author_name
stringclasses 26
values | year
int64 1.97k
2.02k
| label
int64 0
200
| category
stringclasses 5
values | case_name
stringlengths 9
127
| url
stringlengths 55
120
| text
stringlengths 1k
3.91k
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | further legislative action. A determination that the ICJ judgment is enforceable does not quite end the matter, for the judgment itself requires us to make one further decision. It directs the United States to provide further judicial review of the 51 cases of Mexican nationals "by means of its own choosing." Avena, I.C. J., at 72, ¶ 153(9). As I have explained, I believe the judgment addresses itself to the Judicial Branch. This Court consequently must "choose" the means. And rather than, say, conducting the further review in this Court, or requiring Medellín to seek the review in another federal court, I believe that the proper forum for review would be the Texas-court proceedings that would follow a remand of this case. Beyond the fact that a remand would be the normal course upon reversing a lower court judgment, there are additional reasons why further state-court review would be particularly appropriate here. The crime took place in Texas, and the prosecution at issue is a Texas prosecution. The President has specifically endorsed further Texas court review. See President's Memorandum. The ICJ judgment requires further hearings as to whether the police failure to inform Medellín of his Vienna Convention rights prejudiced Medellín, even if such hearings would not otherwise be available under Texas' procedural default rules. While Texas has already considered that matter, it did not consider fully, for example, whether appointed counsel's coterminous 6-month suspension from the practice of the law *1390 "caused actual prejudice to the defendant"prejudice that would not have existed had Medellín known he could contact his consul and thereby find a different lawyer. Finally, Texas law authorizes a criminal defendant to seek postjudgment review. See Tex.Code Crim. Proc. Ann., Art. 11.071, 5(a)(1) And Texas law provides for further review where American law provides a "legal basis" that was previously "unavailable." See Ex parte Medellín, Thus, I would send this case back to the Texas courts, which must then apply the Avena judgment as binding law. See U.S. Const., Art. VI, cl. 2; see also, e.g., I Because the majority concludes that the Nation's international legal obligation to enforce the ICJ's decision is not automatically a domestic legal obligation, it must then determine whether the President has the constitutional authority to enforce it. And the majority finds that he does not. See Part I, ante. In my view, that second conclusion has broader implications than the majority suggests. The President here seeks to implement treaty provisions in which the United States agrees that the ICJ judgment is binding with respect to the Avena parties. Consequently, his actions |
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | binding with respect to the Avena parties. Consequently, his actions draw upon his constitutional authority in the area of foreign affairs. In this case, his exercise of that power falls within that middle range of Presidential authority where Congress has neither specifically authorized nor specifically forbidden the Presidential action in question. See Youngstown Sheet & Tube At the same time, if the President were to have the authority he asserts here, it would require setting aside a state procedural law. It is difficult to believe that in the exercise of his Article powers pursuant to a ratified treaty, the President can never take action that would result in setting aside state law. Cf. United Suppose that the President believes it necessary that he implement a treaty provision requiring a prisoner exchange involving someone in state custody in order to avoid a proven military threat. Cf. Or suppose he believes it necessary to secure a foreign consul's treaty-based rights to move freely or to contact an arrested foreign national. Cf. Vienna Convention, Art. 3, 21 U.S.T., at 98. Does the Constitution require the President in each and every such instance to obtain a special statute authorizing his action? On the other hand, the Constitution must impose significant restrictions upon the President's ability, by invoking Article treaty-implementation authority, to circumvent ordinary legislative processes and to pre-empt state law as he does so. Previously this Court has little about this question. It has held that the President has a fair amount of authority to make and to implement executive agreements, at least in respect to international claims settlement, and that this authority can require contrary state law to be set aside. See, e.g., at 223, 230-231, -23, It has made clear that principles of foreign sovereign immunity trump state law and that the Executive, operating without explicit legislative authority, can assert those principles in state court. See Ex parte Peru, It has also made clear that the Executive has inherent power to bring a lawsuit "to carry out treaty obligations." Sanitary Dist. of 69 L. Ed. But it has reserved judgment as to "the scope of the President's power to preempt state law pursuant to authority delegated by a ratified treaty"a fact that helps to explain the majority's inability to find support in precedent for its own conclusions. Barclays Bank (1). Given the Court's comparative lack of expertise in foreign affairs; given the importance of the Nation's foreign relations; given the difficulty of finding the proper constitutional balance among state and federal, executive and legislative, powers in such matters; and given the likely |
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | and legislative, powers in such matters; and given the likely future importance of this Court's efforts to do so, I would very much hesitate before concluding that the Constitution implicitly sets forth broad prohibitions (or permissions) in this area. Cf. ante, at 1367, n. 13 (stating that the Court's holding is "limited" by the facts that (1) this treaty is non-self-executing and (2) the judgment of an international tribunal is involved). I would thus be content to leave the matter in the constitutional shade from which it has emerged. Given my view of this case, I need not answer the question. And I shall not try to do so. That silence, however, cannot be taken as agreement with the majority's Part I conclusion. IV The majority's two holdings taken together produce practical anomalies. They unnecessarily complicate the President's foreign affairs task insofar as, for example, they increase the likelihood of Security Council Avena enforcement proceedings, of worsening relations with our neighbor Mexico, of precipitating actions by other nations putting at risk American citizens who have the misfortune to be arrested while traveling abroad, or of diminishing our Nation's reputation abroad as a result of our failure to follow the "rule of law" principles that we preach. The holdings also encumber Congress with a task (postratification legislation) that, in respect to many decisions of international tribunals, it may not want and which it may find difficult to execute. See At the same time, insofar as today's holdings make it more difficult to enforce the judgments of international tribunals, including technical non-politically-controversial judgments, those holdings weaken that rule of law for which our Constitution stands. Compare Hughes Defends Foreign Policies in Plea for Lodge, N.Y. Times, Oct. 31, 1922, p. 1, col. 1, p. col. 1 (then-Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes stating that "we favor, and always have favored, an international court of justice for the determination according to judicial standards of justiciable international disputes"); Mr. Root Discusses International Problems, N.Y. Times, July 9, 1916, section 6, book review p. 276 (former Secretary of State and U.S. Senator Elihu Root stating that " `a court of international justice with a general obligation to submit all justiciable questions to its jurisdiction and to abide by its judgment is a primary requisite to any real *1392 restraint of law' "); Mills, The Obligation of the United States Toward the World Court, 11 Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 128 (Congressman Ogden Mills describing the efforts of thenSecretary of State John Hay, and others, to establish a World Court, and |
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | John Hay, and others, to establish a World Court, and the support therefor). These institutional considerations make it difficult to reconcile the majority's holdings with the workable Constitution that the Founders envisaged. They reinforce the importance, in practice and in principle, of asking Chief Justice Marshall's question: Does a treaty provision address the "Judicial" Branch rather than the "Political Branches" of Government. See 2 Pet., at And they show the wisdom of the well-established precedent that indicates that the answer to the question here is "yes." See Parts I and V In sum, a strong line of precedent, likely reflecting the views of the Founders, indicates that the treaty provisions before us and the judgment of the International Court of Justice address themselves to the Judicial Branch and consequently are self-executing. In reaching a contrary conclusion, the Court has failed to take proper account of that precedent and, as a result, the Nation may well break its word even though the President seeks to live up to that word and Congress has done nothing to suggest the contrary. For the reasons set forth, I respectfully dissent. APPENDIXES TO OPINION OF BREYER, J. A Examples of Supreme Court decisions considering a treaty provision to be self-executing. Parentheticals indicate the subject matter; an asterisk indicates that the Court applied the provision to invalidate a contrary state or territorial law or policy. 1. Olympic 2. El Al Israel 176, * 3. (16) Societe Nationale Industrielle 5. Sumitomo Shoji America, 6. Trans World 25, 7. * 8. * 9. Corp. of * 10. 55, 50 *, 11. * 12. 13. * 1. 15. 16. * 17. Wildenhus's 18. United 19. 100 U.S. * 20. American Ins. 21. United 22. United (12) 23. Wheat. * 2. * 25. 26. 27. * 28. * 29. 1 L. Ed. B United States treaties in force containing provisions for the submission of treaty-based disputes to the International Court of Justice. Parentheticals indicate subject matters that can be the subject of ICJ adjudication that are of the sort that this Court has found self-executing. Economic Cooperation Agreements 1. Economic Aid Agreement Between the United States of America and Spain, Sept. 26, 1953, [1953] U.S.T. 1903, 1920-, T.I.A.S. No. 2851 (property and contract) 2. Agreement for Economic Assistance Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of Israel Pursuant to the General Agreement for Technical Cooperation, May 9, [] 3 U.S.T. 17, 177, T.I.A.S. No. 2561 3. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America *139 and Portugal, -2862 (198) Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the |
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | *139 and Portugal, -2862 (198) Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and the United Kingdom, 62 Stat. 260 (198) 5. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and the Republic of Turkey, (198) 6. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Sweden, (198) 7. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Norway, (198) 8. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the Governments of the United States of America and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, (198) 9. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, 62 Stat. 268 (198) 10. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Italy, 62 Stat. 20 (198) 11. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Iceland, (198) 12. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Greece, 62 Stat. 23 (198) 13. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and France, 2 (198) 1. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Denmark, 62 Stat. 221 (198) 15. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and the Kingdom of Belgium, (198) 16. Economic Cooperation Agreement Between the United States of America and Austria, 62 Stat. 21 (198) Bilateral Consular Conventions 1. Consular Convention Between the United States of America and the Kingdom of Belgium, Sept. 2, 1969, [197] 25 U.S.T. 1, 7-9, 56-57, 60-61, 75, T.I.A.S. No. 7775 (domestic court jurisdiction and authority over consular officers, taxation of consular officers, consular notification) 2. Consular Convention Between the United States of America and the Republic of Korea, Jan. 8, 1963, [1963] 1 U.S.T. 1, 161, 16-168, T.I.A.S. No. 569 Friendship, Commerce, and navigation Treaties 1. Treaty of Amity and Economic Between the United States of America and the Togolese Republic, Feb. 8, 1966, [1967] 18 U.S.T. 1, 3-, 10, T.I.A.S. No. 6193 (contracts and property) 2. Treaty of Friendship, Establishment and Navigation Between the United States of America and The Kingdom of Belgium, Feb. 21, [1963] 1 U.S.T. 128, 1290-1291, 1307, T.I.A.S. No. 532 3. Treaty of Friendship, Establishment and Navigation between the United *1395 States of America and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Feb. 23, 1962, [1963] 1 U.S.T. 251, 25-255, 262, T.I.A.S. No. 5306 (consular notification; contracts and property) Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the United States of America and the Kingdom of Denmark, Oct. 1, 1951, [] 12 U.S.T. 908, 912-913, 935, T.I.A.S. No. 797 (contracts and property) 5. Treaty of Friendship and Commerce Between the United States of America and Pakistan, |
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | and Commerce Between the United States of America and Pakistan, Nov. 12, 1959, [] 12 U.S.T. 110, 113, 123, T.I.A.S. No. 863 6. Convention of Establishment Between the United States of America and France, Nov. 25, 1959, [1960] 11 U.S.T. 2398, 201-203, 217, T.I.A.S. No. 625 7. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Between the United States of America and the Republic of Korea, Nov. 28, 1956, [1957] 8 U.S.T. 2217, 2221-2222, 2, T.I.A.S. No. 397 8. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the United States of America and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Mar. 27, 1956, [1957] 8 U.S.T.203, 207-2050, 2082-20, T.I.A.S. No. 392 (freedom to travel, consular notification, contracts and property) 9. Treaty of Amity, Economic and Consular Rights Between the United States of America and Iran, Aug. 15, 1955, [1957] 8 U.S.T. 8, 903, 907, 913, T.I.A.S. No. 3853 (property and freedom of commerce) 10. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Between the United States of America and the Federal Republic of Germany, Oct. 29, 195, [1956] 7 U.S.T. 19, 18-186, 1867, T.I.A.S. No. 3593 (property and contract) 11. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Between the United States of America and Greece, Aug. 3, 1951, [195] 5 U.S.T. 181-187, -1915, T.I.A.S. No. 3057 12. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Between the United States of America and Israel, Aug. 23, 1951, [195] 5 U.S.T. 550, 555-556, 575, T.I.A.S. No. 298 13. Treaty of Amity and Economic Between the United States of America and Ethiopia, Sept. 7, 1951, [1953] U.S.T. 213, 211, 215, 217, T.I.A.S. No. 286 (property and freedom of commerce) 1. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation Between the United States of America and Japan, Apr. 2, 1953, [1953] U.S.T.2063, 2067-2069, 2080, T.I.A.S. No. 2863 (property and contract) 15. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the United States of America and Ireland, Jan. 21, 1950, [1950] 1 U.S.T. 785, 792-79, 801, T.I.A.S. No. 2155 16. Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Navigation between the United States of America and the Italian Republic, 228, 229 (198) (property and freedom of commerce) Multilateral Conventions 1. Patent Cooperation Treaty, June 19, 1970, [1976-77] 28 U.S.T. 765, 7652-7676, 7708, T.I.A.S. No. 8733 (patents) *1396 2. Universal Copyright Convention, July 2, 1971, [197] 25 U.S.T. 131, 135, 1366, T.I.A.S. No. 7868 (copyright) 3. Vienna Convention on Diplomatic and Optional Protocol Concerning the Compulsory Settlement of Disputes, Apr. 18, [1972] 23 U.S.T. 3227, 320-323, 5, T.I.A.S. No. 7502 (rights of diplomats in foreign nations) Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property, July 1, 1967, [1970] 21 U.S.T. 15, 1631-1639, |
Justice Breyer | 2,008 | 2 | dissenting | Medellin v. Texas | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145822/medellin-v-texas/ | Industrial Property, July 1, 1967, [1970] 21 U.S.T. 15, 1631-1639, 1665-1666, T.I.A.S. No. 6923 (patents) 5. Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations, Feb. 13, 196, [1970] 21 U.S.T. 118, 126-128, 130-132, 138-10, T.I.A.S. No. 6900 (rights of U.N. diplomats and officials) 6. Convention on Offences and Certain Other Acts Committed on Board Aircraft, Sept. 1, 1963, [1969] 20 U.S.T. 291, 293-297, 2952, T.I.A.S. No. 6768 (airlines' treatment of passengers) 7. Agreement for Facilitating the International Circulation of Visual and Auditory Materials of an Educational, Scientific and Cultural Character, July 15, 199, [1966] 17 U.S.T. 1578, 1581, 1586, T.I.A.S. No. 6116 (customs duties on importation of films and recordings) 8. Universal Copyright Convention, Sept. 6, [1955] 6 U.S.T. 2731, 2733-2739, 273, T.I.A.S. No. 332 (copyright) 9. Treaty of Peace with Japan, Sept. 8, 1951, [] 3 U.S.T. 3169, 3181-31, 3188, T.I.A.S. No. 290 10. Convention on Road Traffic, Sept. 19, 199, [] 3 U.S.T. 3008, 3012-3017, 3020, T.I.A.S. No. 7 (rights and obligations of drivers) 11. Convention on International Civil Aviation, 61 Stat. 120 (19) |
Justice Scalia | 1,986 | 9 | majority | O'CONNOR v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111771/oconnor-v-united-states/ | The petitioners, United States citizen employees of the Panama Canal Commission and their spouses, seek refunds of income taxes collected on salaries paid by the Commission between 1979 and 1981. We granted certiorari to resolve conflicting appellate interpretations of an international agreement. From 1904 to 1979, the United States exercised sovereignty over the Panama Canal and the surrounding 10-mile-wide Panama Canal Zone under the Isthmian Canal Convention, On September 7, 1977, the United States and Panama signed the Panama Canal Treaty, T.I.A.S. No. 10030, which was ratified by the Senate on April 17, 1978, and took effect on October 1, 1979. The Treaty transferred to Panama sovereignty over the Canal and Zone, but gave the United States the right to operate the Canal until December 31, 1999. The vehicle for United States administration of the Canal is the Panama Canal Commission, a United States Government agency supervised by a Board of nine members, four of whom are Panamanian nationals proposed by the Government of Panama. See 22 *29 T.I.A.S. No. 10031 (hereinafter Agreement), contains the provision that gives rise to the present dispute. Article XV of the Agreement, entitled "Taxation," provides as follows: "1. By virtue of this Agreement, the Commission, its contractors and subcontractors are exempt from payment in the Republic of Panama of all taxes, fees or other charges on their activities or property. "2. United States citizen employees and dependents shall be exempt from any taxes, fees or other charges on income received as a result of their work for the Commission. Similarly, they shall be exempt from payment of taxes, fees or other charges on income derived from sources outside the Republic of Panama. "3. United States citizen employees and dependents shall be exempt from taxes, fees or other charges on gifts or inheritance or on personal property, the presence of which within the territory of the Republic of Panama is due solely to the stay therein of such persons on account of their or their sponsor's work with the Commission. "4. The Coordinating Committee may establish such regulations as may be appropriate for the implementation of this Article." The petitioners contend that 2 of this Article constitutes an express exemption of their Commission salaries from both Panamanian and United States taxation. See 26 U.S. C. 894(a) ("Income of any kind, to the extent required by any treaty obligation of the United States, shall not be included in gross income and shall be exempt from taxation under this subtitle"). The Claims Court agreed, but was reversed by a five-judge panel of the Federal Circuit. In a |
Justice Scalia | 1,986 | 9 | majority | O'CONNOR v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111771/oconnor-v-united-states/ | by a five-judge panel of the Federal Circuit. In a substantively identical case, the Eleventh Circuit has ruled for the taxpayers. cert. pending, *30 No. 85-1011. The same issue is presented in numerous cases still pending in the lower courts.[1] We agree with the Federal Circuit. The first section of Article XV, which confers upon the Commission and its contractors an exemption "from payment in the Republic of Panama of all taxes" (emphasis added), establishes the context for the discussion of tax exemptions in the entire Article so that when 2 and 3 state that "United States citizen employees. shall be exempt" from taxes they are understood to be dealing only with taxes payable in Panama. In that regard the structure of Article XV is similar to that of Article XVI, which in most of its sections speaks generally of import duties, but is understood to refer only to Panamanian import duties principally because 1 sets the stage in that fashion by referring to "the customs laws and regulations of the Republic of Panama." Agreement, Art. XVI, 1 (emphasis added). There is some purely textual evidence, albeit subtle, of the understanding that Article XV applies only to Panamanian taxes: In conferring an exemption from property taxes, 3 displays an assumption that only personal property within the Republic of Panama is at issue; otherwise, that significant qualification to the operation of 3 would more naturally have been set forth as an explicit limitation ("personal property *31 within the territory of the Republic of Panama, whose presence there," etc.) rather than being referred to incidentally in the modifying clause ("personal property, whose presence within the territory of the Republic of Panama," etc.). And the assumption that only personal property within Panama is at issue in turn reflects the more fundamental assumption that only Panamanian personal property taxes are being addressed. More persuasive than the textual evidence, and in our view overwhelmingly convincing, is the contextual case for limiting Article XV to Panamanian taxes. Unless one posits the ellipsis of failing to repeat, in each section, 1's limitation to taxes "in the Republic of Panama," the Article takes on a meaning that is utterly implausible and has no foundation in the negotiations leading to the Agreement. For if the first sentence of 2 refers to United States as well as Panamanian taxes, then the second sentence of 2, and the totality of 3, must do so as well with the consequence that United States citizen employees and their dependents would be exempt not only from United States income tax on their |
Justice Scalia | 1,986 | 9 | majority | O'CONNOR v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111771/oconnor-v-united-states/ | exempt not only from United States income tax on their earnings from the Commission, but also from United States income tax on all income from sources outside Panama (e. g., United States bank accounts), and from all United States gift and inheritance taxes. While, as the petitioners assert, there might have been some reason why Panama would insist that its inability to tax United States citizen Commission employees upon their earnings in Panama be matched by a detraction from the United States' sovereign power to tax those same earnings, there is no conceivable reason why this hypothetical "your-sovereignty-for-mine" negotiating strategy would escalate into a demand that the United States yield more sovereign prerogatives than it was asking Panama to forgo and no imaginable reason why the United States would accept such an escalation, producing tax immunity of unprecedented scope. *32 from the United States' sovereign power to tax those same earnings, there is no conceivable reason why this hypothetical "your-sovereignty-for-mine" negotiating strategy would escalate into a demand that the United States yield more sovereign prerogatives than it was asking Panama to forgo and no imaginable reason why the United States would accept such an escalation, producing tax immunity of unprecedented scope. The petitioners' attempts to explain why these broader tax consequences need not follow from their interpretation are unpersuasive. With regard to the second sentence of 2, they argue that the opening word "similarly" should be read to incorporate into that sentence the first sentence's restriction to "income received as a result of. work for the Commission." On this understanding, the second sentence provides a "simila[r]" tax exemption for Commission-related income "derived from sources outside the Republic of Panama," but allows both countries to tax non-Commission income. In addition to being an unnatural reading of "similarly" in this context, this interpretation is flatly inconsistent with the language of 2. Contrary to the petitioners' tacit assumption, the first sentence contains nothing limiting the scope of its exemption to income received as a result of work for the Commission in Panama. A person receiving a Commission salary for work performed in, for example, Bogota would seem plainly to qualify for exemption under this provision rendering the second sentence, on the petitioners' understanding, superfluous. With regard to 3, the petitioners assert that its reference to taxation of property "within the territory of the Republic of Panama" is sufficient to demonstrate that only Panamanian taxation is intended to be covered. But as a reading of the provision will readily demonstrate, that reference applies only to personal property taxes; there is no |
Justice Scalia | 1,986 | 9 | majority | O'CONNOR v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111771/oconnor-v-united-states/ | reference applies only to personal property taxes; there is no comparable qualification on 3's exemption from taxes "on gifts or inheritance." That is limited, if at all, only by the implication that Panamanian *33 taxes alone are at issue. In sum, we find the verbal distortions necessary to give plausible content, under the petitioners' theory, to the second sentence of 2 and 3, far less tolerable than the acknowledgment of ellipsis which forms the basis of the Government's interpretation. Not only is limitation of Article XV to Panamanian taxes in accord with the consistent application of the Agreement by the Executive Branch a factor which alone is entitled to great weight, see Sumitomo Shoji America, but that application has gone unchallenged by Panama. It is undisputed that, pursuant to clear Executive Branch policy, the Panama Canal Commission consistently withheld United States income taxes from petitioners and others similarly situated, see Letter from John L. Haines, Jr., Deputy General Counsel, Panama Canal Commission, to David Slacter, United States Department of Justice, Dec. 20, 1982, pp. 2-3, 1 App. in Nos. 85-504, 85-505, 85-506, and 85-507 (CA Fed.), pp. 61-62, and that Panama, which had four of its own nationals on the Board of the Commission, did not object. The course of conduct of parties to an international agreement, like the course of conduct of parties to any contract, is evidence of its meaning. See Trans World Airlines, ; Pigeon River Improvement, Slide & Boom Cf. Uniform Commercial Code 2-208(1) (1978).[2] *34 Agreement. Similarly, as is provided by Panamanian law, they shall be exempt from payment of taxes, fees or other charges on income derived from sources outside the Republic of Panama." Panama Canal Treaty: Implementation of Article IV, Sept. 7, 1977, Art. XVI, 2, T.I.A.S. No. 10032 (emphasis added). The petitioners contend that the variation in the phraseology of the two provisions demonstrates that the taxation provisions of the Article III Agreement were meant to be bilateral. We think not. It would be another matter if the variation at issue were alteration of the phrase "Panamanian taxes" in one agreement to merely "taxes" in the other; there would have been no reason to object to the former formulation except the belief that more than Panamanian taxes were covered. Several plausible reasons, however, would justify objection to the phrase "as is provided by Panamanian law." The most obvious is the concern that the phrase would be interpreted to leave future scope of the tax exemption within Panama's unilateral control, through the amendment of its domestic law. (To be sure, that |
Justice Scalia | 1,986 | 9 | majority | O'CONNOR v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111771/oconnor-v-united-states/ | the amendment of its domestic law. (To be sure, that reason would seemingly call for deletion of the phrase from both agreements rather than merely the Agreement in Implementation of Article III but perhaps it was only with respect to the latter agreement, in which Panama had steadfastly opposed the whole concept of tax exemption, that unilateral Panamanian action was feared.) The surmise that the reason for deletion of the phrase in the Article III Agreement was its implication that only Panamanian taxes were covered would perhaps be reasonable if it were clear that the deletion was prompted by Panama. In fact, however, the deletion was made in the course of the American side's own internal drafting, before any text had even been presented to the Panamanians. (The phrase "as is provided by Panamanian law" was included in the June 26, 1977, United States draft of 2 of Art. XV, 1 App. in Nos. 85-504, 85-505, 85-506, and 85-507 (CA Fed.), p. 74, but was dropped from subsequent United States *35 only Panamanian taxes were covered would perhaps be reasonable if it were clear that the deletion was prompted by Panama. In fact, however, the deletion was made in the course of the American side's own internal drafting, before any text had even been presented to the Panamanians. (The phrase "as is provided by Panamanian law" was included in the June 26, 1977, United States draft of 2 of Art. XV, 1 App. in Nos. 85-504, 85-505, 85-506, and 85-507 (CA Fed.), p. 74, but was dropped from subsequent United States drafts,) The petitioners assert that this occurred as a consequence of the American side's knowledge that Panama would not accept a unilateral tax exemption provision and would accept a bilateral one but they point to no Panamanian negotiating proposal supporting that speculation, which seems to us not inordinately credible on its face. We find the petitioners' attempted reliance upon other elements of the negotiating history unavailing. While the Claims Court may have been correct that the negotiating history does not favor the Government's position sufficiently to overcome what that court regarded as a plain textual meaning in favor of the taxpayers, it certainly does not favor the taxpayers' position sufficiently to affect our view of the text. It contains, we may note, only a single (unhelpful) reference to United States income taxation a silence that can perhaps be reconciled with the petitioners' position, but can hardly be said affirmatively to support it. Finally, we find no significance in the fact, urged so strongly by the petitioners, |
Justice White | 1,977 | 6 | majority | Trainor v. Hernandez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109668/trainor-v-hernandez/ | The Illinois Department of Public Aid (IDPA) filed a lawsuit in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Ill., on October 30, against appellees Juan and Maria Hernandez, alleging that they had fraudulently concealed assets while applying for and receiving public assistance. Such conduct is a crime under Illinois law, Ill. Rev. Stat., c. 23, 11-21 The IDPA, however, proceeded civilly and sought only return of the money alleged to have been wrongfully *436 received. The IDPA simultaneously instituted an attachment proceeding against appellees' property. Pursuant to the Illinois Attachment Act, Ill. Rev. Stat., c. 11 (Act), the IDPA filed an affidavit setting forth the nature and amount of the underlying claim and alleging that the appellees had obtained money from the IDPA by fraud.[1] The writ of attachment was issued automatically[2] by the clerk of the court upon receipt of this affidavit.[3] The writ *437 was then given to the sheriff who executed it, on November 5, on money belonging to appellees in a credit union. Appellees received notice of the attachment, freezing their money in the credit union, on November 8, when they received the writ, the complaint, and the affidavit in support of the writ. The writ indicated a return date for the attachment proceeding of November 18,[4] Appellees appeared in court on November 18, and were informed that the matter would be continued until December 19, Appellees never filed an answer either to the attachment or to the underlying complaint.[5] They did not seek a prompt hearing, *438 nor did they attempt to quash the attachment on the ground that the procedures surrounding its issuance rendered it and the Act unconstitutional. Instead appellees filed the instant lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois on December 2, seeking, inter alia, return of the attached money. The federal complaint alleged that the appellees' property had been attached pursuant to the Act and that the Act was unconstitutional in that it provided for the deprivation of debtors' property without due process of law. Appellees as plaintiffs sought to represent a class of those "who have had or may have their property attached without notice or hearing upon the creditor's mere allegation of fraudulent conduct pursuant to the Illinois Attachment Act." App. 6-7. They named as defendants appellants Trainor and O'Malley, officials of the IDPA, and sought declaration of a defendant class made up of all the court clerks in the Circuit Courts of Illinois, and of another defendant class of all sheriffs in Illinois. They sought an injunction against Trainor and O'Malley forbidding them |
Justice White | 1,977 | 6 | majority | Trainor v. Hernandez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109668/trainor-v-hernandez/ | They sought an injunction against Trainor and O'Malley forbidding them to seek attachments under the Act and an injunction against the clerks and sheriffs forbidding them to issue or serve writs of attachment under the Act. Appellees also sought preliminary relief in the form of an order directing the Sheriff of Cook County to release the property which had been attached. Finally, appellees sought the convening of a three-judge court pursuant to 28 U.S. C. 2284. The District Court declined to rule on the request for preliminary relief because the parties had agreed that one-half of the money in the credit union would be returned. A three-judge court was convened. It certified the suit as a plaintiff and defendant class action as appellees had requested. App. 63. In an opinion dated December 19, almost one year after the return date of the attachment in state court, it *439 declined to dismiss the case under the doctrine of and stating: "In Huffman, the State of Ohio proceeded under a statute which gave an exclusive right of action to the state. By contrast, the Illinois Attachment Act provides a cause of action for any person, public or private. It is mere happenstance that the State of Illinois was the petitioner in this attachment proceeding. It is likewise coincidental that the pending state proceedings may arguably be quasi-criminal in nature; under the Illinois Attachment Act, they need not be. These major distinctions preclude this Court from extending the principles of Younger, based on considerations of equity, comity and federalism, beyond the quasi-criminal situation set forth in Huffman." Proceeding to the merits, it held 1, 2, 2a, 6, 8, 10, and 14 of the Act to be "on [their face] patently violative of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution." It ordered the clerk of the court and the Sheriff of Cook County to return to appellees the rest of their attached property; it enjoined all clerks and all sheriffs from issuing or serving attachment writs pursuant to the Act and ordered them to release any currently held attached property to its owner; and it enjoined appellants Trainor and O'Malley from authorizing applications for attachment writs pursuant to the Act. App. 65-66. Appellants appealed to this Court under 28 U.S. C. 1253, claiming that under Younger and Huffman principles the District Court should have dismissed the suit without passing on the constitutionality of the Act and that the Act is in any event constitutional.[6] Since we agree with appellants that Younger and *440 Huffman principles do apply here, |
Justice White | 1,977 | 6 | majority | Trainor v. Hernandez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109668/trainor-v-hernandez/ | appellants that Younger and *440 Huffman principles do apply here, we do not reach their second claim. Because our federal and state legal systems have overlapping jurisdiction and responsibilities, we have frequently inquired into the proper role of a federal court, in a case pending before it and otherwise within its jurisdiction, when litigation between the same parties and raising the same issues is or apparently soon will be pending in a state court. More precisely, when a suit is filed in a federal court challenging the constitutionality of a state law under the Federal Constitution and seeking to have state officers enjoined from enforcing it, should the federal court proceed to judgment when it appears that the State has already instituted proceedings in the state court to enforce the challenged statute against the federal plaintiff and the latter could tender and have his federal claims decided in the state court? and addressed these questions where the already pending state proceeding was a criminal prosecution and the federal plaintiff sought to invalidate the statute under which the state prosecution was brought. In these circumstances, the Court ruled that the Federal District Court should issue neither a declaratory judgment nor an injunction but should dismiss the case. The first justification the Court gave for this rule was simply the "basic doctrine of equity jurisprudence that courts of equity should not act, and particularly should not act to restrain a criminal prosecution, when the moving party has an adequate remedy at law and will not *441 suffer irreparable injury if denied equitable relief." Beyond the accepted rule that equity will ordinarily not enjoin the prosecution of a crime, however, the Court voiced a "more vital consideration," namely, that in a Union where both the States and the Federal Government are sovereign entities, there are basic concerns of federalism which counsel against interference by federal courts, through injunctions or otherwise, with legitimate state functions, particularly with the operation of state courts. Relying on cases that declared that courts of equity should give "scrupulous regard [to] the rightful independence of state governments," the Court held, that in this intergovernmental context, the two classic preconditions for the exercise of equity jurisdiction assumed new dimensions. Although the existence of an adequate remedy at law barring equitable relief normally would be determined by inquiring into the remedies available in the federal rather than in the state courts, Great Lakes here the inquiry was to be broadened to focus on the remedies available in the pending state proceeding. "`The accused should first set up and rely upon his |
Justice White | 1,977 | 6 | majority | Trainor v. Hernandez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109668/trainor-v-hernandez/ | "`The accused should first set up and rely upon his defense in the state courts, even though this involves a challenge of the validity of some statute, unless it plainly appears that this course would not afford adequate protection.'" quoting Dismissal of the federal suit "naturally presupposes the opportunity to raise and have timely decided by a competent state tribunal the federal issues involved." "The policy of equitable restraint is founded on the premise that ordinarily a pending state prosecution provides the accused a fair and sufficient opportunity for vindication of federal constitutional rights." *442 The Court also concluded that the other precondition for equitable reliefirreparable injurywould not be satisfied unless the threatened injury was both great and immediate. The burden of conducting a defense in the criminal prosecution was not sufficient to warrant interference by the federal courts with legitimate state efforts to enforce state laws; only extraordinary circumstances would suffice.[7] As the *443 Court later explained, to restrain a state proceeding that afforded an adequate vehicle for vindicating the federal plaintiff's constitutional rights "would entail an unseemly failure to give effect to the principle that state courts have the solemn responsibility equally with the federal courts" to safeguard constitutional rights and would "reflec[t] negatively upon the state court's ability" to do so. The State would be prevented not only from "effectuating its substantive policies, but also from continuing to perform the separate function of providing a forum competent to vindicate any constitutional objections interposed against those policies." Huffman involved the propriety of a federal injunction against the execution of a judgment entered in a pending state-court suit brought by the State to enforce a nuisance statute. Although the state suit was a civil rather than a criminal proceeding, Younger principles were held to require dismissal of the federal suit. Noting that the State was a party to the nuisance proceeding and that the nuisance statute was "in aid of and closely related to criminal statutes," the Court concluded that a federal injunction would be "an offense to the State's interest in the nuisance litigation [which] is likely to be every bit as great as it would be were this a criminal proceeding." Thus, while the traditional maxim that equity will not enjoin a criminal prosecution strictly speaking did not apply to the nuisance proceeding in Huffman, the "`more vital consideration'" of comity, quoting counseled restraint as strongly in the context of the pending state civil enforcement action as in the context of a pending criminal proceeding. In these circumstances, it was proper that the federal court stay its |
Justice White | 1,977 | 6 | majority | Trainor v. Hernandez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109668/trainor-v-hernandez/ | circumstances, it was proper that the federal court stay its hand. We have recently applied the analysis of Huffman to proceedings similar to state civil enforcement actionsjudicial *444 contempt proceedings. The Court again stressed the "more vital consideration" of comity underlying the Younger doctrine and held that the state interest in vindicating the regular operation of its judicial system through the contempt processwhether that process was labeled civil, criminal, or quasi-criminalwas sufficiently important to preclude federal injunctive relief unless Younger standards were met. These cases control here. An action against appellees was pending in state court when they filed their federal suit. The state action was a suit by the State to recover from appellees welfare payments that allegedly had been fraudulently obtained. The writ of attachment issued as part of that action. The District Court thought that Younger policies were irrelevant because suits to recover money and writs of attachment were available to private parties as well as the State; it was only because of the coincidence that the State was a party that the suit was "arguably" in aid of the criminal law. But the fact remains that the State was a party to the suit in its role of administering its public-assistance programs. Both the suit and the accompanying writ of attachment were brought to vindicate important state policies such as safeguarding the fiscal integrity of those programs. The state authorities also had the option of vindicating these policies through criminal prosecutions. See Although, as in Juidice, the State's interest here is "[p]erhaps not quite as important as is the State's interest in the enforcement of its criminal laws or even its interest in the maintenance of a quasi-criminal proceeding" the principles of Younger and Huffman are broad enough to apply to interference by a federal court with an ongoing civil enforcement action such as this, brought by the State in its sovereign capacity.[8] *445 For a federal court to proceed with its case rather than to remit appellees to their remedies in a pending state enforcement suit would confront the State with a choice of engaging in duplicative litigation, thereby risking a temporary federal injunction, or of interrupting its enforcement proceedings pending decision of the federal court at some unknown time in the future. It would also foreclose the opportunity of the state court to construe the challenged statute in the face of the actual federal constitutional challenges that would also be pending for decision before it, a privilege not wholly shared by the federal courts. Of course, in the case before us the *446 state |
Justice White | 1,977 | 6 | majority | Trainor v. Hernandez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109668/trainor-v-hernandez/ | Of course, in the case before us the *446 state statute was invalidated and a federal injunction prohibited state officers from using or enforcing the attachment statute for any purpose. The eviscerating impact on many state enforcement actions is readily apparent.[9] This disruption of suits by the State in its sovereign capacity, when combined with the negative reflection on the State's ability to adjudicate federal claims that occurs whenever a federal court enjoins a pending state proceeding, leads us to the conclusion that the interests of comity and federalism on which Younger and primarily rest apply in full force here. The pendency of the state-court action called for restraint by the federal court and for the dismissal of appellees' complaint unless extraordinary circumstances were present warranting federal interference or unless their state remedies were inadequate to litigate their federal due process claim. No extraordinary circumstances warranting equitable relief were present here. There is no suggestion that the pending state action was brought in bad faith or for the purpose of harassing appellees. It is urged that this case comes within the exception that we said in Younger might exist where a *447 state statute is "`flagrantly and patently violative of express constitutional prohibitions in every clause, sentence and paragraph, and in whatever manner and against whomever an effort might be made to apply it.'" -54, quoting Even if such a finding was made below, which we doubt (see ), it would not have been warranted in light of our cases. Compare North Georgia Finishing, with As for whether appellees could have presented their federal due process challenge to the attachment statute in the pending state proceeding, that question, if presented below, was not addressed by the District Court, which placed its rejection of Younger and Huffman on broader grounds. The issue is heavily laden with local law, and we do not rule on it here in the first instance.[10] The grounds on which the District Court refused to apply the principles of Younger and Huffman were infirm; it was therefore error, on those grounds, to entertain the action on behalf of either the named or the unnamed plaintiffs and to reach the issue of the constitutionality of the Illinois attachment statute.[11] The judgment is therefore reversed, and the case is remanded *448 to the District Court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. MR. JUSTICE STEWART substantially agrees with the views expressed in the dissenting opinions of MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN and MR. JUSTICE STEVENS. Accordingly, he respectfully dissents from the opinion and judgment of the Court. |
Justice Kennedy | 1,988 | 4 | concurring | Michigan v. Chesternut | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112095/michigan-v-chesternut/ | It is no bold step to conclude, as the Court does, that the evidence should have been admitted, for respondent's unprovoked flight gave the police ample cause to stop him. The Court instead concentrates on the significance of the chase; and as to that it is fair to interpret its opinion as finding no more than an absence of improper conduct. We would do well to add that, barring the need to inquire about hot pursuit, *577 which is not at issue here, neither "chase" nor "investigative pursuit" need be included in the lexicon of the Fourth Amendment. A Fourth Amendment seizure occurs when an individual remains in the control of law enforcement officials because he reasonably believes, on the basis of their conduct toward him, that he is not free to go. See, e. g., ; United The case before us presented an opportunity to consider whether even an unmistakable show of authority can result in the seizure of a person who attempts to elude apprehension and who discloses contraband or other incriminating evidence before he is ultimately detained. It is at least plausible to say that whether or not the officers' conduct communicates to a person a reasonable belief that they intend to apprehend him, such conduct does not implicate Fourth Amendment protections until it achieves a restraining effect. The Court's opinion does not foreclose this holding, and I concur. |
Justice Ginsburg | 2,009 | 5 | majority | Arizona v. Johnson | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145912/arizona-v-johnson/ | This case concerns the authority of police officers to “stop and frisk” a passenger in a motor vehicle temporarily seized upon police detection of a traffic infraction. In a pathmarking decision, the Court considered whether an investigatory stop (tem porary detention) and frisk (patdown for weapons) may be conducted without violating the Fourth Amendment’s ban on unreasonable searches and seizures. The Court upheld “stop and frisk” as constitutionally permissible if two conditions are met. First, the investigatory stop must be lawful. That requirement is met in an on-the-street en counter, Terry determined, when the police officer rea sonably suspects that the person apprehended is commit ting or has committed a criminal offense. Second, to proceed from a stop to a frisk, the police officer must rea sonably suspect that the person stopped is armed and dangerous. For the duration of a traffic stop, we recently confirmed, a police officer effectively seizes “everyone in the vehicle,” the driver and all passengers. v. California, 551 2 ARIZONA v. JOHNSON Opinion of the Court U. S. 249, 255 Accordingly, we hold that, in a traffic-stop setting, the first Terry condition—a lawful investigatory stop—is met whenever it is lawful for police to detain an automobile and its occupants pending inquiry into a vehicular violation. The police need not have, in addition, cause to believe any occupant of the vehicle is involved in criminal activity. To justify a patdown of the driver or a passenger during a traffic stop, however, just as in the case of a pedestrian reasonably suspected of criminal activity, the police must harbor reasonable suspi cion that the person subjected to the frisk is armed and dangerous. I On April 19, 2002, Officer Maria Trevizo and Detectives Machado and Gittings, all members of Arizona’s gang task force, were on patrol in Tucson near a neighborhood asso ciated with the Crips gang. At approximately 9 p.m., the officers pulled over an automobile after a license plate check revealed that the vehicle’s registration had been suspended for an insurance-related violation. Under Arizona law, the violation for which the vehicle was stopped constituted a civil infraction warranting a cita tion. At the time of the stop, the vehicle had three occu pants—the driver, a front-seat passenger, and a passenger in the back seat, Lemon Montrea Johnson, the respondent here. In making the stop the officers had no reason to suspect anyone in the vehicle of criminal activity. See App. 29–30. The three officers left their patrol car and approached the stopped vehicle. Machado instructed all of the occu pants to keep their hands visible. |
Justice Ginsburg | 2,009 | 5 | majority | Arizona v. Johnson | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145912/arizona-v-johnson/ | all of the occu pants to keep their hands visible. He asked whether there were any weapons in the vehicle; all re sponded no. Machado then directed the driver to get out of the car. Gittings dealt with the front-seat passenger, who stayed in the vehicle throughout the stop. Cite as: 555 U. S. (2009) 3 Opinion of the Court See While Machado was getting the driver’s license and information about the vehicle’s registra tion and insurance, see at 42–43, Trevizo attended to Johnson. Trevizo noticed that, as the police approached, Johnson looked back and kept his eyes on the officers. When she drew near, she observed that Johnson was wearing clothing, including a blue bandana, that she considered consistent with Crips membership. She also noticed a scanner in Johnson’s jacket pocket, which “struck [her] as highly unusual and cause [for] concern,” because “most people” would not carry around a scanner that way “unless they’re going to be involved in some kind of criminal activity or [are] going to try to evade the police by listening to the scanner.” In response to Trevizo’s questions, Johnson provided his name and date of birth but said he had no identification with him. He volunteered that he was from Eloy, Arizona, a place Trevizo knew was home to a Crips gang. Johnson further told Trevizo that he had served time in prison for burglary and had been out for about a year. Trevizo wanted to question Johnson away from the front-seat passenger to gain “intelligence about the gang [Johnson] might be in.” App. 19. For that reason, she asked him to get out of the car. Johnson complied. Based on Trevizo’s observations and Johnson’s answers to her questions while he was still seated in the car, Trevizo suspected that “he might have a weapon on him.” at 20. When he exited the vehicle, she therefore “patted him down for officer safety.” During the patdown, Tre vizo felt the butt of a gun near Johnson’s waist. 217 Ariz., at 170 P. 3d, at At that point Johnson began to struggle, and Trevizo placed him in handcuffs. Johnson was charged in state court with, inter alia, possession of a weapon by a prohibited possessor. He 4 ARIZONA v. JOHNSON Opinion of the Court moved to suppress the evidence as the fruit of an unlawful search. The trial court denied the motion, concluding that the stop was lawful and that Trevizo had cause to suspect Johnson was armed and dangerous. See App. 74–78. A jury convicted Johnson of the gun-possession charge. See 217 Ariz., at –, |
Justice Ginsburg | 2,009 | 5 | majority | Arizona v. Johnson | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145912/arizona-v-johnson/ | Johnson of the gun-possession charge. See 217 Ariz., at –, 170 P. 3d, at –0. A divided panel of the Arizona Court of Appeals re versed Johnson’s conviction. Recognizing that “Johnson was [lawfully] seized when the officers stopped the car,” the court nevertheless concluded that prior to the frisk the detention had “evolved into a separate, consensual en counter stemming from an unrelated investigation by Trevizo of Johnson’s possible gang affiliation,” Absent “reason to believe Johnson was involved in criminal activity,” the Arizona appeals court held, Trevizo “had no right to pat him down for weapons, even if she had reason to suspect he was armed and dan gerous.” Judge Espinosa dissented. He found it “highly unrealis tic to conclude that merely because [Trevizo] was courte ous and Johnson cooperative, the ongoing and virtually simultaneous chain of events [had] somehow ‘evolved into a consensual encounter’ in the few short moments in volved.” Throughout the episode, he stressed, Johnson remained “seized as part of [a] valid traffic stop.” Further, he maintained, Trevizo “had a reasonable basis to consider [Johnson] dangerous,” 170 P. 3d, 6, and could there fore ensure her own safety and that of others at the scene by patting down Johnson for weapons. The Arizona Supreme Court denied review. No. CR–07– 0290–PR, We granted certiorari, 554 U. S. (2008), and now reverse the judgment of the Arizona Court of Appeals. Cite as: 555 U. S. (2009) 5 Opinion of the Court II A We begin our consideration of the constitutionality of Officer Trevizo’s patdown of Johnson by looking back to the Court’s leading decision in Terry involved a stop for interrogation of men whose conduct had attracted the attention of a patrolling police officer. The officer’s observation led him reasonably to suspect that the men were casing a jewelry shop in preparation for a robbery. He conducted a patdown, which disclosed weapons concealed in the men’s overcoat pockets. This Court upheld the lower courts’ determinations that the interrogation was warranted and the patdown, per missible. See Terry established the legitimacy of an investigatory stop “in situations where [the police] may lack probable cause for an arrest.” When the stop is justified by suspicion (reasonably grounded, but short of probable cause) that criminal activity is afoot, the Court explained, the police officer must be positioned to act instantly on reasonable suspicion that the persons temporarily de tained are armed and dangerous. Recognizing that a limited search of outer clothing for weapons serves to protect both the officer and the public, the Court held the patdown reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. |
Justice Ginsburg | 2,009 | 5 | majority | Arizona v. Johnson | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145912/arizona-v-johnson/ | the Court held the patdown reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. at 23–24, 27, 30–31. “[M]ost traffic stops,” this Court has observed, “resem ble, in duration and atmosphere, the kind of brief deten tion authorized in Terry.” Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.S. 420, 439, n. 29 (1984). Furthermore, the Court has recog nized that traffic stops are “especially fraught with danger to police officers.” (1983). “ ‘The risk of harm to both the police and the occu pants [of a stopped vehicle] is minimized,’ ” we have stressed, “ ‘if the officers routinely exercise unquestioned command of the situation.’ ” 519 U.S. 6 ARIZONA v. JOHNSON Opinion of the Court 408, 414 (1997) (quoting Michigan v. Summers, 452 U.S. 692, 702–703 (1981)); see Three decisions cumulatively portray Terry’s application in a traffic-stop setting: Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106 (1977) (per curiam); (1997); and v. California, In Mimms, the Court held that “once a motor vehicle has been lawfully detained for a traffic violation, the police officers may order the driver to get out of the vehicle without violating the Fourth Amendment’s proscription of unreasonable searches and seizures.” n. 6. The government’s “legitimate and weighty” interest in officer safety, the Court said, outweighs the “de mini mis” additional intrusion of requiring a driver, already lawfully stopped, to exit the vehicle. at 110–111. Citing Terry as controlling, the Court further held that a driver, once outside the stopped vehicle, may be patted down for weapons if the officer reasonably concludes that the driver “might be armed and presently dangerous.” 434 U.S., at 112. Wilson held that the Mimms rule applied to passengers as well as to drivers. Specifically, the Court instructed that “an officer making a traffic stop may order passengers to get out of the car pending completion of the stop.” 519 U.S., “[T]he same weighty interest in officer safety,” the Court observed, “is present regardless of whether the occupant of the stopped car is a driver or passenger.” It is true, the Court acknowledged, that in a lawful traffic stop, “[t]here is probable cause to believe that the driver has committed a minor vehicular offense,” but “there is no such reason to stop or detain the passengers.” On the other hand, the Court emphasized, the risk of a violent encounter in a traffic-stop setting “stems not from the ordinary reaction of a motorist stopped for a speeding violation, but from the fact that evidence of a Cite as: 555 U. S. (2009) 7 Opinion of the Court more serious crime might be uncovered during the stop.” “[T]he motivation of a |
Justice Ginsburg | 2,009 | 5 | majority | Arizona v. Johnson | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145912/arizona-v-johnson/ | might be uncovered during the stop.” “[T]he motivation of a passenger to employ violence to prevent apprehension of such a crime,” the Court stated, “is every bit as great as that of the driver.” Moreover, the Court noted, “as a practical matter, the passengers are already stopped by virtue of the stop of the vehicle,” –414, so “the additional intrusion on the passenger is minimal,” Completing the picture, held that a passenger is seized, just as the driver is, “from the moment [a car stopped by the police comes] to a halt on the side of the road.” A passenger therefore has stand ing to challenge a stop’s constitutionality. at 256–2. After Wilson, but before the Court had stated, in dictum, that officers who conduct “routine traffic stop[s]” may “perform a ‘patdown’ of a driver and any passengers upon reasonable suspicion that they may be armed and dangerous.” 117–118 (1998). That forecast, we now confirm, accurately captures the combined thrust of the Court’s decisions in Mimms, Wilson, and B The Arizona Court of Appeals recognized that, initially, Johnson was lawfully detained incident to the legitimate stop of the vehicle in which he was a passenger. See 217 Ariz., 170 P.3d, 3. But, that court concluded, once Officer Trevizo undertook to question Johnson on a matter unrelated to the traffic stop, i.e., Johnson’s gang affiliation, patdown authority ceased to exist, absent reasonable suspicion that Johnson had engaged, or was about to engage, in criminal activity. See P. 3d, 4. In support of the Arizona court’s portrayal of Trevizo’s interrogation of Johnson as “consensual,” Johnson emphasizes Trevizo’s testimony at the suppres sion hearing. Responding to the prosecutor’s questions, 8 ARIZONA v. JOHNSON Opinion of the Court Trevizo affirmed her belief that Johnson could have “re fused to get out of the car” and “to turn around for the pat down.” App. 41. It is not clear why the prosecutor, in opposing the sup pression motion, sought to portray the episode as consen sual. Cf. (holding that police officers’ search of a bus passenger’s luggage can be based on consent). In any event, Trevizo also testified that she never advised Johnson he did not have to answer her questions or otherwise cooperate with her. See App. 45. And during cross-examination, Trevizo did not dis agree when defense counsel asked “in fact you weren’t seeking [Johnson’s] permission ?” As the dissenting judge observed, “consensual” is an “unrealistic” characterization of the Trevizo-Johnson interaction. “[T]he encounter took place within minutes of the stop”; the patdown followed “within mere moments” of Johnson’s exit from the vehicle; beyond |
Justice Ginsburg | 2,009 | 5 | majority | Arizona v. Johnson | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145912/arizona-v-johnson/ | “within mere moments” of Johnson’s exit from the vehicle; beyond genuine debate, the point at which Johnson could have felt free to leave had not yet occurred. See 217 Ariz., 170 P.3d, at 5.1 A lawful roadside stop begins when a vehicle is pulled over for investigation of a traffic violation. The temporary seizure of driver and passengers ordinarily continues, and remains reasonable, for the duration of the stop. Nor mally, the stop ends when the police have no further need to control the scene, and inform the driver and passengers they are free to leave. See An officer’s inquiries into matters unrelated to the justifica tion for the traffic stop, this Court has made plain, do not —————— 1 The Court of Appeals majority did not assert that Johnson reasona bly could have felt free to leave. Instead, the court said “a reasonable person in Johnson’s position would have felt free to remain in the vehicle.” 3 That position, however, appears at odds with our decision in 519 U.S. 408 (1997). See at 6–7. Cite as: 555 U. S. (2009) 9 Opinion of the Court convert the encounter into something other than a lawful seizure, so long as those inquiries do not measurably extend the duration of the stop. See Muehler v. Mena, 544 U.S. 93, 100–101 (2005). In sum, as stated in a traffic stop of a car communicates to a reasonable passenger that he or she is not free to terminate the encounter with the police and move about at will. See Nothing oc curred in this case that would have conveyed to Johnson that, prior to the frisk, the traffic stop had ended or that he was otherwise free “to depart without police permis sion.” Officer Trevizo surely was not constitution ally required to give Johnson an opportunity to depart the scene after he exited the vehicle without first ensuring that, in so doing, she was not permitting a dangerous person to get behind her.2 * * * For the reasons stated, the judgment of the Arizona Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. It is so ordered. —————— 2 The Arizona Court of Appeals assumed, “without deciding, that Trevizo had reasonable suspicion that Johnson was armed and danger ous.” 217 Ariz., 170 P.3d, 3. We do not foreclose the appeals court’s consideration of that issue on remand |
Justice Thomas | 2,016 | 1 | concurring | Campbell-Ewald v. Gomez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3177215/campbell-ewald-v-gomez/ | The Court correctly concludes that an offer of complete relief on a claim does not render that claim moot. But, in my view, the Court does not advance a sound basis for this conclusion. The Court rests its conclusion on modern contract law principles and a recent dissent concerning Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68. See ante, at 6–9. I would rest instead on the common-law history of tenders. That history—which led to Rule 68—demonstrates that a mere offer of the sum owed is insufficient to eliminate a court’s jurisdiction to decide the case to which the offer related. I therefore concur only in the judgment. I The text of Article III’s case-or-controversy requirement, that requirement’s drafting history, and our precedents do not appear to provide sufficiently specific principles to resolve this case. When faced with such uncertainty, it seems particularly important for us to look to how courts traditionally have viewed a defendant’s offer to pay the plaintiff’s alleged damages. That history—which stretches from the common law directly to Rule 68 and modern settlement offers—reveals one unbroken practice that should resolve this case: A defendant’s offer to pay the plaintiff—without more—would not have deprived a court 2 CAMPBELL-EWALD CO. v. GOMEZ THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment of jurisdiction. Campbell-Ewald’s offers thus do not bar federal courts from continuing to hear this case. A Modern settlement procedure has its origins in the law of tenders, as refined in the 18th and 19th centuries. As with much of the early common law, the law of tenders had many rigid formalities. These formalities make clear that, around the time of the framing, a mere offer of relief was insufficient to deprive a court of jurisdiction. At common law, a prospective defendant could prevent a case from proceeding, but he needed to provide substan- tially more than a bare offer. A “mere proposal or proposi- tion” to pay a claim was inadequate to end a case. A. Hunt, A Treatise on the Law of Tender, and Bringing Money Into Court 3–4 (1903) (Hunt) (citing cases from the 1800’s). Nor would a defendant’s “readiness and an ability to pay the money” suffice to end a case. Holmes v. Rather, a pro- spective defendant needed to provide a “tender”—an offer to pay the entire claim before a suit was filed, accompa- nied by “actually produc[ing]” the sum “at the time of tender” in an “unconditional” manner. M. Bacon, A New Abridgment of the Law, 314–315, 321 (citing cases from the early 1800’s). Furthermore, in state and federal courts, a tender of the amount due was |
Justice Thomas | 2,016 | 1 | concurring | Campbell-Ewald v. Gomez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3177215/campbell-ewald-v-gomez/ | and federal courts, a tender of the amount due was deemed “an admission of a liability” on the cause of action to which the tender related, so any would-be defendant who tried to deny liability could not effectuate a tender. Hunt at 448; see Cottier v. Stimpson, (explaining that a tender constitutes “an admission of the cause of action”); The Rossend Castle Dillenback v. The Rossend Castle, 30 F. 462, 464 (SDNY 1887) (same). As one treatise ex- plained, “[a] tender must be of a specific sum which the tenderor admits to be due”—“[t]here must be no denial of Cite as: 577 U. S. (2016) 3 THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment the debt.” Hunt at 253 (emphasis added). The tender had to offer and actually deliver complete relief. See at 4; (Pa. 1792) (defendant must “brin[g] the money into Court”). And an offer to pay less than what was demanded was not a valid tender. See, e.g., –341, Even when a potential defendant properly effectuated a tender, the case would not necessarily end. At common law, a plaintiff was entitled to “deny that [the tender was] sufficient to satisfy his demand” and accordingly “go on to trial.” ; see also Hunt at 595.* This history demonstrates that, at common law, a de- fendant or prospective defendant had to furnish far more than a mere offer of settlement to end a case. This history also demonstrates that courts at common law would not have understood a mere offer to strip them of jurisdiction. B Although 19th-century state statutes expanded the common-law-tender regime, the law retained its essential features. See Bone, “To Encourage Settlement”: Rule 68, Offers of Judgment, and the History of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Nw. U. L. Rev. 1561, (Bone). These changes, for example, allowed defendants to offer a tender “during the pendency of an action,” as well as before it commenced. Taylor v. Brooklyn Elevated —————— * Nevertheless, the common law strongly encouraged a plaintiff to accept a tender by penalizing plaintiffs who improperly rejected them. A plaintiff would not be able to recover any damages that accrued after the tender, nor could he receive the costs of the suit if the jury returned a verdict for either the amount offered or less. See Hunt at 403–404. This rule remains today. See Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 68(d) (taxing costs to plaintiff who fails to recover more than the offer of judgment). 4 CAMPBELL-EWALD ; cf. (at common law, generally no “right of tender after action brought”). Stat- utes also expanded the right of tender to cover |
Justice Thomas | 2,016 | 1 | concurring | Campbell-Ewald v. Gomez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3177215/campbell-ewald-v-gomez/ | Stat- utes also expanded the right of tender to cover types of actions in which damages were not certain. Compare (“[T]ender could not be maintained, according to the strict principles of the common law” in cases where damages were not easily ascertainable), with (state statute “extend[ed] the common-law rule” to tort actions). Nevertheless, state statutes generally retained the core of the common-law tender rules. Most critically for this case, a mere offer remained insufficient to end a lawsuit. See, e.g., (under New York law, a mere offer was insufficient to preclude litigation). Like the common-law tender rules, state statutes recognized that plaintiffs could continue to pursue litigation by rejecting an offer. See Bone 1586. C The offer-of-judgment procedure in Rule 68 was modeled after a provision in the New York Field Code that was enacted in the mid-19th century. See at 1583–1584. That code abrogated many of the common-law formalities governing civil procedure. Among its innovations, the code allowed defendants in any cause of action to make an offer in writing to the plaintiff proposing to accept judg- ment against the defendant for a specified sum. See The Code of Procedure of the State of New York From 1848 to 1871: Comprising the Act as Originally Enacted and the Various Amendments Made Thereto, to the Close of the Session of 1870 p. 274 (1870). The plaintiff could accept the offer, which would end the litigation, or reject the offer, in which case the offer was considered with- Cite as: 577 U. S. (2016) 5 THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment drawn without any admission of liability by the defendant. In 1938, Rule 68 was adopted as part of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and has subsisted throughout the years without material changes. See Bone 1. As it did in 1938, Rule 68 now authorizes “a party defending against a claim” to “serve on an opposing party an offer to allow judgment on specified terms.” Rule 68(a). Rule 68 also provides a plaintiff the option to accept or reject an offer. If the plaintiff accepts the offer, the “clerk must then enter judgment,” but “[a]n unaccepted offer is consid- ered withdrawn.” Rules 68(a)–(b). Withdrawn offers (unlike common-law tenders) cannot be used in court as an admission against defendants. Rule 68(b). D In light of the history discussed above, a rejected offer does not end the case. And this consistent historical prac- tice demonstrates why Campbell-Ewald’s offers do not divest a federal court of jurisdiction to entertain Gomez’s suit. Campbell-Ewald made two settlement offers after Gomez sued—one filed with the District Court |
Justice Thomas | 2,016 | 1 | concurring | Campbell-Ewald v. Gomez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3177215/campbell-ewald-v-gomez/ | settlement offers after Gomez sued—one filed with the District Court under Rule 68 and one freestanding settlement offer. But with nei- ther of these offers did the company make payment; it only declared its intent to pay. Because Campbell-Ewald only offered to pay Gomez’s claim but took no further steps, the court was not deprived of jurisdiction. II Although the Court reaches the right result, I cannot adopt its reasoning. Building on the dissent in Genesis HealthCare Corp. v. Symczyk, 569 U. S. (2013), the Court relies on principles of contract law that an unac- cepted offer is a legal nullity. But the question here is not whether Campbell-Ewald’s offer formed an enforceable contract. The question is whether its continuing offer of 6 CAMPBELL-EWALD CO. v. GOMEZ THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment complete relief eliminated the case or controversy required by Article III. By looking only to contract law and one recent Rule 68 opinion, the Court fails to confront this broader issue. Instead, I believe that we must resolve the meaning of “case” and “controversy” in Article III by look- ing to “the traditional, fundamental limitations upon the powers of common-law courts” because “cases” and “con- troversies” “have virtually no meaning except by reference to that tradition.” (SCALIA, J., dissenting). THE CHIEF JUSTICE’s dissent argues that examining whether the requirements of common-law tenders have been met does not answer “whether there is a case or controversy for purposes of Article III.” Post, at 9, n. 3. As explained above, however, courts have historically refused to dismiss cases when an offer did not conform to the strict tender rules. The logical implications of THE CHIEF JUSTICE’s reasoning are that the common-law-tender rules conflict with Article III and that the Constitution bars Article III courts from following those principles. But see at (stating that, to stop litigation, a party “must adopt the measure prescribed by the common law, except in jurisdictions where a different mode of proceeding is prescribed by statute”). That reasoning, therefore, calls into question the history and tradition that the case-or-controversy requirement embodies. THE CHIEF JUSTICE also contends that our precedents “plainly establish that an admission of liability is not required for a case to be moot under Article III.” Post, at 10, n. 3. But we need not decide today whether compli- ance with every common-law formality would be necessary to end a case. The dispositive point is that state and federal courts have not considered a mere offer, without more, sufficient to moot the case. None of the cases cited by THE CHIEF JUSTICE hold that |
Justice Thomas | 2,016 | 1 | concurring | Campbell-Ewald v. Gomez | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/3177215/campbell-ewald-v-gomez/ | of the cases cited by THE CHIEF JUSTICE hold that a retrospective claim for money damages can become moot based on a mere offer. Cite as: 577 U. S. (2016) 7 THOMAS, J., concurring in judgment (1893), is inapposite because that decision involved a fully tendered offer that extinguished the tax debt under Cali- fornia law. at 313–314. (2009), and Already, LLC v. Nike, Inc., 568 U. S. (2013), are also not on point. Both involved claims for injunctive or declaratory relief that became moot when the defendants ceased causing actual or threatened injury. But whether a claim for prospective relief is moot is differ- ent from the issue in this case, which involves claims for damages to remedy past harms. See, e.g., Parents In- volved in Community (plaintiff “sought damages in her complaint, which is sufficient to preserve our ability to consider the question”); (suggesting that a “continuing controversy over damages” would mean that the case was not moot). As explained above, I would follow history and tradition in construing Article III, and so I find that Campbell- Ewald’s mere offers did not deprive the District Court of jurisdiction. Accordingly, I concur in the judgment only. Cite as: 577 U. S. (2016) 1 ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES No. 14–857 CAMPBELL-EWALD COMPANY, PETITIONER v. |
per_curiam | 1,993 | 200 | per_curiam | United States v. Padilla | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112856/united-states-v-padilla/ | The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has adopted what it terms a "coconspirator exception" to the rule regarding who may challenge the constitutionality of a search or seizure. Under its reasoning, a co-conspirator obtains a legitimate expectation of privacy for Fourth Amendment purposes if he has either a supervisory role in the conspiracy or joint control over the place or property involved in the search or seizure. This "exception," apparently developed in a series of earlier decisions of the Court of Appeals, squarely contradicts the controlling case from this Court. We therefore reject it. While patrolling Interstate Highway 10 in Casa Grande, Arizona, Officer Russel Fifer spotted a Cadillac traveling westbound at approximately 65 miles per hour. Fifer followed the Cadillac for several miles because he thought the driver acted suspiciously as he passed the patrol car. Fifer ultimately stopped the Cadillac because it was going too slowly. Luis Arciniega, the driver and sole occupant of the car, gave Fifer his driver's license and an insurance card demonstrating that respondent Donald Simpson, a United States customs agent, owned the Cadillac. Fifer and Robert Williamson, an officer who appeared on the scene to assist Fifer, believed that Arciniega matched the drug courier profile. Acting on this belief, they requested and received Arciniega's *79 permission to search the vehicle. The officers found 560 pounds of cocaine in the trunk and immediately arrested Arciniega. After agreeing to make a controlled delivery of the cocaine, Arciniega made a telephone call to his contact from a motel in Tempe, Arizona. Respondents Jorge and Maria Padilla drove to the motel in response to the telephone call, but were arrested as they attempted to drive away in the Cadillac. Like Arciniega, Maria Padilla agreed to cooperate with law enforcement officials. She led them to the house in which her husband, respondent Xavier Padilla, was staying. The ensuing investigation linked Donald Simpson and his wife, respondent Maria Sylvia Simpson, to Xavier Padilla.[1] Respondents were charged with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S. C. 846, and possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, in violation of 841(a)(1). Xavier Padilla was also charged with engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, in violation of 21 U.S. C. 848 (1988 ed. and Supp. III). Respondents moved to suppress all evidence discovered in the course of the investigation, claiming that the evidence was the fruit of the unlawful investigatory stop of Arciniega's vehicle. The United States District Court for the District of Arizona ruled that all respondents were entitled to |
per_curiam | 1,993 | 200 | per_curiam | United States v. Padilla | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112856/united-states-v-padilla/ | District of Arizona ruled that all respondents were entitled to challenge the stop and search because they were involved in "a joint venture for transportation that had control of the contraband." App. to Pet. for Cert. 22a. The District Court reasoned that, as owners, the Simpsons retained a reasonable expectation of privacy in their car, but that the Padillas could *80 contest the stop solely because of their supervisory roles and their "joint control over a very sophisticated operation" at 23a. On the merits, the District Court ruled that Officer Fifer lacked reasonable suspicion to stop Arciniega,[2] and granted respondents' motion to suppress. The Court of Appeals affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded. The court began its analysis by stating that in order "[t]o contest the legality of a search and seizure, the defendants must establish that they had a `legitimate expectation of privacy' in the place searched or the property seized." The court then recited its co-conspirator rule: "[A] coconspirator's participation in an operation or arrangement that indicates joint control and supervision of the place searched establishes standing." Relying on a line of cases from the Ninth Circuit, the court held that "because Xavier Padilla and Donald and Maria Simpson have demonstrated joint control and supervision over the drugs and vehicle and engaged in an active participation in a formalized business arrangement, they have standing to claim a legitimate expectation of privacy in the property searched and the items seized." Donald Simpson established an expectation of privacy "not simply because [he] owned the car" but also because "he had a coordinating and supervisory role in the operation. He was a critical player in the transportation scheme who was essential in getting the drugs across the border." Maria Simpson established a privacy interest because she "provided a communication link" between her husband, Xavier Padilla, and other members of the conspiracy, and "held a supervisory role tying everyone together and overseeing the entire operation." Xavier Padilla established an expectation of privacy because he "exhibited substantial *81 control and oversight with respect to the purchase [and] the transportation through Arizona." The court expressly stated that it did not matter that Padilla was not present during the stop, or that he could not exclude others from searching the Cadillac. The Court of Appeals could not tell from the record whether Jorge and Maria Padilla "shared any responsibility for the enterprise," or whether they were "mere employees in a family operation." As a result, the court remanded to the District Court for further findings on that issue. The Ninth Circuit appears to |
per_curiam | 1,993 | 200 | per_curiam | United States v. Padilla | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112856/united-states-v-padilla/ | further findings on that issue. The Ninth Circuit appears to stand alone in embracing the "coconspirator exception."[3] We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict, and now reverse. It has long been the rule that a defendant can urge the suppression of evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment only if that defendant demonstrates that his Fourth Amendment rights were violated by the challenged search or seizure. ; ; We applied this principle to the case of co-conspirators in in which we said: "The established principle is that suppression of the product of a Fourth Amendment violation can be successfully urged only by those whose rights were violated *82 by the search itself, not by those who are aggrieved solely by the introduction of damaging evidence. Coconspirators and codefendants have been accorded no special standing." 394 U.S., at In a police search of a car yielded a box of rifle shells found in the glove compartment and a sawed-off rifle found under the passenger seat. We held that petitioners, who were passengers in the car and had no ownership interest in the rifle shells or sawed-off rifle, and no legitimate expectation of privacy in the area searched, had suffered no invasion of their Fourth Amendment rights. See also The "coconspirator exception" developed by the Ninth Circuit is, therefore, not only contrary to the holding of but at odds with the principle discussed above. Expectations of privacy and property interests govern the analysis of Fourth Amendment search and seizure claims. Participants in a criminal conspiracy may have such expectations or interests, but the conspiracy itself neither adds to nor detracts from them. Neither the fact, for example, that Maria Simpson was the "communication link" between her husband and the others, nor the fact that Donald Simpson and Xavier Padilla were in charge of transportation for the conspirators, has any bearing on their respective Fourth Amendment rights. We therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals. The case is remanded so that the court may consider whether each respondent had either a property interest protected by the Fourth Amendment that was interfered with by the stop of the automobile driven by Arciniega, or a reasonable expectation of privacy that was invaded by the search thereof. It is so ordered. |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | This is a partnership income tax case brought here by the United States on a petition for writ of certiorari from the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Respondents, physicians and partners in a medical partnership, filed suit in the District Court for the Northern District of California seeking the refund of income taxes previously paid pursuant to a deficiency assessed by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue. The case was heard on an agreed statement of facts and the District Court ruled in respondents' favor. The Government appealed to the Ninth Circuit and that court affirmed the lower court's judgment. We agreed to hear this case to consider whether, as the Government contends, the decision below is in conflict with precedents of this Court. Because we find that the decision is incompatible with basic principles of income taxation as developed in our prior cases, we reverse. I Respondents, each of whom is a physician,[1] are partners in a limited partnership known as Permanente *443 Medical Group, which was organized in California in 1949. Associated with the partnership are over 200 partner physicians, as well as numerous nonpartner physicians and other employees. In 1959, Permanente entered into an agreement with Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc., a nonprofit corporation providing prepaid medical care and hospital services to its dues-paying members. Pursuant to the terms of the agreement, Permanente agreed to supply medical services for the 390,000 member-families, or about 900,000 individuals, in Kaiser's Northern California Region which covers primarily the San Francisco Bay area. In exchange for those services, Kaiser agreed to pay the partnership a "base compensation" composed of two elements. First, Kaiser undertook to pay directly to the partnership a sum each month computed on the basis of the total number of members enrolled in the health program. That number was multiplied by a stated fee, which originally was set at a little over $2.60. The second item of compensationand the one that has occasioned the present disputecalled for the creation of a program, funded entirely by Kaiser, to pay retirement benefits to Permanente's partner and non-partner physicians. The pertinent compensation provision of the agreement did not itself establish the details of the retirement program; it simply obligated Kaiser to make contributions to such a program in the event that the parties might thereafter agree to adopt one.[2] As might be expected, a separate trust agreement establishing the contemplated *444 plan soon was executed by Permanente, Kaiser, and the Bank of America Trust and Savings Association, acting as trustee. Under this agreement Kaiser agreed to make payments to the |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | Under this agreement Kaiser agreed to make payments to the trust at a predetermined rate, initially pegged at 12 cents per health plan member per month. Additionally, Kaiser made a flat payment of $200,000 to start the fund and agreed that its prorata payment obligation would be retroactive to the date of the signing of the medical service The beneficiaries of the trust were all partner and nonpartner physicians who had completed at least two years of continuous service with the partnership and who elected to participate. The trust maintained a separate tentative account for each beneficiary. As periodic payments were received from Kaiser, the funds were allocated among these accounts pursuant to a complicated formula designed to take into consideration on a relative basis each participant's compensation level, length of service, and age. No physician was eligible to receive the amounts in his tentative account prior to retirement, and retirement established entitlement only if the participant had rendered at least 15 years of continuous service or 10 years of continuous service and had attained age 65. Prior to such time, however, the trust agreement explicitly provided that no interest in any tentative account was to be regarded as having vested in any particular *445 beneficiary.[3] The agreement also provided for the forfeiture of any physician's interest and its redistribution among the remaining participants if he were to terminate his relationship with Permanente prior to retirement.[4] A similar forfeiture and redistribution also would occur if, after retirement, a physician were to render professional services for any hospital or health plan other than one operated by Kaiser. The trust agreement further stipulated that a retired physician's right to receive benefits would cease if he were to refuse any reasonable request to render consultative services to any Kaiser-operated health plan. The agreement provided that the plan would continue irrespective either of changes in the partnership's personnel or of alterations in its organizational structure. The plan would survive any reorganization of the partnership so long as at least 50% of the plan's participants remained associated with the reorganized entity. In the event of dissolution or of a nonqualifying reorganization, all of the amounts in the trust were to be divided among the participants entitled thereto in amounts governed by each participant's tentative account. Under no circumstances, however, could payments from Kaiser to the trust be recouped by Kaiser: once compensation was paid into the trust it was thereafter committed exclusively *446 to the benefit of Permanente's participating physicians. Upon the retirement of any partner or eligible nonpartner physician, if he had satisfied each |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | partner or eligible nonpartner physician, if he had satisfied each of the requirements for participation, the amount that had accumulated in his tentative account over the years would be applied to the purchase of a retirement income contract. While the program thus provided obvious benefits to Permanente's physicians, it also served Kaiser's interests. By providing attractive deferred benefits for Permanente's staff of professionals, the retirement plan was designed to "create an incentive" for physicians to remain with Permanente and thus "insure" that Kaiser would have a "stable and reliable group of physicians."[5] During the years from the plan's inception until its discontinuance in 1963, Kaiser paid a total of more than $2,000,000 into the trust. Permanente, however, did not report these payments as income in its partnership returns. Nor did the individual partners include these payments in the computations of their distributive shares of the partnership's taxable income. The Commissioner assessed deficiencies against each partner-respondent for his distributive share of the amount paid by Kaiser. Respondents, after paying the assessments under protest, filed these consolidated suits for refund. The Commissioner premised his assessment on the conclusion that Kaiser's payments to the trust constituted a form of compensation to the partnership for the services it rendered and therefore was income to the *447 partnership. And, notwithstanding the deflection of those payments to the retirement trust and their current unavailability to the partners, the partners were still taxable on their distributive shares of that compensation. Both the District Court and the Court of Appeals disagreed. They held that the payments to the fund were not income to the partnership because it did not receive them and never had a "right to receive" them. -1294; 450 F. 2d, They reasoned that the partnership, as an entity, should be disregarded and that each partner should be treated simply as a potential beneficiary of his tentative share of the retirement fund.[6] Viewed in this light, no presently taxable income could be attributed to these cash basis[7] taxpayers because of the contingent and forfeitable nature of the fund allocations. -1296; 450 F. 2d, at 112. We hold that the courts below erred and that respondents were properly taxable on the partnership's retirement fund income. This conclusion rests on two familiar principles of income taxation, first, that income is taxed to the party who earns it and that liability may not be avoided through an anticipatory assignment of that income, and, second, that partners are taxable on *448 their distributive or proportionate shares of current partnership income irrespective of whether that income is actually distributed to them. |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | irrespective of whether that income is actually distributed to them. The ensuing discussion is simply an application of those principles to the facts of the present case. II Section 703 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, insofar as pertinent here, prescribes that "[t]he taxable income of a partnership shall be computed in the same manner as in the case of an individual." 26 U.S. C. 703 (a). Thus, while the partnership itself pays no taxes, 26 U.S. C. 701, it must report the income it generates and such income must be calculated in largely the same manner as an individual computes his personal income. For this purpose, then, the partnership is regarded as an independently recognizable entity apart from the aggregate of its partners. Once its income is ascertained and reported, its existence may be disregarded since each partner must pay a tax on a portion of the total income as if the partnership were merely an agent or conduit through which the income passed.[8] *449 In determining any partner's income, it is first necessary to compute the gross income of the partnership. One of the major sources of gross income, as defined in 61 (a) (1) of the Code, is "[c]ompensation for services, including fees, commissions, and similar items." 26 U.S. C. 61 (a) (1). There can be no question that Kaiser's payments to the retirement trust were compensation for services rendered by the partnership under the medical service These payments constituted an integral part of the employment arrangement. The agreement itself called for two forms of "base compensation" to be paid in exchange for services rendered direct per-member, per-month payments to the partnership and other, similarly computed, payments to the trust. Nor was the receipt of these payments contingent upon any condition other than continuation of the contractual relationship and the performance of the prescribed medical services. Payments to the trust, much like the direct payments to the partnership, were not forfeitable by the partnership or recoverable by Kaiser upon the happening of any contingency. Yet the courts below, focusing on the fact that the retirement fund payments were never actually received by the partnership but were contributed directly to the trust, found that the payments were not includable as income in the partnership's returns. The view of tax accountability upon which this conclusion rests is incompatible with a foundational rule, which this Court has described as "the first principle of income taxation: that income must be taxed to him who earns it." The entity earning the incomewhether a partnership or an individual taxpayercannot avoid taxation by |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | incomewhether a partnership or an individual taxpayercannot avoid taxation by entering into a contractual arrangement whereby that income is diverted to some other person or entity. Such arrangements, known to the tax law as "anticipatory assignments *450 of income," have frequently been held ineffective as means of avoiding tax liability. The seminal precedent, written over 40 years ago, is Mr. Justice Holmes' opinion for a unanimous Court in There the taxpayer entered into a contract with his wife whereby she became entitled to one-half of any income he might earn in the future. On the belief that a taxpayer was accountable only for income actually received by him, the husband thereafter reported only half of his income. The Court, unwilling to accept that a reasonable construction of the tax laws permitted such easy deflection of income tax liability, held that the taxpayer was responsible for the entire amount of his income. The basis for the Court's ruling is explicit and controls the case before us today: "[T]his case is not to be decided by attenuated subtleties. It turns on the import and reasonable construction of the taxing act. There is no doubt that the statute could tax salaries to those who earned them and provide that the tax could not be escaped by anticipatory arrangements and contracts however skilfully devised to prevent the salary when paid from vesting even for a second in the man who earned it. That seems to us the import of the statute before us and we think that no distinction can be taken according to the motives leading to the arrangement by which the fruits are attributed to a different tree from that on which they grew." The principle of that he who earns income may not avoid taxation through anticipatory arrangements no matter how clever or subtle, has been repeatedly invoked by this Court and stands today as a cornerstone of our graduated income tax system. See, e. g., ; *451 United ; ; And, of course, that principle applies with equal force in assessing partnership income. Permanente's agreement with Kaiser, whereby a portion of the partnership compensation was deflected to the retirement fund, is certainly within the ambit of The partnership earned the income and, as a result of arm's-length bargaining with Kaiser,[9] was responsible for its diversion into the trust fund. The Court of Appeals found the Lucas principle inapplicable because Permanente "never had the right itself to receive the payments made into the trust as current income." In support of this assertion, the court relied on language in the agreed statement |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | assertion, the court relied on language in the agreed statement of facts stipulating that "[t]he payments were paid solely to fund the retirement plan, and were not otherwise available to [Permanente]" Emphasizing that the fund was created to serve Kaiser's interest in a stable source of qualified, experienced physicians,[10] the court found that Permanente could not have received that income except in the form in which it was received. The court's reasoning seems to be that, before the partnership could be found to have received income, there must be proof that "Permanente agreed to accept less direct compensation from Kaiser in exchange for the retirement plan payments." Apart from the inherent difficulty of adducing such evidence, we know of no authority imposing this burden upon the Government. Nor do we believe that the guiding principle of may be so easily circumvented. *452 Kaiser's motives for making payments are irrelevant to the determination whether those amounts may fairly be viewed as compensation for services rendered.[11] Neither does Kaiser's apparent insistence upon payment to the trust deprive the agreed contributions of their character as compensation. The Government need not prove that the taxpayer had complete and unrestricted power to designate the manner and form in which his income is received. We may assume, especially in view of the relatively unfavorable tax status of self-employed persons with respect to the tax treatment of retirement plans,[12] that many partnerships would eagerly accept conditions similar to those prescribed by this trust in consideration for tax-deferral benefits of the sort suggested here. We think it clear, however, that the tax laws permit no such easy road to tax avoidance or deferment.[13]*453 Despite the novelty and ingenuity of this arrangement, Permanente's "base compensation" in the form of payments to a retirement fund was income to the partnership and should have been reported as such. III Since the retirement fund payments should have been reported as income to the partnership, along with other income received from Kaiser, the individual partners should have included their shares of that income in their individual returns. 26 U.S. C. 61 (a) (13), 702, 704. For it is axiomatic that each partner must pay taxes on his distributive share of the partnership's income without regard to whether that amount is actually distributed to him. decided under a predecessor to the current partnership provisions of the Code,[14] articulates the salient proposition. *454 After concluding that "distributive" share means the "proportionate" share as determined by the partnership agreement, the Court stated: "The tax is thus imposed upon the partner's proportionate share of the net income |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | imposed upon the partner's proportionate share of the net income of the partnership, and the fact that it may not be currently distributable, whether by agreement of the parties or by operation of law, is not material." Few principles of partnership taxation are more firmly established than that no matter the reason for nondistribution each partner must pay taxes on his distributive share. Treas. Reg. 1.702-1, 26 CFR 1.702-1[15] See, e. g., ; ; ; ; S. Surrey & W. Warren, Federal Income Taxation 1115 (1960); 6 J. Mertens, Law of Federal Income Taxation 35.01, 35.22 ; A. Willis, On Partnership Taxation 5.01 The courts below reasoned to the contrary, holding that the partners here were not properly taxable on the amounts contributed to the retirement fund. This view, apparently, was based on the assumption that each partner's distributive share prior to retirement was too contingent *455 and unascertainable to constitute presently recognizable income. It is true that no partner knew with certainty exactly how much he would ultimately receive or whether he would in fact be entitled to receive anything. But the existence of conditions upon the actual receipt by a partner of income fully earned by the partnership is irrelevant in determining the amount of tax due from him. The fact that the courts below placed such emphasis on this factor suggests the basic misapprehension under which they labored in this case. Rather than being viewed as responsible contributors to the partnership's total income, respondent-partners were seen only as contingent beneficiaries of the trust. In some measure, this misplaced focus on the considerations of uncertainty and forfeitability may be a consequence of the erroneous manner in which the Commissioner originally assessed the partners' deficiencies. The Commissioner divided Kaiser's trust fund payments into two categories: (1) payments earmarked for the tentative accounts of nonpartner physicians; and (2) those allotted to partner physicians. The payments to the trust for the former category of nonpartner physicians were correctly counted as income to the partners in accord with the distributive-share formula as established in the partnership [16] The latter payments to the tentative accounts of the individual partners, however, were improperly allocated to each partner pursuant to the complex formula in the retirement plan itself, just as if that agreement operated as an amendment to the partnership *456 The Solicitor General, alluding to this miscomputation during oral argument, suggested that this error "may be what threw the court below off the track."[17] It should be clear that the contingent and unascertainable nature of each partner's share under the retirement trust is irrelevant |
Justice Powell | 1,973 | 17 | majority | United States v. Basye | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108728/united-states-v-basye/ | of each partner's share under the retirement trust is irrelevant to the computation of his distributive share. The partnership had received as income a definite sum which was not subject to diminution or forfeiture. Only its ultimate disposition among the employees and partners remained uncertain. For purposes of income tax computation it made no difference that some partners might have elected not to participate in the retirement program or that, for any number of reasons, they might not ultimately receive any of the trust's benefits. Indeed, as the Government suggests, the result would be quite the same if the "potential beneficiaries included no partners at all, but were children, relatives, or other objects of the partnership's largesse."[18] The sole operative consideration is that the income had been received by the partnership, not what disposition might have been effected once the funds were received. *457 IV In summary, we find this case controlled by familiar and long-settled principles of income and partnership taxation. There being no doubt about the character of the payments as compensation, or about their actual receipt, the partnership was obligated to report them as income presently received. Likewise, each partner was responsible for his distributive share of that income. We, therefore, reverse the judgments and remand the case with directions that judgments be entered for the United States. It is so ordered. MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS dissents. |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | We decide whether a federal habeas court must assess the prejudicial impact of constitutional error in a state-court criminal trial under the "substantial and injurious effect" standard set forth in when the state appellate court failed to recognize the error and did not review it for harmlessness under the "harmless beyond a reasonable doubt" standard set forth in I After two mistrials on account of hung juries, a third jury convicted petitioner of the 1992 murders of James and Cynthia Bell. At trial, petitioner sought to attribute the murders to one or more other persons. To that end, he offered testimony of several witnesses who linked one Anthony Hurtz to the killings. But the trial court excluded the testimony of one additional witness, Pamela Maples, who was prepared to testify that she had heard Hurtz discussing homicides bearing some resemblance to the murder of the Bells. In the trial court's view, the defense had provided insufficient evidence to link the incidents described by Hurtz to the murders for which petitioner was charged. Following his conviction, petitioner appealed to the California Court of Appeal, arguing (among other things) that the trial court's exclusion of Maples' testimony deprived him of a fair opportunity to defend himself, in violation of Without explicitly addressing petitioner's Chambers argument, the state appellate court held that the trial court had not abused its discretion in excluding Maples' testimony under California's evidentiary rules, adding that "no possible prejudice" could have resulted in light of the "merely cumulative" nature of the testimony. People v. Fry, No. A0396 App. 97, n. 17. The court did not specify which harmless-error standard it was applying in concluding that petitioner suffered "no possible prejudice." The Supreme Court of California denied discretionary review, and petitioner did not then seek a writ of certiorari from this Court. Petitioner next filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California, raising the aforementioned due-process claim (among others). The case was initially assigned to a Magistrate Judge, who ultimately recommended denying relief. He found the state appellate court's failure to recognize error under Chambers to be "an unreasonable application of clearly established law as set forth by the Supreme Court," App. 10, and disagreed with the state appellate court's finding of "no possible prejudice." But he nevertheless concluded that "there ha[d] been an insufficient showing that the improper exclusion of the testimony of Ms. Maples had a substantial and injurious effect on the jury's verdict" under the standard set forth in App. 11-12. The District Court adopted |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | standard set forth in App. 11-12. The District Court adopted the Magistrate Judge's findings and recommendations in full, and a divided panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed. We granted certiorari. 549 U.S. *2325 II A In a case that reached this Court on direct review of a state-court criminal judgment, we held that a federal constitutional error can be considered harmless only if a court is "able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt." In we considered whether the standard of review applies on collateral review of a state-court criminal judgment under Citing concerns about finality, comity, and federalism, we rejected the standard in favor of the more forgiving standard of review applied to nonconstitutional errors on direct appeal from federal convictions. See Under that standard, an error is harmless unless it "`had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury's verdict.'" (quoting ). The question in this case is whether a federal court must assess the prejudicial impact of the unconstitutional exclusion of evidence during a state-court criminal trial under even if the state appellate court has not found, as the state appellate court in had found, that the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt under[1] We begin with the Court's opinion in The primary reasons it gave for adopting a less onerous standard on collateral review of state-court criminal judgments did not turn on whether the state court itself conducted review. The opinion explained that application of would "undermin[e] the States' interest in finality," ; would "infring[e] upon [the States'] sovereignty over criminal matters," ; would undercut the historic limitation of habeas relief to those "`grievously wronged,'" ; and would "impos[e] significant `societal costs,'" ). Since each of these concerns applies with equal force whether or not the state court reaches the question, it would be illogical to make the standard of review turn upon that contingency. The opinion in clearly assumed that the standard would apply in virtually all 2254 cases. It suggested an exception only for the "unusual case" in which "a deliberate and especially egregious error of the trial type, or one that is combined with a pattern of prosecutorial misconduct infect[s] the integrity of the proceeding." n. 9, This, of course, has nothing to do with whether the state court conducted harmless-error review. The concurring and dissenting opinions shared the assumption that would almost always be the standard on collateral review. The former stated in categorical terms that the " standard" "will now apply on collateral review" of state |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | " standard" "will now apply on collateral review" of state convictions, (STEVENS, J., concurring). Justice White's dissent complained that under the Court's opinion would apply even where (as in this case) the state court found that "no violation had occurred," ; and Justice *2326 O'Connor's dissent stated that would "no longer appl[y] to any trial error asserted on habeas," Later cases also assumed that 's applicability does not turn on whether the state appellate court recognized the constitutional error and reached the question. See ; Petitioner's contrary position misreads (or at least exaggerates the significance of) a lone passage from our opinion. In that passage, the Court explained: "State courts are fully qualified to identify constitutional error and evaluate its prejudicial effect on the trial process under and state courts often occupy a superior vantage point from which to evaluate the effect of trial error. For these reasons, it scarcely seems logical to require federal habeas courts to engage in the identical approach to harmless-error review that requires state courts to engage in on direct review." (citation omitted). But the quoted passage does little to advance petitioner's position. To say (a) that since state courts are required to evaluate constitutional error under it makes no sense to establish as the standard for federal habeas review is not at all to say (b) that whenever a state court fails in its responsibility to apply the federal habeas standard must change. It would be foolish to equate the two, in view of the other weighty reasons given in for applying a less onerous standard on collateral reviewreasons having nothing to do with whether the state court actually applied Petitioner argues that, if applies whether or not the state appellate court conducted review, then would apply even if a State eliminated appellate review altogether. That is not necessarily so. The federal habeas review rule applied to the class of case in which state appellate review is available does not have to be the same rule applied to the class of case where it is not. We have no occasion to resolve that hypothetical (and highly unrealistic) question now. In the case before us petitioner did obtain appellate review of his constitutional claim; the state court simply found the underlying claim weak and therefore did not measure its prejudicial impact under The attempted analogybetween (1) eliminating appellate review altogether and (2) providing appellate review but rejecting a constitutional claim without assessing its prejudicial impact under is a false one. Petitioner contends that, even if adopted a categorical rule, post- developments require a different standard |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | adopted a categorical rule, post- developments require a different standard of review. Three years after we decided Congress passed, and the President signed, the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), under which a habeas petition may not be granted unless the state court's adjudication "resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States" (d)(1). In we held that, when a state court determines that a constitutional violation is harmless, a federal court may not award habeas relief under 2254 unless the harmlessness determination itself was unreasonable. Petitioner contends that 2254(d)(1), as interpreted in Esparza, eliminates the requirement that a petitioner also satisfy 's standard. We think not. That conclusion is not suggested by Esparza, which had no *2327 reason to decide the point. Nor is it suggested by the text of AEDPA, which sets forth a precondition to the grant of habeas relief ("a writ of habeas corpus shall not be granted" unless the conditions of 2254(d) are met), not an entitlement to it. Given our frequent recognition that AEDPA limited rather than expanded the availability of habeas relief, see, e.g., it is implausible that, without saying so, AEDPA replaced the standard of "`actual prejudice,'" ), with the more liberal AEDPA/ standard which requires only that the state court's harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt determination be unreasonable. That said, it certainly makes no sense to require formal application of both tests (AEDPA/ and ) when the latter obviously subsumes the former. Accordingly, the Ninth Circuit was correct to apply the standard of review in assessing the prejudicial impact of federal constitutional error in a state-court criminal trial.[2] B Petitioner argues that, even if provides the standard of review, we must still reverse the judgment below because the exclusion of Maples' testimony substantially and injuriously affected the jury's verdict in this case. That argument, however, is not fairly encompassed within the question presented. We granted certiorari to decide a question that has divided the Courts of Appealswhether or provides the appropriate standard of review when constitutional error in a state-court trial is first recognized by a federal court. Compare, e.g., with It is true that the second sentence of the question presented asks: "Does it matter which harmless error standard is employed?" Pet. for Cert. I. But to ask whether makes any real difference is not to ask whether the Ninth Circuit misapplied in this particular case. Petitioner seems to have understood this. Only in a brief footnote of his petition did he |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | Only in a brief footnote of his petition did he hint that the Ninth Circuit erred in its application of the standard. Pet. for Cert. 23, n. 19.[3] Indeed, if application of the standard to the facts of this case were encompassed within the question presented, so too would be the question of whether there was constitutional error in *232 the first place. After all, it would not "matter which harmless error standard is employed" if there were no underlying constitutional error. Unlike the dissenting JUSTICES, some of whom would reverse the decision below on the ground that the error was harmful under and one of whom would vacate the decision below on the ground that it is unclear whether there was constitutional error in the first instance, we read the question presented to avoid these tangential and factbound questions, and limit our review to the question of whether or provides the governing standard. * * * We hold that in 2254 proceedings a court must assess the prejudicial impact of constitutional error in a state-court criminal trial under the "substantial and injurious effect" standard set forth in whether or not the state appellate court recognized the error and reviewed it for harmlessness under the "harmless beyond a reasonable doubt" standard set forth in Since the Ninth Circuit correctly applied the standard rather than the standard, we affirm the judgment below. It is so ordered. Justice STEVENS, with whom Justice SOUTER and Justice GINSBURG join, and with whom Justice BREYER joins in part, concurring in part and dissenting in part. While I join all of the Court's opinion except Part II-B, I am persuaded that we should also answer the question whether the constitutional error was harmless under the standard announced in The parties and the Solicitor General as amicus curiae fully briefed and argued the question, presumably because it appears to fit within the awkwardly drafted question that we agreed to review.[1] Moreover, our answer to the question whether the error was harmless would emphasize the important point that the standard, as more fully explained in our opinion in imposes a significant burden of persuasion on the State. Both the history of this litigation and the nature of the constitutional error involved provide powerful support for the conclusion that if the jurors had heard the testimony of Pamela Maples, they would at least have had a reasonable doubt concerning petitioner's guilt. Petitioner was not found guilty until after he had been tried three times. The first trial ended in a mistrial with the jury deadlocked 6 to 6. App. |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | a mistrial with the jury deadlocked 6 to 6. App. 121. The second trial also resulted in a mistrial due to a deadlocked jury, this time 7 to 5 in favor of conviction. In the third trial, after the jurors had been deliberating for 11 days, the foreperson advised the judge that they were split 7 to 5 and "`hopelessly deadlocked.'" When the judge instructed the jury to continue its deliberations, the foreperson requested clarification on the definition of "reasonable doubt." *2329 The jury deliberated for an additional 23 days after that exchangea total of five weeksbefore finally returning a guilty verdict.[2] It is not surprising that some jurors harbored a reasonable doubt as to petitioner's guilt weeks into their deliberations. The only person to offer eyewitness testimony, a disinterested truckdriver, described the killer as a man who was 5'7" to 5'" tall, weighed about 140 pounds, and had a full head of hair. Tr. 4574 Petitioner is 6'2" tall, weighed 300 pounds at the time of the murder, and is bald. Record, Doc. No. 13, Exh. L (arrest report); Exh. M (petitioner's driver's license). Seven different witnesses linked the killings to a man named Anthony Hurtz, some testifying that Hurtz had admitted to them that he was in fact the killer. App. 60-64, 179. Each of those witnesses, unlike the truckdriver, was impeached by evidence of bias, either against Hurtz or for petitioner. However, Pamela Maples, a cousin of Hurtz's who was in all other respects a disinterested witness, did not testify at either of petitioner's first two trials. During the third trial, she testified out of the presence of the jury that she had overheard statements by Hurtz that he had committed a double murder strikingly similar to that witnessed by the truckdriver. As the Magistrate Judge found, the exclusion of Maples' testimony for lack of foundation was clear constitutional error under and the State does not argue otherwise.[3] Cf. Chambers error is by nature prejudicial. We have said that Chambers "does not stand for the proposition that the defendant is denied a fair opportunity to defend himself whenever a state or federal rule excludes favorable evidence." United 11 S. Ct. 1261, Rather, due process considerations hold sway over state evidentiary rules only when the exclusion of evidence "undermine[s] fundamental elements of the defendant's defense." 11 S. Ct. 1261. Hence, as a matter of law and logical inference, it is well-nigh impossible for a reviewing court to conclude that such error "did not influence the jury, or had but very slight effect" on its verdict. 32 U.S., at |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | but very slight effect" on its verdict. 32 U.S., at 764, It is difficult to imagine a less appropriate case for an exception to that commonsense proposition. We found in 35 U.S. 363, 7 S. Ct. 46, that 26 hours of juror deliberations in a murder trial "indicat[ed] a difference among them as to the guilt of petitioner." 7 S. Ct. 46. Here, the jury was deprived of significant evidence of third-party guilt, and still we measure the length of deliberations by weeks, not hours. In light of the jurors' evident uncertainty, the prospect of rebutting the near-conclusive presumption that the Chambers error did substantial harm vanishes completely.[4] We have not been shy in emphasizing that federal habeas courts do not lightly find constitutional error. See 166 L. Ed. 2d 42 It follows that when they do find an error, they may not lightly discount its significance. Rather, a harmlessness finding requires "fair assurance, after pondering all that happened without stripping the erroneous action from the whole, that the judgment was not substantially swayed by the error." 32 U.S., at 765, Given "all that happened" in this case, and given the nature of the error, I cannot agree with the Ninth Circuit's conclusion that the erroneous exclusion of Maples' testimony was harmless under that standard. Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals. Justice BREYER, concurring in part and dissenting in part. I agree with the Court that sets forth the proper standard of review. Cf. (STEVENS, J., concurring). At the same time, I agree with Justice STEVENS that we should consider the application of the standard, that the error was not harmless, and that "Chambers error is by nature prejudicial." Ante, at 2329 (opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part) ). Cf. ). Nonetheless, I would remand this case rather than reversing the Court of Appeals. My reason arises out of the fact that here, for purposes of deciding whether Chambers error exists, the question of harm is inextricably tied to other aspects of the trial court's determination. The underlying evidentiary judgment at issue involved a weighing of the probative value *2331 of proffered evidence against, e.g., its cumulative nature, its tendency to confuse or to prejudice the jury, or the likelihood that it will simply waste the jury's time. See App. 96-97; Cal. Evid.Code Ann. 352 ; cf. Fed. Rule Evid. 403. In this context, to find a Chambers error a court must take account both of the way in which (and extent to which) the trial court misweighed the relevant admissibility factors and |
Justice Scalia | 2,007 | 9 | majority | Fry v. Pliler | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/145720/fry-v-pliler/ | which) the trial court misweighed the relevant admissibility factors and of the extent to which doing so harmed the defendant. Moreover, to find this kind of error harmless, as the Court of Appeals found it, should preclude the possibility of a Chambers error; but to find this kind of error harmful does not guarantee the contrary. A garden-variety non-harmless misapplication of evidentiary principles normally will not rise to the level of a constitutional, Chambers, mistake. Cf., e.g., United 30, 11 S. Ct. 1261, All this, it seems to me, requires reconsideration by the Court of Appeals of its Chambers determination. I would not consider the question whether that exclusion of evidence amounted to Chambers error because that question is not before us, see ante, at 2325, n. 1 (opinion of the Court). But the logically inseparable question of harm is before us; and that, I believe, is sufficient. I would remand the case to the Ninth Circuit so that, taking account of the points Justice STEVENS raises, ante, at 232-2330, it can reconsider whether there was an error of admissibility sufficiently serious to violate Chambers. I therefore join the Court's opinion except as to footnote 1 and Part II-B, and I join Justice STEVENS' opinion in part. |
per_curiam | 1,972 | 200 | per_curiam | O'BRIEN v. Brown | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108620/obrien-v-brown/ | Yesterday, July 6, 1972, the petitioners filed petitions for writs of certiorari to review judgments of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in actions challenging the recommendations of the Credentials Committee of the 1972 Democratic National Convention regarding the seating of certain delegates to the convention that will meet three days hence. In No. 72-35, the Credentials Committee recommended unseating 59 uncommitted delegates from Illinois on the ground, among others, that they had been elected in violation of the "slate-making" guideline adopted by the Democratic Party in 1971. A complaint challenging the Credentials Committee action was dismissed by the District Court. The Court of Appeals on review rejected the contentions of the unseated delegates that the action of the Committee violated their rights under the Constition of the United States. In No. 72-34, the Credentials Committee recommended unseating 151 of 271 delegates from California committed by California law to Senator George McGovern under that State's "winner-take-all" primary system. The Committee concluded that the winner-take-all system violated the mandate of the Democratic National Convention calling for reform in the party delegate selection process, even though such primaries had not been explicitly prohibited by the rules adopted by the party in 1971 to implement that mandate. A complaint challenging the Credentials Committee action was dismissed by the District Court. On review the Court of Appeals concluded that the action of the Credentials Committee in this case violated the Constitution of the United States. Accompanying the petitions for certiorari were applications to stay the judgments of the Court of Appeals pending disposition of the petitions. *3 The petitions for certiorari present novel questions of importance to the litigants and to the political system under which national political parties nominate candidates for office and vote on their policies and programs. The particular actions of the Credentials Committee on which the Court of Appeals ruled are recommendations that have yet to be submitted to the National Convention of the Democratic Party. Absent judicial intervention, the Convention could decide to accept or reject, or accept with modification, the proposals of its Credentials Committee. This Court is now asked to review these novel and important questions and to resolve them within the remaining days prior to the opening sessions of the convention now scheduled to be convened Monday, July 10, 1972. The Court concludes it cannot in this limited time give to these issues the consideration warranted for final decision on the merits; we therefore take no action on the petitions for certiorari at this time. The applications to stay the |
per_curiam | 1,972 | 200 | per_curiam | O'BRIEN v. Brown | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108620/obrien-v-brown/ | for certiorari at this time. The applications to stay the judgments of the Court of Appeals call for a weighing of three basic factors: (a) whether irreparable injury may occur absent a stay; (b) the probability that the Court of Appeals was in error in holding that the merits of these controversies were appropriate for decision by federal courts; and (c) the public interests that may be affected by the operation of the judgments of the Court of Appeals. Absent a stay, the mandate of the Court of Appeals denies to the Democratic National Convention its traditional power to pass on the credentials of the California delegates in question. The grant of a stay, on the other hand, will not foreclose the Convention's giving the respective litigants in both cases the relief they sought in federal courts. *4 We must also consider the absence of authority supporting the action of the Court of Appeals in intervening in the internal determinations of a national political party, on the eve of its convention, regarding the seating of delegates.[1] No case is cited to us in which any federal court has undertaken to interject itself into the deliberative processes of a national political convention; no holding of this Court up to now gives support for judicial intervention in the circumstances presented here, involving as they do relationships of great delicacy that are essentially political in nature. Cf. Judicial intervention in this area traditionally has been approached with great caution and restraint. See affirming and cases cited; ; Cf. It has been understood since our national political parties first came into being as voluntary associations of individuals that the convention itself is the proper forum for determining intra-party disputes as to which delegates shall be seated. Thus, these cases involve claims of the power of the federal judiciary to review actions heretofore thought to lie in the control of political parties. Highly important questions are presented concerning justiciability, whether the action of the Credentials Committee is state action and, if so, the reach of the Due Process Clause in this unique context. Vital rights of association guaranteed by the Constitution are also involved. While the Court is unwilling to undertake *5 final resolution of the important constitutional questions presented without full briefing and argument and adequate opportunity for deliberation, we entertain grave doubts as to the action taken by the Court of Appeals. In light of the availability of the convention as a forum to review the recommendations of the Credentials Committee, in which process the complaining parties might obtain the relief they have |
per_curiam | 1,972 | 200 | per_curiam | O'BRIEN v. Brown | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108620/obrien-v-brown/ | process the complaining parties might obtain the relief they have sought from the federal courts, the lack of precedent to support the extraordinary relief granted by the Court of Appeals, and the large public interest in allowing the political processes to function free from judicial supervision, we conclude the judgments of the Court of Appeals must be stayed. We recognize that a stay of the Court of Appeals' judgments may well preclude any judicial review of the final action of the Democratic National Convention on the recommendation of its Credentials Committee. But, for nearly a century and a half the national political parties themselves have determined controversies regarding the seating of delegates to their conventions. If this system is to be altered by federal courts in the exercise of their extraordinary equity powers, it should not be done under the circumstances and time pressures surrounding the actions brought in the District Court, and the expedited review in the Court of Appeals and in this Court.[2] The applications for stays of the judgments of the Court of Appeals are granted. MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN is of the view that in the limited time available the Court cannot give these difficult and important questions consideration adequate for *6 their proper resolution. He therefore concurs in the grant of the stays pending action by the Court on the petitions for certiorari. MR. JUSTICE WHITE would deny the applications for stays. MR. |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | This case presents the issue whether an insured serviceman's beneficiary designation under a life policy issued pursuant to the Servicemen's Group Life Insurance Act of 1965 (SGLIA), Stat. 880, prevails over a constructive trust imposed upon the policy proceeds by a state-court decree. *48 I The Facts Richard H. Ridgway was a career sergeant in the United States Army. April D. Ridgway was his wife. Richard and April were the parents of three children, Hayley, Laurie, and Brady, all minors. The Ridgways' marriage, however, ended with a divorce granted by a Maine court on December 7, 1977. The state divorce judgment, entered on April's complaint and apparently following property settlement negotiations, ordered Richard, among other things, to pay specified amounts monthly for the support of the three children. App. 13. It also ordered him "to keep in force the life insurance policies on his life now outstanding for the benefit of the parties' three children. If any of such insurance policies should subsequently be terminated for any reason, defendant shall immediately replace it with other life insurance of equal amount for the benefit of the children." Sergeant Ridgway's life was then insured under a $20,000 policy issued by Prudential Insurance Company of America pursuant to a group contract with the Administrator of Veterans' Affairs. At the time of the Ridgways' divorce, April was the designated beneficiary of that policy. On March 28, 1978, less than four months after the divorce, Ridgway married his second wife, Donna, the individual petitioner here. Six days later, the sergeant, as insured, changed the policy's beneficiary designation to one directing that its proceeds be paid as specified "by law." This referred to the statutory order of beneficiary precedence set forth in 38 U.S. C. 770(a). See also 38 CFR 9.(i) Under that statutory prescription, the policy proceeds, in the event of Ridgway's death, would be paid to his *49 "widow," that is, his "lawful spouse at the time of his death." 38 U.S. C. 765(7). Sergeant Ridgway died on January 5, 1979. Donna survived him and was his lawful wife at the time of his death. Both April and Donna filed claims for the proceeds of the policy. April based her claim, which was on behalf of the children, on the divorce decree. Donna's claim rested on the beneficiary designation and her status as Ridgway's widow. April thereafter instituted the present suit in the Superior Court for Androscoggin County, Me. As legal representative of the three minor children, she sued Prudential, seeking both to enjoin the payment of the policy proceeds to Donna, and to |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | the payment of the policy proceeds to Donna, and to obtain a declaratory judgment that those proceeds were payable to the children. Donna joined the litigation and was aligned as a plaintiff asserting a claim to the proceeds. April then filed a cross-claim against Donna, praying for the imposition of a constructive trust, for the benefit of the children, on any policy proceeds paid to Donna. Prudential supported Donna's position. The Superior Court rejected April Ridgway's claims. It acknowledged that the terms of the judgment of divorce and the beneficiary designation were inconsistent.[1] But it felt that the imposition of a constructive trust would interfere with the operation of the federal SGLIA, and that such a disposition would therefore run afoul of the Supremacy Clause, U. S. Const., Art. VI, cl. 2. App. 38-43. On the ensuing appeal to the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, the parties stipulated, inasmuch as the policy proceeds by that time had been deposited in court, that the sole *50 issue was "[w]hether or not the presiding justice erred in ruling that, on the basis of the facts found, he could not impose a constructive trust on the proceeds of Sergeant Ridgway's insurance." That court, sympathetic to April, vacated the Superior Court's dismissal of her cross-claim, and remanded the case with directions to enter an order naming Donna as constructive trustee of the policy proceeds. The Court Clerk, who held the proceeds, was directed to pay them to April for and on behalf of the three children. We granted certiorari, to review the important issue presented by the case. II The Statutory Background In order to make life insurance coverage available to members of the uniformed services on active duty, particularly in combat zones, Congress in 1965 enacted the SGLIA. See H. R. Rep. No. 1003, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 7 The impetus for the legislation was the escalating level of hostilities and casualties in the then ongoing Vietnam conflict; this had prompted private commercial insurers to restrict coverage for service members.[2] See 111 Cong. Rec. 24339 (remarks of Rep. Teague, Chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs); see also S. Rep. No. 619, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 3 The earlier program of federally sponsored life insurance for service members, see National Service Life Insurance Act of 1940, and National Service Life Insurance Act of 1958, as amended, 38 U.S. C. 701 et seq. (NSLIA), placed in effect shortly before the involvement of this country in World War II, had been allowed *51 to lapse after the end of the Korean hostilities when commercial |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | lapse after the end of the Korean hostilities when commercial insurance generally became available to service members.[3] Accordingly, NSLIA coverage could not be obtained by many service members on active duty in 1965. See 111 Cong. Rec. 24339 (remarks of Rep. Teague). Although its purposes and provisions resemble those of the NSLIA in many respects, the SGLIA differs from the predecessor program in that it directs the Administrator of Veterans' Affairs to purchase coverage from one or more qualified commercial insurers instead of offering coverage by the United States itself. See 38 U.S. C. 766. Thus, under the SGLIA, the Government is the policyholder, rather than the insurer. The Administrator has contracted with petitioner Prudential Insurance Company of America, which now serves as the primary insurer under the SGLIA and which operates, under Veterans' Administration supervision and pursuant to 38 U.S. C. 766(b), the Office of Servicemen's Group Life Insurance in Newark, N. J. The SGLIA initially provided insurance only for members serving in specified services. The maximum coverage allowed was then $10,000. Since 1965, however, statutory changes have expanded both eligibility for coverage and the amount of insurance available.[4] The program is operated on a presumptive enrollment basis; coverage is provided automatically and premiums are withheld from the service member's pay, unless the insurance is expressly declined or is terminated by written election. 38 U.S. C. 767(a) and 769.[5] *52 In order to make the insurance available through a commercial carrier at a reasonable rate, notwithstanding the special mortality risks that service members often must assume, Congress undertook to subsidize the program. See S. Rep. No. 91-398, p. 2 (1969). A sum representing the extra premium for special mortality risks is periodically deposited by the United States into a revolving fund that is used to pay premiums on the master policy. See 38 U.S. C. 769(b) and (d)(1). The fund otherwise is derived primarily from deductions withheld from service members' pay. 769(a)(1) and (d)(1). Accordingly, depending upon the conditions faced by service members at any given time, the program may be financed in part with federal funds. See S. Rep. No. 91-398, at 2. The SGLIA establishes a specified "order of precedence," 38 U.S. C. 770(a), for policy beneficiaries. By this statutory provision, the proceeds of a policy are paid first to such "beneficiary or beneficiaries as the member may have designated by [an appropriately filed] writing received prior to death." If there be no such designated beneficiary, the proceeds go to the widow or widower of the service member or, if there also be no widow or widower, |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | member or, if there also be no widow or widower, "to the child or children of such member and descendants of deceased children by representation." Parents, and then the representative of the insured's estate (an obvious bow at this point in the direction of state law), are next in order. See also 38 CFR 9.(i) In 1970, by Pub. L. 91-291, 5, Congress added an anti-attachment provision. With certain exceptions not applicable here, this provision shields payments made under 770(a) "from taxation" and from "claims of creditors," and states that the payments "shall not be liable to attachment, levy, or seizure by or under any legal or equitable *53 process whatever, either before or after receipt by the beneficiary." 770(g). Pursuant to his general rulemaking authority over veterans' programs, 210(c)(1), the Administrator has promulgated regulations implementing the SGLIA. These provide that the insured "may designate any person, firm, corporation or legal entity" as a policy beneficiary, and any such "designation or change of beneficiary will take effect only if it is in writing, signed by the insured and received [by the appropriate office] prior to the death of the insured." 38 CFR 9.(a) and (d) A change of beneficiary "may be made at any time and without the knowledge or consent of the previous beneficiary." 9.(e). And "[n]o change or cancellation of beneficiary in a last will or testament, or in any other document shall have any force or effect unless such change is received by the appropriate " 9.(f). III The foregoing description of the statutory plan adopted by Congress, and implemented by the Administrator's regulations, demonstrates the pervasive and detailed characteristics of the congressional specifications. The obvious and stated concern of Congress was to provide coverage for the member, no matter how hazardous the duty, and thus protection for the member's designated beneficiaries. The legislation itself says nothing about contrary dictates of state law or state judgments. The Supreme Judicial Court of Maine, however, concluded that the order of beneficiary precedence set forth in 38 U.S. C. 770(a) "does not reflect any federal interest in permitting a serviceman to evade the responsibility to provide for his minor children imposed both by virtue of his voluntary agreement and by the express provision of a valid state court decree." That court further concluded that the anti-attachment provision, 770(g), "has no application to the instant case since its purpose is to protect the proceeds *54 of the insurance from the claims of creditors." It pointed out that it was concerned "not with the claim of a creditor but with the claims |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | with the claim of a creditor but with the claims of minor children who assert an equitable interest in the proceeds arising from their deceased father's voluntary agreement and a valid judicial decree." Thus, it said, the accomplishment of the objectives of the federal statute "is neither obstructed nor interfered with by imposing a constructive trust on the insurance proceeds." We forthwith acknowledge, of course, that this Court's "only power over state judgments is to correct them to the extent that they incorrectly adjudge federal rights." It follows that the decision of the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine is subject to disturbance here only to the extent that it fails to honor federal rights and duties. Notwithstanding the limited application of federal law in the field of domestic relations generally, see ; ; In re Burrus, this Court, even in that area, has not hesitated to protect, under the Supremacy Clause, rights and expectancies established by federal law against the operation of state law, or to prevent the frustration and erosion of the congressional policy embodied in the federal rights. See ; ; Cf. While "[s]tate family and family-property law must do `major damage' to `clear and substantial' federal interests before the Supremacy Clause will demand that state law be overridden," 439 U. S., at with references to United "[t]he relative importance to the State of its own law is not material when there is a conflict with a valid federal law, for the *55 Framers of our Constitution provided that the federal law must prevail." See also And, specifically, a state divorce decree, like other law governing the economic aspects of domestic relations, must give way to clearly conflicting federal enactments. That principle is but the necessary consequence of the Supremacy Clause of our National Constitution. In an insured under an NSLIA policy named his parents as beneficiaries. Upon his death, the serviceman's widow claimed community property rights in the policy proceeds. The NSLIA specifically provided that the insured had the right to designate and to change the beneficiary. It also had an anti-attachment clause. Despite these provisions, a California court held that the policy proceeds were community property, and it ordered half the proceeds paid to the widow. This Court reversed, noting that "Congress has spoken with force and clarity in directing that the proceeds belong to the named beneficiary and no other." Further, "the judgment below nullifies the soldier's choice and frustrates the deliberate purpose of Congress. It cannot stand." And the diversion, as directed by the state court, of future payments to be received by the |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | state court, of future payments to be received by the beneficiary would be a "seizure" prohibited by the anti-attachment provision. These are strong words and a positive ruling. The same approach has been followed in later cases: concerning the right of survivorship in United States Savings Bonds issued in co-ownership form; involving the Railroad Retirement Act of 1974, 45 U.S. C. 231 et seq.; and concerning military retired pay. The present case, we feel, is controlled by Under 717(a) and 770(a) of the SGLIA, just as under 602(g) of the predecessor NSLIA, at issue in *56 the insured service member possesses the right freely to designate the beneficiary and to alter that choice at any time by communicating the decision in writing to the proper Here, as there, it appropriately may be said: "Congress has spoken with force and clarity in directing that the proceeds belong to the named beneficiary and no other." There can be no doubt that Congress was aware of the breadth of the freedom of choice accorded the service member under the SGLIA. The pertinent House Report stated flatly: "The serviceman may designate any person as a beneficiary," H. R. Rep. No. 1003, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 7 and the point was emphasized on the floor of the House by Representative Everett: "This bill permits you to leave your insurance to your church, to your college, to your best friend. The beneficiary provision is wide open under this option." 111 Cong. Rec. 24341 Thus, the Maine court's analysis is inconsistent both with the language of the Act and with its legislative history.[6] Neither respondents nor the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine has questioned the authority of Congress to control payment of the proceeds of SGLIA policies. Indeed, this Court observed in : "Possession of government insurance, payable to the relative of his choice, might well directly enhance the morale of the serviceman. The exemption provision is his *57 guarantee of the complete and full performance of the contract to the exclusion of conflicting claims. The end is a legitimate one within the congressional powers over national defense, and the means are adapted to the chosen end." -661. The federal interest is especially strong because a substantial share of the proceeds of an SGLIA policy may be attributable to general tax revenues. There are, to be sure, some small differences between the SGLIA and the predecessor NSLIA. In the provision granting the service member the right to designate the beneficiary, the words "at all times" appear in the earlier Act, 38 U.S. C. 717(a), but not in |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | the earlier Act, 38 U.S. C. 717(a), but not in the later one, 38 U.S. C. 770(a), and the right to change the beneficiary "without the consent" of the one presently named is spelled out in 717(a) but not in 770(a). But the later Act's unqualified directive to pay the proceeds to the properly designated beneficiary clearly suggests that no different result was intended by Congress. And any possible ambiguity was eliminated by the Administrator's regulations that provide that a "change of beneficiary may be made at any time and without the knowledge or consent of the previous beneficiary." 38 CFR 9.(e) There has been no suggestion that these regulations are unreasonable, unauthorized, or inconsistent with the SGLIA, and such a suggestion would not be supportable.[7] See Whirlpool ; *58 relied on by the respondents, but not cited by the Maine court, does not stand to the contrary. In Yiatchos, the Court considered a question left open in -671, namely, the "scope and application" of the doctrine of fraud as an exception "to the regulatory imperative." There, the decedent Yiatchos, a resident of a community property State, purchased United States Savings Bonds with community funds and had them issued in the name of the decedent but payable on his death to his brother. The state court held that this purchase "was in fraud of the rights" of the surviving wife, as "a void endeavor to divest the wife of any interest in her own property." In re Yiatchos' Estate, This Court agreed that the bonds could "not be used as a device to deprive the widow of property rights which she enjoys under Washington law." 376 U.S., at But because the named beneficiary was entitled to the bonds "unless his deceased brother committed fraud or breach of trust tantamount to fraud" by wrongfully disposing of the wife's property, ib the case was remanded to give the widow an opportunity to demonstrate that she had not consented to or ratified the purchase and registration of the bonds. The remand was also for the determination, under state law, whether the widow had an interest in the community's specific assets, or only a half interest in the estate generally. Here, in contrast, Sergeant Ridgway's conduct did not amount to breach of trust or conversion of another's property. *59 A careful reading of the complaint and the amended complaint, App. 11 and 24, in this case reveals no allegation of fraud or breach of trust. And we are not inclined to provide or infer such an allegation when a case comes to us, as |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | such an allegation when a case comes to us, as this one does, with the record indicating nothing more than a breach of contract on the part of the deceased service member. Indeed, to say that this type of conduct constitutes constructive fraud would be to open the policy proceeds to a suit by any commercial creditor, a result that would render 770(g) nugatory. As the trial court intimated, respondents may have a claim against the insured's estate for that breach; the record does not disclose whether a claim of that kind would be collectible.[8] There is, finally, a fundamental distinction between respondents' asserted interests in the SGLIA policy proceeds and the community property concepts at issue in Yiatchos. Federal law and federal regulations bestow upon the service member an absolute right to designate the policy beneficiary. *60 That right is personal to the member alone. It is not a shared asset subject to the interests of another, as is community property. Yiatchos had imposed his will upon property in which his wife had a distinct vested community interest. In contrast, only Sergeant Ridgway had the power to create and change a beneficiary interest in his SGLIA insurance. By exercising that power, he hardly can be said to have committed fraud. We conclude, therefore, that the controlling provisions of the SGLIA prevail over and displace inconsistent state law.[9] IV The imposition of a constructive trust upon the insurance proceeds is also inconsistent with the anti-attachment provision, 38 U.S. C. 770(g), of the SGLIA. In 338 U. S., this Court invoked the identical anti-attachment provision of the NSLIA as an independent ground for the result reached in that case. The Court rejected, as it did so, the dissent's argument that "Congress was interested in protecting [the fund], not the beneficiary," which parallels respondents' argument here in favor of creating a constructive trust after the proceeds have been received by the beneficiary. Any diversion of the proceeds of Sergeant Ridgway's SGLIA policy by means of a court-imposed constructive trust would therefore operate as a forbidden "seizure" of those proceeds. The Maine court attempted to limit the reach of 770(g), as has been noted above, on the theory that the purpose of the anti-attachment provision was to protect the policy proceeds from the claims of creditors, and that the provision has no *61 application to minor children asserting equitable This contention, however, fails to give effect to the unqualified sweep of the federal statute. Section 770(g), in addition to exempting the policy proceeds "from the claims of creditors," prohibits, in the broadest of |
Justice Blackmun | 1,981 | 11 | majority | Ridgway v. Ridgway | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110578/ridgway-v-ridgway/ | "from the claims of creditors," prohibits, in the broadest of terms, any "attachment, levy, or seizure by or under any legal or equitable process whatever," whether accomplished "either before or after receipt by the beneficiary." The reading adopted by the Maine court renders the bulk of the quoted statutory text extraneous. What was said of the statute under consideration in is applicable without qualification here: "Like anti-attachment provisions generally [citing ], it ensures that the benefits actually reach the beneficiary. It pre-empts all state law that stands in its way. It protects the benefits from legal process `[n]otwithstanding any other law of any State'. It prevents the vagaries of state law from disrupting the national scheme, and guarantees a national uniformity that enhances the effectiveness of congressional policy."[10] We find nothing to indicate that Congress intended to exempt claims based on property settlement agreements from the strong language of the anti-attachment provision.[11] *62 V We recognize that this unpalatable case suggests certain "equities" in favor of the respondent minor children and their mother. Sergeant Ridgway did have specific obligations to *63 the children that were imposed by the 1977 divorce judgment of the Maine court. Those obligations not only concerned life insurance "now outstanding" for the benefit of the children, but also extended to their support, to clothing, to "medical, dental, and optical expense," and to certain loans and other indebtedness. App. 13-15. Ridgway, instead, chose to name his then new wife as beneficiary of his SGLIA policy.[12] A result of this kind, of course, may be avoided if Congress chooses to avoid it. It is within Congress' power. Thus far, however, Congress has insulated the proceeds of SGLIA insurance from attack or seizure by any claimant other than the beneficiary designated by the insured or the one first in line under the statutory order of precedence. That is Congress' choice. It remains effective until legislation providing otherwise is enacted. The judgment of the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine is Reversed. JUSTICE O'CONNOR took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | On the far end of the Trail of Tears was a promise. Forced to leave their ancestral lands in Georgia and Alabama, the Creek Nation received assurances that their new lands in the West would be secure forever. In exchange for ceding “all their land, East of the Mississippi river,” the U. S. gov- ernment agreed by treaty that “[t]he Creek country west of the Mississippi shall be solemnly guarantied to the Creek Indians.” Treaty With the Creeks, Arts. I, XIV, Mar. 24, 1832, 368 (1832 Treaty). Both parties settled on boundary lines for a new and “permanent home to the whole Creek nation,” located in what is now Oklahoma. Treaty With the Creeks, preamble, Feb. 14, 1833, 7 Stat. 418 (1833 Treaty). The government further promised that “[no] State or Territory [shall] ever have a right to pass laws for the government of such Indians, but they shall be al- lowed to govern themselves.” 1832 Treaty, Art. XIV, 7 Stat. 368. Today we are asked whether the land these treaties promised remains an Indian reservation for purposes of fed- eral criminal law. Because Congress has not said other- wise, we hold the government to its word. 2 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court I At one level, the question before us concerns Jimcy McGirt. Years ago, an Oklahoma state court convicted him of three serious sexual offenses. Since then, he has argued in postconviction proceedings that the State lacked jurisdic- tion to prosecute him because he is an enrolled member of the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma and his crimes took place on the Creek Reservation. A new trial for his conduct, he has contended, must take place in federal court. The Okla- homa state courts hearing Mr. McGirt’s arguments rejected them, so he now brings them here. Mr. McGirt’s appeal rests on the federal Major Crimes Act (MCA). The statute provides that, within “the Indian country,” “[a]ny Indian who commits” certain enumerated offenses “against the person or property of another Indian or any other person” “shall be subject to the same law and penalties as all other persons committing any of the above offenses, within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States.” 18 U.S. C. By subjecting Indians to fed- eral trials for crimes committed on tribal lands, Congress may have breached its promises to tribes like the Creek that they would be free to govern themselves. But this par- ticular incursion has its limits—applying only to certain enumerated crimes and allowing only the federal govern- ment to try Indians. State courts generally have no juris- diction to |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | try Indians. State courts generally have no juris- diction to try Indians for conduct committed in “Indian country.” 102103 (1993). The key question Mr. McGirt faces concerns that last qualification: Did he commit his crimes in Indian country? A neighboring provision of the MCA defines the term to in- clude, among other things, “all land within the limits of any Indian reservation under the jurisdiction of the United States Government, notwithstanding the issuance of any patent, and, including rights-of-way running through the reservation.” Mr. McGirt submits he can satisfy Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 3 Opinion of the Court this condition because he committed his crimes on land re- served for the Creek since the 19th century. The Creek Nation has joined Mr. McGirt as amicus cu- riae. Not because the Tribe is interested in shielding Mr. McGirt from responsibility for his crimes. Instead, the Creek Nation participates because Mr. McGirt’s personal interests wind up implicating the Tribe’s. No one disputes that Mr. McGirt’s crimes were committed on lands de- scribed as the Creek Reservation in an 1866 treaty and fed- eral statute. But, in seeking to defend the state-court judg- ment below, Oklahoma has put aside whatever procedural defenses it might have and asked us to confirm that the land once given to the Creeks is no longer a reservation to- day. At another level, then, Mr. McGirt’s case winds up as a contest between State and Tribe. The scope of their dispute is limited; nothing we might say today could unsettle Okla- homa’s authority to try non-Indians for crimes against non- Indians on the lands in See United States v. Still, the stakes are not insignificant. If Mr. McGirt and the Tribe are right, the State has no right to prosecute Indians for crimes commit- ted in a portion of Northeastern Oklahoma that includes most of the city of Tulsa. Responsibility to try these matters would fall instead to the federal government and Tribe. Re- cently, the question has taken on more salience too. While Oklahoma state courts have rejected any suggestion that the lands in question remain a reservation, the Tenth Cir- cuit has reached the opposite conclusion. We granted certiorari to settle the 589 U. S. (2019). II Start with what should be obvious: Congress established a reservation for the Creeks. In a series of treaties, Con- 4 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court gress not only “solemnly guarantied” the land but also “es- tablish[ed] boundary lines which will secure a country and permanent home to the whole Creek Nation of Indians.” 1832 Treaty, |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | home to the whole Creek Nation of Indians.” 1832 Treaty, Art. XIV, ; 1833 Treaty, preamble, The government’s promises weren’t made gra- tuitously. Rather, the 1832 Treaty acknowledged that “[t]he United States are desirous that the Creeks should re- move to the country west of the Mississippi” and, in service of that goal, required the Creeks to cede all lands in the East. Arts. I, XII, 367. Nor were the govern- ment’s promises meant to be delusory. Congress twice as- sured the Creeks that “[the] Treaty shall be obligatory on the contracting parties, as soon as the same shall be ratified by the United States.” 1832 Treaty, Art. XV, ; see 1833 Treaty, Art. IX, (“agreement shall be bind- ing and obligatory” upon ratification). Both treaties were duly ratified and enacted as law. Because the Tribe’s move west was ostensibly voluntary, Congress held out another assurance as well. In the statute that precipitated these negotiations, Congress authorized the President “to assure the tribe that the United States will forever secure and guaranty to them the country so exchanged with them.” Indian Removal Act of 1830, 4 Stat. “[A]nd if they prefer it,” the bill continued, “the United States will cause a patent or grant to be made and executed to them for the same; Provided always, that such lands shall revert to the United States, if the Indians be- come extinct, or abandon the same.” If agreeable to all sides, a tribe would not only enjoy the government’s sol- emn treaty promises; it would hold legal title to its lands. It was an offer the Creek accepted. The 1833 Treaty fixed borders for what was to be a “permanent home to the whole Creek nation of Indians.” 1833 Treaty, preamble, 7 Stat. 418. It also established that the “United States will grant a patent, in fee simple, to the Creek nation of Indians for the land assigned said nation by this treaty.” Art. III, Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 5 Opinion of the Court at 419. That grant came with the caveat that “the right thus guaranteed by the United States shall be continued to said tribe of Indians, so long as they shall exist as a nation, and continue to occupy the country hereby assigned to them.” The promised patent formally issued in 1852. See 293294 These early treaties did not refer to the Creek lands as a “reservation”—perhaps because that word had not yet ac- quired such distinctive significance in federal Indian law. But we have found similar language in treaties from the same era sufficient to |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | similar language in treaties from the same era sufficient to create a reservation. See Menominee (grant of land “ ‘for a home, to be held as Indian lands are held,’ ” es- tablished a reservation). And later Acts of Congress left no room for doubt. In 1866, the United States entered yet an- other treaty with the Creek Nation. This agreement re- duced the size of the land set aside for the Creek, compen- sating the Tribe at a price of 30 cents an acre. Treaty Between the United States and the Creek Nation of Indi- ans, Art. III, June 14, 1866, But Congress ex- plicitly restated its commitment that the remaining land would “be forever set apart as a home for said Creek Na- tion,” which it now referred to as “the reduced Creek reser- vation.” Arts. III, IX,1 Throughout the late —————— 1 The dissent by THE CHIEF JUSTICE (hereinafter the dissent) suggests that the Creek’s intervening alliance with the Confederacy “ ‘unsettled’ ” and “ ‘forfeit[ed]’ ” the longstanding promises of the United States. Post, at 3. But the Treaty of 1866 put an end to any Civil War hostility, prom- ising mutual amnesty, “perpetual peace and friendship,” and guarantee- ing the Tribe the “quiet possession of their country.” Art. I, Though this treaty expressly reduced the size of the Creek Reservation, the Creek were compensated for the lost territory, and otherwise “re- tained” their unceded portion. Art. III, Contrary to the dissent’s implication, nothing in the Treaty of 1866 purported to repeal prior treaty promises. Cf. Art. XII, (the United States expressly “re- affirms and reassumes all obligations of treaty stipulations with the 6 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court 19th century, many other federal laws also expressly re- ferred to the Creek Reservation. See, e.g., Treaty Between United States and Cherokee Nation of Indians, Art. IV, July 19, 1866, ; Act of Mar. 3, 1873, ch. 322, ; (multiple references to the “Creek reservation” and “Creek India[n] Reservation”); 11 Cong. Rec. 2351 (1881) (discussing “the dividing line be- tween the Creek reservation and their ceded lands”); Act of Feb. 13, 1891, (describing a cession by refer- encing the “West boundary line of the Creek Reservation”). There is a final set of assurances that bear mention, too. In the Treaty of 1856, Congress promised that “no portion” of the Creek Reservation “shall ever be embraced or in- cluded within, or annexed to, any Territory or State.” Art. IV, And within their lands, with exceptions, the Creeks were to be “secured in the unrestricted right of |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | Creeks were to be “secured in the unrestricted right of self-government,” with “full jurisdiction” over enrolled Tribe members and their property. Art. XV, So the Creek were promised not only a “permanent home” that would be “forever set apart”; they were also assured a right to self-government on lands that would lie outside both the legal jurisdiction and geographic boundaries of any State. Under any definition, this was a reservation. III A While there can be no question that Congress established a reservation for the Creek Nation, it’s equally clear that Congress has since broken more than a few of its promises to the Tribe. Not least, the land described in the parties’ treaties, once undivided and held by the Tribe, is now frac- tured into pieces. While these pieces were initially distrib- uted to Tribe members, many were sold and now belong to persons unaffiliated with the Nation. So in what sense, if —————— Creek nation entered into before” the Civil War). Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 7 Opinion of the Court any, can we say that the Creek Reservation persists today? To determine whether a tribe continues to hold a reser- vation, there is only one place we may look: the Acts of Con- gress. This Court long ago held that the Legislature wields significant constitutional authority when it comes to tribal relations, possessing even the authority to breach its own promises and treaties. Lone Wolf v. Hitchcock, 187 U.S. 553, 566568 (1903). But that power, this Court has cau- tioned, belongs to Congress alone. Nor will this Court lightly infer such a breach once Congress has established a reservation. Under our Constitution, States have no authority to re- duce federal reservations lying within their borders. Just imagine if they did. A State could encroach on the tribal boundaries or legal rights Congress provided, and, with enough time and patience, nullify the promises made in the name of the United States. That would be at odds with the Constitution, which entrusts Congress with the authority to regulate commerce with Native Americans, and directs that federal treaties and statutes are the “supreme Law of the Land.” Art. I, Art. VI, cl. 2. It would also leave tribal rights in the hands of the very neighbors who might be least inclined to respect them. Likewise, courts have no proper role in the adjustment of reservation borders. Mustering the broad social consensus required to pass new legislation is a deliberately hard busi- ness under our Constitution. Faced with this daunting task, Congress sometimes might wish an inconvenient res- ervation would |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | task, Congress sometimes might wish an inconvenient res- ervation would simply disappear. Short of that, legislators might seek to pass laws that tiptoe to the edge of disestab- lishment and hope that judges—facing no possibility of elec- toral consequences themselves—will deliver the final push. But wishes don’t make for laws, and saving the political branches the embarrassment of disestablishing a reserva- tion is not one of our constitutionally assigned prerogatives. “[O]nly Congress can divest a reservation of its land and 8 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court diminish its boundaries.” 465 U.S., at So it’s no matter how many other promises to a tribe the federal government has already broken. If Congress wishes to break the promise of a reservation, it must say so. History shows that Congress knows how to withdraw a reservation when it can muster the will. Sometimes, legis- lation has provided an “[e]xplicit reference to cession” or an “unconditional commitment to compensate the Indian tribe for its opened land.” Other times, Congress has directed that tribal lands shall be “ ‘restored to the public domain.’ ” (em- phasis deleted). Likewise, Congress might speak of a res- ervation as being “ ‘discontinued,’ ” “ ‘abolished,’ ” or “ ‘va- cated.’ ” U.S. 481, Disestablishment has “never required any particular form of words,” But it does require that Congress clearly express its intent to do so, “[c]ommon[ly with an] ‘[e]xplicit reference to cession or other language evidencing the present and total surrender of all tribal in- terests.’ ” (slip op., at 6). B In an effort to show Congress has done just that with the Creek Reservation, Oklahoma points to events during the so-called “allotment era.” Starting in the 1880s, Congress sought to pressure many tribes to abandon their communal lifestyles and parcel their lands into smaller lots owned by individual tribe members. See 1 F. Cohen, Handbook of Federal Indian Law (2012) (Cohen), discussing Gen- eral Allotment Act of 1887, ch. 119, Some al- lotment advocates hoped that the policy would create a class of assimilated, landowning, agrarian Native Ameri- cans. See Cohen ; F. Hoxie, A Final Promise: The Campaign To Assimilate 1819 (2001). Others may have hoped that, with lands in individual hands and (eventually) Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 9 Opinion of the Court freely alienable, white settlers would have more space of their own. See at 1415; cf. General Allotment Act of 1887, The Creek were hardly exempt from the pressures of the allotment era. In 1893, Congress charged the Dawes Com- mission with negotiating changes to the Creek Reservation. Congress |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | Com- mission with negotiating changes to the Creek Reservation. Congress identified two goals: Either persuade the Creek to cede territory to the United States, as it had before, or agree to allot its lands to Tribe members. Act of Mar. 3, 1893, ch. 209, 646. A year later, the Com- mission reported back that the Tribe “would not, under any circumstances, agree to cede any portion of their lands.” S. Misc. Doc. No. 24, 53d Cong., 3d Sess., 7 (1894). At that time, before this Court’s decision in Lone Wolf, Congress may not have been entirely sure of its power to terminate an established reservation unilaterally. Perhaps for that reason, perhaps for others, the Commission and Congress took this report seriously and turned their attention to al- lotment rather than cession.2 The Commission’s work culminated in an allotment agreement with the Tribe in 1901. Creek Allotment Agree- ment, ch. 676, With exceptions for certain pre- existing town sites and other special matters, the Agree- ment established procedures for allotting 160-acre parcels to individual Tribe members who could not sell, transfer, or otherwise encumber their allotments for a number of years. § 7, at 862864 (5 years for any portion, 21 years for the designated “homestead” portion). Tribe members were given deeds for their parcels that “convey[ed] to [them] all right, title, and interest of the Creek Nation.” at —————— 2 The dissent stresses, repeatedly, that the Dawes Commission was charged with seeking to extinguish the reservation. Post, at 18, 24. Yet, the dissent fails to mention the Commission’s various reports acknowl- edging that those efforts were unsuccessful precisely because the Creek refused to cede their lands. 10 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court 867868. In 1908, Congress relaxed these alienation re- strictions in some ways, and even allowed the Secretary of the Interior to waive them. Act of May 27, 1908, ch. 199, One way or the other, individual Tribe members were eventually free to sell their land to Indians and non-Indians alike. Missing in all this, however, is a statute evincing any- thing like the “present and total surrender of all tribal in- terests” in the affected lands. Without doubt, in 1832 the Creek “cede[d]” their original homelands east of the Missis- sippi for a reservation promised in what is now Oklahoma. 1832 Treaty, Art. I, And in 1866, they “cede[d] and convey[ed]” a portion of that reservation to the United States. Treaty With the Creek, Art. III, But because there exists no equivalent law terminating what remained, the Creek Reservation survived allotment. In saying this we say |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | the Creek Reservation survived allotment. In saying this we say nothing new. For years, States have sought to suggest that allotments automatically ended res- ervations, and for years courts have rejected the argument. Remember, Congress has defined “Indian country” to in- clude “all land within the limits of any Indian reservation notwithstanding the issuance of any patent, and, includ- ing any rights-of-way running through the reservation.” 18 U.S. C. So the relevant statute expressly contem- plates private land ownership within reservation bounda- ries. Nor under the statute’s terms does it matter whether these individual parcels have passed hands to non-Indians. To the contrary, this Court has explained repeatedly that Congress does not disestablish a reservation simply by al- lowing the transfer of individual plots, whether to Native Americans or others. See U.S., at (“[A]llot- ment under the Act is completely consistent with con- tinued reservation status”); 356358 (holding that allotment act “did no more than open the way for non-Indian settlers to own land on the reservation”); Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 11 Opinion of the Court Parker, 577 U. S., at (slip op., at 7) (“[T]he 1882 Act falls into another category of surplus land Acts: those that merely opened reservation land to settlement. Such schemes allow non-Indian settlers to own land on the res- ervation” (internal quotation marks omitted)). It isn’t so hard to see why. The federal government issued its own land patents to many homesteaders throughout the West. These patents transferred legal title and are the ba- sis for much of the private land ownership in a number of States today. But no one thinks any of this diminished the United States’s claim to sovereignty over any land. To ac- complish that would require an act of cession, the transfer of a sovereign claim from one nation to another. 3 E. Wash- burn, American Law of Real Property *521*524. And there is no reason why Congress cannot reserve land for tribes in much the same way, allowing them to continue to exercise governmental functions over land even if they no longer own it communally. Indeed, such an arrangement seems to be contemplated by plain terms. Cf. 358.3 Oklahoma reminds us that allotment was often the first step in a plan ultimately aimed at disestablishment. As this Court explained in Congress’s expressed policy at the time “was to continue the reservation system and the trust status of Indian lands, but to allot tracts to individual Indians for agriculture and grazing.” U.S., at 496. Then, “[w]hen all the lands had been allotted and the trust expired, the |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | the lands had been allotted and the trust expired, the reservation could be abolished.” This plan was set in motion nationally in the General Allotment —————— 3 The dissent not only fails to acknowledge these features of the statute and our precedents. It proceeds in defiance of them, suggesting that by moving to eliminate communal title and relaxing restrictions on aliena- tion, “Congress destroyed the foundation of [the Creek Nation’s] sover- eignty.” Post, at 1819. But this Court long ago rejected the notion that the purchase of lands by non-Indians is inconsistent with reservation status. See 358. 12 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court Act of 1887, and for the Creek specifically in 1901. No doubt, this is why Congress at the turn of the 20th century “believed to a man” that “the reservation system would cease” “within a generation at most.” 465 U.S., at 468. Still, just as wishes are not laws, future plans aren’t either. Congress may have passed allotment laws to create the conditions for disestablishment. But to equate allot- ment with disestablishment would confuse the first step of a march with arrival at its destination.4 Ignoring this distinction would run roughshod over many other statutes as well. In some cases, Congress chose not to wait for allotment to run its course before disestablishing a reservation. When it deemed that approach appropriate, Congress included additional language expressly ending reservation status. So, for example, in 1904, Congress al- lotted reservations belonging to the Ponca and Otoe Tribes, reservations also lying within modern-day Oklahoma, and then provided “further, That the reservation lines of the said reservations are hereby abolished.” Act of Apr. 21, 1904, 218 (emphasis deleted); see also 439440, n. 22 (collecting other exam- ples). Tellingly, however, nothing like that can be found in the nearly contemporary 1901 Creek Allotment Agreement or the 1908 Act. That doesn’t make these laws special. Ra- ther, in using the language that they did, these allotment laws tracked others of the period, parceling out individual —————— 4 The dissent seemingly conflates these steps in other ways, too, by im- plying that the passage of an allotment Act itself extinguished title. Post, at 1819. The reality proved more complicated. Allotment of the Creek lands did not occur overnight, but dragged on for years, well past Okla- homa’s statehood, until Congress finally prohibited any further allot- ments more than 15 years later. Act of Mar. 2, 1917, Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 13 Opinion of the Court tracts, while saving the ultimate fate of the land’s reserva- tion status for another day.5 |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | fate of the land’s reserva- tion status for another day.5 C If allotment by itself won’t work, Oklahoma seeks to prove disestablishment by pointing to other ways Congress intruded on the Creek’s promised right to self-governance during the allotment era. It turns out there were many. For example, just a few years before the 1901 Creek Allot- ment Agreement, and perhaps in an effort to pressure the Tribe to the negotiating table, Congress abolished the Creeks’ tribal courts and transferred all pending civil and criminal cases to the U. S. Courts of the Indian Territory. Curtis Act of 1898, 505. Separately, the Creek Allotment Agreement provided that tribal ordi- nances “affecting the lands of the Tribe, or of individuals after allotment, or the moneys or other property of the Tribe, or of the citizens thereof ” would not be valid until approved by the President of the United States. 31 Stat. 872. Plainly, these laws represented serious blows to the —————— 5 The dissent doesn’t purport to find any of the hallmarks of diminish- ment in the Creek Allotment Agreement. Instead, the dissent tries to excuse their absence by saying that it would have made “little sense” to find such language in an Act transferring the Tribe’s lands to private owners. Post, at 14. But the dissent’s account is impossible to reconcile with history and precedent. As we have noted, plenty of allotment agree- ments during this era included precisely the language of cession and compensation that the dissent says it would make “little sense” to find there. And this Court has confirmed time and again that allotment agreements without such language do not necessarily disestablish or di- minish the reservation at issue. See U.S. 481, ; v. Superintendent of Wash. State Penitentiary, 368 U.S. 351, 358 The dissent’s only answer is to suggest that allotment combined with other statutes limiting the Creek Nation’s governing au- thority amounted to disestablishment—in other words that it’s the argu- ments in the next section that really do the work. 14 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court Creek. But, just as plainly, they left the Tribe with signifi- cant sovereign functions over the lands in For ex- ample, the Creek Nation retained the power to collect taxes, operate schools, legislate through tribal ordinances, and, soon, oversee the federally mandated allotment process. 40, 42, at 871872; 949950, 953954 (CA8 1905). And, in its own way, the congressional incursion on tribal legislative processes only served to prove the power: Congress would have had no need to subject tribal legislation to Presidential review if the Tribe |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | to subject tribal legislation to Presidential review if the Tribe lacked any authority to legislate. Grave though they were, these congressional intrusions on pre-existing treaty rights fell short of eliminating all tribal interests in the land. Much more ominously, the 1901 allotment agreement ended by announcing that the Creek tribal government “shall not continue” past 1906, although the agreement quickly qualified that statement, adding the proviso “sub- ject to such further legislation as Congress may deem proper.” Thus, while suggesting that the tribal government might end in 1906, Congress also neces- sarily understood it had not ended in 1901. All of which was consistent with the Legislature’s general practice of taking allotment as a first, not final, step toward disestab- lishment and dissolution. When 1906 finally arrived, Congress adopted the Five Civilized Tribes Act. But instead of dissolving the tribal government as some may have expected, Congress “deem[ed] proper” a different course, simply cutting away further at the Tribe’s autonomy. Congress empowered the President to remove and replace the principal chief of the Creek, prohibited the tribal council from meeting more than 30 days a year, and directed the Secretary of the Interior to assume control of tribal schools. 10, 28, 140, 148. The Act also provided for the handling of the Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 15 Opinion of the Court Tribe’s funds, land, and legal liabilities in the event of dis- solution. 27, Despite these additional incursions on tribal authority, however, Congress expressly recognized the Creek’s “tribal existence and present tribal governmen[t]” and “continued [them] in full force and effect for all purposes authorized by law.” In the years that followed, Congress continued to adjust its arrangements with the Tribe. For example, in 1908, the Legislature required Creek officials to turn over all “tribal properties” to the Secretary of the Interior. Act of May 27, 1908, The next year, Congress sought the Creek National Council’s release of certain money claims against the U. S. government. Act of Mar. 3, 1909, ch. 263, 805. And, further still, Congress offered the Creek Nation a one-time opportunity to file suit in the fed- eral Court of Claims for “any and all legal and equitable claims arising under or growing out of any treaty or agree- ment between the United States and the Creek Indian Na- tion.” Act of May 24, 1924, ch. 181, ; see, e.g., United But Congress never withdrew its recognition of the tribal gov- ernment, and none of its adjustments would have made any sense if Congress thought it had already completed that job. Indeed, with time, |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | thought it had already completed that job. Indeed, with time, Congress changed course completely. Beginning in the 1920s, the federal outlook toward Native Americans shifted “away from assimilation policies and to- ward more tolerance and respect for traditional aspects of Indian culture.” 1 Cohen Few in 1900 might have foreseen such a profound “reversal of attitude” was in the making or expected that “new protections for Indian rights,” including renewed “support for federally defined tribalism,” lurked around the corner. ; see also M. Scherer, Imperfect Victories: The Legal Tenacity of the Omaha Tribe, 19451995, pp. 24 (1999). But that is ex- actly what happened. Pursuant to this new national policy, 16 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court in Congress authorized the Creek to adopt a constitu- tion and bylaws, see Act of June 26, enabling the Creek government to resume many of its pre- viously suspended functions. Muscogee (Creek) Nation v. 144214476 The Creek Nation has done exactly that. In the interven- ing years, it has ratified a new constitution and established three separate branches of government. ; see Mus- cogee Creek Nation (MCN) Const., Arts. V, VI, and VII. To- day the Nation is led by a democratically elected Principal Chief, Second Chief, and National Council; operates a police force and three hospitals; commands an annual budget of more than $350 million; and employs over 2,000 people. Brief for Muscogee (Creek) Nation as Amicus Curiae 3639. In 1982, the Nation passed an ordinance reestablishing the criminal and civil jurisdiction of its courts. See 851 F.2d, at 1442, 14461447 (confirming Tribe’s authority to do so). The territorial jurisdiction of these courts extends to any Indian country within the Tribe’s territory as defined by the Treaty of 1866. MCN Stat. 27, §1102(A). And the State of Oklahoma has afforded full faith and credit to its judgments since at least 1994. See Barrett v. Barrett, 878 —————— 6 The dissent calls it “fantasy” to suggest that Congress evinced “any unease about extinguishing the Creek domain” because Congress “did what it set out to do: transform a reservation into a State.” Post, 23. The dissent stresses, too, that the Creek were afforded U. S. citizen- ship and the right to vote. Post, at 20. But the only thing implausible here is the suggestion that “creat[ing] a new State” or enfranchising Na- tive Americans implies an “intent to terminate” any and all reservations within a State’s boundaries. Post, at 15. This Court confronted—and rejected—that sort of argument long ago in United 4748 The dissent treats that case as a one-off: special because “the |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | dissent treats that case as a one-off: special because “the tribe in Sandoval, the Pueblo Indians of New Mex- ico, retained a rare communal title to their lands.” Post, at 21, n. 4. But Sandoval is not only a case about the Pueblos; it is a foundational prec- edent recognizing that Congress can welcome Native Americans to par- ticipate in a broader political community without sacrificing their tribal sovereignty. Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 17 Opinion of the Court P. 2d 1051, 1054 ; Full Faith and Credit of Tribal Courts, Okla. State Cts. Network (Apr. 18, 2019), https://www.oscn.net/applications/oscn/DeliverDocument. asp?CiteID=458214. Maybe some of these changes happened for altruistic rea- sons, maybe some for other reasons. It seems, for example, that at least certain Members of Congress hesitated about disestablishment in 1906 because they feared any reversion of the Creek lands to the public domain would trigger a stat- utory commitment to hand over portions of these lands to already powerful railroad interests. See, e.g., 40 Cong. Rec. 2976 (1906) (Sen. McCumber); Many of those who advanced the reorganization efforts of the 1930s may have done so more out of frustration with efforts to assimilate Native Americans than any disaffec- tion with assimilation as the ultimate goal. See 1 Cohen Scherer, Imperfect Victories, at 24. But whatever the confluence of reasons, in all this history there simply arrived no moment when any Act of Congress dissolved the Creek Tribe or disestablished its reservation. In the end, Congress moved in the opposite direction.7 D Ultimately, Oklahoma is left to pursue a very different sort of argument. Now, the State points to historical prac- tices and demographics, both around the time of and long after the enactment of all the relevant legislation. These facts, the State submits, are enough by themselves to prove disestablishment. Oklahoma even classifies and catego- —————— 7 The dissent ultimately concedes what Oklahoma will not: that no “individual congressional action or piece of evidence, standing alone, dis- established the Creek reservation.” Post, at 910. Instead we’re told we must consider “all of the relevant Acts of Congress together, viewed in light of contemporaneous and subsequent contextual evidence.” So, once again, the dissent seems to suggest that it’s the arguments in the next section that will get us across the line to disestablishment. 18 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court rizes how we should approach the question of disestablish- ment into three “steps.” It reads as requiring us to examine the laws passed by Congress at the first step, con- temporary events at the second, and even later |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | step, con- temporary events at the second, and even later events and demographics at the third. On the State’s account, we have so far finished only the first step; two more await. This is mistaken. When interpreting Congress’s work in this arena, no less than any other, our charge is usually to ascertain and follow the original meaning of the law before us. New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira, 586 U. S. (2019) (slip op., at 6). That is the only “step” proper for a court of law. To be sure, if during the course of our work an ambig- uous statutory term or phrase emerges, we will sometimes consult contemporaneous usages, customs, and practices to the extent they shed light on the meaning of the language in question at the time of enactment. But Oklahoma does not point to any ambiguous language in any of the rel- evant statutes that could plausibly be read as an Act of dis- establishment. Nor may a court favor contemporaneous or later practices instead of the laws Congress passed. As So- lem explained, “[o]nce a block of land is set aside for an In- dian reservation and no matter what happens to the title of individual plots within the area, the entire block retains its reservation status until Congress explicitly indicates other- wise.” 465 U.S., at ). Still, Oklahoma reminds us that other language in isn’t so constrained. In particular, the State highlights a passage suggesting that “[w]here non-Indian settlers flooded into the opened portion of a reservation and the area has long since lost its Indian character, we have acknowledged that de facto, if not de jure, diminishment may have occurred.” While acknowledg- ing that resort to subsequent demographics was “an unor- thodox and potentially unreliable method of statutory in- terpretation,” the Court seemed nonetheless taken by its Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 19 Opinion of the Court “obvious practical advantages.” Out of context, statements like these might suggest his- torical practices or current demographics can suffice to dis- establish or diminish reservations in the way Oklahoma en- visions. But, in the end, itself found these kinds of arguments provided “no help” in resolving the dispute be- fore it. Notably, too, suggested that whatever utility historical practice or demographics might have was “demonstrated” by this Court’s earlier decision in Rosebud See 465 U.S., at n. 10. And Rosebud hardly endorsed the use of such sources to find disestablishment. Instead, based on the statute at issue there, the Court came “to the firm conclusion that congressional intent” was to di- minish the reservation |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | conclusion that congressional intent” was to di- minish the reservation in At that point, the Tribe sought to cast doubt on the clear im- port of the text by citing subsequent historical events—and the Court rejected the Tribe’s argument exactly because this kind of evidence could not overcome congressional intent as expressed in a statute. at 604605. This Court has already sought to clarify that extratextual considerations hardly supply the blank check Oklahoma supposes. In Parker, for example, we explained that “[e]vi- dence of the subsequent treatment of the disputed land has ‘limited interpretive value.’ ” 577 U. S., at (slip op., at 11) ).8 Yankton called it the “least —————— 8 The dissent suggests Parker meant to say only that evidence of sub- sequent treatment had limited interpretative value “in that case.” Post, at 12. But the dissent includes just a snippet of the relevant passage. Read in full, there is little room to doubt Parker invoked a general rule: “This subsequent demographic history cannot overcome our conclusion that Congress did not intend to diminish the reservation in 1882. And it is not our rule to ‘rewrite’ the 1882 Act in light of this subsequent demo- graphic history. After all, evidence of the changing demographics of disputed land is ‘the least compelling’ evi- 20 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court compelling” form of evidence. Both cases em- phasized that what value such evidence has can only be in- terpretative—evidence that, at best, might be used to the extent it sheds light on what the terms found in a statute meant at the time of the law’s adoption, not as an alterna- tive means of proving disestablishment or diminishment. To avoid further confusion, we restate the point. There is no need to consult extratextual sources when the mean- ing of a statute’s terms is clear. Nor may extratextual sources overcome those terms. The only role such materials can properly play is to help “clear up not create” ambi- guity about a statute’s original meaning. And, as we have said time and again, once a reservation is established, it re- tains that status “until Congress explicitly indicates other- wise.” 465 U.S., at (citing Celestine, 215 U.S., at ); see also Yankton (“[O]nly Congress can alter the terms of an Indian treaty by dimin- ishing a reservation, and its intent to do so must be clear and plain”) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). The dissent charges that we have failed to take account of the “compelling reasons” for considering extratextual ev- idence as a matter of course. Post, at 1112. |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | ev- idence as a matter of course. Post, at 1112. But Oklahoma and the dissent have cited no case in which this Court has found a reservation disestablished without first concluding that a statute required that result. Perhaps they wish this case to be the first. To follow Oklahoma and the dissent down that path, though, would only serve to allow States and courts to finish work Congress has left undone, usurp —————— dence in our diminishment analysis, for ‘[e]very surplus land Act neces- sarily resulted in a surge of non-Indian settlement and degraded the “In- dian character” of the reservation, yet we have repeatedly stated that not every surplus land Act diminished the affected reservation.’ Yankton 522 U.S., Evidence of the subsequent treatment of the disputed land by Government officials likewise has ‘limited interpretive value.’” 577 U. S., at (slip op., at 11). Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 21 Opinion of the Court the legislative function in the process, and treat Native American claims of statutory right as less valuable than others. None of that can be reconciled with our normal in- terpretive rules, let alone our rule that disestablishment may not be lightly inferred and treaty rights are to be con- strued in favor, not against, tribal rights. 465 U.S., at 472.9 To see the perils of substituting stories for statutes, we need look no further than the stories we are offered in the case before us. Put aside that the Tribe could tell more than a few stories of its own: Take just the evidence on which Oklahoma and the dissent wish to rest their case. First, they point to Oklahoma’s long historical prosecutorial prac- tice of asserting jurisdiction over Indians in state court, even for serious crimes on the contested lands. If the Creek lands really were part of a reservation, the argument goes, all of these cases should have been tried in federal court pursuant to the MCA. Yet, until the Tenth Circuit’s Mur- phy decision a few years ago, no court embraced that possi- bility. See Murphy, Second, they offer state- ments from various sources to show that “everyone” in the late 19th and early 20th century thought the reservation system—and the Creek Nation—would be disbanded soon. Third, they stress that non-Indians swiftly moved on to the reservation in the early part of the last century, that Tribe —————— 9 In an effort to support its very different course, the dissent stitches together quotes from Rosebud and South Dakota v. Yankton Tribe, Post, at 1011. But far from supporting the dissent, both cases |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | at 1011. But far from supporting the dissent, both cases emphasize that “[t]he focus of our inquiry is congressional intent,” Rosebud, 430 U.S., at 588, n. 4; see also Yankton and merely acknowledge that extratextual sources may help resolve ambiguity about Congress’s directions. The dissent’s appeal to fares no better. As we have seen, the extratextual sources in only confirmed what the relevant statute already suggested—that the reservation in question was not diminished or 476. 22 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court members today constitute a small fraction of those now re- siding on the land, and that the area now includes a “vi- brant city with expanding aerospace, healthcare, technol- ogy, manufacturing, and transportation sectors.” Brief for Petitioner in Carpenter v. Murphy, O. T. 2018, No. 171107, p. 15. All this history, we are told, supplies “compelling” evidence about the lands in Maybe so, but even taken on its own terms none of this evidence tells the story we are promised. Start with the State’s argument about its longstanding practice of assert- ing jurisdiction over Native Americans. Oklahoma pro- ceeds on the implicit premise that its historical practices are unlikely to have defied the mandates of the federal MCA. That premise, though, appears more than a little shaky. In conjunction with the MCA, not only sends to federal court certain major crimes committed by Indians on reservations. Two doors down, in the statute does the same for major crimes committed by Indi- ans on “Indian allotments, the Indian titles of which have not been extinguished.” Despite this direction, however, Oklahoma state courts erroneously entertained prosecu- tions for major crimes by Indians on Indian allotments for decades, until state courts finally disavowed the practice in 1989. See (Okla. Crim. App. 1989) ); see also United 10621063 And if the State’s prosecution practices disregarded for so long, it’s unclear why we should take those same practices as a reli- able guide to the meaning and application of Things only get worse from there. Why did Oklahoma historically think it could try Native Americans for any crime committed on restricted allotments or anywhere else? Part of the explanation, Oklahoma tells us, is that it thought the eastern half of the State was always categori- cally exempt from the terms of the federal MCA. So Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 23 Opinion of the Court whether a crime was committed on a restricted allotment, a reservation, or land that wasn’t Indian country at all, to Oklahoma it just didn’t matter. In the State’s view, when Congress adopted the Oklahoma Enabling Act |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | the State’s view, when Congress adopted the Oklahoma Enabling Act that paved the way for its admission to the Union, it carved out a spe- cial exception to the MCA for the eastern half of the State where the Creek lands can be found. By Oklahoma’s own admission, then, for decades its historical practices in the area in question didn’t even try to conform to the MCA, all of which makes the State’s past prosecutions a meaningless guide for determining what counted as Indian country. As it turns out, too, Oklahoma’s claim to a special exemption was itself mistaken, yet one more error in historical prac- tice that even the dissent does not attempt to defend. See Part V, infra.10 To be fair, Oklahoma is far from the only State that has overstepped its authority in Indian country. Perhaps often in good faith, perhaps sometimes not, others made similar mistakes in the past. But all that only underscores further the danger of relying on state practices to determine the meaning of the federal MCA. See, e.g., Negonsett, 507 U.S., at 07 (“[I]n practice, Kansas had exercised jurisdic- tion over all offenses committed on Indian reservations in- volving Indians” (quoting memorandum from Secretary of the Interior, H. R. Rep. No. 1999, 76th Cong., 3d Sess., 4 (1940)); Scherer, Imperfect Victories, at 18 (describing “na- tionwide jurisdictional confusion” as a result of the MCA); —————— 10 The dissent tries to avoid this inconvenient history by distinguishing fee allotments from reservations, noting that the two categories are le- gally distinct and geographically incommensurate. Post, at 27. But this misses the point: The reason that Oklahoma thought it could prosecute Indians for crimes on restricted allotments applied with equal force to reservations. And it hardly “stretches the imagination” to think that reason was wrong, post, at 28, when the dissent itself does not dispute our rejection of it in Part V. 24 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court Cohen (“Before 1942 the state of New York reg- ularly exercised or claimed the right to exercise jurisdiction over the New York reservations, but a federal court decision in that year raised questions about the validity of state ju- risdiction”); Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae in Carpenter v. Murphy, O. T. 2018, No. 171107, pp. 7a8a (Letter from Secretary of the Interior, Mar. 27, 1963) (not- ing that many States have asserted criminal jurisdiction over Indians without an apparent basis in a federal law).11 Oklahoma next points to various statements during the allotment era which, it says, show that even the Creek un- |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | era which, it says, show that even the Creek un- derstood their reservation was under threat. And there’s no doubt about that. By 1893, the leadership of the Creek Nation saw what the federal government had in mind: “They [the federal government] do not deny any of our rights under treaty, but say they will go to the people them- selves and confer with them and urge upon them the neces- sity of a change in their present condition, and upon their refusal will force a change upon them.” P. Porter & A. McKellop, Printed Statement of Creek Delegates, reprinted in Creek Delegation Documents 89 (Feb. 9, 1893). Not a decade later, and as a result of these forced changes, the leadership recognized that “ ‘[i]t would be difficult, if not im- possible to successfully operate the Creek government now.’ ” App. to Brief for Respondent 8a ). But even assuming that Oklahoma courts exercised civil jurisdiction over Creek members, too, the dissent never explains why this jurisdiction im- plies the Creek Reservation must have been After all, everyone agrees that the Creeks were prohibited from having their own courts at the time. So it should be no surprise that some Creek might have resorted to state courts in hope of resolving their disputes. Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 25 Opinion of the Court National Council (May 7, 1901), reprinted in The Indian Journal (May 10, 1901)). Surely, too, the future looked even bleaker: “ ‘The remnant of a government now accorded to us can be expected to be maintained only until all settlements of our landed and other interests growing out of treaty stip- ulations with the government of the United States shall have been settled.’ ” But note the nature of these statements. The Creek Na- tion recognized that the federal government will seek to get popular support or otherwise would force change. Like- wise, the Tribe’s government would continue for only so long. These were prophesies, and hardly groundbreaking ones at that. After all, the 1901 Creek Allotment Agree- ment explicitly said that the tribal government “shall not continue” past 1906. So what might statements like these tell us that isn’t already evident from the statutes themselves? Oklahoma doesn’t suggest they shed light on the meaning of some disputed and ambiguous statutory direction. More nearly, the State seeks to render the Creek’s fears self-fulfilling.12 We are also asked to consider commentary from those outside the Tribe. In particular, the dissent reports that the federal government “operated” on the “understanding” that the reservation was Post, at 32. |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | on the “understanding” that the reservation was Post, at 32. In support of its claim, the dissent highlights a 1941 statement from Felix Cohen. Then serving as an official at the Interior Department, Cohen opined that “ ‘all offenses by or against Indians’ in the former Indian Territory ‘are subject to State —————— 12 The dissent finds the statements of the Creek leadership so proba- tive that it cites them not just as evidence about the meaning of treaties the Tribe signed but even as evidence about the meaning of general pur- pose laws the Creek had no hand in. See post, at 26 (citing Chief Porter’s views on the legal effects of the Oklahoma Enabling Act). That is quite a stretch from using tribal statements as “historical evidence of ‘the man- ner in which [treaties were] negotiated’ with the Tribe.” Parker, 577 U. S., at (slip op., at 9) ). 26 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court laws.’ ” (quoting App. to Supp. Reply Brief for Peti- tioner in Carpenter v. Murphy, O. T. 2018, No. 171107, p. 1a (Memorandum for Commissioner of Indian Affairs (July 11, 1941)). But that statement is incorrect. As we have just seen, Oklahoma’s courts acknowledge that the State lacks jurisdiction over Indian crimes on Indian allotments. See And the dissent does not dis- pute that Oklahoma is without authority under the MCA to try Indians for crimes committed on restricted allotments and any reservation. All of which highlights the pitfalls of elevating commentary over the law.13 Finally, Oklahoma points to the speedy and persistent movement of white settlers onto Creek lands throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries. But this history proves no more helpful in discerning statutory meaning. Maybe, as Oklahoma supposes, it suggests that some white settlers in good faith thought the Creek lands no longer con- stituted a reservation. But maybe, too, some didn’t care and —————— 13 Part of the reason for Cohen’s error might be explained by a portion of the memorandum the dissent leaves unquoted. Cohen concluded that Oklahoma was free to try Indians anywhere in the State because, among other things, the Oklahoma Enabling Act “transfer[red] jurisdiction from the Federal courts to the State courts upon the establishment of the State of Oklahoma.” App. to Supp. Reply Brief for Petitioner in Carpen- ter v. Murphy, O. T. 2018, No. 171107, p. 1a (Memorandum for Commis- sioner of Indian Affairs (July 11, 1941)). Yet, as we explore below, the Oklahoma Enabling Act did not send cases covered by the federal MCA to state court. See |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | cases covered by the federal MCA to state court. See Part V, infra. Other, contemporaneous Interior De- partment memoranda acknowledged that Oklahoma state courts had simply “assumed jurisdiction” over cases arising on restricted allotments without any clear authority in the Oklahoma Enabling Act or the MCA, and much the same appears to have occurred here. App. to Supp. Reply Brief for Respondent in Carpenter v. Murphy, O. T. 2018, No. 171107, p. 1a (Memorandum from N. Gray, Dept. of Interior, for Mr. Flanery (Aug. 12, 1942)). So rather than Oklahoma and the United States having a “shared understanding” that Congress had disestablished the Creek Reservation, post, at 27, it seems more accurate to say that for many years much uncertainty remained about whether the MCA applied in eastern Oklahoma. Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 27 Opinion of the Court others never paused to think about the Certain historians have argued, for example, that the loss of Creek land ownership was accelerated by the discovery of oil in the region during the period at issue here. A number of the federal officials charged with implementing the laws of Congress were apparently openly conflicted, holding shares or board positions in the very oil companies who sought to deprive Indians of their lands. A. Debo, And Still the Wa- ters Run 8687, 117118 (1940). And for a time Okla- homa’s courts appear to have entertained sham competency and guardianship proceedings that divested Tribe members of oil rich allotments. at 104106, 233234; Brief for Historians et al. as Amici Curiae 2630. Whatever else might be said about the history and demographics placed before us, they hardly tell a story of unalloyed respect for tribal interests.14 In the end, only one message rings true. Even the care- fully selected history Oklahoma and the dissent recite is not nearly as tidy as they suggest. It supplies us with little help —————— 14 The dissent asks us to examine a hodge-podge of other, but no more compelling, material. For example, the dissent points to later statutes that do no more than confirm there are former reservations in the State of Oklahoma. Post, at 3031. It cites legislative history to show that Congress had the Creek Nation—or, at least, its neighbors—in mind when it added these in Post, at 31, n. 7. The dissent cites a Senate Report from 1989 and post-1980 statements made by representatives of other tribes. Post, at 30, 3233. It highlights three occasions on which this Court referred to something like a “former Creek Nation,” though it neglects to add that in each |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | Creek Nation,” though it neglects to add that in each the Court was referring to the loss of the Nation’s communal fee title, not its sovereignty. Grayson v. Harris, 267 U.S. 352, 357 (1925); 289 290 ; 423425 The dissent points as well to a single instance in which the Creek Nation dis- claimed reservation boundaries for purposes of litigation in a lower court, post, at 32, but ignores that the Creek Nation has repeatedly filed briefs in this Court to the contrary. This is thin gruel to set against treaty promises enshrined in statutes. 28 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court in discerning the law’s meaning and much potential for mis- chief. If anything, the persistent if unspoken message here seems to be that we should be taken by the “practical ad- vantages” of ignoring the written law. How much easier it would be, after all, to let the State proceed as it has always assumed it might. But just imagine what it would mean to indulge that path. A State exercises jurisdiction over Na- tive Americans with such persistence that the practice seems normal. Indian landowners lose their titles by fraud or otherwise in sufficient volume that no one remembers whose land it once was. All this continues for long enough that a reservation that was once beyond doubt becomes questionable, and then even farfetched. Sprinkle in a few predictions here, some contestable commentary there, and the job is done, a reservation is None of these moves would be permitted in any other area of statu- tory interpretation, and there is no reason why they should be permitted here. That would be the rule of the strong, not the rule of law. IV Unable to show that Congress disestablished the Creek Reservation, Oklahoma next tries to turn the tables in a completely different way. Now, it contends, Congress never established a reservation in the first place. Over all the years, from the federal government’s first guarantees of land and self-government in 1832 and through the litany of promises that followed, the Tribe never received a reserva- tion. Instead, what the Tribe has had all this time qualifies only as a “dependent Indian community.” Even if we were to accept Oklahoma’s bold feat of reclas- sification, however, it’s hardly clear the State would win this case. “Reservation[s]” and “Indian allotments, the In- dian titles to which have not been extinguished,” qualify as Indian country under subsections (a) and (c) of But “dependent Indian communities” also qualify as Indian Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 29 Opinion of the |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 29 Opinion of the Court country under subsection (b). So Oklahoma lacks jurisdic- tion to prosecute Mr. McGirt whether the Creek lands hap- pen to fall in one category or another. About this, Oklahoma is at least candid. It admits the entire point of its reclassification exercise is to avoid So- lem’s rule that only Congress may disestablish a reserva- tion. And to achieve that, the State has to persuade us not only that the Creek lands constitute a “dependent Indian community” rather than a reservation. It also has to con- vince us that we should announce a rule that dependent In- dian community status can be lost more easily than reser- vation status, maybe even by the happenstance of shifting demographics. To answer this argument, it’s enough to address its first essential premise. Holding that the Creek never had a res- ervation would require us to stand willfully blind before a host of federal statutes. Perhaps that is why the Solicitor General, who supports Oklahoma’s disestablishment argu- ment, refuses to endorse this alternative effort. It also may be why Oklahoma introduced this argument for affirmance only for the first time in this Court. And it may be why the dissent makes no attempt to defend Oklahoma here. What are we to make of the federal government’s repeated treaty promises that the land would be “solemnly guarantied to the Creek Indians,” that it would be a “permanent home,” “forever set apart,” in which the Creek would be “secured in the unrestricted right of self-government”? What about Congress’s repeated references to a “Creek reservation” in its statutes? No one doubts that this kind of language nor- mally suffices to establish a federal reservation. So what could possibly make this case different? Oklahoma’s answer only gets more surprising. The rea- son that the Creek’s lands are not a reservation, we’re told, is that the Creek Nation originally held fee title. Recall that the Indian Removal Act authorized the President not only to “solemnly assure the tribe that the United States 30 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court will forever secure and guaranty to them the country so exchanged with them,” but also, “if they prefer it, the United States will cause a patent or grant to be made and executed to them for the same.” 4 Stat. Recall that the Creek insisted on this additional protection when negotiat- ing the Treaty of 1833, and in fact received a land patent pursuant to that treaty some 19 years later. In the eyes of Oklahoma, the Tribe’s |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | 19 years later. In the eyes of Oklahoma, the Tribe’s choice on this score was a fateful one. By asking for (and receiving) fee title to their lands, the Creek inadvertently made their tribal sovereignty easier to divest rather than harder. The core of Oklahoma’s argument is that a reservation must be land “reserved from sale.” Celestine, 215 U.S., at Often, that condition is satisfied when the federal gov- ernment promises to hold aside a particular piece of feder- ally owned land in trust for the benefit of the Tribe. And, admittedly, the Creek’s arrangement was different, be- cause the Tribe held “fee simple title, not the usual Indian right of occupancy.” United 295 U.S. 103, 109 Still, as we explained in Part II, the land was reserved from sale in the very real sense that the government could not “give the tribal lands to others, or to appropriate them to its own purposes,” without engaging in “ ‘an act of confiscation.’ ” It’s hard to see, too, how any difference between these two arrangements might work to the detriment of the Tribe. Just as we have never insisted on any particular form of words when it comes to disestablishing a reservation, we have never done so when it comes to establishing one. See (“[I]n or- der to create a reservation it is not necessary that there should be a formal cession or a formal act setting apart a particular tract. It is enough that from what has been there results a certain defined tract appropriated to certain pur- poses”). As long as 120 years ago, the federal court for the Indian Territory recognized all this and rightly rejected the Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 31 Opinion of the Court notion that fee title is somehow inherently incompatible with reservation status. (Indian Terr. 1900). By now, Oklahoma’s next move will seem familiar. Seek- ing to sow doubt around express treaty promises, it cites some stray language from a statute that does not control here, a piece of congressional testimony there, and the scat- tered opinions of agency officials everywhere in between. See, e.g., Act of July 31, 1882, ch. 360, (refer- ring to Creek land as “Indian country” as opposed to an “In- dian reservation”); S. Doc. No. 143, 59th Cong., 1st. Sess., 33 (1906) (Chief of Choctaw Nation—which had an arrange- ment similar to the Creek’s—testified that both Tribes “ob- ject to being classified with the reservation Indians”); Dept. of Interior, Census Office, Report on Indians Taxed and In- dians Not Taxed in the U. S. 284 (1894) |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | In- dians Not Taxed in the U. S. 284 (1894) (Creeks and neigh- boring Tribes were “not on the ordinary Indian reservation, but on lands patented to them by the United States”). Ok- lahoma stresses that this Court even once called the Creek lands a “dependent Indian community,” though it used that phrase in passing and only to show that the Tribe’s “prop- erty and affairs were subject to the control and manage- ment of that government”—a point that would also be true if the lands were a reservation. Creek Nation, 295 U.S., at 109. Unsurprisingly given the Creek Nation’s nearly 200- year occupancy of these lands, both sides have turned up a few clues suggesting the label “reservation” either did or did not apply. One thing everyone can agree on is this history is long and messy. But the most authoritative evidence of the Creek’s rela- tionship to the land lies not in these scattered references; it lies in the treaties and statutes that promised the land to the Tribe in the first place. And, if not for the Tribe’s fee title to its land, no one would question that these treaties and statutes created a reservation. So the State’s argument inescapably boils down to the untenable suggestion that, 32 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court when the federal government agreed to offer more protec- tion for tribal lands, it really provided less. All this time, fee title was nothing more than another trap for the wary. V That leaves Oklahoma to attempt yet another argument in the alternative. We alluded to it earlier in Part III. Now, the State accepts for argument’s sake that the Creek land is a reservation and thus “Indian country” for purposes of the Major Crimes Act. It accepts, too, that this would nor- mally mean serious crimes by Indians on the Creek Reser- vation would have to be tried in federal court. But, the State tells us, none of that matters; everything the parties have briefed and argued so far is beside the point. It’s all irrelevant because it turns out the MCA just doesn’t apply to the eastern half of Oklahoma, and it never has. That federal law may apply to other States, even to the western half of Oklahoma itself. But eastern Oklahoma is and has always been exempt. So whether or not the Creek have a reservation, the State’s historic practices have always been correct and it remains free to try individuals like Mr. McGirt in its own courts. Notably, the dissent again declines to join Oklahoma in its |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | Notably, the dissent again declines to join Oklahoma in its latest twist. And, it turns out, for good reason. In sup- port of its argument, Oklahoma points to statutory artifacts from its territorial history. The State of Oklahoma was formed from two territories: the Oklahoma Territory in the west and Indian Territory in the east. Originally, it seems criminal prosecutions in the Indian Territory were split be- tween tribal and federal courts. See Act of May 2, 1890, But, in 1897, Congress abolished that scheme, granting the U. S. Courts of the Indian Territory “exclusive jurisdiction” to try “all criminal causes for the punishment of any offense.” Act of June 7, 1897, 30 Stat. 83. These federal territorial courts applied federal law and Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 33 Opinion of the Court state law borrowed from Arkansas “to all persons irre- spective of race.” A year later, Congress abolished tribal courts and transferred all pending criminal cases to U. S. courts of the Indian Territory. Curtis Act of 1898, 505. And, Oklahoma says, sending Indians to federal court and all others to state court would be incon- sistent with this established and enlightened policy of ap- plying the same law in the same courts to everyone. Here again, however, arguments along these and similar lines have been “frequently raised” but rarely “accepted.” United (Kelly, J.). “The policy of leaving Indians free from state jurisdiction and control is deeply rooted in this Nation’s his- tory.” Chief Jus- tice Marshall, for example, held that Indian Tribes were “distinct political communities, having territorial bounda- ries, within which their authority is exclusive which is not only acknowledged, but guarantied by the United States,” a power dependent on and subject to no state au- thority. ; see also 168169 And in many treaties, like those now be- fore us, the federal government promised Indian Tribes the right to continue to govern themselves. For all these rea- sons, this Court has long “require[d] a clear expression of the intention of Congress” before the state or federal gov- ernment may try Indians for conduct on their lands. Ex parte Crow Dog, Oklahoma cannot come close to satisfying this standard. In fact, the only law that speaks expressly here speaks against the State. When Oklahoma won statehood in 1907, the MCA applied immediately according to its plain terms. That statute, as phrased at the time, provided exclusive fed- eral jurisdiction over qualifying crimes by Indians in “any Indian reservation” located within “the boundaries of any 34 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court State.” Act of |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court State.” Act of Mar. 3, 1885, ch. 341, (em- phasis added); see also 18 U.S. C. (defining “Indian country” even more broadly). By contrast, every one of the statutes the State directs us to merely discusses the assign- ment of cases among courts in the Indian Territory. They say nothing about the division of responsibilities between federal and state authorities after Oklahoma entered the Union. And however enlightened the State may think it was for territorial law to apply to all persons irrespective of race, some Tribe members may see things differently, given that the same policy entailed the forcible closure of tribal courts in defiance of treaty terms. Left to hunt for some statute that might have rendered the MCA inapplicable in Oklahoma after statehood, the best the State can find is the Oklahoma Enabling Act. Con- gress adopted that law in preparation for Oklahoma’s ad- mission in 1907. Among its many provisions sorting out the details associated with Oklahoma’s transition to statehood, the Enabling Act transferred all nonfederal cases pending in territorial courts to Oklahoma’s new state courts. Act of June 16, 1906, ; see also Act of Mar. 4, 1907, (clarifying treatment of cases to which United States was a party). The State says this transfer made its courts the inheritors of the federal terri- torial courts’ sweeping authority to try Indians for crimes committed on reservations. But, at best, this tells only half the story. The Enabling Act not only sent all nonfederal cases pending in territorial courts to state court. It also transferred pending cases that arose “under the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States” to federal district courts. Pending criminal cases were thus transferred to federal court if the prosecution would have belonged there had the Territory been a State at the time of the crime. 34 Stat. 1287 (amending the Enabling Act). Nor did the statute make any distinction between cases arising in the former Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 35 Opinion of the Court eastern (Indian) and western (Oklahoma) territories. So, simply put, the Enabling Act sent state-law cases to state court and federal-law cases to federal court. And serious crimes by Indians in Indian country were matters that arose under the federal MCA and thus properly belonged in federal court from day one, wherever they arose within the new State. Maybe that’s right, Oklahoma acknowledges, but that’s not what happened. Instead, for many years the State con- tinued to try Indians for crimes committed anywhere within its borders. But what can |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | for crimes committed anywhere within its borders. But what can that tell us? The State identifies not a single ambiguous statutory term in the MCA that its actions might illuminate. And, as we have seen, its own courts have acknowledged that the State’s his- toric practices deviated in meaningful ways from the MCA’s terms. See 23. So, once more, it seems Okla- homa asks us to defer to its usual practices instead of fed- eral law, something we will not and may never do. That takes Oklahoma down to its last straw when it comes to the MCA. If Oklahoma lacks the jurisdiction to try Native Americans it has historically claimed, that means at the time of its entry into the Union no one had the power to try minor Indian-on-Indian crimes committed in Indian country. This much follows, Oklahoma reminds us, because the MCA provides federal jurisdiction only for ma- jor crimes, and no tribal forum existed to try lesser cases after Congress abolished the tribal courts in 1898. Curtis Act, 505. Whatever one thinks about the plausibility of other discontinuities between federal law and state practice, the State says, it is unthinkable that Congress would have allowed such a significant “jurisdic- tional gap” to open at the moment Oklahoma achieved statehood. But what the State considers unthinkable turns out to be easily imagined. Jurisdictional gaps are hardly foreign to this area of the law. See, e.g., 36 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court 704706 (1990) (Brennan, J., dissenting). Many tribal courts across the country were absent or ineffective during the early part of the last century, yielding just the sort of gaps Oklahoma would have us believe impossible. Indeed, this might be why so many States joined Oklahoma in pros- ecuting Indians without proper jurisdiction. The judicial mind abhors a vacuum, and the temptation for state prose- cutors to step into the void was surely strong. See at 2324. With time, too, Congress has filled many of the gaps Ok- lahoma worries about. One way Congress has done so is by reauthorizing tribal courts to hear minor crimes in Indian country. Congress chose exactly this course for the Creeks and others in Act of June 26, ; see also 1446. Another option Congress has employed is to allow affected Indian tribes to consent to state criminal jurisdiction. 25 U.S. C. 1326. Finally, Congress has sometimes expressly expanded state criminal jurisdiction in targeted bills addressing spe- cific States. See, e.g., 18 U.S. C. (creating jurisdic- tion for Kansas); Act of May 31, 1946, ch. 279, (same for a |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | Act of May 31, 1946, ch. 279, (same for a reservation in North Dakota); Act of June 30, 1948, ch. 759, (same for certain reservations in Iowa); 18 U.S. C. (creating jurisdiction for six ad- ditional States). But Oklahoma doesn’t claim to have com- plied with the requirements to assume jurisdiction volun- tarily over Creek lands. Nor has Congress ever passed a law conferring jurisdiction on Oklahoma. As a result, the MCA applies to Oklahoma according to its usual terms: Only the federal government, not the State, may prosecute Indians for major crimes committed in Indian country. VI In the end, Oklahoma abandons any pretense of law and speaks openly about the potentially “transform[ative]” ef- fects of a loss today. Brief for Respondent 43. Here, at Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 37 Opinion of the Court least, the State is finally rejoined by the dissent. If we dared to recognize that the Creek Reservation was never disestablished, Oklahoma and dissent warn, our holding might be used by other tribes to vindicate similar treaty promises. Ultimately, Oklahoma fears that perhaps as much as half its land and roughly 1.8 million of its residents could wind up within Indian country. It’s hard to know what to make of this self-defeating ar- gument. Each tribe’s treaties must be considered on their own terms, and the only question before us concerns the Creek. Of course, the Creek Reservation alone is hardly in- significant, taking in most of Tulsa and certain neighboring communities in Northeastern Oklahoma. But neither is it unheard of for significant non-Indian populations to live successfully in or near reservations today. See, e.g., Brief for National Congress of American Indians Fund as Amicus Curiae 2628 (describing success of Tacoma, Washington, and Mount Pleasant, Michigan); see also Parker, 577 U. S., at (slip op., at 1012) (holding Pender, Nebraska, to be within Indian country despite tribe’s absence from the disputed territory for more than 120 years). Oklahoma re- plies that its situation is different because the affected pop- ulation here is large and many of its residents will be sur- prised to find out they have been living in Indian country this whole time. But we imagine some members of the 1832 Creek Tribe would be just as surprised to find them there. What are the consequences the State and dissent worry might follow from an adverse ruling anyway? Primarily, they argue that recognizing the continued existence of the Creek Reservation could unsettle an untold number of con- victions and frustrate the State’s ability to prosecute crimes in the future. But the |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | State’s ability to prosecute crimes in the future. But the MCA applies only to certain crimes committed in Indian country by Indian defendants. A neighboring statute provides that federal law applies to a broader range of crimes by or against Indians in Indian country. See 18 U.S. C. States are otherwise free 38 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court to apply their criminal laws in cases of non-Indian victims and defendants, including within Indian country. See 104 U.S., at And Oklahoma tells us that somewhere between 10% and 15% of its citizens identify as Native American. Given all this, even Oklahoma admits that the vast majority of its prosecutions will be unaffected whatever we decide today. Still, Oklahoma and the dissent fear, “[t]housands” of Na- tive Americans like Mr. McGirt “wait in the wings” to chal- lenge the jurisdictional basis of their state-court convic- tions. Brief for Respondent 3. But this number is admittedly speculative, because many defendants may choose to finish their state sentences rather than risk reprosecution in federal court where sentences can be graver. Other defendants who do try to challenge their state convictions may face significant procedural obstacles, thanks to well-known state and federal limitations on post- conviction review in criminal proceedings.15 In any event, the magnitude of a legal wrong is no reason to perpetuate it. When Congress adopted the MCA, it broke many treaty promises that had once allowed tribes like the Creek to try their own members. But, in return, Congress allowed only the federal government, not the States, to try —————— 15 For example, Oklahoma appears to apply a general rule that “issues that were not raised previously on direct appeal, but which could have been raised, are waived for further review.” Indeed, JUSTICE THOMAS contends that this state-law limitation on collateral review prevents us from considering even the case now before us. Post, at 2 (dissenting opinion). But while that state-law rule may often bar our way, it doesn’t in this case. After noting a potential state-law obstacle, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (OCCA) proceeded to address the merits of Mr. McGirt’s federal MCA claim anyway. Because the OCCA’s opinion “fairly appears to rest primarily on federal law or to be interwoven with federal law” and lacks any “plain statement” that it was relying on a state-law ground, we have jurisdiction to consider the federal-law question presented to us. See 10401041, 1044 Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 39 Opinion of the Court tribal members for major crimes. All our decision today does is vindicate that replacement promise. And |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | our decision today does is vindicate that replacement promise. And if the threat of unsettling convictions cannot save a precedent of this Court, see Ramos v. Louisiana, 590 U. S. (2020) (plurality opinion) (slip op., at 2326), it certainly cannot force us to ignore a statutory promise when no prec- edent stands before us at all. What’s more, a decision for either party today risks up- setting some convictions. Accepting the State’s argument that the MCA never applied in Oklahoma would preserve the state-court convictions of people like Mr. McGirt, but simultaneously call into question every federal conviction obtained for crimes committed on trust lands and restricted Indian allotments since Oklahoma recognized its jurisdic- tional error more than 30 years ago. See It’s a consequence of their own arguments that Oklahoma and the dissent choose to ignore, but one which cannot help but illustrate the difficulty of trying to guess how a ruling one way or the other might affect past cases rather than simply proceeding to apply the law as written. Looking to the future, Oklahoma warns of the burdens federal and tribal courts will experience with a wider juris- diction and increased caseload. But, again, for every juris- dictional reaction there seems to be an opposite reaction: recognizing that cases like Mr. McGirt’s belong in federal court simultaneously takes them out of state court. So while the federal prosecutors might be initially under- staffed and Oklahoma prosecutors initially overstaffed, it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see how things could work out in the end. Finally, the State worries that our decision will have sig- nificant consequences for civil and regulatory law. The only question before us, however, concerns the statutory defini- tion of “Indian country” as it applies in federal criminal law under the MCA, and often nothing requires other civil stat- 40 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court utes or regulations to rely on definitions found in the crim- inal law. Of course, many federal civil laws and regulations do currently borrow from when defining the scope of Indian country. But it is far from obvious why this collat- eral drafting choice should be allowed to skew our interpre- tation of the MCA, or deny its promised benefits of a federal criminal forum to tribal members. It isn’t even clear what the real upshot of this borrowing into civil law may be. Oklahoma reports that recognizing the existence of the Creek Reservation for purposes of the MCA might potentially trigger a variety of federal civil stat- utes and rules, including ones making the region |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | civil stat- utes and rules, including ones making the region eligible for assistance with homeland security, 6 U.S. C. 606, historical preservation, 54 U.S. C. schools, 20 U.S. C. highways, 23 U.S. C. roads, pri- mary care clinics, 25 U.S. C. §1616e1, housing assistance, nutritional programs, 7 U.S. C. 2013, disa- bility programs, 20 U.S. C. and more. But what are we to make of this? Some may find developments like these unwelcome, but from what we are told others may celebrate them. The dissent isn’t so sanguine—it assures us, without fur- ther elaboration, that the consequences will be “drastic pre- cisely because they depart from more than a century [of] settled understanding.” Post, at 37. The prediction is a fa- miliar one. Thirty years ago the Solicitor General warned that “[l]aw enforcement would be rendered very difficult” and there would be “grave uncertainty regarding the appli- cation” of state law if courts departed from decades of “long- held understanding” and recognized that the federal MCA applies to restricted allotments in Oklahoma. Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae in Oklahoma v. Brooks, O.T. No. 881147, pp. 2, 9, 18, 19. Yet, during the intervening decades none of these predictions panned out, and that fact stands as a note of caution against too readily crediting identical warnings today. Cite as: 591 U. S. (2020) 41 Opinion of the Court More importantly, dire warnings are just that, and not a license for us to disregard the law. By suggesting that our interpretation of Acts of Congress adopted a century ago should be inflected based on the costs of enforcing them to- day, the dissent tips its hand. Yet again, the point of look- ing at subsequent developments seems not to be determin- ing the meaning of the laws Congress wrote in 1901 or 1906, but emphasizing the costs of taking them at their word. Still, we do not disregard the dissent’s concern for reli- ance interests. It only seems to us that the concern is mis- placed. Many other legal doctrines—procedural bars, res judicata, statutes of repose, and laches, to name a few—are designed to protect those who have reasonably labored un- der a mistaken understanding of the law. And it is precisely because those doctrines exist that we are “fre[e] to say what we know to be true today, while leaving questions about reliance interest[s] for later proceedings crafted to ac- count for them.” Ramos, 590 U. S., at (plurality opin- ion) (slip op., at 24). In reaching our conclusion about what the law demands of us today, we do |
Justice Gorsuch | 2,020 | 7 | majority | McGirt v. Oklahoma | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/4766667/mcgirt-v-oklahoma/ | about what the law demands of us today, we do not pretend to foretell the future and we proceed well aware of the potential for cost and conflict around jurisdictional boundaries, especially ones that have gone unappreciated for so long. But it is unclear why pes- simism should rule the day. With the passage of time, Ok- lahoma and its Tribes have proven they can work success- fully together as partners. Already, the State has negotiated hundreds of intergovernmental agreements with tribes, including many with the Creek. See Okla. Stat., Tit. 74, (2019 Cum. Supp.); Oklahoma Secre- tary of State, Tribal Compacts and Agreements, www.sos.ok.gov/tribal.aspx. These agreements relate to taxation, law enforcement, vehicle registration, hunting and fishing, and countless other fine regulatory questions. See Brief for Tom Cole et al. as Amici Curiae 1319. No one before us claims that the spirit of good faith, “comity and 42 MCGIRT v. OKLAHOMA Opinion of the Court cooperative sovereignty” behind these agreements, at 20, will be imperiled by an adverse decision for the State today any more than it might be by a favorable one.16 And, of course, should agreement prove elusive, Congress re- mains free to supplement its statutory directions about the lands in question at any time. It has no shortage of tools at its disposal. * The federal government promised the Creek a reserva- tion in perpetuity. Over time, Congress has diminished that reservation. It has sometimes restricted and other times expanded the Tribe’s authority. But Congress has never withdrawn the promised reservation. As a result, many of the arguments before us today follow a sadly famil- iar pattern. Yes, promises were made, but the price of keep- ing them has become too great, so now we should just cast a blind eye. We reject that thinking. If Congress wishes to withdraw its promises, it must say so. Unlawful acts, per- formed long enough and with sufficient vigor, are never enough to amend the law. To hold otherwise would be to elevate the most brazen and longstanding injustices over the law, both rewarding wrong and failing those in the right. The judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals of Okla- homa is Reversed. —————— 16 This sense of cooperation and a shared future is on display in this very case. The Creek Nation is supported by an array of leaders of other Tribes and the State of Oklahoma, many of whom had a role in negotiat- ing exactly these agreements. See Brief for Tom Cole et al. as Amici Curiae 1 (“Amici are a former Governor, State Attorney General, |
Justice Brennan | 1,978 | 13 | concurring | National Boiler Marketing Assn. v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109885/national-boiler-marketing-assn-v-united-states/ | join the Court's opinion. agree that since several of NBMA's members were not engaged in the production of agriculture as farmers, Case-Swayne compels the holding that NBMA's activities challenged by the United States cannot be afforded the Sherman Act exemption NBMA asserts. Since that disposition settles this aspect of the suit between the parties, it is unnecessary for the Court to consider, and the Court reserves, the question of "the status under the Act of the fully integrated producer that not only maintains its breeder flock, hatchery, and grow-out facility, but also runs its own processing plant." Ante, at 828 n. 21. write separately only to suggest some considerations which bear on this broader question. do so because the rationale of the dissent necessarily carries over to that question. The Capper-Volstead Act, 7 U.S. C. 291 et seq. (1976 ed.), like the Sherman Act which it modifies, was populist legislation which reacted to the increasing concentrations of economic power which followed on the heels of the industrial revolution. The Sherman Act was the first legislation to deal with the problems of participation of small economic units in an economy increasingly dominated by economic titans. Next enacted was 6 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S. C. 17 (1976 ed.), which provides: "The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce. Nothing contained in the antitrust laws shall be construed to forbid the existence and operation *830 of labor, agricultural, or horticultural organizations, instituted for the purposes of mutual help, and not having capital stock or conducted for profit, or to forbid or restrain individual members of such organizations from lawfully carrying out the legitimate objects thereof; nor shall such organizations, or the members thereof, be held or construed to be illegal combinations or conspiracies in restraint of trade, under the anti-trust laws." This legislation linked industrial labor and farmers as the kind of economic units of individuals for whom it was thought necessary to permit cooperationcartelization in economic parlancein order to survive against the economically dominant manufacturing, supplier, and purchasing interests with which they had to interrelate. The failure of 6 expressly to authorize cooperative marketing activities, and to permit capital stock organizations coverage under it, prompted enactment of the Capper-Volstead Act in 1922 to remedy these omissions. Section 1 of that Act provides, inter alia: "Persons engaged in the production of agricultural products as farmers, planters, ranchmen, dairymen, nut or fruit growers may act together in associations, corporate or otherwise, with or without capital stock, in collectively processing, preparing for market, handling, and marketing in |
Justice Brennan | 1,978 | 13 | concurring | National Boiler Marketing Assn. v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109885/national-boiler-marketing-assn-v-united-states/ | in collectively processing, preparing for market, handling, and marketing in interstate and foreign commerce, such products of persons so engaged." At the time the Capper-Volstead Act was enacted, farming was not a vertically integrated industry. The economic model was a relatively large number of small, individual, economic farming units which actually tilled the soil and husbanded animals, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the relatively small number of large economic units which processed the agricultural products and resold them for wholesale and retail distribution. t was the disparity of power between the units at the respective levels of production that spurred *831 this congressional action. See, e. g., 62 Cong. Rec. 2257 (1922) (remarks of Sen. Norris). Congress was concerned that the farmer, at the mercy of natural forces on one hand, and the economically dominant processors on the other, was being driven from the land and forced to migrate in ever-increasing numbers to the cities. "Senator Capper stated a point of view to be found on almost every page of the congressional debate on his bill, `Middlemen who buy farm products act collectively as stockholders in corporations owning the business and through their representatives buy of farmers, and if farmers must continue to sell individually to these large aggregations of men who control the avenues and agencies through and by which farm products reach the consuming market, then farmers must for all time remain at the mercy of the buyers.' 62 Cong. Rec. 2058 (1922)." Post, at 841 (footnote omitted). The legislative history makes clear that the regime which Congress created in the Capper-Volstead Act to ameliorate this situation was one of voluntary cooperation. The Act would allow farmers to "`combine with [their] neighbors and cooperate and act as a corporation, following [their] product from the farm as near to the consumer as [they] can, doing away in the meantime with unnecessary machinery and unnecessary middle men.' That is all this bill attempts to do." 62 Cong. Rec. 2257 (1922) (remarks of Sen. Norris). As the Court notes, however, "[c]learly, Congress did not intend to extend the benefits of the Act to processors and packers to whom the farmers sold their goods, even when the relationship was such that the processor and packer bore a part of the risk." Ante, at 826-827. This fact is demonstrated from several exchanges during the debate clarifying the intent behind the bill and also by the abortive Phipps amendment. n the colloquy between Senators Kellogg and Cummins, quoted in extenso, ante, at 823-824, n. 13, an intent not *832 to |
Justice Brennan | 1,978 | 13 | concurring | National Boiler Marketing Assn. v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109885/national-boiler-marketing-assn-v-united-states/ | ante, at 823-824, n. 13, an intent not *832 to extend the benefits of the bill to processors of agricultural products is clear: "Mr. CUMMNS Take the flouring mills of Minneapolis: They are engaged in a broad sense, in the production of an agricultural product. The packers are engaged in a broad sense, in the production of an agricultural product. The Senator does not intend by this bill to confer upon them the privileges which the bill grants, assume? "Mr. KELLOGG: Certainly not" 62 Cong. Rec. 2052 (1922). Debate surrounding the proposed Phipps amendment, quoted ante, at 827 n. 19, the effect of which would have been to exempt, for example, sugar refiners with preplanting contracts, yields a similar understanding. Senator Norris, in leading the successful rejection of the amendment, explained: "The amendment. is simply offered for the purpose of giving to certain manufacturers the right to be immune from any prosecution under the Sherman Antitrust Act. They are not cooperators; they are not producers; it is not an organization composed of producers who incorporate together to handle their own products; that is not it." 62 Cong. Rec. 2275 (1922) (emphasis added). These statements show that Congress regarded both "manufacturers of finished agricultural products" and "processors" as ineligible. Whether or not there is a distinction in economic or other terms between "manufacturers" who refine sugar from beets, or "processors" who mill wheat into flour, both groups were thought of as beyond the reach of 1"They are not cooperators." Thus the legislative history demonstrates that the purpose of the legislation was to permit only individual economic units working at the farm level[1] to form cooperatives for purposes of *833 "collectively processing, preparing for market, handling, and marketing in interstate and foreign commerce, such products of persons so engaged." This focus on collectives to replace the processors and middlemen is the key to application of the Act's policies to modern agricultural conditions. A The dissent is correct, of course, that "[t]he nature of agriculture has changed profoundly since the early 1920's when the Capper-Volstead Act was debated and adopted. The reality of integrated agribusiness admittedly antiquates some of the congressional characterizations of farming." Post, at 843. Most NBMA members are fully integrated, except for the grow-out stage which they contract out. Rather than groups of single-function farmers forming a collective jointly to handle, process, and market their agricultural products, these multifunction integrated units stand astride several levels of agricultural production which Congress in 1922 envisioned would be collectivized. Performing these functions for themselves, *834 the allegations of the complaint suggest, they now |
Justice Brennan | 1,978 | 13 | concurring | National Boiler Marketing Assn. v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109885/national-boiler-marketing-assn-v-united-states/ | themselves, *834 the allegations of the complaint suggest, they now seek protection of the exemption not to permit collectivized processing but simply as a shield for price fixing. The issue is whether a fully integrated producer of agricultural products performing its own processing or manufacturing and which hence does not associate for purposes of common handling, processing, and marketing is nevertheless "engaged in the production of agricultural products as [a] farme[r]" for purposes of 1's exemption for such cooperatives if also engaged in traditional farming activity. The dissent frankly recognizes that integrated poultry producers do not neatly fit the limitation Congress signified by the phrase "as farmers," but reads that limitation out of the Act in order to give effect to what it perceives as Congress' desire to aid the agricultural industry generally because of the uncertainty of profits in that industry caused by the combination of weather, fluctuations in demand, and perishability of the product. Elision of the limitation Congress placed on the exemption is sacrificed to this end, and the exemption extended to encompass all persons engaged in the production of agriculture. But that drastic restructuring of the statute is not only inconsistent with Congress' specific intent regarding the meaning of the limitation, but is unnecessary to give continuing effect to its broader purposes. Congress clearly intended, as the discussion in Part demonstrates, to withhold exempting processors engaged in the production of agriculture notwithstanding that they bore risks common to agriculture generally, and that they may be "price takers" with respect to the product they sell to large chains of grocery stores. The dissent fails to explain how extending the exemption in the fashion it suggests can be reconciled with the fundamental purpose of this populist legislation to authorize farmers' cooperatives for collective handling, processing, and marketing purposes. The dissent's construction, it seems to me, would permit the behemoths of agribusiness to form an exempt association *835 to engage in price fixing, and territorial and market division, so long as these concerns are engaged in the production of agriculture. t is hard to believe that in enacting a provision to authorize horizontal combinations for purposes of collective processing, handling, and marketing so as to eliminate middlemen, Congress authorized firms which integrated further downstream beyond the level at which cooperatives could be utilized for these purposes to combine horizontally as a cartel with license to carve up the national agricultural market. Such a construction would turn on its head Congress' manifest purpose to protect the small, individual economic units engaged in farming from exploitation and extinction at the hands |
Justice Brennan | 1,978 | 13 | concurring | National Boiler Marketing Assn. v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109885/national-boiler-marketing-assn-v-united-states/ | engaged in farming from exploitation and extinction at the hands of "these large aggregations of men who control the avenues and agencies through and by which farm products reach the consuming market," 62 Cong. Rec. 2058 (1922) (remarks of Sen. Capper), by exempting instead, and thereby fomenting "these great trusts, these great corporations, these large moneyed institutions" at which the Sherman Act took aim. 21 Cong. Rec. 2562 (1890) (remarks of Sen. Teller). There is nothing in the legislative history, and much to the contrary, to indicate that Congress enacted 1 to remake agriculture in the image of the great cartels. B Definition of the term "farmer" cannot be rendered without reference to Congress' purpose in enacting the Capper-Volstead Act. "When technological change has rendered its literal terms ambiguous, the Act must be construed in light of [its] basic purpose." Twentieth Century Music seriously question the validity of any definition of "farmer" in 1 which does not limit that term to exempt only persons engaged in agricultural production who are in a position to use cooperative associations for collective handling and processingthe very activities for which the exemption was created. At some point along the path of downstream integration, the function of the *836 exemption for its intended purpose is lost, and seriously doubt that a person engaged in agricultural production beyond that point can be considered to be a farmer, even if he also performs some functions indistinguishable from those performed by persons who are "farmers" under the Act. The statute itself may provide the functional definition of farmer as persons engaged in agriculture who are insufficiently integrated to perform their own processing and who therefore can benefit from the exemption for cooperative handling, processing, and marketing. Thus, in my view, the nature of the association's activities, the degree of integration of its members, and the functions historically performed by farmers in the industry are relevant considerations in deciding whether an association is exempt. The record before us does not provide evidence relevant to these considerations, and there is therefore no basis for appraising NBMA's entitlement to the exemption while it includes members whose operations are fully integrated whether or not they contract rather than perform the grow-out phase. f, because of changes in agriculture not envisioned by it in 1922, Congress' purpose no longer can be achieved, there would be no warrant for judicially extending the exemption, even if otherwise it would fall into desuetude. n construing a specific, narrow exemption to a statute articulating a comprehensive national policy, we must, of course, give full effect to the |
Justice Brennan | 1,978 | 13 | concurring | National Boiler Marketing Assn. v. United States | https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109885/national-boiler-marketing-assn-v-united-states/ | policy, we must, of course, give full effect to the specific purpose for which the exemption was established. But when that purpose has been frustrated by changed circumstances, the courts should not undertake to rebalance the conflicting interests in order to give it continuing effect. Cf. Teleprompter v. Columbia Broadcasting System, nc., ; Fortnightly Specific exemptions are the product of rough political accommodations responsive to the time and current conditions. f the passage of time *837 has "antiquated" the premise upon which that compromise was struck, the exemption should not be judicially reincarnated in derogation of the enduring national policy embodied in the Sherman Act. The dissent's reconstruction of the exemption is doubly flawed, for it would frustrate the Act's purpose to protect that segment of agricultural enterprise as to which Congress' purpose retains vitality. The American Farm Bureau Federation, which has filed a brief amicus curiae in this case, "is a voluntary general farm organization, representing more than 2.5 million member families in every State (except Alaska) and Puerto Rico." Brief as Amicus Curiae 2. Speaking for the contract growersthose who actually own the land and husband the chicks from the time they are hatched until just before their slaughterthe Federation argues that extending the exemption to integrators would stand the Act on its head; the integrators who process the fully grown broilers could thereby combine to dictate the terms upon which they will deal with the contract growers to the latter's disadvantage. Moreover, there is persuasive evidence that Congress' concern for protecting contract growers vis-à-vis processors and handlers has not abated. n 1968, Congress enacted the Agricultural Fair Practices Act of 1967, 7 U.S. C. 2301 et seq. (1976 ed.), designed to protect the "bargaining position" of "individual farmers" by prohibiting "handlers" from interfering with the "producers'" right "to join together voluntarily in cooperative organizations as authorized by law." 2301. n doing so, Congress legislated specifically to protect contract growers from integrated broiler producers. Section 4 (b) of the Act prohibits a "handler" from discriminating against "producers" with respect to any term "of purchase, acquisition or other handling of agricultural products because of his membership in or contract with an association of producers." 7 U.S. C. 2303 (b) (1976 ed.) (emphasis added). The definition of the term "producer" is identical to that in *838 1 of Capper-Volstead, see 7 U.S. C. 2302 (b) (1976 ed.), but the legislative history makes clear that for purposes of this Act, Congress considered integrated broiler producers to be "handlers" and acted to prevent them from preying on contract growers. The Senate Report |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.