552
Opinion of Souter, J.
necessity of putting them away. The cases, of course, would mean nothing if citizens and comparable residents could be shorn of due process by this sort of categorical sleight of hand. Without any "full-blown adversary hearing" before detention, Salerno, supra, at 750, or heightened burden of proof, Addington, supra, or other procedures to show the government's interest in committing an individual, Foucha, supra; Jackson, supra, procedural rights would amount to nothing but mechanisms for testing group membership. Cf. Foucha, supra, at 88 (opinion of O'Connor, J.) ("Nor would it be permissible to treat all acquittees alike, without regard for their particular crimes"). And if procedure could be dispensed with so expediently, so presumably could the substantive requirements that the class of detainees be narrow and the detention period strictly limited. Salerno, supra; Hendricks, supra.
C
We held as much just two Terms ago in Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U. S. 678 (2001), which stands for the proposition that detaining an alien requires more than the rationality of a general detention statute; any justification must go to the alien himself. Zadvydas considered detention of two aliens, Zadvydas and Ma, who had already been ordered removed and therefore enjoyed no lawful immigration status. Their cases arose because actual removal appeared unlikely owing to the refusal of their native countries to accept them, with the result that they had been detained not only for the standard 90-day removal period, during which time most removal orders are executed, but beyond that period because the INS considered them to be a " 'risk to the community' " and " 'unlikely to comply with the order of removal.' " Id., at 682 (quoting 8 U. S. C. § 1231(a)(6) (1994 ed., Supp. V)). Zadvydas and Ma challenged their continued and potentially indefinite detention under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment.
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