On May 7, 1958, William A. Hogan, District Director of Immigration and Naturalization Service, issued an administrative subpoena directing Lee Tin Mew to appear and give testimony at the office of the Service in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii, pursuant to the provisions of Section 235 of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Although an attempt to serve the subpoena at the home of Lee Tin Mew failed, his attorney appeared with appellant at the place designated and requested that the subpoena be served and the testimony taken. Lee Tin Mew was sworn before William S. Jones, described as an Investigator of the Service. Before the oath was administered, Investigator Jones gave him the following advice:

Apparently Lee Tin Mew understood only too well, for he answered only a few questions concerning his names and thereafter refused to answer any and all inquiries. Investigator Jones then petitioned for and obtained an order from the United States District Court ordering Lee Tin Mew to appear and testify. Thereafter, a motion to quash the order, together with an affidavit, was filed. The District Court denied the motion after argument. This appeal followed.

As will hereafter appear, the questions in this appeal could have been *378 defined with clarity if Lee Tin Mew had appeared before the officer after the court sustained the subpoena and then based refusal to answer specific questions on various grounds available to him. Both parties claim that the order is presently appealable. And United States v. Vivian, 7 Cir., 217 F.2d 882, 883 , so holds.

The government did not in any of the proceedings lay sufficient foundation to establish the authority of Investigator Jones to question Lee Tin Mew under the administrative subpoena here issued in the manner set out. The order, which approves the propounding of the questions asked and apparently directs Lee Tin Mew to answer each and every one, is clearly erroneous.

The statute under which the administrative subpoena was issued, 8 U.S.C.A. § 1225 , so far as pertinent, reads:

No claim is made that the proceeding was one conducted by a Special Inquiry Officer under the provisions of 8 U.S.C.A. § 1252 (b).

The warrant issued by the District Director does not recite that the officer is carrying on an inspection of any alien seeking “admission or readmission to or the privilege of passing through the United States.” It does not recite that Lee Tin Mew is a “person coming into the United States” who may be required under the enactment to “state under oath” certain matters and “if an alien” to give information on a vastly enlarged scale. The warrant does not state that the purpose of the subpoena is to take evidence “touching the privilege of any alien or person he believes or suspects to be an alien to enter, reenter, pass through or reside in the United States.” The subpoena does not state whether the “alien or person he suspects to be an alien” is Lee Tin Mew or one of his three brothers or Mow Sing or the wife or one of the four children of the latter. As to Lee Tin Mew, although the subpoena did not recite he was an alien or a person the Investigator believed or suspected to be an alien or so much as intimate that he was the subject of the investigation, questions were directed to him regarding his citizenship.

The whole section seems to be geared to the examination of the qualifications of a person arriving at the border to enter the country and reside therein. There is the question whether the statute was intended to require a person resident in the country to give evidence as to his citizenship. The case of United States v. Minker, 350 U.S. 179 , 76 S.Ct. 281 , 100 L.Ed. 185 , decides this question as to a citizen naturalized by court process adversely to the contention of the government. Lee Tin Mew claimed in the affidavit filed on the motion to quash subpoena that he is a citizen because he claims to have been born in Hawaii on April 4, 1894, and was collectively naturalized. He also claims therein to have been admitted, upon return to Hawaii, by a Board of Special Inquiry on December 10, 1922. The allegations of the affidavit are, however, not properly before this Court. But the question still remains whether the order of the court was erroneous.

After Lee Tin Mew was warned that his testimony must be voluntary and that anything he said might be used against him in a civil or criminal proceeding, he was interrogated over a wide field. He was asked his occupation, whether he was known as “Big Shake,” if he ran gambling among the Chinese, whether he had a legitimate occupation, whether he organized the “1350 Club” in 1935, what his occupation was during the war between this country and Germany and Japan, whether he registered for the draft in the 2nd World War.

Can a person claiming to be a citizen be required “voluntarily” to answer such questions when warned that his answers may be used against him in any civil or criminal proceedings simply because the officer believes or suspects him of being an alien?

Lee Tin Mew was also asked questions about Lee Tim Kam and Lee Tim Sau, his alleged brothers, and the family of Mow Sing above noted. He was asked questions which might have been pertinent to his status as a citizen or an alien.

All in all, this examination, as actually conducted, would seem to afford little ground for the immigration officer to apply to the court for the enforcement of this subpoena.

The petition to the District Court for enforcement was subject to all the defects above noted as to the subpoena itself. There is no allegation therein that this person concerning whom the examination is to be had is “seeking admission or readmission” or that he is not presently residing permanently in the United States. It does not state that Jones believes or suspects Lee Tin Mew or anyone else of alienage.

The order of the court recites none of this foundation. Although there is a re *380 cital in the order that testimony was introduced, no evidence appears in the transcript which might serve as a basis for findings respecting such matters. The order reads in part as follows:

This is apparently a blanket affirmation of the right of the immigration officer to inquire into all the matters gone into in the previous examination without any affirmative proof of the jurisdictional foundation for the command.

The order was erroneous.

Reversed.