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Justice Douglas
| 1,971 | 10 |
majority
|
United States v. District Court for Eagle County
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108293/united-states-v-district-court-for-eagle-county/
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as required by This proceeding, unlike the one in Dugan, is not a private one to determine whether named claimants have priority over the United States. The whole community of claims is involved and as Senator McCarran, Chairman of the Committee reporting on the bill, said in reply to Senator Magnuson:[4] "S. 18 is not intended to be used for any other purpose than to allow the United States to be joined in a suit wherein it is necessary to adjudicate all of the rights of various owners on a given stream. This is so because unless all of the parties owning or in the process of acquiring water rights on a particular stream can be joined as parties defendant, any subsequent decree would be of little value." It is said, however, that since this is a supplemental adjudication only those who claim water rights acquired since the last adjudication of that water district are before the court.[5] It is also said that the earliest priority date decreed in such an adjudication must be later than the last priority date decreed in the preceding adjudication.[6] The last water adjudication in this water district was entered on February 21, 1966, and the United States was not a party to that or to any prior proceeding in this water district. The United States accordingly says that since the United States cannot be barred by the previous decrees and since the owners of previously decreed rights are not before the court, the consent envisaged by 43 U.S. C. 666 is not present. We think that argument is extremely technical; and we decline to confine 43 U.S. C. 666 so narrowly. The absence of owners of previously decreed rights may present *526 problems going to the merits, in case there develops a collision between them and any reserved rights of the United States.[7] All such questions, including the volume and scope of particular reserved rights, are federal questions which, if preserved, can be reviewed here after final judgment by the Colorado court. Affirmed. [For concurring statement of MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, see post, p. 530.]
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Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
|
Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
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The "filed rate doctrine" was developed in the 19th century as part of a program to regulate the ruthless exercise of monopoly power by the Nation's railroads. Today the Court places an interpretation on that doctrine even more strict than the original version. In doing so, the Court misreads the text of the Interstate Commerce Act (Act), 49 U.S. C. 10101 et seq. (1982 ed.), ignores the history of motor carrier *139 regulation in this country, and gives no deference to the sensible construction of the Act by six Courts of Appeals[1] and the administrative agency responsible for its enforcement. Most significantly, the majority fails to appreciate the significance of the "sea change" in the statutory scheme that has converted a regime of regulated monopoly pricing into a highly competitive market. Even wearing his famous blinders, old Dobbin would see through the tired arguments the Court accepts today. I As originally enacted in 1887, the Act provided, in part: "And when any such common carrier shall have established and published its rates, fares, and charges in compliance with the provisions of this section, it shall be unlawful for such common carrier to charge, demand, collect, or receive from any person or persons a greater or less compensation for the transportation of passengers or property, or for any services in connection therewith, than is specified in such published schedule of rates, fares, and charges as may at the time be in force." Read literally, this text commanded strict adherence to the tariffs filed by a carrier. From the beginning, however, the Court construed that command as subject to the unstated exception *140 that a filed rate would not be enforced if the Interstate Commerce Commission (Commission) determined that the rates were "unreasonable."[2] Amendments to the Act incorporated language that expressly allows exceptions in cases in which the Commission determines that strict enforcement would be unreasonable.[3] Thus, 49 U.S. C. 10761(a) (1982 ed.) now provides: "Except as provided in this subtitle, a carrier providing transportation or service subject to the jurisdiction of the Interstate Commerce Commission under chapter 105 of this title shall provide that transportation or service only if the rate for the transportation or service is contained in a tariff that is in effect under this subchapter. That carrier may not charge or receive a different compensation for that transportation or service than the rate specified in the tariff whether by returning a part of that rate to a person, giving a person a privilege, allowing the use of a facility that affects the value of that transportation or service,
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Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
|
Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
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facility that affects the value of that transportation or service, or another device." (Emphasis added.) The emphasized language in the foregoing provision obviously refers, inter alia, to 10701(a) which states, in part: *141 "A rate (other than a rail rate), classification, rule, or practice related to transportation or service provided by a carrier subject to the jurisdiction of the Interstate Commerce Commission under chapter 105 of this title must be reasonable." (Emphasis added.) Furthermore, 10704(b) expressly authorizes the Commission, after finding that a rate or practice of a carrier is unreasonable, to prescribe the rate or practice that the carrier must follow.[4] The action of the Commission in this case faithfully tracks its statutory grant of authority. After considering all of the relevant evidence, the Commission determined "that it would be an unreasonable practice now to require Primary to pay undercharges for the difference between the negotiated rates and the tariff rates." App. to Pet. for Cert. 44a. That determination was unquestionably consistent with the plain language of the statute governing the Commission's authority. A carrier's failure to file negotiated rates obviously does not make it reasonable for the carrier to quote low rates and collect higher ones; the Commission is free to find, as it has done, that a practice of misquotation, failure to file, and subsequent collection is unreasonable under 10701(a). The Court offers no reason whatsoever to doubt this conclusion. Indeed, the Court's discussion of the statutory text consists almost entirely of vague references to some unarticulated *142 interplay between 10761(a) and 10762(a)(1),[5] see ante, at 126-127, an interplay which the Court contends would be "render[ed] nugatory" if carriers are not permitted to obtain payment of the filed rate when they have led shippers to rely upon a lower negotiated rate. Ante, at 133. For the reasons I have already stated, the text of those provisions does not generate any "interplay" capable of sustaining so rigid an inference. The Court virtually concedes as much, for it recognizes that the unreasonableness of a rate is a longstanding ground for denying collection of the filed rate, ante, at 128-129, and n. 10, and refuses to hold that the unreasonableness of a practice can never bar collection of a filed rate, ante, at 129-130. Having admitted that the doctrine synthesized from the "interplay" between 10761(a) and 10762(a)(1) is susceptible of exceptions based upon the nature of a carrier's rates and practices, the Court can argue only that this particular exception is impermissible.[6] The source of the exceptions is, *143 however, not the "interplay" that dominates the majority's reasoning, but the
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
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Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
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not the "interplay" that dominates the majority's reasoning, but the combined effect of the "Except as otherwise provided" language of 10761(a) and the express authority to determine reasonableness granted to the Commission by 10701(a). This second "interplay" gets little attention from the majority, and it is difficult to see how the text of either component might yield the distinction which the majority insists upon drawing. Nor can the Court mean that the exception literally voids the obligations imposed by 10761(a) and 10762(a)(1), because the Commission maintains, and the Court does not deny, that the filed rate doctrine would still provide an effective right to recover for undercharges in some cases. See, e. g., NITLPetition to Institute Rulemaking on Negotiated Motor Common Carrier Rates, 5 I. C. C. 2d 623, 629, and n. 13 (1989). Moreover, even if the "filed rate doctrine" were discarded entirely, a knowing or willful failure to comply with 10761(a) and 10762(a)(1) may subject a carrier to prosecution.[7] *144 The Court's assertion that the agency policy now before us "renders nugatory" the "interplay" between 10761(a) and 10762(a)(1) therefore amounts to no more than an observation that the policy substantially diminishes the importance of the "filed rate doctrine" as a means for enforcing those sections. Consideration of the statute's structure makes all the more clear what should already be evident from the statutory text: The Court's observation is true but utterly irrelevant. II Because no particular provision of the statute supports the Court's position, its principal argument must be that the agency's construction of the Act is inconsistent with the regulatory scheme as a whole. See ante, at 131. There are, of course, important differences between markets in which prices are regulated, either by private cartels or by public authority, and those in which prices are the product of independent decisions by competitors. Rules requiring adherence to predetermined prices are characteristic of regulated markets, but are incompatible with independent pricing in a competitive market.[8] The "filed rate doctrine" has played an important role, not just in the segments of the transportation industry regulated by the Commission, but in other regulated markets as well.[9] It requires the courts to respect the public agency's control over *145 market prices and industry practices; moreover, it significantly reduces the temptation of regulated parties to deviate from the marketwide rules formulated by the agency. The filed rate doctrine has been a part of our law during the century of regulation of the railroad industry by the Commission. In 1935, when Congress decided to impose economic regulation on the motor carrier industry, partly if
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
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Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
|
impose economic regulation on the motor carrier industry, partly if not primarily in order to protect the railroads from too much competition,[10] the filed rate doctrine was applied to their rates just as it had previously applied to the railroads. It had the same regulatory purpose.[11] In its applications during *146 the period of regulatory control over motor carrier ratemaking, the doctrine was for the most part applied to reinforce the policies and the decisions of the regulatory agency.[12] *147 After years of debate over whether it was sound policy to substitute regulation for competition in the motor carrier industry, Congress decided to eliminate the regulatory barriers to free entry and individual ratemaking. The 1980 amendments to the Act represented a fundamental policy choice in favor of deregulation."[13] Overnight the application of the filed rate doctrine in that market became an anachronism. As Judge Posner has explained: "Many years later came deregulation, which has changed the trucking industry beyond recognition. As a result of amendments made to the Motor Carrier Act in 1980 and their interpretation by the Commission, the present regime is essentially one of free competition. No longer does the ICC seek to nurture and protect cartel pricing and division of markets. A motor carrier that wants to lower its price can file a new tariff effective the following day. Short Notice Effectiveness for Independently Filed Motor Carrier and Freight Forwarder Rates, 1 1. C. C. 2d 146 affirmed as Southern Motor Carriers Rate No longer does the Commission seek to limit the number of motor carriers, which *148 has more than doubled in less than a decade. Most important, a carrier and shipper who want to get out from under tariff regulation altogether have only to negotiate a contract of carriage, and then the lawful price is the price in the contract rather than in any filed tariff. There used to be all sorts of restrictions on contract carriage, which greatly limited it as an escape hatch from regulation. There are no longer. Wheaton Van Lines, The skeleton of regulation remains; the flesh has been stripped away." Orscheln Bros. Truck Lines, The significance of these fundamental changes was also noted and explained by Judge Alarcon: "A variety of practices that previously would have been considered discriminatory are now allowed. For example, the ICC has recently ruled that volume discount rates are not per se unlawful and may be justified by cost savings to the carrier. See Lawfulness of Volume Discount Rates by Motor Common Carrier of Property, 365 I. C. C. 711, 715-16 (1982). Moreover, carriers may
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Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
|
Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
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365 I. C. C. 711, 715-16 (1982). Moreover, carriers may impose geographic or product line restrictions that must be met to obtain rate reductions. See Rates for Named Shipper or Receiver, 367 I. C. C. 959, 962-965 "In addition to increased competitive pressures, statutory changes, and a relaxed regulatory climate, the ICC's Negotiated Rates decisions are a practical response to the information costs faced by shippers. The ease of filing tariffs and the sheer number filed no longer makes it appropriate to allocate the burden of discovering a filed rate to the shipper in all cases. Reduced tariff rates may now be filed to become effective on one day's notice." West Coast Truck Lines, *149 The Court catalogs these reforms, ante, at 133-134, but fails to analyze their implications for the "reasonableness" requirement of 10701(a) and, consequently, for the provisions of 10761(a). What the Court now misses has been succinctly set forth by Judge Alarcon: "The ICC's determination that the collection of undercharges constitutes an unreasonable practice if the shipper is unaware of the filed rate is also a reflection of changing legislative goals. Congress modified national transportation policy when it amended 49 U.S. C. 10101(a) in the Motor Carrier Act of 1980. Section 10101(a)(2) now directs the Commission, `in regulating transportation by motor carrier, to promote competitive and efficient transportation services in order to (A) meet the needs of shippers, receivers, passengers, and consumers; [and] (B) allow a variety of quality and price options to meet changing market demands and the diverse requirements of the shipping and traveling public' 49 U.S. C. 10101(a)(1)(A), (B) (1982). In addition, 10101(a)(1)(D) directs the ICC to encourage the establishment of reasonable transportation rates without `unfair or destructive competitive practices.' 49 U.S. C. 10101(a)(1)(D) (1982). Congress intended these sections of the Motor Carrier Act `to emphasize the importance of competition and efficiency as the most desirable means for achieving transportation goals while, at the same time, providing the Commission with sufficient flexibility to promote the public interest.' H. R. Rep. No. 96-1069, 96th Cong., 2d Sess. 12, reprinted in 1980 U. S. Code Cong. & Admin. News 2283, 2294. "Section 10701(a) provides the ICC with the mechanism to put into effect Congress' restated goals of national transportation policy. By declaring the adherence to filed rates unreasonable under the circumstances presented in this case, the ICC has demonstrated its intention to prevent carriers from engaging in unfair *150 competitive practices." Weyerhaeuser, 893 F. 2d, at -1027. Despite the Court's puzzling suggestion that the filed rate doctrine is essential to the "core purposes of the Act,"
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
|
Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
|
doctrine is essential to the "core purposes of the Act," ante, at 133, the doctrine is instead, as the Court elsewhere seems to concede, "an anachronism in the wake of the [Motor Carrier Act of 1980]," ante, at 136. If plain text is a poor basis for the Court's holding, statutory purpose is altogether worse. As Judge Posner has explained: "Counsel for the carrier in this casewhich is to say for the carrier's trustee in bankruptcyconceded at argument that the motor carrier industry is today highly competitive. But if so, the filed-rate doctrine has lost its raison d'etre. The classic explanations for the doctrine are from a different world. `If a mistake in naming a rate between two given points is to be accepted as requiring the application of that rate by the carrier, the great principle of equality in rates, to secure which was the very purpose and object of the enactment of these several statutes, might as well be abandoned.' Poor v. Chicago, Burlington & Quincy 12 I. C. C. at 421. `Stability and equality of rates are more important to commercial interests than reduced rates.' `Occasional hardships may result from any inelastic rule of general application. The principle, however, is vital in our commercial life that there shall be one fixed and absolutely rigid rate governing the transportation at a given time of any given commodity between two given points.' "Cessante ratione legis, cessat et ipsa lex. Firms in a competitive market cannot discriminate against weak shippers, for even the weak shipper has, by definition of competition, alternative sources of supply to which to turn if one of his suppliers tries to make a monopoly profit off him. `In the more competitive, more flexible pricing atmosphere created by [deregulation], there is *151 little likelihood of carriers using a rate misquotation as a means to discriminate in favor of particular shippers.' Petition to Institute Rulemaking on Negotiated Motor Common Carrier Rates, 5 I. C. C. 2d at 625. And since it is no longer the policy of Congress or the ICC to foster monopoly pricing in the motor carrier industry, no public object is served by forcing carriers to adhere to published price schedules regardless of circumstances. All this the Commission found and persuasively articulated in National Industrial Transportation League, 3 I. C. C. 2d at 104-08." Orscheln, 899 F. 2d, at -645. Judge Posner's conclusion that strict mechanical adherence to the filed rate doctrine produces absurd results and serves no social purpose, is one that I share. It is likewise shared by the agency charged with administration
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
|
Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
|
It is likewise shared by the agency charged with administration of the Act. III A few years ago, in Chevron U. S. A. we reiterated the importance of giving appropriate deference to an agency's reasonable interpretation of its governing statute. Indeed, long before our decision in Chevron, we recognized that even when faced with a "long history of the Commission's construction and application of the Act contrary to its present position," American Trucking Assns., we must defer to the Commission's interpretation of a statute which it is responsible for administering: "[W]e agree that the Commission, faced with new developments or in light of reconsideration of the relevant facts and its mandate, may alter its past interpretation and overturn past administrative rulings and practice. In fact, although we make no judgment as to the policy aspects of the Commission's action, this kind of flexibility *152 and adaptibility to changing needs and patterns of transportation is an essential part of the office of a regulatory agency." Four Courts of Appeals have expressly invoked Chevron in the course of upholding the agency action challenged in this case,[14] but this Court does not deem Chevronor any other case involving deference to agency actionworthy of extended discussion. The Court dismisses Chevron by means of a conclusory assertion that the agency's interpretation is inconsistent with "the statutory scheme as a whole." Ante, at 131. Insofar as the Court offers any justification for that result, it does so by relying on cases in which this Court's action was entirely consistent with the agency's interpretation of the Act.[15] The fact that the Court has strictly enforced the filed rate doctrine in the many cases in which it served the agency's regulatory purposes provides no justification for enforcing the doctrine in a competitive market in which it frustrates the agency's attempt to carry out the plainly expressed intent of Congress. The Court's failure to adhere today to the teaching of Chevron is compounded by its misplaced reliance on Square D See ante, at 134-135. In Square D, we adhered to a longstanding settled construction of 4 of the Clayton Act that had not been affected by any subsequent statutory amendment. No question of agreeing or disagreeing with agency action, or with an agency's interpretation of a congressional policy choice, was presented. That case is therefore totally inapplicable to the question presented here. Even less persuasive authority for the Court's position is see ante, at 131, 135, a case in which we upheld *153 an agency interpretation that conformed to longstanding precedent. IV Finally, I must express my emphatic agreement
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,990 | 16 |
dissenting
|
Maislin Industries, US, Inc. v. Primary Steel, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112473/maislin-industries-us-inc-v-primary-steel-inc/
|
longstanding precedent. IV Finally, I must express my emphatic agreement with the Commission's conclusion, App. to Pet. for Cert. 44a, that an unreasonable practice would result if the carrier in this case were rewarded for violating its duty to file a new rate promptly. There is no evidence of discrimination in this record; nor is there any reason to believe that any shipper or any competing motor carrier was harmed by the negotiated rate or by the failure to file it. The only consequence of today's misguided decision is to produce a bonanza for the bankruptcy bar. "Now that off-tariff pricing is harmless to the (de)regulatory scheme, the only purpose served by making the statutory obligation to price in conformity with published tariffs draconian is to provide windfalls for unsecured creditors in bankruptcy." Orscheln, 899 F. 2d, at 646. As Justice Black said more than 30 years ago in similar circumstances, "I am unable to understand why the Court strains so hard to reach so bad a result." T. I. M. E. The Court's analysis is plausible only if read as a historical excursus about a statute that no longer exists. Nothing more than blind adherence to language in cases that have nothing to do with the present situation supports today's result. I respectfully dissent.
|
Justice Kennedy
| 2,003 | 4 |
concurring
|
Federal Election Comm'n v. Beaumont
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/130151/federal-election-commn-v-beaumont/
|
My position, expressed in dissenting opinions in previous cases, has been that the Court erred in sustaining certain state and federal restrictions on political speech in the campaign *164 finance context and misapprehended basic First Amendment principles in doing so. See ; ; Colorado Republican Federal Campaign I adhere to this view, and so can give no weight to those authorities in the instant case. That said, it must be acknowledged that Federal Election contains language supporting the Court's holding here that corporate contributions can be regulated more closely than corporate expenditures. The language upon which the Court relies tends to reconcile the tension between the approach in MCFL and the Court's earlier decision in Federal Election Were we presented with a case in which the distinction between contributions and expenditures under the whole scheme of campaign finance regulation were under review, I might join JUSTICE THOMAS' dissenting opinion. The Court does not undertake that comprehensive examination here, however. And since there is language in MCFL that supports today's holding, I concur in the judgment.
|
Justice Marshall
| 1,979 | 15 |
concurring
|
Chrysler Corp. v. Brown
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110062/chrysler-corp-v-brown/
|
I agree that respondents' proposed disclosure of information is not "authorized by law" within the meaning of 18 U.S. C. 1905, and I therefore join the opinion of the Court. Because the number and complexity of the issues presented by this case will inevitably tend to obscure the dispositive conclusions, I wish to emphasize the essential basis for the decision today. This case does not require us to determine whether, absent a congressional directive, federal agencies may reveal information obtained during the exercise of their functions. For whatever inherent power an agency has in this regard, 1905 forbids agencies from divulging certain types of information unless disclosure is independently "authorized by law." Thus, the controlling issue in this case is whether the OFCCP disclosure *320 regulations, 41 CFR 60.40-1 to 60.40-4 (1978), provide the requisite degree of authorization for the agency's proposed release. The Court holds that they do not, because the regulations are not sanctioned directly or indirectly by federal legislation.[1] In imposing the authorization requirement of 1905, Congress obviously meant to allow only those disclosures contemplated by congressional action. Ante, at 298-312. Otherwise, the agencies Congress intended to control could create their own exceptions to 1905 simply by promulgating valid disclosure regulations. Finally, the Court holds that since 10 (e) of the Administrative Procedure Act requires agency action to be "in accordance with law," 5 U.S. C. 706 (2) (A), a reviewing court can prevent any disclosure that would violate 1905.[2] Our conclusion that disclosure pursuant to the OFCCP regulations is not "authorized by law" for purposes of 1905, however, does not mean the regulations themselves are "in excess of statutory jurisdiction, authority, or limitations, or short of statutory right" for purposes of the Administrative Procedure Act. 5 U.S. C. 706 (2) (C). As the Court recognizes, ante, at 309 n. 40, that inquiry involves very different considerations than those presented in the instant case. Accordingly, we do not question the general validity of these OFCCP regulations or any other regulations promulgated under 201 of Executive Order No. 11246, 3 CFR 340 (1964-1965 Comp.). Nor do we consider whether such an Executive Order must be founded on a legislative enactment. The *321 Court's holding is only that the OFCCP regulations in issue here do not "authorize" disclosure within the meaning of 1905. Based on this understanding, I join the opinion of the Court.
|
per_curiam
| 2,010 | 200 |
per_curiam
|
Presley v. Georgia
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1746/presley-v-georgia/
|
After a jury trial in the Superior Court of DeKalb County, Georgia, petitioner Eric Presley was convicted of a cocaine trafficking offense. The conviction was affirmed by the Supreme Court of Georgia. Presley seeks certiorari, claiming his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment right to a public trial was violated when the trial court excluded the public from the voir dire of prospective jurors. The Supreme Court of Georgia's affirmance contravened this Court's clear precedents. Certiorari and petitioner's motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis are now granted, and the judgment is reversed. Before selecting a jury in Presley's trial, the trial court noticed a lone courtroom observer. The court explained that prospective jurors were about to enter and instructed the man that he was not allowed in the courtroom and had to leave that floor of the courthouse entirely. The court then questioned the man and learned he was Presley's uncle. The court reiterated its instruction: "`Well, you still can't sit out in the audience with the jurors. You know, most of the afternoon actually we're going to be picking a jury. And we may have a couple of pre-trial matters, so you're welcome to come in after we complete selecting the jury this afternoon. But, otherwise, you would have to leave the sixth floor, because jurors will be all out in the hallway in a few moments. That applies to everybody who's got a case.'" Presley's counsel objected to "`the exclusion of the public from the courtroom,'" but the court explained, "`[t]here just isn't space for them to sit in the audience.'" When Presley's counsel requested "`some accommodation,'" the court explained its ruling further: "`Well, the uncle can certainly come back in once the trial starts. There's no, really no need for the uncle to be present during jury selection. [W]e have 42 jurors coming up. Each of those rows will be occupied by jurors. And his uncle cannot sit and intermingle with members of the jury panel. But, when the trial starts, the opening statements and other matters, he can certainly come back into the '" After Presley was convicted, he moved for a new trial based on the exclusion of the public from the juror voir dire. At a hearing on the motion, Presley presented evidence showing that 14 prospective jurors could have fit in the jury box and the remaining 28 could have fit entirely on one side of the courtroom, leaving adequate room for the public. App. to Pet. for Cert. E-37, E-41. The trial court denied the motion, commenting that it preferred to seat
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per_curiam
| 2,010 | 200 |
per_curiam
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Presley v. Georgia
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1746/presley-v-georgia/
|
court denied the motion, commenting that it preferred to seat jurors throughout the entirety of the courtroom, and "it's up to the individual judge to decide what's comfortable." E-38. The court continued: "t's totally up to my discretion whether or not want family members in the courtroom to intermingle with the jurors and sit directly behind the jurors where they might overhear some inadvertent comment or conversation." at E-42 to E-43. On appeal, the Court of Appeals of Georgia agreed, finding "[t]here was no abuse of discretion here, when the trial court explained the need to exclude spectators at the voir dire stage of the proceedings and when members of the public were invited to return *723 afterward." The Supreme Court of Georgia granted certiorari and affirmed, with two justices dissenting. After finding "the trial court certainly had an overriding interest in ensuring that potential jurors heard no inherently prejudicial remarks from observers during voir dire," the Supreme Court of Georgia rejected Presley's argument that the trial court was required to consider alternatives to closing the t noted that "the United States Supreme Court [has] not provide[d] clear guidance regarding whether a court must, sua sponte, advance its own alternatives to [closure]," and the court ruled that "Presley was obliged to present the court with any alternatives that he wished the court to consider." at 912. When no alternatives are offered, it concluded, "there is no abuse of discretion in the court's failure to sua sponte advance its own alternatives." This Court's rulings with respect to the public trial right rest upon two different provisions of the Bill of Rights, both applicable to the States via the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Sixth Amendment directs, in relevant part, that "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial" The Court in n re Oliver, made it clear that this right extends to the States. The Sixth Amendment right, as the quoted language makes explicit, is the right of the accused. The Court has further held that the public trial right extends beyond the accused and can be invoked under the First Amendment. This requirement, too, is binding on the States. The case now before the Court is brought under the Sixth Amendment, for it is the accused who invoked his right to a public trial. An initial question is whether the right to a public trial in criminal cases extends to the jury selection phase of trial, and in particular the voir dire of prospective jurors. n the First Amendment
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per_curiam
| 2,010 | 200 |
per_curiam
|
Presley v. Georgia
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1746/presley-v-georgia/
|
the voir dire of prospective jurors. n the First Amendment context that question was answered in The Court there held that the voir dire of prospective jurors must be open to the public under the First Amendment. Later in the same Term as the Court considered a Sixth Amendment case concerning whether the public trial right extends to a pretrial hearing on a motion to suppress certain evidence. The Waller Court relied heavily upon in finding that the Sixth Amendment right to a public trial extends beyond the actual proof at trial. t ruled that the pretrial suppression hearing must be open to the public because "there can be little doubt that the explicit Sixth Amendment right of the accused is no less protective of a public trial than the implicit First Amendment right of the press and public." While was heavily relied upon in Waller, the jury selection issue in the former case was resolved under the First, not the Sixth, Amendment. (STEVENS, J., concurring) ("The constitutional protection for the right of access that the Court upholds today is found in the First Amendment, rather than the public trial provision of the Sixth" (footnote omitted)). n the instant case, the question then arises whether it is so well settled that the Sixth Amendment *724 right extends to jury voir dire that this Court may proceed by summary disposition. The point is well settled under and Waller. The extent to which the First and Sixth Amendment public trial rights are coextensive is an open question, and it is not necessary here to speculate whether or in what circumstances the reach or protections of one might be greater than the other. Still, there is no legitimate reason, at least in the context of juror selection proceedings, to give one who asserts a First Amendment privilege greater rights to insist on public proceedings than the accused has. "Our cases have uniformly recognized the public-trial guarantee as one created for the benefit of the defendant." Gannett There could be no explanation for barring the accused from raising a constitutional right that is unmistakably for his or her benefit. That rationale suffices to resolve the instant matter. The Supreme Court of Georgia was correct in assuming that the Sixth Amendment right to a public trial extends to the voir dire of prospective jurors. While the accused does have a right to insist that the voir dire of the jurors be public, there are exceptions to this general rule. "[T]he right to an open trial may give way in certain cases to other rights or
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per_curiam
| 2,010 | 200 |
per_curiam
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Presley v. Georgia
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1746/presley-v-georgia/
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may give way in certain cases to other rights or interests, such as the defendant's right to a fair trial or the government's interest in inhibiting disclosure of sensitive information." Waller, "Such circumstances will be rare, however, and the balance of interests must be struck with special care." Waller provided standards for courts to apply before excluding the public from any stage of a criminal trial: "[T]he party seeking to close the hearing must advance an overriding interest that is likely to be prejudiced, the closure must be no broader than necessary to protect that interest, the trial court must consider reasonable alternatives to closing the proceeding, and it must make findings adequate to support the closure." n upholding exclusion of the public at juror voir dire in the instant case, the Supreme Court of Georgia concluded, despite our explicit statements to the contrary, that trial courts need not consider alternatives to closure absent an opposing party's proffer of some alternatives. While the Supreme Court of Georgia concluded this was an open question under this Court's precedents, the statement in Waller that "the trial court must consider reasonable alternatives to closing the proceeding" settles the point. f that statement leaves any room for doubt, the Court was more explicit in : "Even with findings adequate to support closure, the trial court's orders denying access to voir dire testimony failed to consider whether alternatives were available to protect the interests of the prospective jurors that the trial court's orders sought to guard. Absent consideration of alternatives to closure, the trial court could not constitutionally close the voir dire." The conclusion that trial courts are required to consider alternatives to closure even when they are not offered by the parties is clear not only from this Court's precedents but also from the premise that "[t]he process of juror selection is itself a matter of importance, not simply to the adversaries but to the criminal justice system." The public has a right to be present whether or not any party has asserted the *725 right. n for instance, neither the defendant nor the prosecution requested an open courtroom during juror voir dire proceedings; in fact, both specifically argued in favor of keeping the transcript of the proceedings confidential. The Court, nonetheless, found it was error to close the Trial courts are obligated to take every reasonable measure to accommodate public attendance at criminal trials. Nothing in the record shows that the trial court could not have accommodated the public at Presley's trial. Without knowing the precise circumstances, some possibilities include reserving one or
|
per_curiam
| 2,010 | 200 |
per_curiam
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Presley v. Georgia
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1746/presley-v-georgia/
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knowing the precise circumstances, some possibilities include reserving one or more rows for the public; dividing the jury venire panel to reduce courtroom congestion; or instructing prospective jurors not to engage or interact with audience members. Petitioner also argues that, apart from failing to consider alternatives to closure, the trial court erred because it did not even identify any overriding interest likely to be prejudiced absent the closure of voir dire. There is some merit to this complaint. The generic risk of jurors over-hearing prejudicial remarks, unsubstantiated by any specific threat or incident, is inherent whenever members of the public are present during the selection of jurors. f broad concerns of this sort were sufficient to override a defendant's constitutional right to a public trial, a court could exclude the public from jury selection almost as a matter of course. As noted in the dissent below, "the majority's reasoning permits the closure of voir dire in every criminal case conducted in this courtroom whenever the trial judge decides, for whatever reason, that he or she would prefer to fill the courtroom with potential jurors rather than spectators." There are no doubt circumstances where a judge could conclude that threats of improper communications with jurors or safety concerns are concrete enough to warrant closing voir dire. But in those cases, the particular interest, and threat to that interest, must "be articulated along with findings specific enough that a reviewing court can determine whether the closure order was properly entered." ; see also 106 S. Ct. 5, We need not rule on this second claim of error, because even assuming, arguendo, that the trial court had an overriding interest in closing voir dire, it was still incumbent upon it to consider all reasonable alternatives to closure. t did not, and that is all this Court needs to decide. The Supreme Court of Georgia's judgment is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. t is so ordered.
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,987 | 9 |
dissenting
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Arkansas Writers' Project, Inc. v. Ragland
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111866/arkansas-writers-project-inc-v-ragland/
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All government displays an enduring tendency to silence, or to facilitate silencing, those voices that it disapproves. In the case of the Judicial Branch of Government, the principal restraint upon that tendency, as upon other judicial error, is the requirement that judges write opinions providing logical reasons for treating one situation differently from another. I dissent from today's decision because it provides no rational basis for distinguishing the subsidy scheme here under challenge from many others that are common and unquestionably lawful. It thereby introduces into First Amendment law an element of arbitrariness that ultimately erodes rather than fosters the important freedoms at issue. The Court's opinion does not dispute, and I think it evident, that the tax exemption in this case has a rational basis sufficient to sustain the tax scheme against ordinary equal protection attack, see, e. g., Massachusetts Board of Though assuredly not "narrowly tailored," it is reasonably related to the legitimate goals of encouraging small publishers with limited audiences and advertising revenues (a category which in the State's judgment includes most publishers of religious, professional, trade, and sports magazines) and of *236 avoiding the collection of taxes where administrative cost exceeds tax proceeds. See Brief for Appellee 15-16. The exemption is found invalid, however, because it does not pass the "strict scrutiny" test applicable to discriminatory restriction or prohibition of speech, namely, that it be "necessary to serve a compelling state interest and narrowly drawn to achieve that end." Ante, at 231; cf. Police Department of ; Here, as in the Court's earlier decision in Minneapolis Star & Tribune application of the "strict scrutiny" test rests upon the premise that for First Amendment purposes denial of exemption from taxation is equivalent to regulation. That premise is demonstrably erroneous and cannot be consistently applied. Our opinions have long recognized in First Amendment contexts as elsewhere the reality that tax exemptions, credits, and deductions are "a form of subsidy that is administered through the tax system," and the general rule that "a legislature's decision not to subsidize the exercise of a fundamental right does not infringe the right, and thus is not subject to strict scrutiny." See also ; ; ; *237 The reason that denial of participation in a tax exemption or other subsidy scheme does not necessarily "infringe" a fundamental right is that unlike direct restriction or prohibition such a denial does not, as a general rule, have any significant coercive effect. It may, of course, be manipulated so as to do so, in which case the courts will be available to
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,987 | 9 |
dissenting
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Arkansas Writers' Project, Inc. v. Ragland
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/111866/arkansas-writers-project-inc-v-ragland/
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so, in which case the courts will be available to provide relief. But that is not remotely the case here. It is implausible that the 4% sales tax, generally applicable to all sales in the State with the few enumerated exceptions, was meant to inhibit, or had the effect of inhibiting, this appellant's publication. Perhaps a more stringent, prophylactic rule is appropriate, and can consistently be applied, when the subsidy pertains to the expression of a particular viewpoint on a matter of political concern a tax exemption, for example, that is expressly available only to publications that take a particular point of view on a controversial issue of foreign policy. Political speech has been accorded special protection elsewhere. See, e. g., ; ; Red Lion Broadcasting There is no need, however, and it is realistically quite impossible, to extend to all speech the same degree of protection against exclusion from a subsidy that one might think appropriate for opposing shades of political expression. By seeking to do so, the majority casts doubt upon a wide variety of tax preferences and subsidies that draw distinctions based upon subject matter. The United States Postal *238 Service, for example, grants a special bulk rate to written material disseminated by certain nonprofit organizations religious, educational, scientific, philanthropic, agricultural, labor, veterans', and fraternal organizations. See Domestic Mail Manual 623 (1985). Must this preference be justified by a "compelling governmental need" because a nonprofit organization devoted to some other purpose dissemination of information about boxing, for example does not receive the special rate? The Kennedy Center, which is subsidized by the Federal Government in the amount of up to $23 million per year, see 20 U.S. C. 76n(a), is authorized by statute to "present classical and contemporary music, opera, drama, dance, and poetry." 76j. Is this subsidy subject to strict scrutiny because other kinds of expressive activity, such as learned lectures and political speeches, are excluded? Are government research grant programs or the funding activities of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, see 47 U.S. C. 396(g)(2), subject to strict scrutiny because they provide money for the study or exposition of some subjects but not others? Because there is no principled basis to distinguish the subsidization of speech in these areas which we would surely uphold from the subsidization that we strike down here, our decision today places the granting or denial of protection within our own idiosyncratic discretion. In my view, that threatens First Amendment rights infinitely more than the tax exemption at issue. I dissent.
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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The issue before us in this case is whether a Social Security claimant is entitled to an award of attorney's fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act for representation provided during administrative proceedings held pursuant to a district court order remanding the action to the Secretary of Health and Human I Respondent Elmer Hudson filed an application for the establishment of a period of disability and for disability benefits under the Social Security Act, as amended, 42 U.S. C. 401 et seq. (1982 ed. and Supp. V) on September 9, 1981. On the same day, she filed an application for supplemental security income under Title XVI of the Act. Respondent, now 50, submitted medical evidence indicating obesity, limitations in movement, and lower back pain. Her application for benefits was administratively denied, and that position was upheld on reconsideration by the Social Security Administration. Respondent requested and received a hearing before an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ), where *0 she was represented by a Legal Corporation para-legal. At the hearing, respondent testified that she suffered from back pain, depression, and nervousness. Respondent was in a state of anxiety and cried throughout the hearing. The ALJ ordered a posthearing psychiatric examination by Dr. Anderson, a psychiatrist, and respondent's representative chose to have her undergo an additional evaluation by Dr. Myers, a clinical psychologist. Dr. Anderson's report indicated that respondent suffered from mild to moderate dysthymic disorder and a histrionic personality disorder. He concluded that respondent's psychological condition would not interfere with her ability to work in the domestic services area, where most of her past work experience lay. Dr. Myers found that respondent was moderately to severely depressed, suffered from insomnia, fatigue, psychomotor retardation, tearfulness, and anxiety. He concluded that her psychological problems, coupled with her mild physical disabilities and back pain, rendered her unemployable absent exhaustive rehabilitative efforts. Based on these two reports, the ALJ rendered her decision finding that respondent was not disabled because she was capable of performing work similar to that she had done in the past. The ALJ's decision was approved by the Social Security Appeals Council, thus becoming the final decision of the Secretary concerning respondent's applications. Respondent then brought an action in the District Court for the Northern District of Alabama under 42 U.S. C. 405(g) seeking judicial review of the Secretary's decision denying benefits. The District Court found that the Secretary's decision was supported by substantial evidence and affirmed the denial of benefits. App. to Pet. for Cert. 43a-44a. The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed. It vacated the Secretary's decision and
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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the Eleventh Circuit reversed. It vacated the Secretary's decision and instructed the District Court to remand the case to the Secretary for reconsideration. The Court of Appeals agreed with respondent that "the Secretary did *1 not follow her own regulations" in making the disability determination in respondent's case. The court found that those regulations required the Secretary to consider the cumulative effect of impairments even where no individual ailment considered in isolation would be disabling. In respondent's case the ALJ had never considered the combined effect of respondent's physical and psychological afflictions. Nor had the ALJ given any reasons for her rejection of Dr. Myers' evaluation of the combined effects of respondent's physical and psychological conditions. -786. Following the District Court's remand order, the Social Security Appeals Council vacated its earlier denial of respondent's request for review and returned the case to an ALJ for further proceedings. App. to Pet. for Cert. 30a. The Appeals Council instructed the ALJ to provide respondent with an opportunity to testify at a supplemental hearing and to adduce additional evidence. at 31a. The Appeals Council also indicated that the ALJ might wish to obtain the services of a medical adviser to evaluate respondent's psychiatric impairment during the period at issue. Finally, the Appeals Council instructed the ALJ to apply the revised regulations for determining disability due to mental disorders, which had been published by the Secretary in pursuant to statutory directive. On remand, the ALJ found that respondent had been disabled as of May 1981, as she had originally maintained in her initial applications for benefits. Respondent was represented before the ALJ in the remand proceedings by the same counsel who had represented her before the District Court and the Court of Appeals. On October 22, the Appeals Council adopted the ALJ's recommended decision and instructed the Social Security Administration to pay respondent disability and supplemental income benefits. at 21a-23a. On December 11, the District Court, pursuant to the Secretary's motion, *2 dismissed respondent's action for judicial review, finding that after the remand order respondent had obtained all the relief prayed for in her complaint. The District Court retained jurisdiction over the action for the limited purpose of considering any petition for the award of attorney's fees. Respondent then filed the instant petition for an award of attorney's fees under the Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), Stat. 2328, as amended, 28 U.S. C. 2412(d) (1982 ed., Supp. V). The District Court denied respondent's fee application in toto, finding that the position taken by the Secretary in the initial denial of benefits to respondent
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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the Secretary in the initial denial of benefits to respondent was "substantially justified." App. to Pet. for Cert. 17a-20a. The Court of Appeals again reversed. The Court of Appeals noted that in its earlier opinion it had found that the Secretary had violated her own regulations by failing to consider the cumulative effect of respondent's ailments, and that the ALJ had failed to give her reasons for rejection of Dr. Myers' testimony concerning the cumulative effects of respondent's ailments. The Secretary's defense of the denial of benefits to respondent "on those two grounds was not substantially justified." Having concluded that an award of attorney's fees was proper under the EAJA, the court went on to consider whether the award could include attorney's fees for work done at the administrative level after the cause was remanded to the Secretary by the District Court. The Court of Appeals rejected the Secretary's argument that 5 U.S. C. 504(a)(1) and 504(b)(1)(C) (1982 ed., Supp. V) limited a court's power to award attorney's fees for administrative proceedings to those situations "in which the position of the United States is represented by counsel or otherwise." While recognizing that the Secretary was not represented by counsel in the remand proceedings at issue here, the Court of Appeals found that "the critical determination is whether the Secretary has staked out a position." *3 Since the Secretary had taken an adversarial position in the proceedings for judicial review prior to the remand, the Court of Appeals found that the proceedings were no less "adversarial" on remand before the agency, and therefore a fee award encompassing work performed before the agency on remand was proper. Because the Court of Appeals' decision granting attorney's fees for representation in administrative proceedings on remand from judicial review of a Social Security benefits determination conflicts with the decisions of other Courts of Appeals, see, e. g., we granted the Secretary's petition for certiorari. Sub nom. II In 1980, Congress passed the EAJA in response to its concern that persons "may be deterred from seeking review of, or defending against, unreasonable governmental action because of the expense involved in securing the vindication of their rights." As the Senate Report put it: "For many citizens, the costs of securing vindication of their rights and the inability to recover attorney fees preclude resort to the adjudicatory process. When the cost of contesting a Government order, for example, exceeds the amount at stake, a party has no realistic choice and no effective remedy. In these cases, it is more practical to endure an injustice than to contest it."
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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more practical to endure an injustice than to contest it." S. Rep. No. 96-253, p. 5 (1979). The EAJA was designed to rectify this situation by providing for an award of a reasonable attorney's fee to a "prevailing party" in a "civil action" or "adversary adjudication" unless the position taken by the United States in the proceeding at issue "was substantially justified" or "special circumstances make an award unjust." That portion of the Act applicable *4 to "civil actions" provides, as amended, in relevant part that "[e]xcept as otherwise specifically provided by statute, a court shall award to a prevailing party other than the United States fees and other expenses incurred by that party in any civil action including proceedings for judicial review of agency action, brought by or against the United States in any court having jurisdiction of that action, unless the court finds that the position of the United States was substantially justified or that special circumstances make an award unjust." 28 U.S. C. 2412(d)(1)(A) (1982 ed., Supp. V). Application of this provision to respondent's situation here requires brief consideration of the structure of administrative proceedings and judicial review under the Social Security Act. Once a claim has been processed administratively, judicial review of the Secretary's decision is available pursuant to 205(g) of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S. C. 405(g), which provides in pertinent part: "Any individual, after any final decision of the Secretary made after a hearing to which he was a party, may obtain a review of such decision by a civil action The court shall have the power to enter, upon the pleadings and transcript of the record, a judgment affirming, modifying, or reversing the decision of the Secretary, with or without remanding the cause for a rehearing. The court may, on motion of the Secretary for good cause shown before he files his answer, remand the case to the Secretary for further action by the Secretary, and it may at any time order additional evidence to be taken before the Secretary, but only upon a showing that there is new evidence which is material and that there is good cause for the failure to incorporate such evidence into the record in a prior proceeding; and the Secretary shall, after the case is remanded, and after hearing such additional *5 evidence if so ordered, modify or affirm his findings of fact or his decision, or both, and shall file with the court any such additional and modified findings of fact and decision, and a transcript of the additional record and testimony upon which his
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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transcript of the additional record and testimony upon which his action in modifying or affirming was based." As provisions for judicial review of agency action go, 405(g) is somewhat unusual. The detailed provisions for the transfer of proceedings from the courts to the Secretary and for the filing of the Secretary's subsequent findings with the court suggest a degree of direct interaction between a federal court and an administrative agency alien to traditional review of agency action under the Administrative Procedure Act. As one source puts it: "The remand power places the courts, not in their accustomed role as external overseers of the administrative process, making sure that it stays within legal bounds, but virtually as coparticipants in the process, exercising ground-level discretion of the same order as that exercised by ALJs and the Appeals Council when they act upon a request to reopen a decision on the basis of new and material evidence." J. Mashaw, C. Goetz, F. Goodman, W. Schwartz, P. Verkuil, & M. Carrow, Social Security Hearings and Appeals 133 Where a court finds that the Secretary has committed a legal or factual error in evaluating a particular claim, the district court's remand order will often include detailed instructions concerning the scope of the remand, the evidence to be adduced, and the legal or factual issues to be addressed. See, e. g., Often, complex legal issues are involved, including classification of the claimant's alleged disability or his or her prior work experience within the Secretary's guidelines or "grids" used for determining claimant disability. See, e. g., Deviation from the court's remand order in the subsequent administrative proceedings is itself legal error, subject to reversal on further judicial review. See, e. g., ; In many remand situations, the court will retain jurisdiction over the action pending the Secretary's decision and its filing with the court. See ; ; accord, 3-5 The court retains the power in such situations to assure that its prior mandate is effectuated. See Ford Motor Two points important to the application of the EAJA emerge from the interaction of the mechanisms for judicial review of Social Security benefits determinations and the EAJA. First, in a case such as this one, where a court's remand to the agency for further administrative proceedings does not necessarily dictate the receipt of benefits, the claimant will not normally attain "prevailing party" status within the meaning of 2412(d)(1)(A) until after the result of the administrative proceedings is known. The situation is for all intents and purposes identical to that we addressed in There we held that the reversal of
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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we addressed in There we held that the reversal of a directed verdict for defendants on appeal did not render the plaintiffs in that action "prevailing parties" such that an interim award of attorney's fees would be justified under 42 U.S. C. We found that such "procedural or evidentiary rulings" were not themselves "matters on which a party could `prevail' for purposes of shifting his counsel fees to the opposing party under" *7 More recently in Texas State Teachers we indicated that in order to be considered a prevailing party, a plaintiff must achieve some of the benefit sought in bringing the action. We think it clear that under these principles a Social Security claimant would not, as a general matter, be a prevailing party within the meaning of the EAJA merely because a court had remanded the action to the agency for further proceedings. See Indeed, the vast majority of the Courts of Appeals have come to this conclusion. See, e. g., ; ; at 0-1. Second, the EAJA provides that an application for fees must be filed with the court "within thirty days of final judgment in the action." 28 U.S. C. 2412(d)(1)(B) (1982 ed., Supp. V). As in this case, there will often be no final judgment in a claimant's civil action for judicial review until the administrative proceedings on remand are complete. See ("[T]he procedure set forth in 42 U.S. C. 405(g) contemplates additional action both by the Secretary and a district court before a civil action is concluded following a remand"). The Secretary concedes that a remand order from a district court to the agency is not a final determination of the civil action and that the district court "retains jurisdiction to review any determination rendered on remand." Brief for Petitioner 16, 16-17. Thus, for purposes of the EAJA, the Social Security claimant's status as a prevailing party and the final judgment in her "civil action for review of agency action" are often completely dependent on the successful completion of the remand proceedings before the Secretary. Moreover, the remanding court continues to retain jurisdiction over the action within the meaning of the EAJA and may exercise that jurisdiction *8 to determine if its legal instructions on remand have been followed by the Secretary. Our past decisions interpreting other fee-shifting provisions make clear that where administrative proceedings are intimately tied to the resolution of the judicial action and necessary to the attainment of the results Congress sought to promote by providing for fees, they should be considered part and parcel of the action for which fees
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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considered part and parcel of the action for which fees may be awarded. In we considered whether the costs of representation before federal and state administrative agencies in defense of the provisions of a consent decree entered under the Clean Air Act were compensable under the fee-shifting provision of that statute. Section 304(d) of the Clean Air Act provides for the award of a reasonable attorney fee in conjunction with "any final order in any action brought pursuant to" certain provisions of the Act. 42 U.S. C. 4(d). In Delaware we rejected the contention that the word "action" in the fee-shifting provision should be read narrowly to exclude all proceedings which could be plausibly characterized as "nonjudicial." We indicated that "[a]lthough it is true that the proceedings [at issue] were not `judicial' in the sense that they did not occur in a courtroom or involve `traditional' legal work such as examination of witnesses or selection of jurors for trial, the work done by counsel in these two phases was as necessary to the attainment of adequate relief for their client as was all of their earlier work in the courtroom which secured Delaware 's initial success in obtaining the consent decree." Similarly, in New York Gas Light Club, we held that under the fee-shifting provision of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S. C. 2000e-5(k), a federal court could award attorney's fees for services performed in state administrative and judicial *9 enforcement proceedings. We noted that the words of the statute, authorizing "the court" to award attorney's fees "[i]n any action or proceeding under this title," could be read to include only federal administrative or judicial proceedings. -61. Looking to the entire structure of Title VII, we observed that Congress had mandated initial resort to state and local remedies, and that "Congress viewed proceedings before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and in federal court as supplements to available state remedies for employment discrimination." Given this interlocking system of judicial and administrative avenues to relief, we concluded that the exclusion of state and local administrative proceedings from the fee provisions would clearly clash with the congressional design behind the statutory scheme whose enforcement the fee-shifting provisions was designed to promote. See also ; North Carolina Dept. of We think the principles we found persuasive in Delaware and Carey are controlling here. As in Delaware the administrative proceedings on remand in this case were "crucial to the vindication of [respondent's] rights." Delaware at No fee award at all would have been available to respondent absent successful conclusion of
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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would have been available to respondent absent successful conclusion of the remand proceedings, and the services of an attorney may be necessary both to ensure compliance with the District Court's order in the administrative proceedings themselves, and to prepare for any further proceedings before the District Court to verify such compliance. In addition, as we did in Carey, we must endeavor to interpret the fee statute in light of the statutory provisions it was designed to effectuate. Given the "mandatory" nature of the administrative proceedings *890 at issue here, and their close relation in law and fact to the issues before the District Court on judicial review, we find it difficult to ascribe to Congress an intent to throw the Social Security claimant a lifeline that it knew was a foot short. Indeed, the incentive which such a system would create for attorneys to abandon claimants after judicial remand runs directly counter to long established ethical canons of the legal profession. See American Bar Association, Model Rules of Professional Conduct, Rule 1.16, pp. 53-55 Given the anomalous nature of this result, and its frustration of the very purposes behind the EAJA itself, Congress cannot lightly be assumed to have intended it. See Christiansburg Garment U.S. 412, Since the judicial review provisions of the Social Security Act contemplate an ongoing civil action of which the remand proceedings are but a part, and the EAJA allows "any court having jurisdiction of that action" to award fees, 28 U.S. C. 2412(d)(1)(A), we think the statute, read in light of its purpose "to diminish the deterrent effect of seeking review of, or defending against, governmental action," permits a court to award fees for services performed on remand before the Social Security Administration. Where a court finds that the Secretary's position on judicial review was not substantially justified within the meaning of the EAJA, see it is within the court's discretion to conclude that representation on remand was necessary to the effectuation of its mandate and to the ultimate vindication of the claimant's rights, and that an award of fees for work performed in the administrative proceedings is therefore proper. See Delaware at ; at The Secretary mounts two interrelated challenges to this interpretation of 2412(d)(1)(A). While the Secretary's contentions are not without some force, neither rises to the level necessary to oust what we think is the most reasonable interpretation of the statute in light of its manifest purpose. *891 First, the Secretary argues that plain meaning of the term "civil action" in 2412(d)(1)(A) excludes any proceedings outside of a court of law. Brief
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
|
excludes any proceedings outside of a court of law. Brief for Petitioner 12-13; Reply Brief for Petitioner 8-9. Of course, if the plain language of the EAJA evinced a congressional intent to preclude the interpretation we reach here, that would be the end of the matter. In support of this proposition, the Secretary points out that the " `[t]erm [action] in its usual legal sense means a suit brought in a court; a formal complaint within the jurisdiction of a court of law.' " Brief for Petitioner 13, n. 7, quoting Black's Law Dictionary 26 (5th ed. 1979). Second, the Secretary notes that Congress did authorize EAJA fee awards under 5 U.S. C. 504(a)(1) (1982 ed., Supp. V) where an agency "conducts an adversary adjudication," and that an adversary adjudication is defined in 504(b)(1)(C) as "an adjudication. in which the position of the United States is represented by counsel or otherwise." Under 28 U.S. C. 2412(d)(3) (1982 ed., Supp. V) a court is empowered to award fees for representation before an agency to a party who prevails in an action for judicial review to "the same extent authorized in [5 U.S. C. 504(a)]." Thus, the Secretary concludes that since benefits proceedings before the Secretary and his designates are nonadversarial, and a court is explicitly empowered to award fees for agency proceedings where such proceedings satisfy the requirements of 504(a)(1), the principle of expressio unius est exclusio alterius applies, and a court may never award fees for time spent in nonadversarial administrative proceedings. See Brief for Petitioner 12-18; Reply Brief for Petitioner 7-12. We agree with the Secretary that for purposes of the EAJA Social Security benefit proceedings are not "adversarial" within the meaning of 504(b)(1)(C) either initially or on remand from a court. See The plain language of the statute requires that the United States be represented by "counsel or otherwise," and neither is true in this context. Nonetheless, *892 we disagree with the conclusion the Secretary would draw from this fact. First, as Delaware and Carey indicate, administrative proceedings may be so intimately connected with judicial proceedings as to be considered part of the "civil action" for purposes of a fee award. This is particularly so in the Social Security context where "a suit [has been] brought in a court," and where "a formal complaint within the jurisdiction of a court of law" remains pending and depends for its resolution upon the outcome of the administrative proceedings. Second, we disagree with the Secretary's submission that a negative implication can be drawn from the power granted a court to award
|
Justice O'Connor
| 1,989 | 14 |
majority
|
Sullivan v. Hudson
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112281/sullivan-v-hudson/
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be drawn from the power granted a court to award fees based on representation in a prior adversary adjudication before an agency. Section 2412(d)(3) provides that "[i]n awarding fees and other expenses under this subsection to a prevailing party in any action for judicial review of an adversary adjudication," the court may award fees to the same extent that they would have been available before the agency itself under 504(a)(1). On its face, the provision says nothing about the power of a court to award reasonable fees for representation in a nonadversarial adjudication which is wholly ancillary to a civil action for judicial review. That Congress carved the world of EAJA proceedings into "adversary adjudications" and "civil actions" does not necessarily speak to, let alone preclude, a reading of the term "civil action" which includes administrative proceedings necessary to the completion of a civil action. We conclude that where a court orders a remand to the Secretary in a benefits litigation and retains continuing jurisdiction over the case pending a decision from the Secretary which will determine the claimant's entitlement to benefits, the proceedings on remand are an integral part of the "civil action" for judicial review, and thus attorney's fees for representation on remand are available subject to the other limitations in the EAJA. We thus affirm the judgment of the *893 Court of Appeals on this issue and remand the case to that court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is so ordered.
|
Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
|
Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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, held that a "cause of action for damages" arises under *230 the Constitution when Fourth Amendment rights are violated. The issue presented for decision in this case is whether a cause of action and a damages remedy can also be implied directly under the Constitution when the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment is violated. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, en banc, concluded that "no civil action for damages" can be thus implied. We granted certiorari, and we now reverse. I At the time this case commenced, respondent Otto E. Passman was a United States Congressman from the Fifth Congressional District of Louisiana.[] On February 4, Passman hired petitioner Shirley Davis as a deputy administrative assistant.[2] Passman subsequently terminated her employment, effective July 3, 4, writing Davis that, although she was "able, energetic and a very hard worker," he had concluded "that it was essential that the understudy to my Administrative Assistant be a man."[3] App. 6. *23 Davis brought suit in the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, alleging that Passman's conduct discriminated against her "on the basis of sex in violation of the United States Constitution and the Fifth Amendment thereto." Davis sought damages in the form of backpay.[4] Jurisdiction for her suit was founded on 28 U.S. C. 33 (a), which provides in pertinent part that federal "district courts shall have original jurisdiction of all civil actions wherein the matter in controversy exceeds the sum or value of $0,000 and arises under the Constitution of the United States" *232 Passman moved to dismiss Davis' action for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 2 (b) (6), arguing, inter alia, that "the law affords no private right of action" for her claim.[5] App. 8. The District Court accepted this argument, ruling that Davis had "no private right of action."[6] A panel of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reversed. The panel concluded that a cause of action for damages arose directly under the Fifth Amendment; that, taking as true the allegations in Davis' complaint, Passman's conduct violated the Fifth Amendment; and that Passman's conduct was not shielded by the Speech or Debate Clause of the Constitution, Art. I, 6, cl.[7] The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, sitting en banc, reversed the decision of the panel. The en banc court did not reach the merits, nor did it discuss the application of the Speech or Debate Clause. The court instead held that "no right of action may be
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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court instead held that "no right of action may be implied from the Due Process Clause of the fifth amendment." 57 F.2d, at The court reached this conclusion on the basis of the criteria that had been set out in for determining whether a private cause of action should be implied from a federal statute.[8] Noting that Congress had failed to create a *233 damages remedy for those in Davis' position, the court also concluded that "the proposed damage remedy is not constitutionally compelled" so that it was not necessary to "countermand the clearly discernible will of Congress" and create such a II In federal agents had allegedly arrested and searched without *234 probable cause, thereby subjecting him to great humiliation, embarrassment, and mental suffering. held that the Fourth Amendment guarantee against "unreasonable searches and seizures" was a constitutional right which could enforce through a private cause of action, and that a damages remedy was an appropriate form of redress. Last Term, reaffirmed this holding, stating that "the decision in established that a citizen suffering a compensable injury to a constitutionally protected interest could invoke the general federal-question jurisdiction of the district courts to obtain an award of monetary damages against the responsible federal official." 04. Today we hold that and Butz require reversal of the holding of the en banc Court of Our inquiry proceeds in three stages. We hold first that, pretermitting the question whether respondent's conduct is shielded by the Speech or Debate Clause, petitioner asserts a constitutionally protected right; second, that petitioner has stated a cause of action which asserts this right; and third, that relief in damages constitutes an appropriate form of A The Fifth Amendment provides that "[n]o person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law" In numerous decisions, this Court "has held that the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment forbids the Federal Government to deny equal protection of the laws. E. g., ; ; ;" 440 U.S. "To withstand scrutiny under the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause, `classifications by gender must serve important governmental objectives and must be *235 substantially related to achievement of those objectives.'"[9]Califano v. Webster, The equal protection component of the Due Process Clause thus confers on petitioner a federal constitutional right[0] to be free from gender discrimination which cannot meet these requirements.[]*236 We inquire next whether petitioner has a cause of action to assert this right. B It is clear that the District Court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S. C. 33 (a) to consider petitioner's claim.
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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under 28 U.S. C. 33 (a) to consider petitioner's claim. It is equally clear, and the en banc Court of Appeals so held, that the Fifth Amendment confers on petitioner a constitutional right to be free from illegal discrimination.[2] Yet the Court of Appeals concluded *237 that petitioner could not enforce this right because she lacked a cause of action. The meaning of this missing "cause of action," however, is far from apparent. Almost half a century ago, Mr. Justice Cardozo recognized that a "`cause of action' may mean one thing for one purpose and something different for another." United (3).[3] The phrase apparently became a legal term of art when the New York Code of Procedure of 848 abolished the distinction between actions at law and suits in equity and simply required a plaintiff to include in his complaint "[a] statement of the facts constituting the cause of action"[4] 848 N. Y. Laws, ch. 379, 20 (2). By the first third of the 20th century, however, the phrase had become so encrusted with doctrinal complexity that the authors of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure eschewed it altogether, requiring only that a complaint contain "a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief." Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 8 (a). See Original Ballet Russe, Nevertheless, courts and commentators have continued to use the phrase "cause of action" in the traditional sense established by the Codes to refer roughly to the alleged invasion of "recognized legal rights" upon which a litigant bases his claim for relief.[5]*238 6 This is not the meaning of the "cause of action" which the Court of Appeals below refused to imply from the Fifth Amendment, however, for the court acknowledged that petitioner had alleged an invasion of her constitutional right to be free from illegal discrimination.[6] Instead the Court of Appeals appropriated the meaning of the phrase "cause of action" used in the many cases in which this Court has parsed congressional enactments to determine whether the rights and obligations so created could be judicially enforced by a particular "class of litigants." Securities Investor Protection for example, held that although "Congress' primary purpose in creating the SIPC was the protection of investors," and although investors were thus "the intended beneficiaries of the [Securities Investor Protection] Act [of 0]," *239 5 U.S. C. 78aaa et seq., investors nevertheless had no private cause of action judicially to compel SIPC "to commit its funds or otherwise to act for the protection" of 42 U.S., 8, 42. We held that under the Act
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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42 U.S., 8, 42. We held that under the Act only the Securities and Exchange Commission had a cause of action enabling it to invoke judicial authority to require SIPC to perform its statutory obligations. On the other hand, Texas & N. O. R. (0), held that 2 of the Railway Labor Act of 926, 45 U.S. C. 52, which provides that railroad employees be able to designate representatives "without interference, influence, or coercion," did not confer "merely an abstract right," but was judicially enforceable through a private cause of action.[7] 28 U. S., 58, 567-568. In cases such as these, the question is which class of litigants may enforce in court legislatively created rights or obligations. If a litigant is an appropriate party to invoke the power of the courts, it is said that he has a "cause of action" under the statute, and that this cause of action is a necessary element of his "claim." So understood, the question whether a litigant has a "cause of action" is analytically distinct and prior to the question of what relief, if any, a litigant may be entitled to receive. The concept of a "cause of action" is employed specifically to determine who may judicially enforce the statutory rights or obligations.[8] *240 It is in this sense that the Court of Appeals concluded that petitioner lacked a cause of action. The Court of Appeals reached this conclusion through the application of the criteria set out in for ascertaining whether a private cause of action may be implied from "a *24 statute not expressly providing one."[9] The Court of Appeals used these criteria to determine that those in petitioner's position should not be able to enforce the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause, and that petitioner therefore had no cause of action under the Amendment. This was error, for the question of who may enforce a statutory right is fundamentally different from the question of who may enforce a right that is protected by the Constitution. Statutory rights and obligations are established by Congress, and it is entirely appropriate for Congress, in creating these rights and obligations, to determine in addition who may enforce them and in what manner. For example, statutory rights and obligations are often embedded in complex regulatory schemes, so that if they are not enforced through private causes of action, they may nevertheless be enforced through alternative mechanisms, such as criminal prosecutions, see or other public causes of actions. See Securities Investor Protection National Railroad Passenger (4). In each case, however, the question is the nature of the legislative
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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case, however, the question is the nature of the legislative intent informing a specific statute, and Cort set out the criteria through which this intent could be discerned. The Constitution, on the other hand, does not "partake of the prolixity of a legal code." It speaks instead with a majestic simplicity. One of "its important objects," ibid., is the designation of rights. And in "its great outlines," ibid., the judiciary is clearly discernible as the primary means through which these rights may be enforced. As James Madison stated when he presented the Bill of Rights to the Congress: "If [these rights] are incorporated into the Constitution, independent tribunals of justice will consider themselves in a peculiar manner the guardians of those rights; they *242 will be an impenetrable bulwark against every assumption of power in the Legislative or Executive; they will be naturally led to resist every encroachment upon rights expressly stipulated for in the Constitution by the declaration of rights." Annals of Cong. 439 (789). At least in the absence of "a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of [an] issue to a coordinate political department," we presume that justiciable constitutional rights are to be enforced through the courts. And, unless such rights are to become merely precatory, the class of those litigants who allege that their own constitutional rights have been violated, and who at the same time have no effective means other than the judiciary to enforce these rights, must be able to invoke the existing jurisdiction of the courts for the protection of their justiciable constitutional rights. "The very essence of civil liberty," wrote Mr. Chief Justice Marshall in "certainly consists in the right of every individual to claim the protection of the laws, whenever he receives an injury. One of the first duties of government is to afford that protection." Traditionally, therefore, "it is established practice for this Court to sustain the jurisdiction of federal courts to issue injunctions to protect rights safeguarded by the Constitution and to restrain individual state officers from doing what the 4th Amendment forbids the State to do." See 403 U. S., 00 Indeed, this Court has already settled that a cause of action may be implied directly under the equal protection component of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment in favor of those who seek to enforce this constitutional right.[20] The plaintiffs in for example, claimed that they had been refused admission into certain public schools in the District of Columbia solely on account of their race. They rested their suit directly on the Fifth Amendment and on the
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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their suit directly on the Fifth Amendment and on the general federal-question jurisdiction of the district courts, 28 U.S. C. 33. The District Court dismissed their complaint for failure "to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 2 (b) (6). This Court reversed. Plaintiffs were clearly the appropriate parties to bring such a suit, and this Court held that equitable relief should be made available. Like the plaintiffs in petitioner rests her claim directly on the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. She claims that her rights under the Amendment have been violated, and that she has no effective means other than the judiciary to vindicate these rights.[2]*244 We conclude, therefore, that she is an appropriate party to invoke the general federal-question jurisdiction of the District Court to seek relief. She has a cause of action under the Fifth Amendment.[22] Although petitioner has a cause of action, her complaint might nevertheless be dismissed under Rule 2 (b) (6) unless it can be determined that judicial relief is available. We therefore proceed to consider whether a damages remedy is an appropriate form of relief. *245 C We approach this inquiry on the basis of established law. "[I]t is well settled that where legal rights have been invaded, and a federal statute provides for a general right to sue for such invasion, federal courts may use any available remedy to make good the wrong done." holds that in appropriate circumstances a federal district court may provide relief in damages for the violation of constitutional rights if there are "no special factors counselling hesitation in the absence of affirmative action by Congress." See 438 U. S., 04. First, a damages remedy is surely appropriate in this case. "Historically, damages have been regarded as the ordinary remedy for an invasion of personal interests in liberty." Relief in damages would be judicially manageable, for the case presents a focused remedial issue without difficult questions of valuation or causation. See 403 U.S., 09 Litigation under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 964 has given federal courts great experience evaluating claims for backpay due to illegal sex discrimination. See 42 U.S. C. 2000e-5 (g). Moreover, since respondent is no longer a Congressman, see n. equitable relief in the form of reinstatement would be unavailing. And there are available no other alternative forms of judicial relief. For Davis, as for "it is damages or nothing."[23], 0 *246 Second, although a suit against a Congressman for putatively unconstitutional actions taken in the course of his official conduct does raise special
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110097/davis-v-passman/
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in the course of his official conduct does raise special concerns counseling hesitation, we hold that these concerns are coextensive with the protections afforded by the Speech or Debate Clause.[24] See n. If respondent's actions are not shielded by the Clause, we apply the principle that "legislators ought generally to be bound by [the law] as are ordinary persons." 65 (2). Cf. 42 U.S. 306, (3). As stated only last Term: "Our system of jurisprudence rests on the assumption that all individuals, whatever their position in government, are subject to federal law: "`No man in this country is so high that he is above the law. No officer of the law may set that law at defiance with impunity. All officers of the government, from the highest to the lowest, are creatures of the law, and are bound to obey it.' United States v. Lee, 06 U. S. [96,] 220 [(882)]." 438 U.S., 06.[25] Third, there is in this case "no explicit congressional declaration *247 that persons" in petitioner's position injured by unconstitutional federal employment discrimination "may not recover money damages from" those responsible for the injury. (Emphasis supplied.) The Court of Appeals apparently interpreted 77 of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 964, 86 Stat. 42 U.S. C. 2000e-6, as an explicit congressional prohibition against judicial remedies for those in petitioner's position. When 77 was added to Title VII to protect federal employees from discrimination, it failed to extend this protection to congressional employees such as petitioner who are not in the competitive service.[26] See 42 U.S. C. 2000e-6 (a). There is no evidence, however, that Congress meant 77 to foreclose alternative remedies available to those not covered by the statute. Such silence is far from "the clearly discernible will of Congress" perceived by the Court of Indeed, the Court of Appeals' conclusion that 77 permits judicial relief to be made available only to those who are protected by the statute is patently inconsistent with which held that equitable relief was available in a challenge to the constitutionality of Civil Service Commission regulations excluding aliens from federal employment. That 77 does not prohibit discrimination on the basis of alienage[27] did not prevent Hampton from authorizing relief. In a similar manner, we do not now interpret 77 to foreclose the judicial remedies of those expressly unprotected by the statute. On the contrary, 77 leaves undisturbed whatever remedies petitioner might otherwise possess. *248 Finally, the Court of Appeals appeared concerned that, if a damages remedy were made available to petitioner, the danger existed "of deluging federal courts with claims"
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Justice Brennan
| 1,979 | 13 |
majority
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Davis v. Passman
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petitioner, the danger existed "of deluging federal courts with claims" We do not perceive the potential for such a deluge. By virtue of 42 U.S. C. 983, a damages remedy is already available to redress injuries such as petitioner's when they occur under color of state law. Moreover, a plaintiff seeking a damages remedy under the Constitution must first demonstrate that his constitutional rights have been violated. We do not hold that every tort by a federal official may be redressed in damages. See (963). And, of course, were Congress to create equally effective alternative remedies, the need for damages relief might be obviated. See 403 U. S., But perhaps the most fundamental answer to the concerns expressed by the Court of Appeals is that provided by Mr. Justice Harlan concurring in : "Judicial resources, I am well aware, are increasingly scarce these days. Nonetheless, when we automatically close the courthouse door solely on this basis, we implicitly express a value judgment on the comparative importance of classes of legally protected interests. And current limitations upon the effective functioning of the courts arising from budgetary inadequacies should not be permitted to stand in the way of the recognition of otherwise sound constitutional principles." We conclude, therefore, that in this case, as in if petitioner is able to prevail on the merits, she should be able to redress her injury in damages, a "remedial mechanism normally available in the federal courts." III We hold today that the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, en banc, must be reversed because petitioner has a *249 cause of action under the Fifth Amendment, and because her injury may be redressed by a damages The Court of Appeals did not consider, however, whether respondent's conduct was shielded by the Speech or Debate Clause of the Constitution. Accordingly, we do not reach this question. And, of course, we express no opinion as to the merits of petitioner's complaint. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. So ordered. MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURGER, with whom MR. JUSTICE POWELL and MR.
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Justice Marshall
| 1,978 | 15 |
concurring
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Mincey v. Arizona
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109905/mincey-v-arizona/
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I join the opinion of the Court, which holds that petitioner's rights under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments have been violated. I write today to emphasize a point that is illustrated by the instant case, but that applies more generally to all cases in which we are asked to review Fourth Amendment issues arising out of state criminal convictions. It is far from clear that we would have granted certiorari solely to resolve the involuntary-statement issue in this case, for that could have been resolved on federal habeas corpus. With regard to the Fourth Amendment issue, however, we had little choice but to grant review, because our decision in precludes federal habeas consideration of such issues. In Stone the Court held that, "where the State has provided an opportunity for full and fair litigation of a Fourth Amendment claim, a state prisoner may not be granted federal habeas corpus relief on the ground that evidence obtained in an unconstitutional search or seizure was introduced at his trial." Because of this holding, petitioner would not have been able to present to a federal habeas court the Fourth Amendment claim that the Court today unanimously upholds. The additional responsibilities placed on this Court in the wake of Stone become apparent upon examination of decisions *403 of the Arizona Supreme Court on the Fourth Amendment issue presented here. The Arizona court created its "murder scene exception" in a 71 case. When the Arizona Supreme Court next gave plenary consideration to the issue, prior to our decision in Stone, it apparently felt bound by the Ninth Circuit's Sample decision, although it found the case before it to be distinguishable.[1] When the Arizona Supreme Court rendered its decision in the instant case, however, it took a different approach. The decision, issued nearly a year after Stone, merely noted that the Ninth Circuit had "disagreed" with the Arizona court's view of the validity of the murder-scene exception. It thus created an effective "conflict" for us to resolve. Cf. this Court's Rule (1) (b). If certiorari had not been granted, we would have left standing a decision of the State's highest court on a question of federal constitutional law that had been resolved in a directly opposing way by the highest federal court having * special responsibility for the State. Regardless of which court's view of the Constitution was the correct one, such nonuniformity on Fourth Amendment questions is obviously undesirable; it is as unfair to state prosecutors and judges who must make difficult determinations regarding what evidence is subject to exclusionas it is to state criminal
|
Justice Marshall
| 1,978 | 15 |
concurring
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Mincey v. Arizona
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109905/mincey-v-arizona/
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evidence is subject to exclusionas it is to state criminal defendants. Prior to there would have been no need to grant certiorari in a case such as this, since the federal habeas remedy would have been available to the defendant. Indeed, prior to Stone petitioner here probably would not even have had to utilize federal habeas, since the Arizona courts were at that earlier time more inclined to follow the federal constitutional pronouncements of the Ninth Circuit, as discussed above. But Stone eliminated the habeas remedy with regard to Fourth Amendment violations, thus allowing state-court rulings to diverge from lower federal-court rulings on these issues and placing a correspondingly greater burden on this Court to ensure uniform federal law in the Fourth Amendment area. At the time of Stone my Brother BRENNAN wrote that "institutional constraints totally preclude any possibility that this Court can adequately oversee whether state courts have properly applied federal law." ; see Because of these constraints, we will often be faced with a Hobson's choice in cases of less than national significance that could formerly have been left to the lower federal courts: either to deny certiorari and thereby let stand divergent state and federal decisions with regard to Fourth Amendment rights; or to grant certiorari and thereby add to our calendar, which many believe is already overcrowded, cases that might better have been resolved elsewhere. In view of this problem and others,[2] I hope that the *405 Court will at some point reconsider the wisdom of[3] MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST, concurring in part and dissenting in part. Petitioner was indicted for murder, assault, and three counts of narcotics offenses. He was convicted on all charges. On appeal, the Supreme Court of Arizona reversed all but the narcotics convictions. In his petition for certiorari, petitioner challenged the introduction of evidence material to his narcotics convictions that was seized during a lengthy warrantless search of his apartment. Petitioner also challenged on voluntariness grounds the introduction of various statements made to the police relating to the murder charge. We granted certiorari, and the Court today reverses the Supreme Court of Arizona on both issues. While I agree with the Court that the warrantless search was not justifiable on the grounds advanced by the Arizona Supreme Court, I dissent from the Court's holding that Mincey's statements were involuntary and thus inadmissible. I I join Part I of the Court's opinion. As the Supreme Court of Arizona recognized, the four-day warrantless search of petitioner's apartment did not, on the facts developed at trial, "fit within [any] usual `exigent circumstances' exception." Instead,
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Justice Marshall
| 1,978 | 15 |
concurring
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Mincey v. Arizona
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109905/mincey-v-arizona/
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at trial, "fit within [any] usual `exigent circumstances' exception." Instead, the State of *406 Arizona asks us to adopt a separate "murder scene" exception to the warrant requirement and the Court, for the reasons stated in its opinion, correctly rejects this invitation. I write separately on this issue only to emphasize that the question of what, if any, evidence was seized under established Fourth Amendment standards is left open for the Arizona courts to resolve on remand. Ante, at 395 n. 9. Much of the evidence introduced by the State at trial was apparently removed from the apartment the same day as the shooting. App. 40. And the State's brief suggests that some evidence for example, blood on the floorrequired immediate examination. Brief for Respondent 70-71. The question of what evidence would have been "lost, destroyed, or removed" if a warrant had been obtained, ante, at 394, otherwise required an immediate search, or was in plain view should be considered on remand by the Arizona courts. In considering whether exigencies required the search for or seizure of particular evidence, the previous events within the apartment cannot be ignored. I agree with the Court that the police's entry to arrest Mincey, followed by the shooting and the search for victims, did not justify the later four-day search of the apartment. Ante, at 391-392. But the constitutionality of a particular search is a question of reasonableness and depends on "a balance between the public interest and the individual's right to personal security free from arbitrary interference by law officers." United See In we held that once a motor vehicle had been lawfully detained for a traffic violation, police officers could constitutionally order the driver out of the vehicle. In so holding, we emphasized that the challenged intrusion was "occasioned not by the initial stop of the vehicle, which was admittedly justified, but by the order to get out of the car. We think this additional intrusion can only be described as de minimis." *407 Similarly, in the instant case, the prior intrusions occasioned by the shooting and the police's response thereto may legitimize a search under some exigencies that in tamer circumstances might not permit a search. II The Court in Part II of its opinion advises the Arizona courts on the admissibility of certain statements made by Mincey that are relevant only to the murder charge. Because Mincey's murder conviction was reversed by the Arizona Supreme Court, and it is not certain that there will be a retrial. I would not reach this issue. Since the Court addresses the issue, however,
|
Justice Marshall
| 1,978 | 15 |
concurring
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Mincey v. Arizona
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109905/mincey-v-arizona/
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reach this issue. Since the Court addresses the issue, however, I must register my disagreement with its conclusion. Before trial, Mincey moved to suppress as involuntary certain statements that he had made while confined in an intensive care unit some hours after the shooting. As the Court acknowledges, the trial court found "`with unmistakable clarity'" that the statements were voluntary, ante, at 397 n. 12, and the Supreme Court of Arizona unanimously affirmed. -480, 566 P. 2d, at 280-281. This Court now disagrees and holds that "Mincey's statements were not `the product of his free and rational choice'" and therefore "cannot be used in any way against [him] at his trial." Ante, at 401, 402. Because I believe that the Court both has failed to accord the state-court finding the deference that the Court has always found such findings due and also misapplied our past precedents, I dissent. As the Court notes, ante, at 398, past cases of this Court hold that a state-court finding as to voluntariness which is "not fairly supported by the record cannot be conclusive of federal rights." (63) Instead, these cases require the Court to "make an independent determination on the undisputed facts." 0 (52) ; *408 U.S. 401, (45). It is well established that, "for purposes of review in this Court, the determination of the trial judge or of the jury will ordinarily be taken to resolve evidentiary conflicts and may be entitled to some weight even with respect to the ultimate conclusion on the crucial issue of voluntariness." (63). See 314 U.S. 2, (41); 361 U.S. 9, (60). Such deference, particularly on the resolution of evidentiary conflicts, "is particularly apposite because the trial judge and jury are closest to the trial scene and thus afforded the best opportunity to evaluate contradictory testimony." The Court in this case, however, ignores entirely some evidence of voluntariness and distinguishes away yet other testimony. There can be no discounting that Mincey was seriously wounded and laden down with medical equipment. Mincey was certainly not able to move about and, because of the breathing tube in his mouth, had to answer Detective Hust's questions on paper. But the trial court was certainly not required to find, as the Court would imply, that Mincey was "a seriously and painfully wounded man on the edge of consciousness." Ante, at 401. Nor is it accurate to conclude that Detective Hust "ceased the interrogation only during intervals when Mincey lost consciousness or received medical treatment, and after each such interruption returned relentlessly to his task." As the Arizona Supreme Court observed in
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Justice Marshall
| 1,978 | 15 |
concurring
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Mincey v. Arizona
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109905/mincey-v-arizona/
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to his task." As the Arizona Supreme Court observed in affirming the trial court's finding of voluntariness, Mincey's nurse "testified that she had not given [Mincey] any medication and that [he] was alert and able to understand the officer's questions. She said that [Mincey] was in moderate pain but was very cooperative with everyone. The interrogating officer also testified that [Mincey] did not appear to be under the influence of drugs and that *409 [his] answers were generally responsive to the questions." See App. 50-51 (testimony of Detective Hust), 63 and 66 (testimony of Nurse Graham).[1] The uncontradicted testimony of Detective Hust also reveals a questioning that was far from "relentless." While the interviews took place over a three-hour time span, the interviews were not "very long; probably not more than an hour total for everything." Hust would leave the room whenever Mincey received medical treatment "or if it looked like he was getting a little bit exhausted." According to Detective Hust, Mincey never "los[t] consciousness at any time." As the Court openly concedes, there were in this case none of the "gross abuses that have led the Court in other cases to find confessions involuntary, such as beatings or `truth serums.'" Ante, at 401. Neither is this a case, however, where the defendant's will was "simply overborne" by "mental coercion." Cf. ; (66); 390 U.S. 5, As the Supreme Court of Arizona observed, it was the testimony of both Detective Hust and Nurse Graham "that neither mental or physical force nor abuse was used on [Mincey] Nor were any promises made." 566 P. 2d. at 281. See App. 58-59 (testimony of Detective Hust) and 63 (testimony of Nurse Graham). According to Mincey's own testimony, he wanted *410 to help Hust "the best I could" and tried to answer each question "to the best of my recollection at the time that this was going on." Mincey did not claim that he felt compelled by Detective Hust to answer the questions propounded.[2] Cf. at By all of these standards enunciated in our previous cases, I think the Court today goes too far in substituting its own judgment for the judgment of a trial court and the highest court of a State, both of which decided these disputed issues differently than does this Court, and both of which were a good deal closer to the factual occurrences than is this Court. Admittedly we may not abdicate our duty to decide questions of constitutional law under the guise of wholly remitting to state courts the function of fact finding which is a necessary
|
Justice Thomas
| 2,015 | 1 |
second_dissenting
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Comptroller of Treasury of Md. v. Wynne
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2801433/comptroller-of-treasury-of-md-v-wynne/
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“I continue to adhere to my view that the negative Commerce Clause has no basis in the text of the Constitu- tion, makes little sense, and has proved virtually unwork- able in application, and, consequently, cannot serve as a basis for striking down a state statute.” McBurney v. Young, 569 U. S. (2013) (THOMAS, J., concurring) (slip op., ) (internal quotation marks and alteration omitted); accord, e.g., Camps Newfound/Owatonna, Inc. v. Town of Harrison, (THOMAS, J., dissenting). For that reason, I would uphold Maryland’s tax In reaching the contrary conclusion, the Court proves just how far our negative Commerce Clause jurisprudence has departed from the actual Commerce Clause. Accord- ing to the majority, a state income tax that fails to provide residents with “a full credit against the income taxes that they pay to other States” violates the Commerce Clause. Ante, That news would have come as a surprise to those who penned and ratified the Constitution. As this Court observed some time ago, “Income taxes were imposed by several of the States at or shortly after the adoption of the Federal Constitution.” 2 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF* There is no indication that those early state income tax schemes provided credits for income taxes paid elsewhere. Thus, under the majority’s reason- ing, all of those state laws would have contravened the newly ratified Commerce Clause. It seems highly implausible that those who ratified the Commerce Clause understood it to conflict with the in- come tax laws of their States and nonetheless adopted it without a word of concern. That silence is particularly deafening given the importance of such taxes for raising revenues at the time. See Kinsman, The Income Tax in the Commonwealths of the United States 7, in 4 Publica- tions of the American Economic Assn. (1903) (noting, for example, that “Connecticut from her earliest history had followed the plan of taxing incomes rather than property” and that “[t]he total assessed value of [taxable] incomes in Connecticut in the year 95 was a little over $300,000” ). In other areas of constitutional analysis, we would have considered these laws to be powerful evidence of the origi- nal understanding of the Constitution. We have, for ex- —————— * See, e.g., 77–78 Mass. Acts ch. 13, p. 756 (taxing “the amount of [inhabitants’] income from any profession, faculty, handi- craft, trade or employment; and on the amount of all incomes and profits gained by trading by sea and on shore”); 81 Pa. Laws ch. 961, p. 390 (providing that “[a]ll offices and posts of profit, trades, occupations and professions (that of
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and posts of profit, trades, occupations and professions (that of ministers of the gospel of all denominations and schoolmasters only excepted), shall be rated at the discretion of the township, ward or district assessors having due regard of the profits arising from them”); see Report of Oliver Wolcott, Jr., Secretary of the Treasury, to 4th Cong., 2d Sess., concern- ing Direct Taxes (96), in 1 American State Papers, Finance 414, 4 (1832) (describing Connecticut’s income tax as assessing, as relevant, “the estimated gains or profits arising from any, and all, lucrative professions, trades, and occupations”); (noting that, in Delaware, “[t]axes have been hitherto collected on the estimated annual income of the inhabitants of this State, without reference to specific objects”). Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 3 THOMAS, J., dissenting ample, relied on the practices of the First Congress to guide our interpretation of provisions defining congres- sional power. See, e.g., Golan v. Holder, 565 U. S. (2012) (slip op., 6) (Copyright Clause); McCulloch v. Maryland, (Necessary and Proper Clause). We have likewise treated “actions taken by the First Congress a[s] presumptively consistent with the Bill of Rights,” Town of v. Galloway, 572 U. S. (2014) (ALITO, J., concurring) (slip op., 2). See, e.g., at – (majority opinion) (slip op., – 8); And we have looked to founding-era state laws to guide our understanding of the Constitution’s meaning. See, e.g., District of 600–602 (Second Amendment); Atwater v. Lago Vista, 532 U.S. 318, 337–340 (1) (Fourth Amendment); Roth v. United States, (First Amendment); U.S. 168, 202– (1881) (Speech and Debate Clause); see Calder v. Bull, (Ex Post Facto Clause). Even if one assumed that the negative Commerce Clause existed, I see no reason why it would be subject to a different mode of constitutional interpretation. The majority quibbles that I fail to “sho[w] that the small number of individuals who earned income out of State were taxed twice on that income,” ante, at 28, but given the deference we owe to the duly enacted laws of a State— particularly those concerning the paradigmatically sover- eign activity of taxation—the burden of proof falls on those who would wield the Federal Constitution to foreclose that exercise of sovereign power. I am doubtful that the majority’s application of one of our many negative Commerce Clause tests is correct under our precedents, see ante, at 5–7 (SCALIA, J., dissent- ing); post, 0–19 (GINSBURG, J., dissenting), but I am 4 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF certain that the majority’s result is incorrect under our Constitution. As was well said in another area of constitu- tional law: “[I]f
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well said in another area of constitu- tional law: “[I]f there is any inconsistency between [our] tests and the historic practice the inconsistency calls into question the validity of the test, not the historic prac- tice.” Town of at (ALITO, J., concurring) (slip op., 2). I respectfully dissent. Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 1 GINSBURG, J., dissenting SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES No. 13–485 COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY OF MARYLAND, PETITIONER v. BRIAN WYNNE ET UX. ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF APPEALS OF MARYLAND [May 18, 2015] JUSTICE GINSBURG, with whom JUSTICE SCALIA and JUSTICE KAGAN join, dissenting. Today’s decision veers from a principle of interstate and international taxation repeatedly acknowledged by this Court: A nation or State “may tax all the income of its residents, even income earned outside the taxing jurisdic- tion.” Oklahoma Tax Comm’n v. 5 U.S. 450, 462–463 In accord with this principle, the Court has regularly rejected claims that taxes on a resident’s out-of-state income violate the Due Process Clause for lack of a sufficient “connection” to the taxing State. Quill (1992) ; see, e.g., Law- (1932). But under dormant Commerce Clause jurispru- dence, the Court decides, a State is not really empowered to tax a resident’s income from whatever source derived. In taxing personal income, the Court holds, source-based authority, i.e., authority to tax commerce conducted within a State’s territory, boxes in the taxing authority of a tax- payer’s domicile. As I see it, nothing in the Constitution or in prior deci- sions of this Court dictates that one of two States, the domiciliary State or the source State, must recede simply because both have lawful tax regimes reaching the same 2 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting income. See Moorman Mfg. 277, n. 12 (1978) (finding no “discriminat[ion] against interstate commerce” where alleged taxation disparities were “the consequence of the combined effect” of two other- wise lawful income-tax schemes). True, Maryland elected to deny a credit for income taxes paid to other States in computing a resident’s county tax liability. It is equally true, however, that the other States that taxed the Wynnes’ income elected not to offer them a credit for their Maryland county income taxes. In this situation, the Constitution does not prefer one lawful basis for state taxation of a person’s income over the other. Nor does it require one State, in this case Maryland, to limit its residence-based taxation, should the State choose to exercise, to the full extent, its source-based authority. States often offer their residents credits for income
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source-based authority. States often offer their residents credits for income taxes paid to other States, as Maryland does for state income tax purposes. States do so, however, as a matter of tax “policy,” 5 U.S., at 463, n. 12 (inter- nal quotation marks omitted), not because the Constitu- tion compels that course. I For at least a century, “domicile” has been recognized as a secure ground for taxation of residents’ worldwide in- come. “Enjoyment of the privileges of residence within [a] state, and the attendant right to invoke the protection of its laws,” this Court has explained, “are inseparable from the responsibility for sharing the costs of government.” “A tax measured by the net income of residents is an equitable method of distributing the burdens of government among those who are privileged to enjoy its benefits.” New York ex rel. Cohn v. More is given to the residents of a State than to those who reside elsewhere, therefore more may be demanded of Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 3 GINSBURG, J., dissenting them. With this Court’s approbation, States have long favored their residents over nonresidents in the provision of local services. See Reeves, 442 (1980) (such favoritism does not violate the Commerce Clause). See (upholding residency requirements for free primary and secondary schooling). The cost of services residents enjoy is substantial. According to the State’s Comptroller, for example, in 2012 Maryland and its local governments spent over $11 billion to fund public schools, $4 billion for state health programs, and $1.1 billion for the State’s food supplemental program—all programs available to resi- dents only. Brief for Petitioner 20–. See Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 18 (Howard County— where the Wynnes lived in 6—budgeted more than $903 million for education in fiscal year 2014). Excluding nonresidents from these services, this Court has observed, is rational for it is residents “who fund the state treasury and whom the State was created to serve.” Reeves, 447 U.S., at 442. A taxpayer’s home State, then, can hardly be faulted for making support of local government activi- ties an obligation of every resident, regardless of any obligations residents may have to other States.1 Residents, moreover, possess political means, not shared by outsiders, to ensure that the power to tax their income is not abused. “It is not,” this Court has observed, “a purpose of the Commerce Clause to protect state residents from their own state taxes.” v. Sweet, 488 U.S. 252, 266 (1989). The reason is evident. Residents are —————— 1 The Court offers no response to this reason for permitting a
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Court offers no response to this reason for permitting a State to tax its residents’ worldwide income, other than to urge that Commerce Clause doctrine ought not favor corporations over individuals. See ante, 0–11. I scarcely disagree with that proposition (nor does this opinion suggest otherwise). But I fail to see how it answers, or is even relevant to, my observation that affording residents greater benefits entitles a State to require that they bear a greater tax burden. 4 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting “insider[s] who presumably [are] able to complain about and change the tax through the [State’s] political process.” Nonresidents, by contrast, are not similarly posi- tioned to “effec[t] legislative change.” As Chief Justice Marshall, developer of the Court’s Commerce Clause jurisprudence, reasoned: “In imposing a tax the legislature acts upon its constituents. This is in general a sufficient security against erroneous and oppressive taxa- tion.” The “people of a State” can thus “res[t] confidently on the interest of the legislator, and on the influence of the con- stituents over their representative, to guard them against abuse” of the “right of taxing themselves and their property.” 2 I hardly maintain, as the majority insistently asserts I do, that “the Commerce Clause places no constraint on a State’s power to tax” its residents. Ante, 3. See ante, 1–15. This Court has not shied away from strik- ing down or closely scrutinizing state efforts to tax resi- dents at a higher rate for out-of-state activities than for in- state activities (or to exempt from taxation only in-state activities). See, e.g., Department of Revenue of Ky. v. Davis, ; Camps Newfound/ Owatonna, —————— 2 The majority dismisses what we said in v. Sweet, 488 U.S. 252 (1989), as “dictum” allegedly “repudiated” by the Court in West Lynn 2 U.S. 186, Ante, 1– 12. That is doubly wrong. In we distinguished the tax struck down in American Trucking Assns., noting, in particular, that the tax in ATA I fell on “out- of-state[rs]” whereas the tax in fell on “the insider who presumably is able to complain about and change the tax through the Illinois political process.” Essential to our holding, this rationale cannot be written off as “dictum.” As for West Lynn far from “repudiat[ing]” the Court cited and reaffirmed its political safeguards rationale, as explained below. See infra this page and 5. Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 5 GINSBURG, J., dissenting ; Fulton 6 U.S. 325 ; Bacchus Imports, See ante, 1, and n. 3, 14–15 (mistakenly charging that under my analysis “all of these
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14–15 (mistakenly charging that under my analysis “all of these cases would be thrown into doubt”). “[P]olitical processes” are ill equipped to guard against such facially discriminatory taxes because the effect of a tax of this sort is to “mollif[y]” some of the “in-state interests [that] would otherwise lobby against” it. West Lynn 2 U.S. 186, By contrast, the Court has generally upheld “even- handed tax[es] in spite of any adverse effects on interstate commerce, in part because ‘[t]he existence of major in-state interests adversely affected is a power- ful safeguard against legislative abuse.’ ” (citing, inter alia, ). That justification applies with full force to the “evenhanded tax” challenged here, which taxes residents’ income at the same rate whether earned in-state or out-of-state.3 These rationales for a State taxing its residents’ world- wide income are not diminished by another State’s inde- pendent interest in “requiring contributions from [nonres- idents] who realize current pecuniary benefits under the protection of the [State’s] government.” A taxpayer living in one State and working in another gains protection and benefits from both—and so can be called upon to share in the costs of —————— 3 Given the pedigree of this rationale, applying it here would hardly “work a sea change in our Commerce Clause jurisprudence.” Ante, at 14. See United Haulers Assn., (7); 488 U.S., at 266; 473, n. (1981); Raymond Motor Transp., 444, n. 18 (1978); South Carolina Highway Nor would applying the rationale to a net income tax cast “doubt” on the Court’s gross receipts precedents, ante, 4–15, given the Court’s longstanding practice of evaluating income and gross receipt taxes differently, see infra, 2–14. 6 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting both States’ governments. States deciding whether to tax residents’ entire world- wide income must choose between legitimate but compet- ing tax policy objectives. A State might prioritize obtain- ing equal contributions from those who benefit from the State’s protection in roughly similar ways. Or a State might prioritize ensuring that its taxpayers are not sub- ject to double taxation. A State cannot, however, accom- plish both objectives at once. To illustrate, consider the Wynnes. Under the tax scheme in place in 6, other Howard County residents who earned their income in-state but who otherwise had the same tax profile as the Wynnes (e.g., $2.67 million in taxable net income) owed the same amount of taxes to Maryland as the Wynnes. See App. to Pet. for Cert. A–56. The scheme thus ensured that all residents with similar access to the State’s protection and benefits and similar ability to
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to the State’s protection and benefits and similar ability to pay made equal contributions to the State to defray the costs of those benefits. Maryland could not achieve that objective, however, without exposing the Wynnes to a risk of double taxation. Conversely, the Court prioritizes reducing the risk that the Wynnes’ in- come will be taxed twice by two different States. But that choice comes at a cost: The Wynnes enjoyed equal access to the State’s services but will have paid $25,000 less to cover the costs of those services than similarly situated neighbors who earned their income entirely within the State. See Pet. for Cert. 15. States confront the same trade-off when deciding whether to tax nonresidents’ entire in-state income. A State can require all residents and nonresidents who work within the State under its protection to contribute equally to the cost of that protection. Or the State can seek to avoid exposing its workers to any risk of double taxation. But it cannot achieve both objectives. For at least a century, responsibility for striking the Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 7 GINSBURG, J., dissenting right balance between these two policy objectives has belonged to the States (and Congress), not this Court. Some States have chosen the same balance the Court embraces today. See ante, at But since almost the dawn of the modern era of state income taxation, other States have taken the same approach as Maryland does now, taxing residents’ entire income, wherever earned, while at the same time taxing nonresidents’ entire in-state income. And recognizing that “[p]rotection, benefit, and power over [a taxpayer’s income] are not confined to ei- ther” the State of residence or the State in which income is earned, this Court has long afforded States that flexibility. This history of States imposing and this Court upholding income tax schemes materially identical to the one the Court con- fronts here should be the beginning and end of this case. The modern era of state income taxation dates from a Wisconsin tax enacted in 1911. See 1911 Wis. Laws ch. 658; R. Blakey, State Income Taxation 1 (1930). From close to the start of this modern era, States have taxed residents and nonresidents in ways materially indistin- guishable from the way Maryland does now. In 1915, for example, Oklahoma began taxing residents’ “entire net income arising or accruing from all sources,” while at the same time taxing nonresidents’ “entire net income from [sources] in th[e] State.” 1915 Okla. Sess. Laws ch. 164, pp. 2–3 Like Maryland today, Oklahoma provided no credit to either residents
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Like Maryland today, Oklahoma provided no credit to either residents or nonresidents for taxes paid elsewhere. See ch. 164, et seq., at 2–7. In 19, neighboring Missouri adopted a similar scheme: Residents owed taxes on their “entire net income from all sources” and nonresidents owed taxes on their “entire net income from all sources within th[e] state.” 19 Mo. Laws (a), pp. 524–525 Missouri too provided neither residents nor nonresidents a credit for taxes paid to other jurisdic- 8 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting tions. See et seq., at 524–538. Thus, much like Maryland today, these early income tax adopters simulta- neously taxed residents on all income, wherever earned, and nonresidents on all income earned within the State.4 Almost immediately, this Court began issuing what became a long series of decisions, repeatedly upholding States’ authority to tax both residents’ worldwide income and nonresidents’ in-state income. E.g., ; Shaffer, 252 U.S., at 52–53, 57 (nonresident income tax). See State Tax Comm’n of 316 U.S. 4, 8 (1942); 307 U.S., at ; Guaranty Trust Co. v. Virginia, ; 300 U.S., at ; 286 U.S., at By the end of the 20th cen- tury, it was “a well-established principle of interstate and international taxation” that “sovereigns have authority to tax all income of their residents, including income earned outside their borders,” 5 U.S., at 462, 463, n. 12, and that sovereigns generally may tax nonresidents on “income earned within the [sovereign’s] jurisdiction,” Far from suggesting that States must choose between taxing residents or nonresidents, this Court specifically affirmed that the exact same “income may be taxed [si- multaneously] both by the state where it is earned and by the state of the recipient’s domicile.” 307 U. S., at —————— 4 Unlike Maryland’s county income tax, these early 20th-century income taxes allowed a deduction for taxes paid to other jurisdictions. Compare App. 18 with 19 Mo. Laws pp. 526–527, and 1915 Okla. Sess. Laws p. 4. The Wynnes have not argued and the majority does not suggest, however, that Maryland could fully cure the asserted defects in its tax “scheme” simply by providing a deduction, in lieu of a tax credit. And I doubt that such a deduction would give the Wynnes much satisfaction: Deducting taxes paid to other States from the Wynnes’ $2.67 million taxable net income would reduce their Maryland tax burden by a small fraction of the $25,000 tax credit the majority awards them. See Pet. for Cert. 15; App. to Pet. for Cert. A–56. Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 9 GINSBURG, J., dissenting See
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as: 575 U. S. (2015) 9 GINSBURG, J., dissenting See 316 U.S., at 6– 8, 181 (rejecting “a rule of immunity from taxation by more than one state,” including with respect to income taxation ). In Law- rence, for example, this Court dealt with a Mississippi tax “scheme” with the same structure Maryland has today: Mississippi taxed residents on all income, wherever earned, and nonresidents on income earned within the State, without providing either set of taxpayers a credit for taxes paid elsewhere. See –279; Miss. Code Ann. (b)(9) (1930). upheld a Mississippi tax on net income earned by one of its resi- dents on the construction of public highways in Tennessee. See –. The Court did so fully aware that both Mississippi and Tennessee were effectively imposing “an income tax upon the same occupation.” Reply Brief in Law, O. T. 1931, No. 580, p. 32. See 307 U.S., at 363, n. 1, (discussing ). Likewise, in Guaranty Trust, both New York and Vir- ginia had taxed income of a New York trust that had been distributed to a Virginia –22. The resident sought to block Virginia’s tax in order to avoid “double taxation” of the “identical income.” at 22. Rejecting that challenge, the Court once again reiter- ated that “two States” may simultaneously tax the “same income.” The majority deems these cases irrelevant because they involved challenges brought under the Due Process Clause, not the Commerce Clause. See ante, 2–15. These cases are significant, however, not because the constraints imposed by the two Clauses are identical. Obviously, they are not. See Quill What the sheer volume and consistency of this precedent confirms, rather, is the degree to which this Court has— until now—endorsed the “well-established principle of 10 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting interstate and international taxation” that a State may tax its residents’ worldwide income, without restriction arising from the source-based taxes imposed by other States and regardless of whether the State chooses to impose source-based taxes of its own. 5 U.S., at 462.5 In any event, it is incorrect that support for this princi- ple is limited to the Court’s Due Process Clause cases. In Shaffer, for example, this Court rejected both a Due Pro- cess Clause challenge and a dormant Commerce Clause challenge to an income tax “scheme” (the Oklahoma stat- ute described above) with the very features the majority latches onto today: Oklahoma taxed residents on all worldwide income and nonresidents on all in-state income, without providing a credit for taxes paid elsewhere to either residents or –53 (Due Process
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taxes paid elsewhere to either residents or –53 (Due Process challenge); (dormant Commerce Clause challenge). See The specific tax chal- lenged in Shaffer—a tax on a nonresident’s in-state in- come—exposed taxpayers to the same risk of double taxa- tion as the Maryland tax challenged in this case. The majority labors mightily to distinguish Shaffer, but it does not dispute the one thing that ought to give it pause: Today’s decision overrules Shaffer’s dormant Commerce Clause holding. See ante, 5–16. I would not discard our precedents so lightly. Just as the tax in Shaffer en- countered no constitutional shoals, so Maryland’s scheme should survive the Court’s inspection. —————— 5 Upholding Maryland’s facially neutral tax hardly means, as the majority contends, ante, 2, that the dormant Commerce Clause places no limits on States’ authority to tax residents’ worldwide income. There are, for example, no well-established principles of interstate and international taxation permitting the kind of facially discriminatory tax the majority “[i]magine[s]” a State enacting. Nor are the political processes noted above an adequate safeguard against such a tax. See at 3–5. Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 11 GINSBURG, J., dissenting This Court’s decision in West Publishing Co. v. McColgan, 328 U.S. 8 reinforces that conclu- sion. In West Publishing, the Court summarily affirmed a decision of the California Supreme Court that denied a dormant Commerce Clause challenge based on the princi- ples today’s majority disrespects: “[T]here [is no] merit to the contention that [Califor- nia’s tax] discriminates against interstate commerce on the ground that it subjects part of plaintiff ’s in- come to double taxation, given the taxability of plain- tiff ’s entire net income in the state of its domicile. Taxation in one state is not an immunization against taxation in other states. Taxation by states in which a corporation carries on business activities is justified by the advantages that attend the pursuit of such ac- tivities. Income may be taxed both by the state where it is earned and by the state of the recipient’s domi- cile. Protection, benefit and power over the subject matter are not confined to either state.” 27 Cal. 2d 705, 710–711, (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). In treating the matter summarily, the Court rejected an argument strikingly similar to the one the majority now embraces: that California’s tax violated the dormant Commerce Clause because it subjected “interstate com- merce to the risk of a double tax burden.” Brief for Appellant Opposing Motion to Dismiss or Affirm in West Publishing Co. v. McColgan, O. T. 1945, No. 1255, pp. 20– 21 ). The long
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T. 1945, No. 1255, pp. 20– 21 ). The long history just recounted counsels in favor of respecting States’ authority to tax without discount its residents’ worldwide income. As Justice Holmes stated over a century ago, in regard to a “mode of taxation of long standing, the fact that the system has been in 12 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting force for a very long time is of itself a strong reason for leaving any improvement that may be desired to the legis- lature.” (1908). Only recently, this Court followed that sound advice in resisting a dormant Commerce Clause challenge to a taxing practice with a pedigree as enduring as the practice in this case. See Department of Revenue of Ky. v. Davis, (quoting Padell, 211 U.S., at ). Surely that advice merits application here, where the challenged tax draws support from both histori- cal practice and numerous decisions of this Court. The majority rejects Justice Holmes’ counsel, observing that most States, over time, have chosen not to exercise plenary authority to tax residents’ worldwide income. See ante, at –18. The Court, however, learns the wrong lesson from the “independent policy decision[s]” States have made. 5 U.S., at 463, n. 12 (emphasis added; internal quotation marks omitted). This history demonstrates not that States “doub[t]” their “constitu- tiona[l]” authority to tax residents’ income, wherever earned, as the majority speculates, ante, 8, but that the very political processes the Court disregards as “fanci- ful,” ante, 2, have in fact worked to produce policies the Court ranks as responsible—all the more reason to resist this Court’s heavy-handed supervision. The Court attempts to deflect the force of this his- tory and precedent by relying on a “trilogy” of decisions it finds “particularly instructive.” Ante, at 6–7 ; Gwin, White & Prince, ; J. D. Adams Mfg., ). As the majority acknowledges, however, those three decisions involved gross receipts taxes, not income taxes. Ante, –9. True, this Court has recently pointed to similarities between these two forms of taxation. See ante, at 9. But it is an indulgence in wishful thinking to say that this Court has Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 13 GINSBURG, J., dissenting previously “rejected the argument that the Commerce Clause distinguishes between” these taxes. Ante, at 9. For decades—including the years when the majority’s “trilogy” was decided—the Court has routinely maintained that “the difference between taxes on net income and taxes on gross receipts from interstate commerce warrants different results” under the Commerce Clause. C. Trost & P. Hartman, Federal Limitations on State and Local
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Trost & P. Hartman, Federal Limitations on State and Local Taxa- tion 2d 0:1 (3). In Shaffer, for example, the Court rejected the taxpay- er’s dormant Commerce Clause challenge because “the tax [was] imposed not upon gross receipts but only upon the net proceeds.” 252 U.S., Just three years before deciding J. D. Adams, the Court emphasized “mani- fest and substantial” differences between the two types of taxes, calling the burden imposed by a gross receipts tax “direct and immediate,” in contrast to the “indirect and incidental” burden imposed by an income tax. Stewart Dry Goods (quoting United States Glue Co. v. Town of Oak Creek, 247 U.S. 321, 328 (1918)). And the Gwin, White opinion observed that invalidating the gross receipts tax at issue “left to the states wide scope for taxation of those engaged in inter- state commerce, extending to net income derived from it.” The majority asserts that this Court “rejected” this distinction in Moorman Mfg. See ante, at 9. That decision in fact described gross receipts taxes as “more burden- some” than income taxes— In particular, Moorman upheld a state income tax because an earlier decision had upheld a similar but “inherently more burdensome” gross receipts tax. at To say that the constitutionality of an income tax follows a fortiori from the constitutionality of a similar but “more burdensome” gross receipts tax is to affirm, not reject, a distinction between the two. 14 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting The Justices participating in the Court’s “trilogy,” in short, would scarcely expect to see the three decisions invoked to invalidate a tax on net income. II Abandoning principles and precedent sustaining simul- taneous residence- and source-based income taxation, the Court offers two reasons for striking down Maryland’s county income tax: (1) the tax creates a risk of double taxation, ante, 18; and (2) the Court deems Mary- land’s income tax “scheme” “inherently discriminatory”— by which the Court means, the scheme fails the so-called “internal consistency” test, ante, at 21–22. The first objec- tion is overwhelmed by the history, recounted above, of States imposing and this Court upholding income taxes that carried a similar risk of double taxation. See at 6–12. The Court’s reliance on the internal consistency test is no more compelling. This Court has not rigidly required States to maintain internally consistent tax regimes. Before today, for two decades, the Court has not insisted that a tax under re- view pass the internal consistency test, see Oklahoma Tax 4 U.S. 5, and has not struck down a state tax for failing the
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Justice Thomas
| 2,015 | 1 |
second_dissenting
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Comptroller of Treasury of Md. v. Wynne
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2801433/comptroller-of-treasury-of-md-v-wynne/
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has not struck down a state tax for failing the test in nearly 30 years, see American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Scheiner, ; Tyler Pipe Industries, 483 U.S. 2, Moreover, the Court has rejected challenges to taxes that flunk the test. The Okla- homa tax “scheme” upheld under the dormant Commerce Clause in Shaffer, for example, is materially indistin- guishable from—therefore as internally inconsistent as— Maryland’s 252 U.S., And more recently, in American Trucking Assns., Inc. v. Michigan Pub. Serv. Comm’n, the Court upheld a “concede[dly]” internally inconsistent state tax. (5) Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 15 GINSBURG, J., dissenting The Court did so, satisfied that there was a sufficiently close connection between the tax at issue and the local conduct that triggered the tax. See ibid.6 The logic of ATA II, counsel for the Wynnes appeared to recognize, see Tr. of Oral Arg. 46–47, would permit a State to impose a head tax—i.e., a flat charge imposed on every resident in the State—even if that tax were part of an internally inconsistent tax Such a tax would rest on purely local conduct: the taxpayer’s residence in the taxing State. And the taxes paid would defray costs closely connected to that local conduct—the services used by the taxpayer while living in the State. I see no reason why the Constitution requires us to disarm States from using a progressive tax, rather than a flat toll, to cover the costs of local services all residents enjoy. A head tax and a residence-based income tax differ, do they not, only in that the latter is measured by each taxpayer’s ability to pay. Like the head tax, however, a residence-based income tax is triggered by the purely local conduct of residing in the State. And like the head tax, a residence-based income tax covers costs closely —————— 6 The majority reads American Trucking Assns., (5) in a way so implausible, it must resort to quoting from an amicus brief, rather than from the Court’s opinion. According to the majority, this Court did not think the challenged tax failed the internal consistency test in ATA II, it held only that the challengers had failed to make the necessary “empirical showing.” See ante, at 20–21, n. 7. It is true that the United States made that argument. See Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae in ATA II, O. T. 4, No. 03–10, p. 26. But one searches the U. S. Reports in vain for any indication that the Court adopted it. Which is hardly surprising, for one would scarcely think that a test
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Justice Thomas
| 2,015 | 1 |
second_dissenting
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Comptroller of Treasury of Md. v. Wynne
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2801433/comptroller-of-treasury-of-md-v-wynne/
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hardly surprising, for one would scarcely think that a test turning on “hypothetically” assessing a tax’s “structure,” ante, 9 (emphasis added), would require empirical data. What the Court in fact said in ATA II, is that the tax’s internal inconsistency would be excused be- cause any multiple taxation resulting from every State adopting the challenged tax would be caused by interstate firms’ choosing to “en- gag[e] in local business in all those States.” 545 U.S., at 16 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting connected to that residence: It finances services used by those living in the State. If a head tax qualifies for ATA II’s reprieve from internal consistency, then so too must a residence-based income tax. The majority asserts that because Maryland’s tax scheme is internally inconsistent, it “operates as a tariff,” making it “ ‘patently unconstitutional.’ ” Ante, at 22. This is a curious claim. The defining characteristic of a tariff is that it taxes interstate activity at a higher rate than it taxes the same activity conducted within the State. See West Lynn 2 U.S., 93. Maryland’s resi- dent income tax does the exact opposite: It taxes the in- come of its residents at precisely the same rate, whether the income is earned in-state or out-of-state.7 There is, moreover, a deep flaw in the Court’s chosen test. The Court characterizes internal consistency as a “cure,” ante, 8, 25–26, but the test is scarcely that, at least for the double taxation the Court believes to justify its intervention. According to the Court, Maryland’s tax “scheme” is internally inconsistent because Maryland simultaneously imposes two taxes: the county income tax and the special nonresident tax. See ante, 21–22, and n. 8. But only one of these taxes—the county income tax— actually falls on the Wynnes. Because it is the interaction between these two taxes that renders Maryland’s tax scheme internally inconsistent, Maryland could eliminate the inconsistency by terminating the special nonresident tax—a measure that would not help the Wynnes at all.8 Maryland could, in other words, bring itself into compli- ance with the test at the heart of the Court’s analysis without removing the double tax burden the test is pur- —————— 7 The majority faults the dissents for not “disput[ing]” its “economic analysis,” but beyond citation to a pair of amicus briefs, its opinion offers no analysis to dispute. Ante, at 22. 8 Or Maryland could provide nonresidents a credit for taxes paid to other jurisdictions on Maryland source income. Cf. ante, at 25–26. Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) GINSBURG, J., dissenting portedly designed
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Justice Thomas
| 2,015 | 1 |
second_dissenting
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Comptroller of Treasury of Md. v. Wynne
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2801433/comptroller-of-treasury-of-md-v-wynne/
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as: 575 U. S. (2015) GINSBURG, J., dissenting portedly designed to “cure.” To illustrate this oddity, consider the Court’s “simple example” of April (who lives and works in State A) and Bob (who lives in State A, but works in State B). Ante, at 21–22, 25. Both States fail the internal consistency test because they impose (1) a 1.25% tax on income that resi- dents earn in-state, (2) a 1.25% tax on income that resi- dents earn in other jurisdictions, and (3) a 1.25% tax on income that nonresidents earn in-state. According to the Court, these tax schemes are troubling because “Bob will pay more income tax than April solely because he earns income interstate.” Ante, at 22. Each State, however, need not pursue the same ap- proach to make their tax schemes internally consistent.9 See ante, at 25–26. State A might choose to tax residents’ worldwide income only, which it could do by eliminating tax #3 (on nonresidents’ in-state income). State B might instead choose exclusively to tax income earned within the State by deleting tax #2 (on residents’ out-of-state income). Each State’s tax scheme would then be internally con- sistent. But the tax burden on April and Bob would re- main unchanged: Just as under the original schemes, April would have to pay a 1.25% tax only once, to State A, and Bob would have to pay a 1.25% tax twice: once to State A, where he resides, and once to State B, where he earns the income. The Court’s “cure,” in other words, is no match for the perceived disease.10 —————— 9 I do not “clai[m]” as the Court groundlessly suggests, that the Court’s analysis “establish[es] [a] rule of priority” between resi- dence- and source-based taxation. Ante, at 25–26. My objection, rather, is that the Court treats source-based authority as “box[ing] in” a State’s discrete authority to tax on the basis of There is no “inconsisten[cy]” in my analysis, and the majority plainly errs in insisting that there is. Ante, at 25. 10 Attempting to preserve the test’s qualification as a “cure,” the Court redefines the illness as not just double taxation but double taxation caused by an “inherently discriminat[ory]” tax “” Ante, 18 COMPTROLLER OF TREASURY OF MD. v. WYNNE GINSBURG, J., dissenting The Court asserts that this flaw is just a “truism” of every discrimination case, whether brought under the dormant Commerce Clause or the Equal Protection Clause. Ante, at 26. That is simply incorrect. As the Court acknowledges, a government that impermissibly “treats like cases differently” (i.e., discriminates) can ordinarily cure the violation either
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| 2,015 | 1 |
second_dissenting
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Comptroller of Treasury of Md. v. Wynne
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/2801433/comptroller-of-treasury-of-md-v-wynne/
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cases differently” (i.e., discriminates) can ordinarily cure the violation either by “leveling up” or “leveling down.” Consider another April and Bob example. If Bob must pay a 10% tax and April must pay a 5% tax, that discrimina- tion can be eliminated either by requiring both to pay the 10% tax (“leveling up”) or by requiring both to pay the 5% tax (“leveling down”). True, “leveling up” leaves Bob’s tax bill unchanged. “Leveling up” nonetheless benefits Bob because it eliminates the unfairness of being treated differently. And if, as is often true in dormant Commerce Clause cases, April and Bob compete in the same market, then “leveling up” provides the concrete benefit of placing a new burden on Bob’s competitors. The majority’s rule does not work this way. As just explained, Maryland can “cure” what the majority deems discrimination without lowering the Wynnes’ taxes or increasing the tax burden on any of the Wynnes’ neigh- bors—by terminating the special nonresident tax. See 6–. The State can, in other words, satisfy the majority not by lowering Bob’s taxes or by raising April’s taxes, but by eliminating the taxes imposed on yet a third —————— 9–20. Relying on such a distinction to justify the test is entirely circular, however, as the Court defines “inherent discrimination” in this case as internal inconsistency. In any event, given the concern that purportedly drives the Court’s analysis, it is mystifying why the Court sees “virtue” in striking down only one of the two schemes under which Bob is taxed Ante, 9. Whatever disincentive the original scheme creates for Bob (or the Wynnes) to work in interstate commerce is created just as much by the revised scheme that the Court finds satisfactory. Cite as: 575 U. S. (2015) 19 GINSBURG, J., dissenting taxpayer (say, Cathy). The Court’s internal consis- tency test thus scarcely resembles “ordinary” anti- discrimination law. Whatever virtue the internal con- sistency test has in other contexts, this shortcoming makes it a poor excuse for jettisoning taxation principles as entrenched as those here. * * * This case is, at bottom, about policy choices: Should States prioritize ensuring that all who live or work within the State shoulder their fair share of the costs of govern- ment? Or must States prioritize avoidance of double taxation? As I have 6–19, achieving even the latter goal is beyond this Court’s com- petence. Resolving the competing tax policy considera- tions this case implicates is something the Court is even less well equipped to do. For a century, we have recog- nized that state legislatures and the Congress are
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Justice Stevens
| 1,983 | 16 |
majority
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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On April 24, petitioner John Anderson announced that he was an independent candidate for the office of President of the United States. Thereafter, his supporters by gathering the signatures of registered voters, filing required documents, and submitting filing fees were able to meet the substantive requirements for having his name placed on the ballot for the general election in November in all 50 States and the District of Columbia. On April 24, however, it was already too late for Anderson to qualify for a position on the ballot in Ohio and certain other States because the statutory deadlines for filing a statement of candidacy had already passed. The question presented by this case is whether Ohio's early filing deadline placed an unconstitutional burden on the voting and associational rights of Anderson's supporters. The facts are not in dispute. On May 16, Anderson's supporters tendered a nominating petition containing approximately 14,500 signatures and a statement of candidacy to respondent Celebrezze, the Ohio Secretary of State. These documents would have entitled Anderson to a place on the ballot if they had been filed on or before March 20, Respondent refused to accept the petition solely because it had not been filed within the time required by 3513.25.7 of *783 the Ohio Revised Code.[1] Three days later Anderson and three voters, two registered in Ohio and one in New Jersey, commenced this action in the United States District for the Southern District of Ohio, challenging the constitutionality of Ohio's early filing deadline for independent candidates. The District granted petitioners' motion for summary judgment and ordered respondent to place Anderson's name on the general election The District held that the statutory deadline was unconstitutional on two grounds. It imposed an impermissible burden on the First Amendment rights of Anderson and his Ohio supporters and diluted the potential value of votes that might be cast for him in other States. Moreover, by requiring an independent to declare his candidacy in March without mandating comparable action by the nominee of a political party, the State violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The District noted that the State did not advance any administrative reasons for the early deadline and rejected the State's asserted justification that the deadline promoted "political stability." Not only did that interest have diminished importance in a Presidential *784 campaign; it also was adequately vindicated by another statute prohibiting a defeated candidate in a party primary from running as an independent.[2] The Secretary of State promptly appealed and unsuccessfully requested expedited review in both the of Appeals and this
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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requested expedited review in both the of Appeals and this but apparently did not seek to stay the District 's order.[3] The election was held while the appeal was pending. In Ohio Anderson received 254,472 votes, or 5.9 percent of the votes cast; nationally, he received 5,720,060 votes or approximately 6.6 percent of the total.[4] The of Appeals reversed. It first inferred that the 's summary affirmances in summarily aff'd, and summarily aff'd, had implicitly sustained the validity of early filing deadlines. Then, correctly recognizing the limited precedential effect to be accorded summary dispositions,[5] the of Appeals independently *785 reached the same conclusion. It held that Ohio's early deadline "ensures that voters making the important choice of their next president have the opportunity for a careful look at the candidates, a chance to see how they withstand the close *786 scrutiny of a political campaign." In other litigation brought by Anderson challenging early filing deadlines in Maine and Maryland, the s of Appeals for the First and Fourth Circuits affirmed District judgments ordering Anderson's name placed on the See (Me.), affirmance order, ; (Md.), aff'd,[6] The conflict among the Circuits on an important question of constitutional law led us to grant certiorari. We now reverse. I After a date toward the end of March, even if intervening events create unanticipated political opportunities, no independent candidate may enter the Presidential race and seek to place his name on the Ohio general election Thus the direct impact of Ohio's early filing deadline falls upon aspirants for office. Nevertheless, as we have recognized, "the rights of voters and the rights of candidates do not lend themselves to neat separation; laws that affect candidates always have at least some theoretical, correlative effect on voters." Our primary concern is with the tendency of ballot access restrictions "to limit the field of candidates from which voters might choose." Therefore, "[i]n approaching candidate restrictions, it is essential to examine in a realistic light the extent and nature of their impact on voters." The impact of candidate eligibility requirements on voters implicates basic constitutional rights.[7] Writing for a unanimous *787 in Justice Harlan stated that it "is beyond debate that freedom to engage in association for the advancement of beliefs and ideas is an inseparable aspect of the `liberty' assured by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which embraces freedom of speech." In our first review of Ohio's electoral scheme, this explained the interwoven strands of "liberty" affected by ballot access restrictions: "In the present situation the state laws place burdens on two different, although overlapping,
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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the state laws place burdens on two different, although overlapping, kinds of rights the right of individuals to associate for the advancement of political beliefs, and the right of qualified voters, regardless of their political persuasion, to cast their votes effectively. Both of these rights, of course, rank among our most precious freedoms." As we have repeatedly recognized, voters can assert their preferences only through candidates or parties or both. "It is to be expected that a voter hopes to find on the ballot a candidate who comes near to reflecting his policy preferences on contemporary issues." The right to vote is "heavily burdened" if that vote may be cast only for major-party candidates at a time when other parties or other candidates are "clamoring for a place on the " ; The exclusion of candidates also burdens voters' freedom *788 of association, because an election campaign is an effective platform for the expression of views on the issues of the day, and a candidate serves as a rallying point for likeminded citizens.[8] Although these rights of voters are fundamental, not all restrictions imposed by the States on candidates' eligibility for the ballot impose constitutionally suspect burdens on voters' rights to associate or to choose among candidates. We have recognized that, "as a practical matter, there must be a substantial regulation of elections if they are to be fair and honest and if some sort of order, rather than chaos, is to accompany the democratic processes." To achieve these necessary objectives, States have enacted comprehensive and sometimes complex election codes. Each provision of these schemes, whether it governs the registration and qualifications of voters, the selection and eligibility of candidates, or the voting process itself, inevitably affects at least to some degree the individual's right to vote and his right to associate with others for political ends. Nevertheless, the State's important regulatory interests are generally sufficient to justify reasonable, nondiscriminatory restrictions.[9] *789 Constitutional challenges to specific provisions of a State's election laws therefore cannot be resolved by any "litmus-paper test" that will separate valid from invalid restrictions. at Instead, a court must resolve such a challenge by an analytical process that parallels its work in ordinary litigation. It must first consider the character and magnitude of the asserted injury to the rights protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments that the plaintiff seeks to vindicate. It then must identify and evaluate the precise interests put forward by the State as justifications for the burden imposed by its rule. In passing judgment, the must not only determine the
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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rule. In passing judgment, the must not only determine the legitimacy and strength of each of those interests, it also must consider the extent to which those interests make it necessary to burden the plaintiff's rights. Only after weighing all these factors is the reviewing court in a position to decide whether the challenged provision is unconstitutional. See at ; -; American of ; Illinois Elections The results of this evaluation will not be automatic; as we have recognized, there is "no substitute *790 for the hard judgments that must be made." at[10] II An early filing deadline may have a substantial impact on independent-minded voters. In election campaigns, particularly those which are national in scope, the candidates and the issues simply do not remain static over time. Various candidates rise and fall in popularity; domestic and international developments bring new issues to center stage and may affect voters' assessments of national problems. Such developments will certainly affect the strategies of candidates who have already entered the race; they may also create opportunities for new candidates. See A. Bickel, Reform and Continuity 87-89 Yet Ohio's filing deadline prevents persons who wish to be independent candidates from entering the significant political arena established in the State by a Presidential election campaign and creating new political coalitions of Ohio voters at any time after mid to late March.[11] At this point developments in campaigns for *791 the major-party nominations have only begun, and the major parties will not adopt their nominees and platforms for another five months. Candidates and supporters within the major parties thus have the political advantage of continued flexibility; for independents, the inflexibility imposed by the March filing deadline is a correlative disadvantage because of the competitive nature of the electoral process. If the State's filing deadline were later in the year, a newly emergent independent candidate could serve as the focal point for a grouping of Ohio voters who decide, after mid-March, that they are dissatisfied with the choices within the two major parties. As we recognized in "[s]ince the principal policies of the major parties change to some extent from year to year, and since the identity of the likely major party nominees may not be known until shortly before the election, this disaffected `group' will rarely if ever be a cohesive or identifiable group until a few months before the election."[12] Indeed, several *792 important third-party candidacies in American history were launched after the two major parties staked out their positions and selected their nominees at national conventions during the summer.[13] But under 3513.25.7,
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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nominees at national conventions during the summer.[13] But under 3513.25.7, a late-emerging Presidential candidate outside the major parties, whose positions on the issues could command widespread community support, is excluded from the Ohio general election The "Ohio system thus denies the `disaffected' not only a choice of leadership but a choice on the issues as well." Not only does the challenged Ohio statute totally exclude any candidate who makes the decision to run for President as an independent after the March deadline, it also burdens the signature-gathering efforts of independents who decide to run in time to meet the deadline. When the primary campaigns are far in the future and the election itself is even more remote, the obstacles facing an independent candidate's organizing efforts are compounded. Volunteers are more difficult to recruit and retain, media publicity and campaign contributions are more difficult to secure, and voters are less interested in the campaign.[14] It is clear, then, that the March filing deadline places a particular burden on an identifiable segment of Ohio's independent-minded voters. See As our cases have held, *793 it is especially difficult for the State to justify a restriction that limits political participation by an identifiable political group whose members share a particular viewpoint, associational preference, or economic status.[15] "Our ballot access cases focus on the degree to which the challenged restrictions operate as a mechanism to exclude certain classes of candidates from the electoral process. The inquiry is whether the challenged restriction unfairly or unnecessarily burdens the `availability of political opportunity.' " quoting 415 U. S., at[16] A burden that falls unequally on new or small political parties or on independent candidates impinges, by its very nature, on associational choices protected by the First Amendment. *794 It discriminates against those candidates and of particular importance against those voters whose political preferences lie outside the existing political parties. at -965 By limiting the opportunities of independent-minded voters to associate in the electoral arena to enhance their political effectiveness as a group, such restrictions threaten to reduce diversity and competition in the marketplace of ideas. Historically political figures outside the two major parties have been fertile sources of new ideas and new programs; many of their challenges to the status quo have in time made their way into the political mainstream. Illinois Elections ;[17] In short, the primary values protected by the First Amendment "a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open," New York Times (1) are served when election campaigns are not monopolized
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| 1,983 | 16 |
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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(1) are served when election campaigns are not monopolized by the existing political parties. Furthermore, in the context of a Presidential election, state-imposed restrictions[18] implicate a uniquely important *795 national interest. For the President and the Vice President of the United States are the only elected officials who represent all the voters in the Nation. Moreover, the impact of the votes cast in each State is affected by the votes cast for the various candidates in other States.[19] Thus in a Presidential election a State's enforcement of more stringent ballot access requirements, including filing deadlines, has an impact beyond its own borders.[20] Similarly, the State has a less important interest in regulating Presidential elections than statewide or local elections, because the outcome of the former will be largely determined by voters beyond the State's boundaries. This striking down a state statute unduly restricting the choices made by a major party's Presidential nominating convention, observed that such conventions serve "the pervasive national interest in the selection of candidates for national office, and this national interest is greater than any interest of an individual State." The Ohio filing deadline challenged in this case does more than burden the associational rights of independent voters and candidates. It places a significant state-imposed restriction on a nationwide electoral process. *796 III The State identifies three separate interests that it seeks to further by its early filing deadline for independent Presidential candidates: voter education, equal treatment for partisan and independent candidates, and political stability. We now examine the legitimacy of these interests and the extent to which the March filing deadline serves them. Voter Education There can be no question about the legitimacy of the State's interest in fostering informed and educated expressions of the popular will in a general election. Moreover, the of Appeals correctly identified that interest as one of the concerns that motivated the Framers' decision not to provide for direct popular election of the President.[21] We are persuaded, however, that the State's important and legitimate interest in voter education does not justify the specific restriction on participation in a Presidential election that is at issue in this case. The passage of time since the Constitutional Convention in 1787 has brought about two changes that are relevant to the reasonableness of Ohio's statutory requirement that independents formally declare their candidacy at least seven months in advance of a general election. First, although it took days *797 and often weeks for even the most rudimentary information about important events to be transmitted from one part of the country to another in 1787,[22] today
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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one part of the country to another in 1787,[22] today even trivial details about national candidates are instantaneously communicated nationwide in both verbal and visual form. Second, although literacy was far from universal in 18th-century America,[23] today the vast majority of the electorate not only is literate but also is informed on a day-to-day basis about events and issues that affect election choices and about the ever-changing popularity of individual candidates. In the modern world it is somewhat unrealistic to suggest that it takes more than seven months to inform the electorate about the qualifications of a particular candidate simply because he lacks a partisan label. Our cases reflect a greater faith in the ability of individual voters to inform themselves about campaign issues. In the considered the validity of a Tennessee statute requiring residence in the State for one year and in the county for three months as a prerequisite for registration to vote. The held the statute unconstitutional, specifically rejecting the argument that the requirements were justified by the State's interest in voter education. "Given modern communications, and given the clear indication that campaign spending and voter education occur largely during the month before an election, the State cannot seriously maintain that it is `necessary' to reside for a year in the State and three months in the county in order to be knowledgeable about congressional, state, or even purely local elections." *798 This reasoning applied with even greater force to a Presidential election, which receives more intense publicity.[24] Nor are we persuaded by the State's assertion that, unless a candidate actually files a formal declaration of candidacy in Ohio by the March deadline, Ohio voters will not realize that they should pay attention to his candidacy. Brief for Respondent 38. The validity of this asserted interest is undermined by the State's willingness to place major-party nominees on the November ballot even if they never campaigned in Ohio. It is also by no means self-evident that the interest in voter education is served at all by a requirement that independent candidates must declare their candidacy before the end of March in order to be eligible for a place on the ballot in November. Had the requirement been enforced in Ohio, petitioner Anderson might well have determined that it would be futile for him to allocate any of his time and money to campaigning in that State. The Ohio electorate might thereby have been denied whatever benefits his participation in local debates could have contributed to an understanding of the issues. A State's claim that it is enhancing the
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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the issues. A State's claim that it is enhancing the ability of its citizenry to make wise decisions by restricting the flow of information to them must be viewed with some skepticism. As we observed in another First Amendment context, it is often true "that the best means to that end is to open the channels of communication rather than to close them." Virginia Pharmacy[25] *799 Equal Treatment We also find no merit in the State's claim that the early filing deadline serves the interest of treating all candidates alike. Brief for Respondent 33. It is true that a candidate participating in a primary election must declare his candidacy on the same date as an independent. But both the burdens and the benefits of the respective requirements are materially different, and the reasons for requiring early filing for a primary candidate are inapplicable to independent candidates in the general election. The consequences of failing to meet the statutory deadline are entirely different for party primary participants and independents. The name of the nominees of the Democratic and Republican Parties will appear on the Ohio ballot in November even if they did not decide to run until after Ohio's March deadline had passed, but the independent is simply denied a position on the ballot if he waits too long.[26] Thus, under Ohio's scheme, the major parties may include all events preceding their national conventions in the calculus that produces their respective nominees and campaign platforms, but *800 the independent's judgment must be based on a history that ends in March.[27] The early filing deadline for a candidate in a party's primary election is adequately justified by administrative concerns. Seventy-five days appears to be a reasonable time for processing the documents submitted by candidates and preparing the The primary date itself must be set sufficiently in advance of the general election; furthermore, a Presidential preference primary must precede the national convention, which is regularly held during the summer. Finally, the successful participant in a party primary generally acquires the automatic support of an experienced political organization; in the Presidential contest he obtains the support of convention delegates. Neither the administrative justification nor the benefit of an early filing deadline is applicable to an independent candidate. Ohio does not suggest that the March deadline is necessary to allow petition signatures to be counted and verified or to permit November general election ballots to be printed.[28] In addition, the early deadline does not correspond *801 to a potential benefit for the independent, as it does for the party candidate. After filing his statement of
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| 1,983 | 16 |
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Anderson v. Celebrezze
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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does for the party candidate. After filing his statement of candidacy, the independent does not participate in a structured intraparty contest to determine who will receive organizational support; he must develop support by other means. In short, "equal treatment" of partisan and independent candidates simply is not achieved by imposing the March filing deadline on both. As we have written, "[s]ometimes the grossest discrimination can lie in treating things that are different as though they were exactly alike." Political Stability Although the of Appeals did not discuss the State's interest in political stability, that was the primary justification advanced by respondent in the District and it is again asserted in this Respondent's brief explains that the State has a substantial interest in protecting the two major political parties from "damaging intraparty feuding." Brief for Respondent 41. According to respondent, a candidate's decision to abandon efforts to win the party primary and to run as an independent "can be very damaging to state political party structure." Anderson's decision to run as an independent, respondent argues, threatened to "splinter" the Ohio Republican "by drawing away its activists to work in his `independent' campaign." ; see Ohio's asserted interest in political stability amounts to a desire to protect existing political parties from competition competition for campaign workers, voter support, and other campaign resources generated by independent candidates who have previously been affiliated with the party.[29] Our *802 evaluation of this interest is guided by two of our prior cases, and In we squarely held that protecting the Republican and Democratic Parties from external competition cannot justify the virtual exclusion of other political aspirants from the political arena. Addressing Ohio's claim that it "may validly promote a two-party system in order to encourage compromise and political stability," we wrote: "The fact is, however, that the Ohio system does not merely favor a `two-party system'; it favors two particular parties the Republicans and the Democrats and in effect tends to give them a complete monopoly. There is, of course, no reason why two parties should retain a permanent monopoly on the right to have people vote for or against them. Competition in ideas and governmental policies is at the core of our electoral process and of the First Amendment freedoms. New parties struggling for their place must have the time and opportunity to organize in order to meet reasonable requirements for ballot position, just as the old parties have had in the past." 393 U. S., -32. Thus in we concluded that First Amendment values outweighed the State's interest in protecting
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,983 | 16 |
majority
|
Anderson v. Celebrezze
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
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that First Amendment values outweighed the State's interest in protecting the two major political parties. On the other hand, in we upheld two California statutory provisions that restricted access by independent *803 candidates to the general election Under California law, a person could not run as an independent in November if he had been defeated in a party primary that year or if he had been registered with a political party within one year prior to that year's primary election. We stated that "California apparently believes with the Founding Fathers that splintered parties and unrestrained factionalism may do significant damage to the fabric of government," and that destruction of "the political stability of the system of the State" could have "profound consequences for the entire citizenry." Further, we approved the State's goals of discouraging "independent candidacies prompted by short-range political goals, pique, or personal quarrel." Thus in we recognized the legitimacy of the State's interest in preventing "splintered parties and unrestrained factionalism." But we did not suggest that a political party could invoke the powers of the State to assure monolithic control over its own members and supporters.[30] Political competition that draws resources away from the major parties cannot, for that reason alone, be condemned as "unrestrained factionalism." Instead, in we examined the two challenged provisions in the context of California's electoral system. By requiring a candidate to remain in the intraparty competition once the disaffiliation deadline had passed, and by giving conclusive effect to the winnowing process performed by party members in the primary election, the challenged provisions were an essential part of "a general state policy aimed at maintaining the integrity of the various routes to the " Moreover, we pointed out that the *804 policy "involves no discrimination against independents." Ohio's challenged restriction is substantially different from the California provisions upheld in As we have noted, the early filing deadline does discriminate against independents. And the deadline is neither a "sore loser" provision nor a disaffiliation statute.[31] Furthermore, it is important to recognize that upheld the State's interest in avoiding political fragmentation in the context of elections wholly within the boundaries of California.[32] The State's interest in regulating a nationwide Presidential election is not nearly as strong; no State could singlehandedly assure "political stability" in the Presidential context. The Ohio deadline does not serve any state interest in "maintaining the integrity of the various routes to the ballot" for the Presidency, because Ohio's Presidential preference primary does not serve to narrow the field for the general election. A major party candidate who loses the Ohio primary, or
|
Justice Stevens
| 1,983 | 16 |
majority
|
Anderson v. Celebrezze
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110904/anderson-v-celebrezze/
|
A major party candidate who loses the Ohio primary, or who does not even run in Ohio, may nonetheless appear on the November general election ballot as the party's nominee. In addition, the national scope of the competition for delegates at the Presidential nominating conventions assures that "intraparty feuding" will continue until August. *805 More generally, the early filing deadline is not precisely drawn to protect the parties from "intraparty feuding," whatever legitimacy that state goal may have in a Presidential election. If the deadline is designed to keep intraparty competition within the party structure, its coverage is both too broad and too narrow. It is true that in this case 3513.25.7 was applied to a candidate who had previously competed in party primaries and then sought to run as an independent. But the early deadline applies broadly to independent candidates who have not been affiliated in the recent past with any political party. On the other hand, as long as the decision to run is made before the March deadline, Ohio does not prohibit independent candidacies by persons formerly affiliated with a political party, or currently participating in intraparty competition in other States regardless of the effect on the political party structure. Moreover, the early deadline for filing as an independent may actually impair the State's interest in preserving party harmony. As Professor Bickel perceptively observed: "The characteristic American third party, then, consists of a group of people who have tried to exert influence within one of the major parties, have failed, and later decide to work on the outside. States in which there is an early qualifying date tend to force such groups to create minor parties without first attempting to influence the course taken by a major one. For a dissident group is put to the choice of foregoing major-party primary and other prenomination activity by organizing separately early on in an election year, or losing all opportunity for action as a third party later." Bickel, at 87-88. The same analysis, of course, is applicable to a "dissident group" that coalesces around an independent candidate rather than attempting to form a new political party. We conclude that Ohio's March filing deadline for independent candidates for the office of President of the United *806A States cannot be justified by the State's asserted interest in protecting political stability. "For even when pursuing a legitimate interest, a State may not choose means that unnecessarily restrict constitutionally protected liberty. `Precision of regulation must be the touchstone in an area so closely touching our most precious freedoms.' NAACP v. Button, 371
|
Justice Marshall
| 1,976 | 15 |
second_dissenting
|
United States v. Miller
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/109433/united-states-v-miller/
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In California Bankers the Court upheld the constitutionality of the recordkeeping requirements of the Bank Secrecy Act. 12 U.S. C. 1829b (d). I dissented, finding the required maintenance of bank customers' records to be a seizure within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment and unlawful in the absence of a warrant and probable cause. While the Court in California Bankers Assn. did not then purport to decide whether a customer could later challenge the bank's delivery of his records to the Government pursuant to subpoena, I warned: "[I]t is ironic that although the majority deems the bank customers' Fourth Amendment claims premature, it also intimates that once the bank has made copies of a customer's checks, the customer no longer has standing to invoke his Fourth Amendment rights when a demand is made on the bank by the Government for the records. By accepting the Government's bifurcated approach to the recordkeeping requirement and the acquisition of the records, the majority engages in a hollow charade whereby Fourth Amendment claims are to be labeled premature until such time as they can be deemed too late." Today, not surprisingly, the Court finds respondent's claims to be made too late. Since the Court in California *456 Bankers Assn. held that a bank, in complying with the requirement that it keep copies of the checks written by its customers, "neither searches nor seizes records in which the depositor has a Fourth Amendment right," there is nothing new in today's holding that respondent has no protected Fourth Amendment interest in such records. A fortiori, he does not have standing to contest the Government's subpoena to the bank. I wash my hands of today's extended redundancy by the Court. Because the recordkeeping requirements of the Act order the seizure of customers' bank records without a warrant and probable cause, I believe the Act is unconstitutional and that respondent has standing to raise that claim. Since the Act is unconstitutional, the Government cannot rely on records kept pursuant to it in prosecuting bank customers. The Government relied on such records in this case and, because of that, I would affirm the Court of Appeals' reversal of respondent's conviction. I respectfully dissent.
|
Justice Breyer
| 2,011 | 2 |
dissenting
|
Davis v. United States
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218926/davis-v-united-states/
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In 2009, in Arizona v. Gant, 556 U. S. this Court held that a police search of an automobile without a war rant violates the Fourth Amendment if the police have pre viously removed the automobile’s occupants and placed them securely in a squad car. The present case involves these same circumstances, and it was pending on appeal when this Court decided Gant. Because Gant represents a “shift” in the Court’s Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, ante, at 1, we must decide whether and how Gant’s new rule applies here. I I agree with the Court about whether Gant’s new rule applies. It does apply. Between 1965, when the Court decided and 1987, when it decided that conclusion would have been more difficult to reach. Under Linkletter, the Court determined a new rule’s retroactivity by looking to several different factors, including whether the new rule represented a “clear break” with the past and the degree of “reliance by law enforcement authorities on the old standards.” 248–249 (1969) (also 2 DAVIS v. UNITED STATES BREYER, J., dissenting citing “the purpose to be served by the new standards” and “the effect on the administration of justice” as factors ). And the Court would often not apply the new rule to identical cases still pend ing on appeal. See After 22 years of struggling with its Linkletter approach, however, the Court decided in that Linkletter had proved unfair and unworkable. It then substituted a clearer approach, stating that “a new rule for the conduct of criminal prosecutions is to be applied retroactively to all cases, state or federal, pending on direct review or not yet final, with no exception for cases in which the new rule constitutes a ‘clear break’ with the past.” 479 U.S., at 328. The Court today, following concludes that Gant’s new rule applies here. And to that extent I agree with its decision. II The Court goes on, however, to decide how Gant’s new rule will apply. And here it adds a fatal twist. While conceding that, like the search in Gant, this search vio lated the Fourth Amendment, it holds that, unlike Gant, this defendant is not entitled to a remedy. That is be cause the Court finds a new “good faith” exception which prevents application of the normal remedy for a Fourth Amendment violation, namely, suppression of the illegally seized evidence. (1914); Leaving Davis with a right but not a remedy, the Court “keep[s] the word of promise to our ear” but “break[s] it to our hope.” A At this point I can no longer agree with the Court.
|
Justice Breyer
| 2,011 | 2 |
dissenting
|
Davis v. United States
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218926/davis-v-united-states/
|
this point I can no longer agree with the Court. A new “good faith” exception and this Court’s retroactivity decisions are incompatible. For one thing, the Court’s distinction between (1) retroactive application of a new Cite as: 564 U. S. (2011) 3 BREYER, J., dissenting rule and (2) availability of a remedy is highly artificial and runs counter to precedent. To determine that a new rule is retroactive is to determine that, at least in the normal case, there is a remedy. As we have previously said, the “source of a ‘new rule’ is the Constitution itself, not any judicial power to create new rules of law”; hence, “[w]hat we are actually determining when we assess the ‘retroac tivity’ of a new rule is not the temporal scope of a newly announced right, but whether a violation of the right that occurred prior to the announcement of the new rule will entitle a criminal defendant to the relief sought.” Dan The Court’s “good faith” exception (unlike, say, inevitable discovery, a remedial doctrine that applies only upon occasion) creates “a categorical bar to obtaining redress” in every case pend ing when a precedent is overturned. Ante, at 13–14. For another thing, the Court’s holding re-creates the very problems that led the Court to abandon Linkletter’s approach to retroactivity in favor of ’s. One such problem concerns workability. The Court says that its exception applies where there is “objectively reasonable” police “reliance on binding appellate precedent.” Ante, at 1, 19. But to apply the term “binding appellate precedent” often requires resolution of complex questions of degree. Davis conceded that he faced binding anti-Gant precedent in the Eleventh Circuit. But future litigants will be less forthcoming. Ante, at 18. Indeed, those litigants will now have to create distinctions to show that previous Circuit precedent was not “binding” lest they find relief foreclosed even if they win their constitutional claim. At the same time, Fourth Amendment precedents fre quently require courts to “slosh” their “way through the factbound morass of ‘reasonableness.’ ” Suppose an officer’s conduct is consistent with the language of a Fourth Amendment rule that a court of appeals announced in a case with clearly 4 DAVIS v. UNITED STATES BREYER, J., dissenting distinguishable facts? Suppose the case creating the rele vant precedent did not directly announce any general rule but involved highly analogous facts? What about a rule that all other jurisdictions, but not the defendant’s jurisdiction, had previously accepted? What rules can be developed for determining when, where, and how these different kinds of precedents do, or do not, count
|
Justice Breyer
| 2,011 | 2 |
dissenting
|
Davis v. United States
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218926/davis-v-united-states/
|
these different kinds of precedents do, or do not, count as rele vant “binding precedent”? The Linkletter-like result is likely complex legal argument and police force confusion. See (opinion of Harlan, J.) (describing trying to follow Linklet ter decisions as “almost as difficult” as trying to follow “the tracks made by a beast of prey in search of its intended victim”). Another such problem concerns fairness. Today’s hold ing, like that in Linkletter, “violates basic norms of con stitutional adjudication.” It treats the defendant in a case announcing a new rule one way while treating similarly situated defendants whose cases are pending on appeal in a different way. See ante, at 18– 19. Justice Harlan explained why this approach is wrong when he said: “We cannot release criminals from jail merely because we think one case is a particularly appropriate one [to announce a constitutional doctrine] Simply fish ing one case from the stream of appellate review, us ing it as a vehicle for pronouncing new constitutional standards, and then permitting a stream of similar cases subsequently to flow by unaffected by that new rule constitute an indefensible departure from [our ordinary] model of judicial review.” at 679. And in the Court “embraced to a significant ex tent the comprehensive analysis presented by Justice Harlan.” 479 U.S., Cite as: 564 U. S. (2011) 5 BREYER, J., dissenting Of course, the Court may, as it suggests, avoid this un fairness by refusing to apply the exclusionary rule even to the defendant in the very case in which it announces a “new rule.” But that approach would make matters worse. What would then happen in the lower courts? How would courts of appeals, for example, come to reconsider their prior decisions when other circuits’ cases lead them to believe those decisions may be wrong? Why would a de fendant seek to overturn any such decision? After all, if the (incorrect) circuit precedent is clear, then even if the defendant wins (on the constitutional question), he loses (on relief). See (1967). To what extent then could this Court rely upon lower courts to work out Fourth Amendment differences among themselves—through circuit reconsideration of a precedent that other circuits have criticized? See Ari- (GINSBURG, J., dissenting). B Perhaps more important, the Court’s rationale for creat ing its new “good faith” exception threatens to undermine well-settled Fourth Amendment law. The Court correctly says that pre-Gant Eleventh Circuit precedent had held that a Gant-type search was constitutional; hence the police conduct in this case, consistent with that precedent, was “innocent.” Ante, at 10. But the Court
|
Justice Breyer
| 2,011 | 2 |
dissenting
|
Davis v. United States
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218926/davis-v-united-states/
|
that precedent, was “innocent.” Ante, at 10. But the Court then finds this fact sufficient to create a new “good faith” exception to the exclusionary rule. It reasons that the “sole purpose” of the exclusionary rule “is to deter future Fourth Amendment violations,” ante, at 6. The “deterrence benefits of exclu sion vary with the culpability of the law enforcement conduct at issue,” ante, at 8 (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted). Those benefits are sufficient to jus tify exclusion where “police exhibit deliberate, reckless, or grossly negligent disregard for Fourth Amendment 6 DAVIS v. UNITED STATES BREYER, J., dissenting rights,” But those benefits do not justify exclusion where, as here, the police act with “simple, isolated negligence” or an “objec tively reasonable good-faith belief that their conduct is lawful,” If the Court means what it says, what will happen to the exclusionary rule, a rule that the Court adopted nearly a century ago for federal courts, 232 U.S. and made applicable to state courts a half cen tury ago through the Fourteenth Amendment, Mapp v. Ohio, ? The Court has thought of that rule not as punishment for the individual officer or as repara tion for the individual defendant but more generally as an effective way to secure enforcement of the Fourth Amendment’s commands. (without the exclusionary rule, the Fourth Amendment would be “of no value,” and “might as well be stricken from the Consti tution”). This Court has deviated from the “suppression” norm in the name of “good faith” only a handful of times and in limited, atypical circumstances: where a magistrate has erroneously issued a warrant, United ; where a database has erroneously informed police that they have a warrant, Arizona v. Evans, v. United States, 555 U.S. 135 (2009); and where an unconstitutional statute purported to authorize the search, Illinois v. Krull, 480 U.S. 340 (1987). See (“good faith” exception inaptly named). The fact that such exceptions are few and far between is understandable. Defendants frequently move to suppress evidence on Fourth Amendment grounds. In many, per haps most, of these instances the police, uncertain of how the Fourth Amendment applied to the particular factual circumstances they faced, will have acted in objective good faith. Yet, in a significant percentage of these instances, courts will find that the police were wrong. And, unless Cite as: 564 U. S. (2011) 7 BREYER, J., dissenting the police conduct falls into one of the exceptions previ ously noted, courts have required the suppression of the evidence seized. 1 W. LaFave, Search and Seizure pp. 103–104 (4th ed. 2004) (“good
|
Justice Breyer
| 2,011 | 2 |
dissenting
|
Davis v. United States
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218926/davis-v-united-states/
|
LaFave, Search and Seizure pp. 103–104 (4th ed. 2004) (“good faith” exception has not yet been applied to warrantless searches and seizures beyond the “rather special situations” of Evans, and Krull). See Frequency and Success: An Em pirical Study of Criminal Law Defenses, Federal Constitu tional Evidentiary Claims, and Plea Negotiations, 153 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1709, 1728 (2005) (suppression motions are filed in approximately 7% of criminal cases; approximately 12% of suppression motions are successful); LaFave, su pra, at 64 (“Surely many more Fourth Amendment viola tions result from carelessness than from intentional con stitutional violations”); Stewart, The Road to Mapp v. Ohio and Beyond: The Origins, Development and Future of the Exclusionary Rule in Search-and-Seizure Cases, 83 Colum. L. Rev. 1365, 1389 (1983) (“[T]he vast majority of fourth amendment violations [are] motivated by com mendable zeal, not condemnable malice”). But an officer who conducts a search that he believes complies with the Constitution but which, it ultimately turns out, falls just outside the Fourth Amendment’s bounds is no more culpable than an officer who follows erroneous “binding precedent.” Nor is an officer more culpable where circuit precedent is simply suggestive rather than “binding,” where it only describes how to treat roughly analogous instances, or where it just does not exist. Thus, if the Court means what it now says, if it would place determinative weight upon the culpability of an individual officer’s conduct, and if it would apply the exclusionary rule only where a Fourth Amendment viola tion was “deliberate, reckless, or grossly negligent,” then the “good faith” exception will swallow the exclusionary rule. Indeed, our broad dicta in —dicta the Court repeats and expands upon today—may already be leading 8 DAVIS v. UNITED STATES BREYER, J., dissenting lower courts in this direction. See United (assuming warrantless search was unconstitutional and remanding for District Court to “perform the cost/benefit analysis required by ” and to consider “whether the degree of police culpability in this case rose beyond mere negligence” before ordering suppression); United States v. Master, 614 F.3d 236, 243 (“[T]he Court’s empha sis seems weighed more toward preserving evidence for use in obtaining convictions, even if illegally seized unless the officers engage in ‘deliberate, reckless, or grossly negligent conduct’ ” (quoting at 144)). Today’s decision will doubtless accelerate this trend. Any such change (which may already be underway) would affect not “an exceedingly small set of cases,” ante, at 18, but a very large number of cases, potentially many thousands each year. See And since the exclusionary rule is often the only sanction avail able for a
|
Justice Breyer
| 2,011 | 2 |
dissenting
|
Davis v. United States
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/218926/davis-v-united-states/
|
rule is often the only sanction avail able for a Fourth Amendment violation, the Fourth Amendment would no longer protect ordinary Americans from “unreasonable searches and seizures.” See Wolf v. Colorado, ) (In many circumstances, “there is but one alternative to the rule of exclusion. That is no sanction at all”); (the exclusionary rule is “an essential auxiliary” to the Fourth Amendment). It would become a watered-down Fourth Amendment, offering its protection against only those searches and sei zures that are egregiously unreasonable. III In sum, I fear that the Court’s opinion will undermine the exclusionary rule. And I believe that the Court wrongly departs from regardless. Instead I would Cite as: 564 U. S. (2011) 9 BREYER, J., dissenting follow apply Gant’s rule retroactively to this case, and require suppression of the evidence. Such an ap proach is consistent with our precedent, and it would indeed affect no more than “an exceedingly small set of cases.” Ante, at 18. For these reasons, with respect, I dissent
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
|
Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
|
Today the Court overrules which construed the legislative intent of Congress in enacting the lineal predecessor of 28 U.S. C. 2241. Although considerations of "convenience" may support the result reached in this case, those considerations are, in this context, appropriate for Congress, not this Court, to make. Congress has not legislatively overruled Ahrens, and subsequent "developments" are simply irrelevant to the judicial task of ascertaining the legislative intent of Congress in providing, in 1867, that federal district courts may issue writs of habeas corpus "within their respective jurisdictions" for prisoners in the custody of state authorities. The Court, however, not only accomplishes a feat of judicial prestidigitation but, without discussion or analysis, explicitly extends the scope of and implicitly rejects Ex parte I In order to appreciate the full impact of the Court's decision, a brief reiteration of the procedural stance of the case at the time the petition for habeas corpus was filed is necessary. Petitioner is incarcerated in Alabama pursuant to a state court judgment, the validity of which petitioner does not attack. Petitioner had been indicted in Kentucky and a detainer filed by Kentucky authorities with the Alabama authorities. Kentucky had conducted no proceedings against petitioner; no judgment of conviction on the Kentucky indictment had been obtained. From Alabama, petitioner requested Kentucky authorities to ask the Alabama authorities to deliver *503 him to Kentucky so that petitioner could be tried on the Kentucky indictment. No action was taken on this request, and the Kentucky Supreme Court refused to issue a writ of mandamus requiring Kentucky authorities to request that Alabama deliver petitioner for trial in Kentucky. Petitioner then filed the instant habeas corpus proceeding in Kentucky, contending that he was "in custody" of Kentucky authorities and that the "custody" was illegal because he had been denied his right to a speedy trial. Petitioner is not seeking to attack collaterally a state judgment of conviction in federal court. In substance, petitioner is seeking, prior to trial, to force the Commonwealth of Kentucky to litigate a that otherwise could only be raised as an absolute defense in a state criminal proceeding against petitioner. II The first inquiry is whether a state prisoner can, prior to trial, raise the claim of the denial of a right to a speedy trial by petitioning a federal court for writ of habeas corpus. The Court reasons that since "discarded the prematurity doctrine," ante, at 488, "petitioner is entitled to raise his speedy trial claim on federal habeas corpus." Petitioner filed this petition alleging federal jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S. C. 2241, 2254. Section
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
|
Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
|
federal jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S. C. 2241, 2254. Section 2254 pertains only to a prisoner in custody pursuant to a judgment of conviction of a state court; in the context of the attempt to assert a right to a speedy trial, there is simply no 2254 trap to "ensnare" petitioner, such as the court below felt existed. The issue here is whether habeas corpus is warranted under 2241 (c) (3); that section empowers district courts to issue the writ, inter alia, before a judgment is rendered in a criminal proceeding. It is in the context of an application for federal habeas *504 corpus by a state prisoner prior to any trial in a state court that the effect of the instant decision must be analyzed. The Court reasons that since held that a State must, consistent with the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments, "make a diligent, good-faith effort to bring" a prisoner to trial on a state indictment even though he is incarcerated in another jurisdiction, and, since overruled "the prematurity doctrine," therefore, a prisoner can attack in a federal habeas corpus proceeding the validity of an indictment lodged against him in one State even though he is imprisoned in another. I cannot agree with this reasoning. In Smith, this Court held that a State must make an effort to try a person even though he was incarcerated in another jurisdiction. That case did not, however, involve federal habeas corpus. It came here on certiorari after the state court had denied a petition for a writ of mandamus seeking to have the underlying indictment dismissed. The Texas Supreme Court had ruled that the state courts had no power to order the federal prisoner produced for trial on the state indictment. This Court reversed, holding that, in view of the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment guarantees of a speedy trial, the State must, after demand therefor, attempt to obtain the prisoner from the sovereignty with custody over the prisoner. It by no means follows, however, that a state prisoner can assert the right to a speedy trial in a federal district court. The fundamental flaw in the reasoning of the Court is the assumption that since a prisoner has some "right" under he must have some forum in which affirmatively to assert that right, and that therefore the right may be vindicated in a federal district court under 2241 (c) (3). did *505 not, however, establish that a right distinct from the right to a speedy trial existed. It merely held that a State could not totally rely on the fact that
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
|
Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
|
a State could not totally rely on the fact that it could not order that a prisoner be brought from another jurisdiction as a justification for not attempting to try the defendant as expeditiously as possible. The right to a speedy trial is, like other constitutional rights, a defense to a criminal charge, but one which, unlike others, increases in terms of potential benefit to the accused with the passage of time. The fact that a State must make an effort to obtain a defendant from another sovereign for trial but fails, after demand, to make an effort would weigh heavily in the defendant's favor. But does not necessarily imply that federal courts may, as the District Court did in this case, in effect, issue an injunction requiring a state court to conduct a criminal trial. If the State fails to perform its duty, it must face the consequences of possibly not obtaining a conviction, But the fact that the State has a duty by no means leads to the conclusion that the failure to perform that duty can be raised by a prospective defendant on federal habeas corpus in advance of trial. The history of habeas corpus and the principles of federalism strongly support the approach established by Ex parte that, absent extraordinary circumstances, federal habeas corpus should not be used to adjudicate the merits of an affirmative defense to a state criminal charge prior to a judgment of conviction by a state court. The Court's reasoning for allowing a state prisoner to resort to federal habeas corpus is that the prisoner is attacking the validity of a "future custody." The Court relies on Peyton to justify federal jurisdiction. Peyton, however, was in a significantly different procedural posture from the instant case. There, the Court held that a *506 state prisoner could challenge the constitutional validity of a sentence which he had not yet begun to serve when he was currently incarcerated pursuant to a valid conviction and sentence, but the sentence he sought to attack was to run consecutively to the valid sentence. Even though a person may be "in custody" for purposes of 2241 (c) (3), or 2254, if he has not yet begun to serve a sentence entered after a judgment of conviction, as the Court held in Peyton, it by no means follows that he is similarly "in custody" when no judgment of conviction has been entered or even any trial on the underlying charge conducted. The Court's suggestion that a person may challenge by way of federal habeas corpus any custody that might possibly
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
|
Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
|
way of federal habeas corpus any custody that might possibly be imposed at some time in the "future," which suggestion unwarrantedly assumes both that a constitutional defense will be rejected and that the jury will convict, is not supported by the language or reasoning of Peyton. Mr. Chief Justice Warren, writing for the Court in Peyton, emphasized the role of federal habeas corpus for state prisoners as "substantially a post-conviction device," and "the instrument for resolving fact issues not adequately developed in the original proceedings." The Court there stated that the demise of the McNally rule would allow prisoners "the opportunity to challenge defective convictions." The Court here glosses over the disparate procedural posture of this case, and merely asserts, without analyzing the historical function of federal habeas corpus for state prisoners, that the rationale of Peyton is applicable to a pretrial, preconviction situation. Citation to that decision cannot obscure the fact that the Court here makes a significant departure from previous decisions, a departure that certainly requires analysis and justification more detailed than that which the Court puts forth. *507 There is no doubt that a prisoner such as petitioner can assert, by appropriate motion in the courts of the State in which the indictment was handed down, that he should be brought to trial on that charge. There is also no doubt that such a prisoner may petition a federal district court for a writ of habeas corpus prior to trial. See 28 U.S. C. 2241 (c) (3). What the Court here disregards, however, is almost a century of decisions of this Court to the effect that federal habeas corpus for state prisoners, prior to conviction, should not be granted absent truly extraordinary circumstances. In Ex parte the petitioner was indicted in state court for selling a bond coupon without a license. Prior to trial on that indictment, he petitioned in federal court for a writ of habeas corpus, contending that the statute upon which the indictment was predicated violated the contract clause, insofar as it was applied to owners of coupons. In holding that the (then) Circuit Court had the power to issue the writ but had properly exercised its discretion not to do so, the Court wrote: "That discretion should be exercised in the light of the relations existing, under our system of government, between the judicial tribunals of the Union and of the States, and in recognition of the fact that the public good requires that those relations be not disturbed by unnecessary conflict between courts equally bound to guard and protect rights secured by
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
|
Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
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courts equally bound to guard and protect rights secured by the Constitution." The judicial approach set forth in Ex parte that federal courts should not, absent extraordinary circumstances, interfere with the judicial administration and process of state courts prior to trial and conviction, even though the state prisoner claims that he is held in violation of the Constitutionhas been consistently followed. (custody *508 alleged to violate Art. 4, 2); New ; ; Cf. Ex parte Fonda, ; In re Duncan, ; In re Wood, ; In re Frederich, The situations in which pretrial or preconviction federal interference by way of habeas corpus with state criminal processes is justified involve the lack of jurisdiction, under the Supremacy Clause, for the State to bring any criminal charges against the petitioner. Wildenhus's Case, ; In re Loney, ; In re Neagle, The effect of today's ruling that federal habeas corpus prior to trial is appropriate because it will determine the validity of custody that may be imposed in actuality only sometime in the indefinite future constitutes an unjustifiable federal interference with the judicial administration of a State's criminal laws. The use of federal habeas corpus is, presumably, limited neither to the interstate detainer situation nor to the constitutional rights secured by the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments. The same reasoning would apply to a state prisoner who alleges that "future custody" will result because the State plans to introduce at a criminal trial sometime in the future a confession allegedly obtained in violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, or evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. I thoroughly disagree with this conversion of federal habeas corpus into a pretrial-motion forum for state prisoners. *509 III In addition to sanctioning an expansion of when a federal court may interfere with state judicial administration, the Court overrules and expands the parameters of which federal courts may so intervene. In Ahrens, the Court held that "the presence within the territorial jurisdiction of the District Court of the person detained is [a] prerequisite to filing a petition for writ of habeas corpus." The Court construed the phrase "within their respective jurisdictions" to mean that Congress intended to limit the jurisdiction of a district court to prisoners in custody within its territorial jurisdiction. The Court here says that the "language" of Ahrens "indicates" the result reached below. The explicit holding of the Court, however, is plainly much more than an "indication." "Thus the view that the jurisdiction of the District Court to issue the writ in cases such as this is restricted to those
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
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Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
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writ in cases such as this is restricted to those petitioners who are confined or detained within the territorial jurisdiction of the court is supported by the language of the statute, by considerations of policy, and by the legislative history of the enactment. We therefore do not feel free to weigh the policy considerations which are advanced for giving district courts discretion in cases like this. If that concept is to be imported into this statute, Congress must do so." The result reached today may be desirable from the point of view of sound judicial administration, see ; It is the function of this Court, however, to ascertain the intent of Congress as to the meaning *510 of "within their respective jurisdictions." Having completed that task in Ahrens, it is the function of Congress to amend the statute if this Court misinterpreted congressional intent or if subsequent developments suggest the desirability, from a policy viewpoint, of alterations in the statute. See We noted in Nelson that the resolution of any apparent dilemma "caused" by this Court's holding in Ahrens is appropriately one to be undertaken by 399 U.S., at Legislative "inaction" in amending a statute to comport with this Court's evaluation of "[s]ound judicial administration" hardly warrants the disingenuous reading of a previous decision to achieve the result that Congress, despite judicial prodding, has refused to mandate. However impatient we may be with a federal statute which sometimes may fail to provide a remedy for every situation, one would have thought it inappropriate for the Court to amend the statute by judicial action. The Court lists several "developments" that have somehow undercut the validity, in the Court's opinion, of the statutory interpretation of the phrase "within their respective jurisdictions." As the amended 2255 is relevant only to federal prisoners collaterally attacking a conviction, and as 2241 (d) applies only to intrastate jurisdiction, the relevance of the amendments with respect to the jurisdictional requirement of 2241 (c) (3) is not a little obscure. The interpretation of the phrase "within their respective jurisdictions" in Ahrens is hardly incompatible with these recent amendments of statutes dealing with situations not involving the interstate transportation of state prisoners. The further argument that "undermines" Ahrens overlooks the fact that the Court in Ahrens specifically reserved that n. 4, the resolution of which is by no means an explicit rejection *511 of Ahrens. Finally, the fact that this Court has expanded the notion of "custody" for habeas corpus purposes hardly supports, much less compels, the rejection of a statutory construction of an unrelated phrase. In the final
|
Justice Rehnquist
| 1,973 | 19 |
dissenting
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Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/108730/braden-v-30th-judicial-circuit-court-of-ky/
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a statutory construction of an unrelated phrase. In the final analysis, the Court apparently reasons that since Congress amended other statutory provisions dealing with habeas corpus, therefore the congressional intent with respect to the meaning of an unamended phrase must somehow have changed since the Court previously ascertained that intent. This approach to statutory construction, however, justifies with as much, if not more, force, the result reached below: Congress, aware of this Court's interpretation of the phrase in Ahrens, deliberately chose not to amend 2241 (c) (3) when it selectively amended other statutory provisions dealing with federal habeas corpus. Indeed, the most recent indications of legislative intent support this conclusion rather than that advanced by the Court. See H. R. Rep. No. 1894, 89th Cong., 2d Sess., 1-2 (1966); S. Rep. No. 1502, 89th Cong., 2d Sess. (1966). See also n. 13, ante, at 497. I would adhere to this Court's interpretation of the legislative intent set forth in and leave it to Congress, during the process of considering legislation to amend this section, to consider and to weigh the various policy factors that the Court today weighs for itself.
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Justice Kennedy
| 1,988 | 4 |
concurring
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Stewart Organization, Inc. v. Ricoh Corp.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112115/stewart-organization-inc-v-ricoh-corp/
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I concur in full. I write separately only to observe that enforcement of valid forum-selection clauses, bargained for by the parties, protects their legitimate expectations and furthers vital interests of the justice system. Although our opinion in The involved a Federal District Court sitting in admiralty, its reasoning applies with much force to federal courts sitting in diversity. The justifications we noted in The to counter the historical disfavor forum-selection clauses had received in American courts, should be understood to guide the District Court's analysis under 1404(a). The federal judicial system has a strong interest in the correct resolution of these questions, not only to spare litigants unnecessary costs but also to relieve courts of time-consuming pretrial motions. Courts should announce and encourage rules that support private parties who negotiate such clauses. Though state policies should be weighed in the balance, the authority and prerogative of the federal courts to determine the issue, as Congress has directed by 1404(a), should be exercised so that a valid forum-selection clause is given controlling weight in all but the most exceptional cases. See The at
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Justice White
| 1,988 | 6 |
concurring
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United States v. Taylor
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112129/united-states-v-taylor/
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I join the Court's opinion, agreeing that when a defendant, through deliberate misconduct, interferes with compliance with the Speedy Trial Act and a violation of the Act then occurs, dismissal with prejudice should not be ordered unless the violation is caused by Government conduct that is much more serious than is revealed by this record. JUSTICE SCALIA, concurring in part. I join the opinion of the Court except Part II-A, which is largely devoted to establishing, through the floor debate in the House, (1) that prejudice to the defendant is one of the factors that the phrase "among others" in 3162(a)(2) refers to, and (2) that that factor is not necessarily determinative. Both these points seem to me so utterly clear from the text of the legislation that there is no justification for resort to the legislative history. Assume that there was nothing in the legislative history except statements that, unless the defendant had been harmed by the delay, dismissal with prejudice could not be granted. Would we permit that to govern, even though the text of the provision does not consider that factor dominant enough to be mentioned specifically, but just includes it within the phrase "among othe[r] [factors]," or perhaps within the phrase "facts and circumstances of the case which led to the dismissal"? Or assume the opposite, that *345 there was nothing in the legislative history except statements that harm to the defendant could not be considered at all. Would we permit that to govern, even though impairment of the accused's defense is so obviously one of the "other factors" highly relevant to whether the Government should be permitted to reinstitute the prosecution? I think the answer to both these questions is obviously no. The text is so unambiguous on these points that it must be assumed that what the Members of the House and the Senators thought they were voting for, and what the President thought he was approving when he signed the bill, was what the text plainly said, rather than what a few Representatives, or even a Committee Report, said it said. Where we are not prepared to be governed by what the legislative history says to take, as it were, the bad with the good we should not look to the legislative history at all. This text is eminently clear, and we should leave it at that. It should not be thought that, simply because adverting to the legislative history produces the same result we would reach anyway, no harm is done. By perpetuating the view that legislative history can alter
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
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Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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The question presented in this case is whether, in a suit brought by a limited partnership, the citizenship of the limited partners must be taken into account to determine diversity of citizenship among the parties I Respondent Arkoma Associates (Arkoma), a limited partnership organized under the laws of Arizona, brought suit on a contract dispute in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, relying upon diversity of citizenship for federal jurisdiction The defendants, C Tom Carden and Leonard L Limes, citizens of Louisiana, moved to dismiss, contending that one of Arkoma's limited partners was also a citizen of Louisiana The District Court denied the motion but certified the question for interlocutory appeal, which the Fifth Circuit declined Thereafter Magee Drilling Company intervened in the suit and, together with the original defendants, counterclaimed against Arkoma under Texas law Following a bench trial, the District Court awarded Arkoma a money judgment plus interest and attorney's fees; it dismissed Carden and Limes' counterclaim as well as Magee's intervention and counterclaim Carden, Limes, and Magee (petitioners here) appealed, and the Fifth Circuit affirmed *87 With respect to petitioners' jurisdictional challenge, the Court of Appeals found complete diversity, reasoning that Arkoma's citizenship should be determined by reference to the citizenship of the general, but not the limited, partners We granted certiorari II Article III of the Constitution provides, in pertinent part, that "[t]he judicial Power shall extend to Controversies between Citizens of different States" Congress first authorized the federal courts to exercise diversity jurisdiction in the Judiciary Act of 789, ch 20, In its current form, the diversity statute provides that "[t]he district courts shall have original jurisdiction of all civil actions where the matter in controversy exceeds $50,000 and is between citizens of different States " 28 US C 332(a) Since its enactment, we have interpreted the diversity statute to require "complete diversity" of citizenship See The District Court erred in finding complete diversity in this case unless () a limited partnership may be considered in its own right a "citizen" of the State that created it, or (2) a federal court must look to the citizenship of only its general, but not its limited, partners to determine whether there is complete diversity of citizenship We consider these questions in turn A We have often had to consider the status of artificial entities created by state law insofar as that bears upon the existence of federal diversity jurisdiction The precise question posed under the terms of the diversity statute is whether such an entity may be considered a "citizen" of
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
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Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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whether such an entity may be considered a "citizen" of the State under whose laws it was created[] A corporation is the paradigmatic *88 artificial "person," and the Court has considered its proper characterization under the diversity statute on more than one occasion not always reaching the same conclusion Initially, we held that a corporation "is certainly not a citizen," so that to determine the existence of diversity jurisdiction the Court must "look to the character of the individuals who compose [it]" Bank of United We overruled Deveaux years later in Louisville, C & C R which held that a corporation is "capable of being treated as a citizen of [the State which created it], as much as a natural person" Ten years later, we reaffirmed the result of Letson, though on the somewhat different theory that "those who use the corporate name, and exercise the faculties conferred by it," should be presumed conclusively to be citizens of the corporation's State of incorporation *89 While the rule regarding the treatment of corporations as "citizens" has become firmly established, we have (with an exception to be discussed presently) just as firmly resisted extending that treatment to other entities For example, in a case involving an unincorporated "joint stock company," we raised the question of jurisdiction on our own motion, and found it to be lacking: "On looking into the record we find no satisfactory showing as to the citizenship of the plaintiff The allegation of the amended petition is, that the United States Express Company is a joint stock company organized under a law of the State of New York, and is a citizen of that State But the express company cannot be a citizen of New York, within the meaning of the statutes regulating jurisdiction, unless it be a corporation The allegation that the company was organized under the laws of New York is not an allegation that it is a corporation In fact the allegation is, that the company is not a corporation, but a joint stock company that is, a mere partnership" Similarly, in Great Fire Proof Hotel we held that a "limited partnership association" although possessing "some of the characteristics of a corporation" and deemed a "citizen" by the law creating it may not be deemed a "citizen" under the jurisdictional rule established for corporations "That rule must not be extended" As recently as 965, our unanimous opinion in reiterated that "the doctrinal wall of" would not be breached The one exception to the admirable consistency of our jurisprudence on this matter is
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
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Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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the admirable consistency of our jurisprudence on this matter is Puerto which held that the entity known as a sociedad en comandita, created under the civil law of Puerto *90 Rico, could be treated as a citizen of Puerto Rico for purposes of determining federal-court jurisdiction The sociedad's juridical personality, we said, "is so complete in contemplation of the law of Puerto Rico that we see no adequate reason for holding that the sociedad has a different status for purposes of federal jurisdiction than a corporation organized under that law" Arkoma fairly argues that this language, and the outcome of the case, "reflec[t] the Supreme Court's willingness to look beyond the incorporated/unincorporated dichotomy and to study the internal organization, state law requirements, management structure, and capacity or lack thereof to act and/or sue, to determine diversity of citizenship" Brief for Respondent 4 The problem with this argument lies not in its logic, but in the fact that the approach it espouses was proposed and specifically rejected in There, in reaffirming "the doctrinal wall of" we explained Russell as a case resolving the distinctive problem "of fitting an exotic creation of the civil law into a federal scheme which knew it not" US, There could be no doubt, after that at least common-law entities (and likely all entities beyond the Puerto Rican sociedad en comandita) would be treated for purposes of the diversity statute pursuant to what Russell called "[t]he tradition of the common law," which is "to treat as legal persons only incorporated groups and to assimilate all others to partnerships" [2] *9 Arkoma claims to have found another exception to our Chapman tradition in Navarro Savings That case, however, did not involve the question whether a party that is an artificial entity other than a corporation can be considered a "citizen" of a State, but the quite separate question whether parties that were undoubted "citizens" (viz, natural persons) were the real parties to the controversy The plaintiffs in Navarro were eight individual trustees of a Massachusetts business trust, suing in their own names The defendant, Navarro Savings Association, disputed the existence of complete diversity, claiming that the trust beneficiaries rather than the trustees were the real parties to the controversy, and that the citizenship of the former and not the latter should therefore control In the course of rejecting this claim, we did indeed discuss the characteristics of a Massachusetts business trust not at all, however, for the purpose of determining whether the trust had attributes making it a "citizen," but only for the purpose of establishing that
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
|
Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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a "citizen," but only for the purpose of establishing that the respondents were "active trustees whose control over the assets held in their names is real and substantial," thereby bringing them under the rule, "more than 50 years" old, which permits such trustees "to sue in their own right, without regard to the citizenship of the trust beneficiaries" Navarro, in short, has nothing to do with the Chapman question, except that it makes available to respondent *92 the argument by analogy that, just as business reality is taken into account for purposes of determining whether a trustee is the real party to the controversy, so also it should be taken into account for purposes of determining whether an artificial entity is a citizen That argument is, to put it mildly, less than compelling B As an alternative ground for finding complete diversity, Arkoma asserts that the Fifth Circuit correctly determined its citizenship solely by reference to the citizenship of its general partners, without regard to the citizenship of its limited partners Only the general partners, it points out, "manage the assets, control the litigation, and bear the risk of liability for the limited partnership's debts," and, more broadly, "have exclusive and complete management and control of the operations of the partnership" Brief for Respondent 30, 36 This approach of looking to the citizenship of only some of the members of the artificial entity finds even less support in our precedent than looking to the State of organization (for which one could at least point to Russell) We have never held that an artificial entity, suing or being sued in its own name, can invoke the diversity jurisdiction of the federal courts based on the citizenship of some but not all of its members No doubt some members of the joint stock company in Chapman, the labor union in and the limited partnership association in Great exercised greater control over their respective entities than other members But such considerations have played no part in our decisions To support its approach, Arkoma seeks to press Navarro into service once again, arguing that just as that case looked to the trustees to determine the citizenship of the business trust, so also here we should look to the general partners, who have the management powers, in determining the citizenship of this partnership As we have already explained, however, Navarro had nothing to do with the citizenship of *93 the "trust," since it was a suit by the trustees in their own names The dissent supports Arkoma's argument on this point, though, as we have
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
|
Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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supports Arkoma's argument on this point, though, as we have described, under the rubric of determining which parties supposedly before the Court are the real parties, rather than under the rubric of determining the citizenship of the limited partnership See n The dissent asserts that "[t]he real party to the controversy approach," post, at 20 by which it means an approach that looks to "control over the conduct of the business and the ability to initiate or control the course of litigation," post, at 204 "has been implemented by the Court both in its oldest and in its most recent cases examining diversity jurisdiction with respect to business associations" Post, at 20 Not a single case the dissent discusses, either old or new, supports that assertion Deveaux, which was in any event overruled by Letson, seems to be applying not a "real party to the controversy" test, but rather the principle that for jurisdictional purposes the corporation has no substance, and merely "represents" its shareholders, see -9; but even if it can be regarded as applying a "real party to the controversy" test, it deems that test to be met by all the shareholders of the corporation, without regard to their "control over the operation of the business" Marshall, which as we have discussed rerationalized Letson's holding that a corporation was a "citizen" in its own right, contains language quite clearly adopting a "real party to the controversy" approach, and arguably even adopting a "control" test for that status ("[T]he court will look behind the corporate or collective name to find the persons who act as the representatives, curators, or trustees " 6 How, at 328- "The presumption arising from the habitat of a corporation in the place of its creation [is] conclusive as to the residence or citizenship of those who use the corporate name and exercise the faculties conferred by it " at ) But as we have also discussed, and as *94 the last quotation shows, that analysis was a complete fiction; the real citizenship of the shareholders (or the controlling shareholders) was not consulted at all[3] From the fictional Marshall, the dissent must leap almost a century and a third to Navarro to find a "real party to the controversy" analysis that discusses "control" That case, as we have said, is irrelevant, since it involved not a juridical person but the distinctive common-law institution of trustees The dissent finds its position supported, rather than contradicted, by the trilogy of Chapman, Great and cases that did involve juridical persons but that did not apply
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
|
Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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that did involve juridical persons but that did not apply "real party to the controversy" analysis, much less a "control" test as the criterion for that status In those cases, the dissent explains, "the members of each association held equivalent power and control over the association's assets, business, and litigation" Post, at 202 It seeks to establish this factual matter, however, not from the text of the opinions (where not the slightest discussion of the point appears) but, for Chapman, by citation of scholarly commentary dealing with the general characteristics of joint stock company agreements, with no reference to (because the record does not contain) the particular agreement at issue in the case, post, at 202-203; for Great by citation of scholarly commentary dealing with the general characteristics of Pennsylvania limited partnership associations, and citation of Pennsylvania statutes, post, at 203; and, for by nothing more than the observation that "[t]here was no indication that any of the union members had any greater power over the litigation or the union's business and *95 assets than any other member, and, therefore, as in Chapman and Great the Court was not called upon to decide" the issue, post, at 204 This will not do Since diversity of citizenship is a jurisdictional requirement, the Court is always "called upon to decide" it As the Court said in Great itself: "[T]he failure of parties to urge objections [to diversity of citizenship] cannot relieve this court from the duty of ascertaining from the record whether the Circuit Court could properly take jurisdiction of this suit `The rule is inflexible and without exception, which requires this court, of its own motion, to deny its own jurisdiction, and, in the exercise of its appellate power, that of all other courts of the United States, in all cases where such jurisdiction does not affirmatively appear in the record on which, in the exercise of that power, it is called to act' " 77 US, at 453 (quoting Mansfield, C & L M R Co v Swan, US 379, (884)) If, as the dissent contends, these three cases were applying a "real party to the controversy" test governed by "control" over the associations, so that the citizenship of all members would be consulted only if all members had equivalent control, it is inconceivable that the existence of equivalency, or at least the absence of any reason to suspect nonequivalency, would not have been mentioned in the opinions Given what 80 years of cases have said and done, as opposed to what they might have said, it is difficult to
|
Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
|
Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
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to what they might have said, it is difficult to understand how the dissent can characterize as "newly formulated" the "rule that the Court will, without analysis of the particular entity before it, count every member of an unincorporated association for purposes of diversity jurisdiction" Post, at 99 In sum, we reject the contention that to determine, for diversity purposes, the citizenship of an artificial entity, the court may consult the citizenship of less than all of the entity's members We adhere to our oft-repeated rule that diversity jurisdiction in a suit by or against the entity depends on the citizenship of "all the members," Chapman, 29 *96 U S, "the several persons composing such association," Great 77 U S, "each of its members," U S, at 46 C The resolutions we have reached above can validly be characterized as technical, precedent-bound, and unresponsive to policy considerations raised by the changing realities of business organization But, as must be evident from our earlier discussion, that has been the character of our jurisprudence in this field after Letson See Currie, The Federal Courts and the American Law Institute, 36 U Chi L Rev (968) Arkoma is undoubtedly correct that limited partnerships are functionally similar to "other types of organizations that have access to federal courts," and is perhaps correct that "[c]onsiderations of basic fairness and substance over form require that limited partnerships receive similar treatment" Brief for Respondent 33 Similar arguments were made in The District Court there had upheld removal because it could divine " `no common sense reason for treating an unincorporated national labor union differently from a corporation,' " US, at 46, and we recognized that that contention had "considerable merit," at 50 We concluded, however, that "[w]hether unincorporated labor unions ought to be assimilated to the status of corporations for diversity purposes," at 53, is "properly a matter for legislative consideration which cannot adequately or appropriately be dealt with by this Court," at 47 In other words, having entered the field of diversity policy with regard to artificial entities once (and forcefully) in Letson, we have left further adjustments to be made by Congress Congress has not been idle In 958 it revised the rule established in Letson, providing that a corporation shall be deemed a citizen not only of its State of incorporation but also "of the State where it has its principal place of business" 28 US C 332(c) No provision was made for the treatment *97 of artificial entities other than corporations, although the existence of many new, post-Letson forms of commercial enterprises, including
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Justice Scalia
| 1,990 | 9 |
majority
|
Carden v. Arkoma Associates
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/112380/carden-v-arkoma-associates/
|
existence of many new, post-Letson forms of commercial enterprises, including at least the sort of joint stock company at issue in Chapman, the sort of limited partnership association at issue in Great and the sort of Massachusetts business trust at issue in Navarro, must have been obvious Thus, the course we take today does not so much disregard the policy of accommodating our diversity jurisdiction to the changing realities of commercial organization, as it honors the more important policy of leaving that to the people's elected representatives Such accommodation is not only performed more legitimately by Congress than by courts, but it is performed more intelligently by legislation than by interpretation of the statutory word "citizen" The 50 States have created, and will continue to create, a wide assortment of artificial entities possessing different powers and characteristics, and composed of various classes of members with varying degrees of interest and control Which of them is entitled to be considered a "citizen" for diversity purposes, and which of their members' citizenship is to be consulted, are questions more readily resolved by legislative prescription than by legal reasoning, and questions whose complexity is particularly unwelcome at the threshold stage of determining whether a court has jurisdiction We have long since decided that, having established special treatment for corporations, we will leave the rest to Congress; we adhere to that decision III Arkoma argues that even if this Court finds complete diversity lacking with respect to Carden and Limes, we should nonetheless affirm the judgment with respect to Magee because complete diversity indisputably exists between Magee and Arkoma This question was not considered by the Court of Appeals We decline to decide it in the first instance, and leave it to be resolved by the Court of Appeals on remand *98 The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion It is so ordered
|
Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
|
Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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The primary question in these cases is whether the statutory time limit for filing charges under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, 42 U.S. C. 2000e et seq. (1970 ed.) is a jurisdictional prerequisite to a suit in the District Court. Secondarily, we resolve a dispute as to whether retroactive seniority was a proper remedy in these Title VII cases. *388 I In 1970, the Air Line Stewards and Stewardesses Association (ALSSA), then the collective-bargaining agent of Trans World Airlines (TWA) flight attendants, brought a class action alleging that TWA practiced unlawful sex discrimination in violation of Title VII by its policy of grounding all female flight cabin attendants who became mothers, while their male counterparts who became fathers were permitted to continue flying. After collective bargaining eliminated the challenged practice prospectively, the parties in the case reached a tentative settlement. The settlement, which provided neither backpay nor retroactive seniority, was approved by the District Court. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, however, found the union to be an inadequate representative of the class because of the inherent conflict between the interests of current and former employees. It remanded the case with instructions that the District Court name individual members of the class to replace ALSSA as the class representative.[1]Air Line Stewards and Stewardesses Upon remand, petitioners in No. 78-1545 were appointed as class representatives. TWA moved to amend its answer to assert that the claims of plaintiffs and other class members were barred by Title VII's "statute of limitations" because they had failed to file charges with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) within the statutory time *389 limit. 1 Ohio App. 89a.[2] Although the District Court granted the motion to amend, it noted that the "delay in pleading the defense of limitations may well ultimately constitute a waiver of the defense." at 101a. Subsequently, on October 15, 1976, the District Court denied TWA's motion to exclude class members who had not filed timely charges with the EEOC. In support of its motion, TWA argued that instead of an affirmative defense analogous to a statute of limitations, timely filing with the EEOC is a jurisdictional prerequisite not subject to waiver by any action of the defendants. While the District Court agreed that the filing requirements of Title VII are jurisdictional, it denied the motion on the basis that any violation by the airline continued against all the class members until the airline changed the challenged policy. at 131a-132a. On October 19, 1976, the District Court granted the motion of the plaintiff class
|
Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
|
Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
|
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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the District Court granted the motion of the plaintiff class for summary judgment on the issue of TWA's liability for violating Title VII. at 133a-134a. The Court of Appeals affirmed the order of October 18, 1976, granting summary judgment on liability, expressly holding that "TWA's no motherhood policy provides a clear example of sex discrimination prohibited by 2000e-2(a)." In re Consolidated Pretrial Proceedings in the Airline Cases, It declined, however, "to extend the continuing violation theory, as did the district court, so as to include in the plaintiff class those employees who were permanently terminated more than 90 days before the filing of EEOC charges." The Court of Appeals went on to hold that timely filing of EEOC charges was a jurisdictional prerequisite. Because TWA could not waive the timely-filing requirement, the *390 Court of Appeals found that approximately 92% of the plaintiffs' claims were jurisdictionally barred by the failure of those plaintiffs to have filed charges of discrimination with the EEOC within 90 days of the alleged unlawful employment practice. The Court of Appeals, however, stayed its mandate pending the filing of petitions in this Court. Petitions for certiorari were filed by the plaintiff class, No. 78-1545, and by TWA, No. 78-1549. This Court granted motions to defer consideration of the petitions pending completion of settlement proceedings in the District Court. In connection with the settlement proceedings, the District Court designated two subclasses. Subclass A, consisting of some 30 women, comprised those who were terminated on or after March 2, 1970, as well as those who were discharged earlier, but who had accepted reinstatement in ground duty positions. Subclass B, numbering some 400 women, covered all other members of the class and consisted of those whose claims the Court of Appeals had found to be jurisdictionally barred for failure to satisfy the timely-filing requirement. The proposed settlement divided $3 million between the two groups. It also provided each class member with full company and union seniority from the date of termination. The agreement specified that "in the event of the timely objection of any interested person, it is agreed that the amount of seniority and credit for length of service for the compensation period will be determined by the Court in its discretion, pursuant to the provisions of Section 706(g), and all other applicable provisions of law, without contest or objection by TWA."[3] App. to Pet. for Cert. in No. 80-951, p. 29a. *391 The Independent Federation of Flight Attendants (union), which had replaced ALSSA as the collective-bargaining agent for the flight attendants, was permitted to intervene and to
|
Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
|
Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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for the flight attendants, was permitted to intervene and to object to the settlement. On the basis that the Court of Appeals had not issued the mandate in its jurisdictional decision, the District Court rejected the union's challenge to its jurisdiction over Subclass B. at 14a-15a. After holding three days of hearings, the District Court approved the settlement and awarded competitive seniority. It explicitly found that full restoration of retroactive seniority would not have an unusual adverse impact upon currently employed flight attendants in any way atypical of Title VII cases. at 18a-19a. The union appealed. It argued that, because of the Court of Appeals' earlier opinion, the District Court lacked jurisdiction to approve the settlement or to order retroactive seniority with respect to Subclass B. The Court of Appeals affirmed, reasoning that "the principles favoring settlement of class action lawsuits remain the same regardless of whether the disputed legal issues center on the jurisdiction of the court over the action." Air Line Stewards and Stewardesses It further explained that the question of jurisdiction as to Subclass B had not been finally determined because a challenge to its decision was pending before this Court and observed that the Courts of Appeals were split on the issue. The Court of Appeals noted that the District Court clearly had subject-matter jurisdiction over the claims of Subclass A. It concluded: "Where, as here, the jurisdictional question is not settled with finality, parties should not be forced to litigate the issue of jurisdiction if they can arrive at a settlement *392 that is otherwise appropriate for district court approval." The Court of Appeals also affirmed the award of seniority. According to the court, the settlement served the public policy of remedying past acts of sex discrimination and the consequences of those past acts. Moreover, "[t]he right to have its objections heard does not, of course, give the intervenor the right to block any settlement to which it objects." [4] The union petitioned for certiorari, No. 80-951. We granted its petition together with the petitions in No. 78-1545 and No. 78-1549, but later removed the TWA case, No. 78-1549,[5] from the argument docket and limited the grant in No. 80-951. II The single question in No. 78-1545 is whether the timely filing of an EEOC charge is a jurisdictional prerequisite to bringing a Title VII suit in federal court or whether the requirement is subject to waiver and estoppel. In reaching its decision that the requirement is jurisdictional, the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit relied on its reading of the statutory language, the
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Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
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Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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Circuit relied on its reading of the statutory language, the absence of any indication to the contrary *393 in the legislative history, and references in several of our cases to the 90-day filing requirement as "jurisdictional."[6] Other Courts of Appeals that have examined the same materials have reached the opposite conclusion.[7] We hold that filing a timely charge of discrimination with the EEOC is not a jurisdictional prerequisite to suit in federal court, but a requirement that, like a statute of limitations, is subject to waiver, estoppel, and equitable tolling.[8] The structure of Title VII, the congressional policy underlying it, and the reasoning of our cases all lead to this conclusion. The provision granting district courts jurisdiction under Title VII, 42 U.S. C. 2000e-5(e) and (f), does not limit jurisdiction to those cases in which there has been a timely filing with the EEOC.[9] It contains no reference to the timely-filing *394 requirement. The provision specifying the time for filing charges with the EEOC appears as an entirely separate provision, and it does not speak in jurisdictional terms or refer in any way to the jurisdiction of the district courts.[10] The legislative history of the filing provision is sparse, but Senator Humphrey did characterize the time period for filing a claim as a "period of limitations," 110 Cong. Rec. 12723 (1964), and Senator Case described its purpose as preventing the pressing of "stale" claims, the end served by a statute of limitations. Although subsequent legislative history is not dispositive, see Seatrain Shipbuilding ; the legislative history of the 1972 amendments also indicates that Congress intended the filing period to operate as a statute of limitations instead of a jurisdictional requirement. In the final Conference Committee section-by-section analysis of H. R. 1746, The Equal Opportunity Act of 1972, 118 Cong. Rec. 7166, 7167 the Committee not only termed the filing period a "time limitation," but explained: "This subsection as amended provides that charges be filed within 180 days of the alleged unlawful employment practice. Court decisions under the present law have *395 shown an inclination to interpret this time limitation so as to give the aggrieved person the maximum benefit of the law; it is not intended that such court decisions should be in any way circumscribed by the extension of the time limitations in this subsection."[11] This result is entirely consistent with prior case law. Although our cases contain scattered references to the timely-filing requirement as jurisdictional, the legal character of the requirement was not at issue in those cases, and as or more often in the same or other
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Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
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Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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and as or more often in the same or other cases, we have referred to the provision as a limitations statute.[12] *396 More weighty inferences however, are to be drawn from other cases. was a Title VII suit against an employer and a union. The District Court denied relief for unnamed class members on the ground that those individuals had not filed administrative charges under the provisions of Title VII and that relief for them was thus not appropriate. The Court of Appeals did not disturb this ruling, but we reversed, saying: "The District Court stated two reasons for its denial of seniority relief for the unnamed class members. The first was that those individuals had not filed administrative charges under the provision of Title VII with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and therefore class relief of this sort was not appropriate. We rejected this justification for denial of class-based relief in the context of backpay awards in Albemarle Paper] and reject it here. This justification for denying class-based relief in Title VII suits has been unanimously rejected by the courts of appeals, and Congress ratified that construction by the 1972 amendments." *397 If the timely-filing requirement were to limit the jurisdiction of the District Court to those claimants who have filed timely charges with the EEOC, the District Courts in Franks and Albemarle Paper would have been without jurisdiction to adjudicate the claims of those who had not filed as well as without jurisdiction to award them seniority. We did not so hold. Furthermore, we noted that Congress had approved the Court of Appeals cases that awarded relief to class members who had not exhausted administrative remedies before the EEOC. It is evident that in doing so, Congress necessarily adopted the view that the provision for filing charges with the EEOC should not be construed to erect a jurisdictional prerequisite to suit in the district court. In we announced a guiding principle for construing the provisions of Title VII. Declining to read literally another filing provision of Title VII, we explained that a technical reading would be "particularly inappropriate in a statutory scheme in which laymen, unassisted by trained lawyers, initiate the process." That principle must be applied here as well. The reasoning of other cases assumes that the filing requirement is not jurisdictional. In Electrical we rejected the argument that the timely-filing requirement should be tolled because the plaintiff had been pursuing a grievance procedure set up in the collective-bargaining agreement. We did not reach this decision on the basis that the 180-day period was jurisdictional. Instead, we
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Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
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Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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the basis that the 180-day period was jurisdictional. Instead, we considered the merits of a series of arguments that grievance procedures should toll the requirement. Such reasoning would have been gratuitous if the filing requirement were a jurisdictional prerequisite.[13] *398 Similarly, we did not sua sponte dismiss the action in Mohasco on the basis that the District Court lacked jurisdiction because of plaintiff's failure to comply with a related Title VII time provision. Instead, we merely observed in a footnote that "[p]etitioner did not assert respondent's failure to file the action within 90 days as a defense." By holding compliance with the filing period to be not a jurisdictional prerequisite to filing a Title VII suit, but a requirement subject to waiver as well as tolling when equity so requires, we honor the remedial purpose of the legislation as a whole without negating the particular purpose of the filing requirement, to give prompt notice to the employer. We therefore reverse the Court of Appeals in No. 78-1545. III In No. 80-951, the union challenges on several grounds the District Court's authority to award, over the union's objection, retroactive seniority to the members of Subclass B. We have already rejected the union's first contention, namely, that the District Court had no jurisdiction to award relief to those who had not complied with Title VII's filing requirement. The union also contends that in any event there has been no finding of discrimination with respect to Subclass B members and that the predicate for relief under 706(g) is therefore missing. This contention is also without merit. The District Court unquestionably found an unlawful discrimination against the plaintiff class, and the class at that *399 time had not been subdivided into Subclasses A and B. Summary judgment ran in favor of the entire class, including both those members who had filed timely charges and those who had not. The Court of Appeals affirmed the summary judgment order as well as the finding of a discriminatory employment practice. The court went on, however, to hold that the District Court had no jurisdiction over claims by those who had not met the filing requirement and that those individuals should have been excluded from the class prior to the grant of summary judgment. But as we have now held, that ruling is erroneous. The District Court did have jurisdiction over nonfiling class members. Thus, there was no jurisdictional barrier to its finding of discrimination with respect to the entire class. With the reversal of the Court of Appeals judgment in No. 78-1545 and our dismissal of No.
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Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
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Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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Appeals judgment in No. 78-1545 and our dismissal of No. 78-1549, which had challenged the affirmance of the summary judgment order, the order that found classwide discrimination remains intact and is final. The award of retroactive seniority to members of Subclass B as well as Subclass A is not infirm for want of a finding of a discriminatory employment practice. Equally meritless is the union's contention that retroactive seniority contrary to the collective-bargaining agreement should not be awarded over the objection of a union that has not itself been found guilty of discrimination. In we read the legislative history of Title VII as giving "emphatic confirmation that federal courts are empowered to fashion such relief as the particular circumstances of a case may require to effect restitution, making whole in so far as possible the victims of discrimination" While recognizing that backpay was the only remedy specifically mentioned in the provision, we reasoned that adequate relief might be denied without a seniority remedy. We concluded that the class-based seniority relief for identifiable victims *400 of illegal discrimination is a form of relief generally appropriate under 706(g). In Franks, the District Court had found both that the employer had engaged in discrimination and that the discriminatory practices were perpetuated in the collective-bargaining agreements with the however, makes it clear that once there has been a finding of discrimination by the employer, an award of retroactive seniority is appropriate even if there is no finding that the union has also illegally discriminated. In Teamsters, the parties agreed to a decree which provided that the District Court would decide "whether any discriminatees should be awarded additional equitable relief such as retroactive seniority." Although we held that the union had not violated Title VII by agreeing to and maintaining the seniority system, we nonetheless directed the union to remain in the litigation as a defendant so that full relief could be awarded the victims of the employer's post-Act discrimination.[14] Here, as in Teamsters, the settlement left to the District Court the final decision as to retroactive seniority. In resolving the seniority issue, the District Court gave the union all the process that was due it under Title VII in our cases. The union was allowed to intervene. The District Court heard its objections, made appropriate findings, and determined that retroactive seniority should be awarded. The Court of Appeals agreed with that determination, and *401 we have eliminated from our consideration here the question whether on the facts of these cases the Court of Appeals and the District Court were in error in this respect.
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Justice White
| 1,982 | 6 |
majority
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Zipes v. Trans World Airlines, Inc.
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https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/110655/zipes-v-trans-world-airlines-inc/
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and the District Court were in error in this respect. Accordingly, the judgment in No. 78-1545 is reversed and the judgment in No. 80-951 is affirmed. So ordered. JUSTICE STEVENS took no part in the consideration or decision of these cases. JUSTICE POWELL, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE and JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, concurring in No. 78-1545 and concurring in the judgment in No. 80-951. The above cases arise out of the same protracted controversy, and the Court disposes of them in a single opinion. The only question in No. 78-1545 is whether the timely filing of an EEOC charge is a jurisdictional prerequisite to bringing a Title VII suit. I agree that timely filing is not jurisdictional and is subject to waiver and estoppel. Accordingly, I join Parts I and II of the Court's opinion. I join only the judgment in No. 80-951. My concern with the Court's opinion is that it does not make clear that a timely charge, as well as a violation of Title VII, is a prerequisite to disturbing rights under a bona fide seniority system protected by 703(h), 42 U.S. C. 2000e-2(h).[1] This was made *402 clear in United Air Lines, a case not discussed in the Court's opinion.[2] I nevertheless concur in the remand of No. 80-951, in which a settlement agreement was approved awarding retroactive competitive-status seniority under the standard of This case has been in litigation since 1970, and in view of its complexity it is difficult to be certain as to "what happened and when." I believe, however, that one can conclude that the requirements of Evans were met. As noted in the Court's opinion, ante, at 398-399, the District Court's order finding classwide discrimination is now final. The District Court also entered an order finding that timely charges had been filed for all class members, and that order is similarly final. The timely-charge order was entered on October 15, 1976, three days before the entry of the order finding classwide discrimination. These orders were consolidated on appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Although the October 18th order, finding discrimination, was affirmed, the Court of Appeals vacated the other order, holding that the members of Subclass B had failed to meet the jurisdictional requirements of Title VII because they had not filed timely claims. No District Court order was ever actually vacated because, on the motion of the parties, the Court of Appeals stayed its mandate, and the parties then reached a settlement. Today, the Court reverses that portion of the Court of Appeals' judgment that would
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