its scope far
exceeds this simple purpose. Immigration law is
concerned not only with borders but with what
goes on inside them. It has much to say about
the legal rights, duties, and obligations of aliens
in the United States, which, in some respects,
are different from those of citizens. Ultimately,
it also provides the means by which certain
aliens are naturalized as new citizens with all the
rights of citizenship.
Congress has total authority over immigra-
tion. In the legislative branch of government,
this power has no equal. The U.S. Supreme
Court has determined that “over no conceivable
subject is the legislative power of Congress more
complete” (Fiallo v. Bell, 430 U.S. 787, 97 S. Ct.
1473, 52 L. Ed. 2d 50 [1977]). With a few
notable exceptions concerning the right of
aliens to constitution al protections, the courts
have rarely intruded. Presidents have no inher-
ent say; their influence is limited to policies on

who was not. Although somewhat less frequently
toward the end of the twentieth century, national
origin has often decided whether the United
States admitted an alien.
Modern legislation has introduced signifi-
cant changes. Reform has followed two distinct
lines of thought: the need to stem illegal
immigration, and the desire to make the law
more fair for legal immigrants. Congress tackled
the first issue in the Immigration Reform and
Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) (Pub. L. No. 99-
603, 100 Stat. 3359, codified as amended in
scattered sections of the U.S.C.A.). The IRCA
toughened criminal sanctions for employers
who hire illegal aliens, denied these aliens
federally funded
WELFARE benefits, and legiti-
mized some aliens through an amnesty pro-
gram. Related legislation, the Immigration
MARRIAGE FRAUD Amendments of 1986, 8 U.S.
C.A. § 1101 note et seq., cracked down on the
popular illegal practice of marrying to obtain
citizenship. Fairness issues helped influence the
second major reform, the Immigration Act of
1990, Pub. L. No. 101-649, 104 Stat. 4978
(codified in scattered sections of the U.S.C.A.).
Thoroughly revamping the INA, the 1990 act
allocated visas more evenly among foreign
nations, eliminated archaic rules, and increase d
the level of worldwide immigration by 35

373,326
70,756
1,041,570
457,257
369,980
8,358
0 0.5 1 1.5 2
1940
1970
2000
2008
a
Immigrants refers to persons obtaining legal permanent resident status.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Office of Immigration Statistics, 2008 Yearbook of Immigration
Statistics.
ILLUSTRATION BY GGS
CREATIVE RESOURCES.
REPRODUCED BY
PERMISSION OF GALE,
A PART OF CENGAGE
LEARNING.
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3
RD E DITION
ALIENS 223
and benefits, to strengthen border patrol and
enforcement, and to ensure
DETENTION and re-
moval of illegal aliens.
Administrative Implementation of
Immigration and Naturalization Laws

1985
Year
0
5 10152025303540
.074
.257
6.608
1.796
9.539
NA
a
.543
.659
NA
a
33.690
.196
.364
3.275
22.640
17.611
39.381
5.603
29.442
1.102
1.101
All classes
Temp. visitors for business
Temp. visitors for pleasure
Students

which is responsible for the detention, investiga-
tion, and inspection of a lien s under federal law.
Admission Procedures
Normally, aliens wishing to enter the United
States first apply for a
VISA at one of the over 200
U.S. consulates and embassies abroad. Visas are
documents required for travel to most nation s
in the world. For example, U.S. citizens may not
simply cross the borders of Germany or Zaire
without a visa. Aliens, likewise, may not simply
cross the borders into the United States; they
have no inherent right to enter the country.
A visa is the only legal means of entry. In a
larger sense, it is the key to understanding the
goals and practices of immigration law.
Two types of visas exist: imm i grant visas
and nonimmigrant visas. It is much easier to
obtain nonimmigrant visas, which are primarily
issued to tourists and temporary business visi-
tors. In 1993 the INS admitted 21,447,000 non-
immigrants to the United States. Nonimmigrant
visas are divided into 18 main categories ranging
from vacationers and diplomatic personnel to
athletes, temporary workers, and students. Most
categories do not have any numerical limitation.
The reasoning is simple: Nonimmigrants
generally spend a short time and a lot of money
in the United States, with obvious benefits for the
nation’s economic, social, and cultural life, and

persons. Far-reaching grounds bar applicants
for reasons related to health, crime, national
security, and other variables. As part of the
process for reviewing visa applications, consular
officials decide whether any ground for exclu-
sion applies. If the officials decide that none
does, a visa may be granted, but entry is still not
certain. The Bureau of Border Security Enforce-
ment can decide otherwise when the alien actually
attempts to cross the border. In practice, exclusion
occurs every day.
Excluded aliens can argue their case in an
exclusion hearing. This procedure differs greatly
from a
DEPORTATION hearing, which involves an
alien who has already entered the United States.
Deportation hearings are actually more advanta-
geous: unlike exclusion proceedings, deportation
hearings only follow from specific allegations,
and aliens subject to deportation have more
forms of legal relief. In an exclusion hearing, the
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
ALIENS 225
burden is always on the alien to prove his or her
right to enter the United States. The alien is
entitled to many attributes of procedural due
process, and aliens who lose may also seek
asylum (refuge or protection, usually for political
reasons) in some instances.
Excluded applicants seeking to cross the

F. Students;
G. International organization representatives;
H. Temporary workers;
I. Foreign media representatives;
J. Exchange program visitors;
K. Fiancées, fiancés, or children of U.S.
citizens;
L. Intracompany transferees;
M. Students in nonacademic institutions;
N. Parents and children of special immigrants;
O. Aliens with extraordinary abilities;
P. Entertainers;
Q. Participants in cultural exchange programs;
R. Religious workers. The visas are further
categorized by numbers—for example, A-1,
A-2, and so forth.
Aliens use specific procedures for the particu-
lar visa sought. Broadly speaking, these fall into
three classes: (1) applications that do not require
contact with anyone in the United States (visas
A, B, C, D, E, G, I, and O); (2) applications that
require proof of acceptance in an authorized
program (visas F, J, M, and Q, and visas for special
education trainees); and (3) applications that
require approved petitions, which provide the
basis for the alien’s presence in the United States
(visas H, K, L, P, and R). More than half of all
visas require supporting documents at the time of
application. For example, an alien hoping to work
temporarily in the United States as a registered

employment.
Immigrant Visas
Immigrant visas come in two main catego ries:
visas subject to numerical limitation and visas
not subject to nume rical limitation. The term
numerical limitation means several things. First,
it refers to the overall limits set by Congress
GALE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN LAW, 3RD E DITION
226 ALIENS
on immigrants. Second, it involves the use of
per-country caps. Third, and most important,
numerically limited visas are organized along a
system of preferences that favors certain aliens
over others. Every immigrant wants the best
chance to obtain a visa, but qualifying for the
easiest category—visas not subject to numerical
limitation—is quite difficult. Congress has
reserved this category for immediate relatives
of U.S. citizens, resident aliens returning from
temporary visits abroad, and former U.S.
citizens. Consequently, for the vast majority of
aliens who want to immigrate, demand is much
higher than the relatively short supply pre-
scribed by law.
Though having no numerical limitation
makes it easier to obtain, the immediate-relative
visa still carries strict limitations. Generally,
the term immediate relatives means children,
spouses, and parents, but unique rules apply to
children and spouses. To qualify as a child, the

immigrants. Aliens may apply once per year in
a lottery, making this a highly uncertain way to
obtain a visa. Not everyone is eligible; applicants
must generally have a high-school education
and two years of work experience. Different
goals make more visas available to Hong Kong:
because of uncertainty over the transfer of the
country to China, the law allotted 20,000 visas
annually to certain Hong Kong citizens who
were employees of U.S. businesses, their
spouses, and their children.
The primary types of numerically limited
visas—family-sponsored and employment-
related—are organized into
PREFERENCE catego-
ries. Preference means that the law allocates
visas to certain aliens over others in order to
promote such goals as preserving fam ilies,
protecting U.S. jobs, and admitting immigrants
most likely to benefit the nation. How the law
ranks aliens can be seen from the numerical
limits on each category. Families are allotted
226,000 visas annually, with a somewhat flexible
maximum of 480,000 in four preference
categories. Only 140,000 employment-related
visas are allotted, in five preference categories.
Unused visas from higher preference categories
are reallocated to the lower categories.
Preference in family-sponsored visas is deci-
ded by the nature of an alien’s relationship to