Word: asylums
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Driven from every other corner of the earth," Samuel Adams intoned in 1776, those seeking freedom "direct their course to this happy country as their last asylum." From the beginnings of American history, no would-be immigrants have had greater claim on the national conscience than those seeking shelter from repression. But how to distinguish legitimate refugees from the mass of aliens who come to the U.S. merely in search of work or a change of life? The U.S. Supreme Court gave an answer last week that should smooth the path, at least slightly, for thousands fleeing death squads, invading...
...court was looking only at the relatively small number of aliens who ask for asylum annually; applications recently have averaged 20,000 a year. Three years ago, it ruled that portions of the Immigration and Nationality Act permit the Government to deport certain aliens who fail to show a "clear probability" that they will be persecuted in their home country. Under another section of that law, many such aliens have been allowed to seek from the Justice Department a discretionary grant of asylum. But this alternative was of little practical benefit because in order to be eligible, they were often...
...decision last week, the court ruled 6 to 3 that the INS standard was more onerous than Congress had intended when it drafted the law. Justice John Paul Stevens, for the majority, said that to be considered eligible for asylum, refugees need only prove a "well-founded fear" of persecution. In a strongly worded concurrence, Justice Harry Blackmun accused the INS of "seemingly purposeful blindness" in its refusal to see that Congress had intended a less stringent standard of proof...
...fear and harassment. But the final decision is still within the discretion of the Justice Department. Many immigration lawyers complain that its practices have been not only legally incorrect but politically biased. They charge that refugees from Communism or the Ayatullah Khomeini have a far better chance of gaining asylum than those fleeing governments that the U.S. counts as friends...
...Chad, is one of eight American-built carriers Libya bought before Gaddafi expelled U.S. forces in 1970. Libyan radio claimed bad weather had forced the plane down and warned Egypt to return it. Meanwhile Egypt, chary of Libyan troublemakers, withheld a decision on three of the airmen and granted asylum to two of them...