Habeas Corpus in The United States - Federal Law

Federal Law

The Suspension Clause of Article I does not expressly establish a right to the writ of habeas corpus; rather, it prevents the U.S. Congress from restricting it. There has been much scholarly debate over whether the Clause positively establishes a right under the federal constitution, merely exists to prevent Congress from prohibiting state courts from granting the writ, or protects a pre-existing common law right enforceable by federal judges. However, in the cases of Immigration and Naturalization Service v. St. Cyr (2001), and Boumediene v. Bush (2008) the U.S. Supreme Court suggested that the Suspension Clause protects "the writ as it existed in 1789," that is, as a writ which federal judges could issue in the exercise of their common law authority.

Regardless of whether the writ is positively guaranteed by the constitution, habeas corpus was first established by statute in the Judiciary Act of 1789. This statutory writ applied only to those held in custody by officials of the executive branch of the federal government and not to those held by state governments, which independently afford habeas corpus pursuant to their respective constitutions and laws. From 1789 until 1866, the federal writ of habeas corpus was largely restricted to prisoners in federal custody, at a time when no direct appeals from federal criminal convictions were provided for by law. Habeas corpus remained the only means for judicial review of federal capital convictions until 1889, and the only means for review of federal convictions for other "infamous crimes" until 1891. Until 1983 the writ of habeas corpus remained the only way that decisions of military courts could be reviewed by the Supreme Court.

The authority of federal courts to review the claims of prisoners in state custody was not clearly established until Congress adopted a statute (28 U.S.C. § 2254) granting federal courts that authority in 1867, as part of the post-Civil War Reconstruction. The U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Waley v. Johnson (1942) interpreted this authority broadly to allow the writ to be used to challenge convictions or sentences in violation of a defendant's constitutional rights where no other remedy was available.

The U.S. Congress grants federal district courts, the Supreme Court, and all Article III federal judges, acting in their own right, jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 to issue writs of habeas corpus to release prisoners held by any government entity within the country from custody, subject to certain limitations, if the prisoner –

• Is in custody under or by color of the authority of the United States or is committed for trial before some court thereof; or
• Is in custody for an act done or omitted in pursuance of an Act of Congress, or an order, process, judgment or decree court or judge of the United States; or
• Is in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States; or
• Being a citizen of a foreign state and domiciled therein is in custody for an act done or omitted under any alleged right, title, authority, privilege, protection, or exemption claimed under the commission, order or sanction of any foreign state, or under color thereof, the validity and effect of which depend upon the law of nations; or
• It is necessary to bring said persons into court to testify or for trial.

In 1950s and 1960s, decisions by the Warren Supreme Court greatly expanded the use and scope of the federal writ largely due to the "constitutionalizing" of criminal procedure by applying the Bill of Rights, in part, to state courts using the incorporation doctrine. This afforded state prisoners many more opportunities to claim that their convictions were unconstitutional, which provided grounds for habeas corpus relief. In the last thirty years, decisions by the Burger and Rehnquist Courts have somewhat narrowed the writ. The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA) further limited the use of the federal writ by imposing a one-year statute of limitations and dramatically increasing the federal judiciary's deference to decisions previously made in state court proceedings either on appeal or in a state court habeas corpus action.

One of AEDPA's most controversial changes is the requirement that any constitutional right invoked to vacate a state court conviction rooted in a mistake of law by the state court must have "resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States." Thus, a U.S. Court of Appeals must ignore its own precedents and affirm a state court decision contrary to its precedents, if the U.S. Supreme Court has never squarely addressed a particular issue of federal law.