Of the four Alien and Sedition Acts passed in 1798, only one is still in effect: the Alien Enemies Act, now codified at 50 U.S.C. § 21. The Naturalization Act was repealed in 1802, the Alien Friends Act expired in 1800, and the Sedition Act expired in 1801. The surviving law lets the president detain and remove foreign nationals of a hostile nation during wartime or an invasion, and it was invoked as recently as March 2025.
The Alien Enemies Act Is Still Law
The Alien Enemies Act has been part of federal law continuously since 1798. It authorizes the president to detain and remove non-citizens who are nationals of a hostile foreign nation or government, but only when one of three conditions exists: a declared war, an invasion, or a “predatory incursion” against U.S. territory perpetrated or threatened by a foreign nation or government.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 50 USC 21 Restraint, Regulation, and Removal It reaches affected foreign nationals aged fourteen and older who are not naturalized citizens or lawful permanent residents.
Before the government can act, the president must issue a public proclamation identifying the triggering event. That proclamation sets the rules for how targeted individuals will be treated, including whether any may remain in the country and under what conditions.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 50 USC 21 Restraint, Regulation, and Removal
Judicial review under the act is unusually narrow. The Supreme Court held in Ludecke v. Watkins (1948) that the statute “precludes judicial review” of the executive’s removal decisions, though courts may still consider whether a declared war or invasion actually exists and whether the person targeted actually qualifies as an alien enemy.2Justia. Ludecke v. Watkins, 335 U.S. 160 (1948)
The Three Laws That Are No Longer in Force
The Naturalization Act, Repealed in 1802
The 1798 Naturalization Act extended the residency requirement for citizenship from five years to fourteen and required immigrants to declare their intent five years before applying rather than three.3Constitution Annotated. ArtI.S8.C4.1.2.3 Early U.S. Naturalization Laws Congress repealed it four years later with the Naturalization Law of 1802, which restored the five-year residency and three-year declaration. That five-year baseline has essentially held ever since; current law still requires five years of continuous residence as a lawful permanent resident, or three years for a person married to a U.S. citizen, with physical presence for at least half of that period.4Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1427 Requirements of Naturalization
The Alien Friends Act, Expired in 1800
The Alien Friends Act gave the president unilateral authority to deport any non-citizen he judged “dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States” or suspected of “treasonable or secret machinations against the government.”5National Archives. Alien and Sedition Acts (1798) No trial or charge was required. Congress built an expiration date into the law and it lapsed in 1800. Modern immigration law does permit deportation of non-citizens in various circumstances, but those cases move through administrative hearings with representation rights and judicial review.
The Sedition Act, Expired in 1801
The Sedition Act criminalized publishing “false, scandalous and malicious” writing about the federal government, Congress, or the president, with penalties of up to $2,000 in fines and two years in prison.6Avalon Project. Sedition Act of 1798 It expired by its own terms on March 3, 1801, the last day of President Adams’s term. Jefferson pardoned everyone still serving sentences under it, and Congress eventually repaid the fines. Although the Supreme Court never ruled on the act while it was in force, it later said in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan (1964) that “the attack upon its validity has carried the day in the court of history.”7Justia. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964)
How the Surviving Act Has Been Used
The Alien Enemies Act sat mostly dormant for its first century before becoming an active tool during both world wars. At the start of World War II, President Roosevelt invoked it against nationals from Japan, Germany, and Italy. The Attorney General created an Alien Enemy Control Unit to review cases, and more than 2,500 individuals were taken into custody through that process.8Congressional Research Service. The Alien Enemy Act History and Potential Use to Remove Noncitizens The wartime internment program eventually expanded far beyond the act’s text, sweeping up U.S. citizens of Japanese descent in a mass forced relocation that the government has since acknowledged as a grave injustice.
The 2025 Invocation
In March 2025, President Trump issued a proclamation invoking the Alien Enemies Act against members of Tren de Aragua (TdA), a Venezuelan criminal organization. The proclamation declared that TdA was “perpetrating, attempting, and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States” and ordered that all Venezuelan citizens aged fourteen or older who were TdA members could be “apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as Alien Enemies.”9The White House. Invocation of the Alien Enemies Act Regarding the Invasion of the United States by Tren de Aragua It was the first time in decades a president had invoked the act, and the first time ever it was aimed at a non-state criminal organization rather than a foreign government during a declared war. The government began transferring detained Venezuelan nationals to El Salvador’s Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT).
Litigation reached the Supreme Court quickly. In Trump v. J.G.G. (2025), the Court vacated a lower court’s temporary restraining order on procedural grounds, ruling that challenges to removal under the act must be filed as habeas petitions in the district where detainees are confined. It also required that detainees receive notice that they are subject to removal under the act “within a reasonable time and in such a manner as will allow them to actually seek habeas relief” before being removed.10Legal Information Institute. Trump v. J.G.G. In a follow-up case, A.A.R.P. v. Trump, the Court said “notice roughly 24 hours before removal, devoid of information about how to exercise due process rights to contest that removal, surely does not pass muster.”11Supreme Court of the United States. A.A.R.P. v. Trump, No. 24A1007
Federal district courts have issued conflicting rulings on the deeper questions, including whether a criminal organization qualifies as a “foreign nation or government” under the statute and whether the situation at the border meets the act’s threshold of “invasion or predatory incursion.” Those questions remain contested and unresolved as of 2026.
Is the Old Sedition Act’s Speech Ban Still Law?
No. The 1798 Sedition Act punished speech and publishing, and it has been gone since 1801. Federal law today does criminalize seditious conspiracy under 18 U.S.C. § 2384, but that statute is a different creature: it applies when two or more people conspire to overthrow the government by force, wage war against it, forcibly oppose its authority, or use force to prevent the execution of federal law or seize government property, with a maximum of twenty years in prison.12Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 2384 Seditious Conspiracy The modern law requires an actual agreement to use force. Criticizing the government, writing harsh editorials, or organizing peaceful protests cannot trigger prosecution under it.
Efforts to Repeal What Remains
The 2025 invocation revived legislative efforts to eliminate the last surviving act. In January 2025, members of Congress reintroduced the Neighbors Not Enemies Act, a bill to repeal the Alien Enemies Act entirely.13Office of Rep. Ilhan Omar. Rep. Ilhan Omar Reintroduces the Neighbors Not Enemies Act to Repeal the Alien Enemies Act The bill has not advanced, and the 227-year-old statute remains on the books.