WASHINGTON — A divided Supreme Court ruled Monday that most immigrant children who have become adults during their parents' years-long wait to become legal permanent residents of the U.S. should go to the back of the line in their own wait for visas.

In a 5-4 decision, the justices sided with President Barack Obama's administration in finding that immigration laws offer relief only to a small percentage of children who "age out" of the system when they turn 21. The majority -- tens of thousands of people -- no longer qualify for the immigration status granted to minors.

The case is unusual in that it pitted the administration against immigration-overhaul advocates who said government officials were misreading a law intended to keep families together by preventing added delays for children seeking visas.

There was no majority opinion. Writing for three justices, Justice Elena Kagan said the law preserves the place in line for a child whose petition for a visa was filed directly by a parent who is a green card holder, but not for children in other categories. She was joined by Justices Anthony Kennedy and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Antonin Scalia wrote a separate opinion agreeing only with the outcome, but not Kagan's reasoning.

Because approving families for green cards can take years, tens of thousands of immigrant children age out of the system each year, according to government estimates. Congress tried to fix the problem in 2002 when it passed the Child Status Protection Act. The law allows aged-out immigrants to retain their child status longer or qualify for a valid adult category and keep their places in line.

But appeals courts have split on whether the law applies to all children or only those in specific categories. The Obama administration argued that the law applied only to a narrow category of immigrants, leaving out most of the those affected. Government attorneys said a broad application of the law would lead to too many young adults entering the country ahead of others waiting in line.

Immigration advocates say the law was passed to promote family unity. According to Catholic Legal Immigration Network, forcing an aged-out immigrant to go to the end of the line would increase wait time by more than nine years. By contrast, it says keeping the immigrant's priority dates would increase the wait time for others by just a few months.

The case involved Rosalina Cuellar de Osorio, a Salvadoran immigrant who was in line for a visa along with her 13-year-old son. But after years of waiting, her son turned 21 and government officials said he no longer qualified as an eligible child. He was placed at the back of the line, resulting in a wait of several more years.

The family won its challenge before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, but the Supreme Court reversed that decision.

In a lengthy dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said there is no conflict in the law and it should be read to clearly allow all aged-out immigrants to keep their places in line. She quotes a book by Scalia in which he says courts "do not lightly presume that Congress has legislated in self-contradicting terms."

Sotomayor was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer and Clarence Thomas. Justice Samuel Alito wrote a separate dissent.

A group of lawmakers in Congress when the law was passed -- including Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz.; Orrin Hatch, R-Utah; Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; and Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif. -- submitted a brief arguing against the government in the case.

Immigration groups were hoping the issue would be addressed in Congress. The Senate last year passed a bipartisan bill that would tighten border security, provide enforcement measures and offer a path to citizenship for the estimated 11 million people living in the United States illegally. That measure stalled in the House, where Republicans have rejected a comprehensive approach in favor of a bill-by-bill process.

In other Supreme Court action, justices refused to halt disputed payments stemming from the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, potentially forcing BP to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in claims.

In a one-sentence order Monday, the justices said they wouldn't put a hold on lower-court rulings that require the oil company to begin making the payments, part of a $9.2 billion accord.

BP has argued some of the money would go to businesses whose losses were unrelated to the spill, including lawyers who lost their licenses and warehouses that burned down before the accident. The company has said the process violates the Constitution and federal rules that govern class-action litigation.

Geoff Morrell, a company spokesman, said BP believes that failure to suspend "the payment of business economic loss claims will allow hundreds of millions of dollars to be irretrievably scattered to claimants whose losses were not plausibly caused by the Deepwater Horizon accident."

The high court will decide late this year whether to take up BP's appeal.

The court also turned away appeals from cigarette manufacturers of more than $70 million in judgments to Florida smokers.

The justices did not comment Monday about the rejection of the companies' complaints.

R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., Philip Morris USA Inc. and Lorillard Tobacco Co. wanted the court to review cases in which smokers won large awards without having to prove that the companies sold a defective and dangerous product or hid the risks of smoking.

Those cases all relied on a Florida court ruling that allows smokers or their surviving relatives to use jury findings in an earlier large class-action lawsuit, even though the verdict in that earlier case was overturned. Each plaintiff still has to show addiction to cigarettes and resulting death or illness.

Also on Monday, the court ruled that a group of homeowners in North Carolina can't sue a company that contaminated their drinking water decades ago because a state deadline has lapsed, a decision that could prevent thousands of other property owners in similar cases from recovering damages after being exposed to toxic waste.

In a 7-2 decision, the justices said state law strictly bars any lawsuit brought more than 10 years after the contamination occurred -- even if residents did not realize their water was polluted until years later.

The high court reversed a lower-court ruling that said federal environmental laws should trump the state law and allow the lawsuit against electronics manufacturer CTS Corp. to proceed.

The decision is a setback for the families of several thousand former North Carolina-based Marines suing the federal government in a separate case for exposing them to contaminated drinking water over several decades at Camp Lejeune. The government is relying on the same state law to avoid liability. That case is currently pending at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta.

Information for this article was contributed by Sam Hananel and staff members of The Associated Press and by Greg Stohr, Margaret Cronin Fisk and Laurel Calkins of Bloomberg News.

A Section on 06/10/2014