Speech #910290726

delivered the opinion of the Court. This habeas corpus proceeding involves a single ultimate questionwhether administrative hearings in deportation cases must conform to requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act of June 11. 1946. 60 Stat. 237. 5 U.S.C. H� 1001 et seq. Wong Yang Sung. native and citizen of China. was arrested by immigration officials on a charge of being unlawfully in the United States through having overstayed shore leave as one of a shipping crew. A hearing was held before an immigrant inspector who recommended deportation. The Acting Commissioner approved. and the Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed. Wong Yang Sung then sought release from custody by habeas corpus proceedings in District Court for the District of Columbia. upon the sole ground that the administrative hearing was not conducted in conformity with � 5 and 11 of the Administrative Procedure Act. The Government admitted noncompliance. but asserted that the Act did not apply. The court. after hearing. discharged the writ and remanded the prisoner to custody. holdIng the Administrative Procedure Act inapplicable to deportation hearings. 80 F. Supp. 235. The Court of Appeals affirmed. 84 U.S. App. D.C. 419. 174 F. 2d 158. Prisoners petition for certiorari was not opposed by the Government and. because the question presented has obvious Importance in the administration of the immigration laws. we granted review. 338 U.S. 812. f I The Administrative Procedure Act of June 11. 1946. supra. is a new. basic and comprehensive regulation of procedures in many agencies. more than a few of which can advance arguments that its generalities should not or do not include them. Determination of questions of its coverage may well be approached through consideration of its purposes as disclosed by its background. Multiplication of federal administrative agencies and expansion of their functions to include adjudications which have serious impact on private rights has been one of the dramatic legal developments of the past halfcentury.2 Partly from restriction by Footnotes at end of article. statute. partly.:from judicial selfrestraint. and. partly by necessityfrom the nature of their multitudinous and semilegislative or executive tasksthe decisions of administrati4ve tribunals were accorded considerable finality. and especially with respect to fact finding.3 The conviction .developed. particularly within the legal profession. that this power was not sufficiently safeguarded and sometimes was put to arbitrary and biased use.