MATA background: What the gov't can already do.

BACKGROUND ADVISORY
Northwest Immigrant Rights Project
October 1, 2001

\"Consider this famous exchange from Robert Bolt\'s, A Man For All Seasons:

Roper: So now you\'d give the Devil benefit of law!

More: Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through
the law to get to the Devil?

Roper: I\'d cut down every law in England to do that!

More: Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil
turned round on you-- where would you hide, Roper, the
laws all being flat? This country\'s planted thick with
laws from coast to coast-- man\'s laws, not God\'s-- and
if you cut them down-- and you\'re just the man to do
it-- d\'you really think you could stand upright in the
winds that would blow then? Yes, I\'d give the devil benefit
of law, for my own safety\'s sake.

-Robert Bolt, A Man For All Seasons 66 (1962)

In recent years Congress has been busily \"cutting down\"
the procedural protections of our laws as they may relate
to resident aliens, the better swiftly to deport those
whom it considers undesirable. . .\"

Fierro v. INS 81 F. Supp 2d. 167 (US District Court for
the District of Massachusetts 1999)


Before the Congress decides to enact new emergency legislation
giving more authority on non-citizens to the Justice Department
and the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), it is
important to consider the enormous legal powers the government
already has, some of which have not been deployed.


THE INS ALREADY HAS BROAD AUTHORITY TO KEEP
ANYONE OUT OF THE UNITED STATES
In addition to the myriad grounds of removal for reasons ranging from
status violations to criminal conviction, under 8 USC