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Supreme Court · Decisions

Jose Francisco Sosa v. Humberto Alvarez-Machain et al.

The Court, in a case under the Alien Tort Statute, found no common law cause of action for arbitrary arrest and detention, limiting new claims to international norms defined as specifically as the 18th century paradigms.· AI-written

542 U.S. 692 · No. 03-339 · 2003 term · Rehnquist Court

Decided Jun 29, 2004 · argued Mar 30, 2004

Economic activity · Liability, other than as in sufficiency of evidence, election of remedies, punitive damages

Majority opinion: David Souter

The voteMajorityDissent

6–36 in the majority, 3 in dissent

3 dissents (6–3)

Reversed. Jose Francisco Sosa won.

What this ruling means

Reversed: the Supreme Court overturned the decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, and its own ruling ends the case.

Jose Francisco Sosa was the petitioner, the side that asked the Supreme Court to review the case. “Won” means the Court gave that side the result it asked for.

From the Supreme Court Database. A justice who agreed with the result but not the reasoning counts in the majority.

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Summary

The opening of the case’s Wikipedia article: what the case was about and what the Court held.

Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain, 542 U.S. 692 (2004), was a United States Supreme Court case involving the Alien Tort Statute and the Federal Tort Claims Act. Many ATS claims were filed after the Second Circuit ruling in Filártiga v. Peña-Irala created a new common law cause of action for torture under the ATS: "For purposes of civil liability, the torturer has become—like the pirate and slave trader before him—hostis humani generis, an enemy of all mankind." The Court in Sosa does not find there is a similar cause of action for arbitrary arrest and detention. They wrote that finding new common law causes of action based on international norms would require "a substantial element of discretionary judgment", and explain that the role of common law has changed since ATS was enacted meaning the Court will "look for legislative guidance before exercising innovative authority over substantive law".

The decision states some limitations on recognizing (or creating) new federal common law causes of action under the ATS: "norms of international character accepted by the civilized world and defined with a specificity comparable to the features of those three 18th century paradigms we have recognized".

Read the full article on Wikipedia

Data notes

The text is Wikipedia’s (CC BY-SA 4.0), matched to the case by its citation, docket number or name and year, and is not checked against the opinion. The site keeps the article’s opening section, ending on its last full sentence. The one-sentence summary under the title is the Decisions list’s: Wikipedia’s own ruling sentence, or, tagged “AI-written”, one Claude wrote from this opening.

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How the justices voted

Each justice who took part, placed by their Martin–Quinn ideology score for the 2003 term. Filled: the 6 in the majority. Hollow: the 3 in dissent. Colour is the party of the president who appointed them.

More liberalMore conservativeMedianStevensGinsburgSouterBreyerO'ConnorKennedyRehnquistScaliaThomas

Majority(6)

Dissent(3)

Data notes

Each justice’s vote and what they wrote are from the justice-centered file of the Supreme Court Database. “Wrote a concurrence” means the justice sided with the majority and wrote separately; a justice who dissented in part is counted on the side they took overall. A justice who wrote nothing is listed as joining their side.

Positions are each justice’s Martin–Quinn score for the case’s term, the same scores as the Ideology page: negative is more liberal, positive more conservative. A score sums up a justice’s votes across the whole term, so it says where they usually sit, not why they voted as they did here. The median line is the Court’s median justice that term.

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The parties

Who brought the case to the Court, who answered it, and how it got there.

Petitioner
Jose Francisco SosaAlien, person subject to a denaturalization proceeding, or one whose citizenship is revoked
Respondent
Humberto Alvarez-Machain et al.Alien, person subject to a denaturalization proceeding, or one whose citizenship is revoked
Reached the Court by
Certiorari (the Court chose to hear it)
Why it was taken
Federal courts were unsure how to apply the law
Data notes

The names are the two sides of the case’s title. The description under each is the Supreme Court Database’s category for that party, in its own wording. The petitioner is the side that asked the Supreme Court to review the decision below. “Why it was taken” appears only when the majority opinion says lower courts disagreed or were unsure about the question; reasons that would fit any case (“to resolve the question presented”, “an important question”) are left out.

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The law at issue

The law the Court was asked to apply, and the kind of power it used to decide.

Provision
Federal Tort Claims, or Alien Tort Statute
Kind of law
Federal Statute
Decided by
Statutory construction
Data notes

The Supreme Court Database codes the main constitutional provision, statute or court rule each case turned on, and the basis of the decision: judicial review of a federal or state law, interpreting a statute, supervising the lower courts, and so on. A case can rest on more than one. “Overruled” counts only where the majority opinion says so.

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Timeline

What happened at the Court and how the case got there, newest first.

  1. Jun 29, 2004DecidedDecided · Decided 6–3: reversed. Jose Francisco Sosa won.
  2. Mar 30, 2004ArguedArgued · Oral argument before the Court.
  3. Not datedTaken upTaken up · The Supreme Court agreed to hear the case (certiorari). Federal courts were unsure how to apply the law.
  4. Not datedCourt belowCourt below · Decided by the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit: affirmed and reversed (or vacated) in part and remanded, with a dissent.
  5. Not datedBeganBegan · The case began in the California Central U.S. District Court.
Data notes

From the Supreme Court Database: the court the case began in, the court whose decision the Supreme Court reviewed and what that court did, how the case came to the Court, and the dates of argument and decision. The database does not date the steps in the lower courts. Court names are the database’s.

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Other decisions on the same issue

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Data notes

Every other orally argued case with a clear vote, from the 1946 term on, that the Supreme Court Database files under the same issue as this one. The database gives each case one issue from a list of about 270 (abortion, search and seizure of vehicles, the death penalty, and so on), whatever law it turned on.

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Official record

Read the full opinion on Justia, the argument audio on Oyez and Wikipedia. Case data from the Supreme Court Database, Version 2026 Release 01, through the 2025 term.