United States Department of State v. Legal Assistance for Vietnamese Asylum Seekers, Inc.

How later courts describe this case

• holding that U.S. resident sponsors had standing to challenge the State Department’s refusal to process visa applications
• holding that U.S. resident sponsors had standing to challenge DOS's refusal to process visa applications because the prolonged separation of immediate family members resulted in injury to the sponsors
• “[W]e may affirm a [trial] court’s decision on different grounds than those employed by the [trial] court[,]”
• “There is, accordingly, no question that propensity would be an ‘improper basis’ 2 for conviction.”
• “[T]he government cannot escape the pitfalls of litigation by simply giving in to a plaintiff's individual claim without renouncing the challenged policy, at least where there is a reasonable chance of the dispute arising again between the government and the same plaintiff.”