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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Kennedy
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Section 4 of the Clayton Act, 38 Stat. 731, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 15, authorizes any person injured by a violation of the antitrust laws to sue for treble damages, costs, and an attorney’s fee. We must decide who may sue under § 4 when, in violation of the antitrust laws, suppliers overcharge a public utility for natural gas and the utility passes on the overcharge to its customers. Consistent with Hanover Shoe, Inc. v. United Shoe Machinery Corp., 392 U. S. 481 (1968), and Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, 431 U. S. 720 (1977), we hold that only the utility has the cause of action because it alone has suffered injury within the meaning of § 4.
I
The respondent, UtiliCorp United Inc., an investor-owned public utility operating in Kansas and western Missouri, purchased natural gas from a pipeline company for its own use and for resale to its commercial and residential customers. Together with a second utility and several other gas purchasers, the respondent sued the pipeline company and five gas production companies in the United States District Court for the District of Kansas. The utilities alleged that the defendants had conspired to inflate the price of their gas in violation of the antitrust laws. They sought treble damages, pursuant to §4 of the Clayton Act, for both the amount overcharged by the pipeline company and the decrease in sales to their customers caused by the overcharge.
The petitioners, the States of Kansas and Missouri, initiated separate §4 actions in the District Court against the same defendants for the alleged antitrust violation. Acting as parens patriae, the petitioners asserted the claims of all natural persons residing within Kansas and Missouri who had purchased gas from any utility at inflated prices. They also asserted claims as representatives of state agencies, municipalities, and other political subdivisions that had purchased gas from the defendants. The District Court consolidated all of the actions.
The defendants, in their answer, asserted that the utilities lacked standing under §4. They alleged that, pursuant to state and municipal regulations and tariffs filed with state regulatory agencies, the utilities had passed through the entire wholesale cost of the natural gas to their customers. As a result, the defendants contended, the utility customers had paid 100 percent of the alleged overcharge, and the utilities had suffered no antitrust injury as required by § 4.
The utilities moved for partial summary judgment with respect to this defense, and the District Court granted their motion. The court ruled that our decisions in Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick controlled its interpretation of § 4. It read these cases to hold that a direct purchaser from an antitrust violator suffers injury to the full extent of an illegal overcharge even if it passes on some or all of the overcharge to its customers. The District Court concluded that utilities, as direct purchasers, had suffered antitrust injury, but that their customers, as indirect purchasers, had not.
In light of its ruling, the District Court chose to treat the partial summary judgment motion as a motion to dismiss the petitioners’ parens patriae claims. It then granted this motion but allowed the petitioners to take an interlocutory appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1292(b). It certified the following question to the Court of Appeals:
“In a private antitrust action under 15 U. S. C. § 15 involving claims of price fixing against the producers of natural gas, is a State a proper plaintiff as parens pa-triae for its citizens who paid inflated prices for natural gas, when the lawsuit already includes as plaintiffs those public utilities who paid the inflated prices upon direct purchase from the producers and who subsequently passed on most or all of the price increase to the citizens of the State?” In re Wyoming Tight Sands Antitrust Cases, 695 F. Supp. 1109, 1120 (Kan. 1988).
The Court of Appeals answered the question in the negative. It agreed with the District Court that Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick required dismissal of the parens patriae claims. See In re Wyoming Tight Sands Antitrust Cases, 866 F. 2d 1286, 1294 (CA10 1989). We granted certiorari to resolve a conflict between this decision and Illinois ex rel. Hartigan v. Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co., 852 F. 2d 891 (CA7 1988) (en banc). 493 U. S. 1041 (1990). We now affirm.
II
Section 4 of the Clayton Act provides in full:
“[A]ny person who shall be injured in his business or property by reason of anything forbidden in the antitrust laws may sue therefor in any district court of the United States in the district in which the defendant resides or is found or has an agent, without respect to the amount in controversy, and shall recover threefold the damages by him sustained, and the cost of suit, including a reasonable attorney’s fee.” 15 U. S. C. § 15(a).
As noted by the District Court and the Court of Appeals, we have applied this section in two cases involving allegations that a direct purchaser had passed on an overcharge to its customers.
In Hanover Shoe, Inc. v. United Shoe Machinery Corp., supra, Hanover alleged that United had monopolized the shoe manufacturing machinery industry in violation of § 2 of the Sherman Act, 26 Stat. 209, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 2. It sought treble damages under §4 of the Clayton Act for overcharges paid in leasing certain machinery from United. United defended, in part, on the ground that Hanover had passed on the overcharge to its customers and, as a result, had suffered no injury. We rejected the defense for two reasons. First, noting that a wide range of considerations may influence a company’s pricing decisions, we concluded that establishing the amount of an overcharge shifted to indirect purchasers “would normally prove insurmountable.” 392 U. S., at 493. Second, we reasoned that a pass-on defense would reduce the effectiveness of § 4 actions by diminishing the recovery available to any potential plaintiff. See id., at 494.
In Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, 431 U. S. 720 (1977), we applied these considerations to reach a similar result. The State of Illinois sued Illinois Brick and other concrete block manufacturers for conspiring to raise the cost of concrete blocks in violation of § 1 of the Sherman Act, 26 Stat. 209, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 1. We ruled that the State had suffered no injury within the meaning of §4 because Illinois Brick had not sold any concrete blocks to it. The company, instead, had sold the blocks to masonry subcontractors, who in turn had sold them to the State’s general contractors. We decided that, because Illinois Brick could not use a pass-on defense in an action by direct purchasers, it would risk multiple liability to allow suits by indirect purchasers. See 431 U. S., at 730-731. We declined to overrule Hanover Shoe or to create exceptions for any particular industries. See 431 U. S., at 735-736, 744-745.
Like the State of Illinois in Illinois Brick, the consumers in this case have the status of indirect purchasers. In the distribution chain, they are not the immediate buyers from the alleged antitrust violators. They bought their gas from the utilities, not from the suppliers said to have conspired to fix the price of the gas. Unless we create an exception to the direct purchaser rule established in Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick, any antitrust claim against the defendants is not for them, but for the utilities to assert.
The petitioners ask us to allow them to press the consumers’ claims for three reasons. First, they assert that none of the rationales underlying Hanover Shoe or Illinois Brick exist in cases involving regulated public utilities. Second, they argue that we should apply an exception, suggested in Illinois Brick, for actions based upon cost-plus contracts. Third, they maintain that §4C of the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976, 90 Stat. 1394, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 15c, authorizes them to assert claims on behalf of utility customers even if the customers could not assert any claims themselves. Affirming the Court of Appeals, we reject each of these contentions in turn.
Ill
The petitioners assert that we should allow indirect purchaser suits in cases involving regulated public utilities that pass on 100 percent of their costs to their customers. They maintain that our concerns in Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick about the difficulties of apportionment, the risk of multiple recovery, and the diminution of incentives for private antitrust enforcement would not exist in such cases. We disagree. Although the rationales of Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick may not apply with equal force in all instances, we find it inconsistent with precedent and imprudent in any event to create an exception for regulated public utilities.
A
The direct purchaser rule serves, in part, to eliminate the complications of apportioning overcharges between direct and indirect purchasers. See Hanover Shoe, 392 U. S., at 493; Illinois Brick, supra, at 740-742; Blue Shield of Va. v. McCready, 457 U. S. 465, 475, n. 11 (1982). The petitioners find the rule unnecessary, in this respect, when a utility passes on its costs to its customers pursuant to state regulations or tariffs filed with a utility commission. In such cases, they assert, the customers pay the entire overcharge, obviating litigation over its apportionment. They maintain that they can prove the exact injury to the residential customers whom they represent because the respondent made periodic public filings showing the volume and price of gas that it sold to these consumers. They ask us to allow them to sue for the entire amount of the overcharge and to limit the respondent’s recovery to damages for its lost business.
The petitioners have oversimplified the apportionment problem in two respects. First, an overcharge may injure a utility, apart from the question of lost business, even if the utility raises its rates to offset its increased costs. As we explained in Hanover Shoe:
“The mere fact that a price rise followed an unlawful cost increase does not show that the sufferer of the cost increase was undamaged. His customers may have been ripe for his price rise earlier; if a cost rise is merely the occasion for a price increase a businessman could have imposed absent the rise in his costs, the fact that he was earlier not enjoying the benefits of the higher price should not permit the supplier who charges an unlawful price to take those benefits from him without being liable for damages. This statement merely recognizes the usual principle that the possessor of a right can recover for its unlawful deprivation whether or not he was previously exercising it.” 392 U. S., at 493, n. 9.
In other words, to show that a direct purchaser has borne no portion of an overcharge, the indirect purchaser would have to prove, among other things, that the direct purchaser could not have raised its rates prior to the overcharge.
In Hanover Shoe, however, we decided not to allow proof of what the direct purchaser might have done because of the “nearly insuperable difficulty” of the issue. Id., at 493. The petitioners assume that the presence of state regulation would make the proof less difficult here. We disagree. The state regulation does not simplify the problem but instead imports an additional level of complexity. To decide whether a utility has borne an overcharge, a court would have to consider not only the extent to which market conditions would have allowed the utility to raise its rates prior to the overcharge, as in the case of an unregulated business, but also what the state regulators would have allowed. In particular, to decide that an overcharge did not injure a utility, a court would have to determine that the State’s regulatory schemes would have barred any rate increase except for the amount reflected by cost increases. Proof of this complex preliminary issue, one irrelevant to the liability of the defendant, would proceed on a case-by-case basis and would turn upon the intricacies of state law.
From the certified question in this case, we do not know whether the respondent could have raised its prices prior to the overcharge. Its customers may have been willing to pay a greater price, and the Kansas and Missouri regulators may have allowed a rate increase based on factors other than strict costs. See Midwest Gas Users Assn. v. State Corporation Comm’n, 5 Kan. App. 2d 653, 661, 623 P. 2d 924, 931 (1981); State ex rel. Associated Natural Gas Co. v. Public Service Comm’n, 706 S. W. 2d 870, 879-880 (Mo. App. 1985). To the extent that the respondent could have sought and gained permission to raise its rates in the absence of an overcharge, at least some portion of the overcharge is being borne by it; whether by overcharge or by increased rates, consumers would have been paying more for natural gas than they had been paying in the past. Because of this potential injury, the respondent must remain in the suit. If we were to add indirect purchasers to the action, we would have to devise an apportionment formula. This is the very complexity that Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick sought to avoid.
Second, difficult questions of timing might necessitate apportioning overcharges if we allowed indirect suits by utility customers. Even if, at some point, a utility can pass on 100 percent of its costs to its customers, various factors may delay the passing-on process. Some utilities must seek approval from the governing regulators prior to raising their rates. Other utilities, pursuant to purchase gas adjustment clauses (PGA’s) filed with state regulators, may adjust their rates to reflect changes in their wholesale costs according to prearranged formulas without seeking regulatory approval in each instance. Yet, even utilities that use PGA’s often encounter some delay. See Brief for State of Illinois as Ami-cus Curiae 9, n. 11 (describing the various time lags under a typical PGA between the increase in a utility’s wholesale costs and the rise in consumer rates). During any period in which a utility’s costs rise before it may adjust its rates, the utility will bear the costs in the form of lower earnings. See S. Breyer, Regulation and its Reform 48-49 (1982). Even after the utility raises its rates, moreover, the pass-through process may take time to complete. During this time, the utility and its customers each would pay for some of the increased costs.
In this case, we could not deprive the respondent of its § 4 action without first determining that the passing-on process in fact had allowed it to shift the entire overcharge to its customers. The certified question, however, leaves unclear whether the respondent had passed on “most or all” of its costs at the time of the suit. In addition, even the means by which the passthrough occurred remain unsettled. The petitioners allege that, pursuant to formulas in PGA’s filed with the Kansas Corporation Commission and the Missouri Public Service Commission, the respondent “automatically” adjusted some of its rates to reflect increases in the wholesale cost of gas. Brief for Petitioners 5, n. 5. The respondent, however, maintains that PGA’s did not govern all of its sales. See Brief for Respondent 17. The difficulties posed by issues of this sort led us to adopt the direct purchaser rule, and we must decline to create an exception that would require their litigation. As we have stated before: “[T]he task of disentangling overlapping damages claims is not lightly to be imposed upon potential antitrust litigants, or upon the judicial system.” McCready, 457 U. S., at 475, n. 11.
In addition to these complications, the regulation of utilities itself may make an exception to Illinois Brick unnecessary. Our decisions in Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick often deny relief to consumers who have paid inflated prices because of their status as indirect purchasers. See 2 P. Areeda & D. Turner, Antitrust Law §337e, pp. 193-194 (1978); Harris & Sullivan, Passing on the Monopoly Overcharge: A Comprehensive Policy Analysis, 128 U. Pa. L. Rev. 269, 342 (1979). Although one might criticize Illinois Brick for this consequence in other circumstances, the criticism may have less validity in the context of public utilities. Both the Court of Appeals in this case and the Seventh Circuit in Illinois ex rel. Hartigan v. Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co., 852 F. 2d 891 (1988), have suggested that state regulators would require the utilities to pass on at least some of the recovery obtained in a § 4 suit. See Wyoming Tight Sands, 866 F. 2d, at 1291; Panhandle Eastern, supra, at 895. State regulators have followed this approach elsewhere. See, e. g., Louisiana Power & Light Co., Ex Parte, Nos. U-17906, U-12636, U-17649, 1989 La. PUC LEXIS 3, *31-*32 (Mar. 1, 1989) (requiring Louisiana Power & Light Co., which won a $190 million judgment against United Gas Pipe Line Co., to flow the proceeds back to ratepayers through reduced rates over a 5-year period). If Kansas and Missouri impose similar requirements, then even if the customers cannot sue the alleged antitrust violaters, they may receive some of the compensation obtained by the respondent. Creating an exception to allow apportionment in violation of Illinois Brick would make little sense when, in light of all its difficulty, its practical significance is so diminished.
B
The Illinois Brick rule also serves to eliminate multiple recoveries. See Illinois Brick, 431 U. S., at 730-731; McCready, supra, at 474. The petitioners assert that no risk of multiple recovery would exist here, if we allowed them to sue, because the direct and indirect purchasers would be seeking different, not duplicative, damages; the petitioners would recover the amount of the overcharge and the utilities would recover damages for their lost sales. Leaving aside the apportionment issue, we reject the argument in this case, just as we did in Illinois Brick. Bringing all classes of direct and indirect purchasers together in a single lawsuit may reduce the risk of multiple recovery, but the reduction comes at too great a cost. See Illinois Brick, supra, at 731, n. 11.
This case already has become quite complicated. It involves numerous utilities and other companies operating in several States under federal, state, and municipal regulation and, in some instances, under no rate regulation at all. Even apart from gas sold to customers, the utilities seek damages for lost sales and for gas purchased for their own use. The petitioners, in addition to their parens patriae claims, are asserting direct claims on behalf of numerous state agencies. Other direct purchasers also seek several measures of damages. Allowing the petitioners to proceed on behalf of consumers would complicate the proceedings further. Even if they could represent consumers residing in Kansas and Missouri, they could not represent industrial and commercial purchasers or consumers from other States. See 15 U. S. C. § 15c(a)(l) (extending parens patriae representation only to resident natural persons). These unrepresented consumers might seek intervention and further delay the prompt determination of the suit. The expansion of the case would risk the confusion, costs, and possibility of error inherent in complex litigation. At the same time, however, it might serve little purpose because, as noted above, state regulatory law may provide appropriate relief to consumers even if they cannot sue under § 4. As in Illinois Brick, we continue to believe that “even if ways could be found to bring all potential plaintiffs together in one huge action, the complexity thereby introduced into treble-damages proceedings argues strongly for retaining the Hanover Shoe rule.” 431 U. S., at 731, n. 11.
C
We have maintained, throughout our cases, that our interpretation of §4 must promote the vigorous enforcement of the antitrust laws. See Hanover Shoe, 392 U. S., at 493; Illinois Brick, supra, at 746; McCready, 457 U. S., at 475, n. 11; California v. ARC America Corp., 490 U. S. 93, 102, n. 6 (1989). If we were convinced that indirect suits would secure this goal better in cases involving utilities, the argument to interpret § 4 to create the exception sought by the petitioners might be stronger. On balance, however, we do not believe that the petitioners can prevail in this critical part of the case. The petitioners assert that utilities, such as the respondent, lack the incentive to prosecute § 4 cases for two reasons. First, they state that utilities, by law, may pass on their costs to customers. Second, they surmise that utilities might have to pass on damages recovered in a § 4 action. In other words, according to the petitioners, utilities lose nothing if they do not sue and gain nothing if they do sue. In contrast, the petitioners maintain, the large aggregate claims of residential consumers will give state attorneys general ample motivation to sue in their capacity as parens patriae.
The petitioners’ argument does not persuade us that utilities will lack incentives to sue overcharging suppliers. Utilities may bring § 4 actions in some instances for fear that regulators will not allow them to shift known and avoidable overcharges on to their customers. See Kan. Stat. Ann. §66-128a (1985) (allowing the state commission to “review and evaluate the efficiency or prudence of any actions ... of any public utility or common carrier for the purpose of establishing fair and reasonable rates”); Mo. Rev. Stat. §393.150 (1986) (interpreted in State ex rel. Associated Natural Gas Co. v. Public Service Comm’n, 706 S. W. 2d 870, 879-880 (Mo. App. 1985), to give regulators “considerable discretion” in setting gas rates). In addition, even if state law would require a utility to reimburse its customers for recovered overcharges, a utility may seek treble damages in a § 4 action. The petitioners have cited no authority indicating that a victorious utility would have to pay the entire exemplary portion of these damages to its customers.
Utilities, moreover, have an established record of diligent antitrust enforcement, having brought highly successful § 4 actions in many instances. The well-known group of actions from the 1960’s involving overcharges for electrical generating equipment provides an excellent example. In these cases, which involved “a series of horizontal price-fixing conspiracies characterized as the most shocking in the history of the Sherman Act, plaintiff utilities . . . recovered] in unprecedented sums” even though some of the utilities “passed on to their own customers whatever higher costs they incurred as a consequence of the alleged conspiracies.” Pollock, Standing to Sue, Remoteness of Injury, and the Passing-On Doctrine, 32 A. B. A. Antitrust L. J. 5, 10-11 (1966). The courts in these suits, even before the Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick decisions, considered the pass-on issue and held that the causes of action were for the utilities to assert. See, e. g., Commonwealth Edison Co. v. Allis-Chalmers Mfg. Co., 335 F. 2d 203, 208 (CA7 1964); Ohio Valley Electric Corp. v. General Electric Co., 244 F. Supp. 914, 949-951 (SDNY 1965). Various factors may have prompted these and other utility actions. For example, in addition to the reasons stated above, the respondent asserts that, like any business, an investor-owned utility has an interest in protecting its market. But whatever the motivation for their §4 suits, this history makes us quite hesitant to take from the utilities the responsibility for enforcing the antitrust laws.
Relying on indirect purchaser actions in utility cases might fail to promote antitrust enforcement for other reasons. Consumers may lack the expertise and experience necessary for detecting improper pricing by a utility’s suppliers. See Landes & Posner, The Economics of Passing On: A Reply to Harris and Sullivan, 128 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1274, 1278-1279 (1980). Although state attorneys general have greater expertise, they may hesitate to exercise the parens patriae device in cases involving smaller, more speculative harm to consumers. See Landes & Posner, Should Indirect Purchasers Have Standing to Sue Under the Antitrust Laws? An Economic Analysis of the Rule of Illinois Brick, 46 U. Chi. L. Rev. 602, 613 (1979). See also Illinois Brick, 431 U. S., at 745 (stating that, in indirect actions, “the uncertainty of how much of an overcharge could be established . . . [and] the uncertainty of how that overcharge would be apportioned . . . would further reduce the incentive to sue”). And even when state attorneys general decide to bring parens patriae actions, they may sue only on behalf of resident natural persons. See 15 U. S. C. § 15c(a)(l). All others, including nonresidents and small businesses, might fail to enforce their claims because of the insignificance of their individual recoveries. For these reasons, we remain unconvinced that the exception sought by the petitioners would promote antitrust enforcement better than the current Illinois Brick rule.
D
The preceding conclusions bring us to a broader point. The rationales underlying Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick will not apply with equal force in all cases. We nonetheless believe that ample justification exists for our stated decision not to “carve out exceptions to the [direct purchaser] rule for particular types of markets.” Illinois Brick, 431 U. S., at 744. The possibility of allowing an exception, even in rather meritorious circumstances, would undermine the rule. As we have stated:
“[T]he process of classifying various market situations according to the amount of pass-on likely to be involved and its susceptibility of proof in a judicial forum would entail the very problems that the Hanover Shoe rule was meant to avoid. The litigation over where the line should be drawn in a particular class of cases would inject the same ‘massive evidence and complicated theories’ into treble-damages proceedings, albeit at a somewhat higher level of generality.” Id., at 744-745.
In sum, even assuming that any economic assumptions underlying the Illinois Brick rule might be disproved in a specific case, we think it an unwarranted and counterproductive exercise to litigate a series of exceptions. Having stated the rule in Hanover Shoe, and adhered to it in Illinois Brick, we stand by our interpretation of § 4.
<
The suggestion in Hanover Shoe and Illinois Brick that a departure from the direct purchaser rule may be necessary when an indirect purchaser buys under a pre-existing cost-plus contract does not justify an exception in this case. In Hanover Shoe, we stated:
“We recognize that there might be situations — for instance, when an overcharged buyer has a pre-existing ‘cost-plus’ contract, thus making it easy to prove that he has not been damaged — where the considerations requiring that the passing-on defense not be permitted in this case would not be present.” 392 U. S., at 494.
We observed further in Illinois Brick:
“In [a cost-plus contract] situation, the [direct] purchaser is insulated from any decrease in its sales as a result of attempting to pass on the overcharge, because its customer is committed to buying a fixed quantity regardless of price. The effect of the overcharge is essentially determined in advance, without reference to the interaction of supply and demand that complicates the determination in the general case.” 431 U. S., at 736.
The petitioners argue that the regulations and tariffs requiring the respondent to pass on its costs to the consumers place this case within the cost-plus contract exception. We disagree.
The respondent did not sell the gas to its customers under a pre-existing cost-plus contract. Even if we were to create an exception for situations that merely resemble those governed by such a contract, we would not apply the exception here. Our statements above show that we might allow indirect purchasers to sue only when, by hypothesis, the direct purchaser will bear no portion of the overcharge and otherwise suffer no injury. That certainty does not exist here.
The utility customers made no commitment to purchase any particular quantity of gas, and the utility itself had no guarantee of any particular profit. Even though the respondent raised its prices to cover its costs, we cannot ascertain its precise injury because, as noted above, we do not know what might have happened in the absence of an overcharge. In addition, even if the utility customers had a highly inelastic demand for natural gas, see Panhandle Eastern, 852 F. 2d, at 895, the need to inquire into the precise operation of market forces would negate the simplicity and certainty that could justify a cost-plus contract exception. See Illinois Brick, supra, at 742; P. Areeda & H. Hovencamp, Antitrust Law § 337.3c, pp. 323-324 (Supp. 1988). Thus, although we do not alter our observations about the possibility of an exception for cost-plus contracts, we decline to create the general exception for utilities sought by the petitioners.
V
The petitioners, in their final argument, contend that § 4C of the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976, 90 Stat. 1394, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 15c, authorizes them to sue on behalf of consumers even though the consumers, as indirect purchasers, have no cause of action of their own. Section 40(a)(1) provides in relevant part:
“Any attorney general of a State may bring a civil action in the name of such state as parens patriae on behalf of natural persons residing in such State ... to secure monetary relief as provided in this section for injury sustained by such natural persons to their property by reason of any violation of sections 1 to 7 of this title.” 15 U. S. C. § 15c(a)(l).
Because the Act, in their view, has the clear purpose of protecting consumers, see Kintner, Griffin, & Goldston, The Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976: An Analysis, 46 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 1, 23 (1977), the petitioners contend that it must allow the States to sue on behalf of consumers notwithstanding their status as indirect purchasers.
We have rejected this argument before. We stated in Illinois Brick that § 4C did not establish any new substantive liability. Instead, “[i]t simply created a new procedural device — 'parens patriae actions by States on behalf of their citizens — to enforce existing rights of recovery under §4 [of the Clayton Act].” 431 U. S., at 734, n. 14. Section 4, as noted above, affords relief only to a person “injured in his business or property by reason of anything forbidden in the antitrust laws.” 15 U. S. C. § 15(a). State attorneys general may bring actions on behalf of consumers who have such an injury. See, e. g., Pennsylvania v. Mid-Atlantic Toyota Distributors, Inc., 704 F. 2d 125, 128 (CA4 1983) (suit on behalf of consumers injured by an alleged conspiracy to fix the price of cars). But here the respondent is the injured party under the antitrust laws, and the predicate for a parens patriae action has not been established. We conclude that the petitioners may not assert any claims on behalf of the customers.
Affirmed.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Brennan
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Appellant National Geographic Society, a nonprofit scientific and educational corporation of the District of Columbia, maintains two offices in California that solicit advertising copy for the Society’s monthly magazine, the National Geographic Magazine. However, the offices perform no activities related to the Society’s operation of a mail-order business for the sale from the District of Columbia of maps, atlases, globes, and books. Orders for these items are mailed from California directly to appellant’s Washington, D. C., headquarters on coupons or forms enclosed with announcements mailed to Society members and magazine subscribers or on order forms contained in the magazine. Deliveries are made by mail from the Society’s Washington, D. C., or Maryland offices. Payment is either by cash mailed with the order or after a mailed billing following receipt of the merchandise. Such mail-order sales to California residents during the period involved in this suit aggregated $83,596.48.
California Rev. & Tax. Code § 6203 (West Supp. 1976) requires every “retailer engaged in business in this state and making sales of tangible personal property for storage, use, or other consumption in this state” to collect from the purchaser a use tax in lieu of the sales tax imposed upon local retailers. The California Supreme Court held that appellant is subject to the statute as a “ 'retailer engaged in business in this state,' ” because its maintenance of the two offices brings appellant within the definition under § 6203 (a) that includes “ '[a]ny retailer maintaining . . . an office. . . .'" 16 Cal. 3d 637, 642, 547 P. 2d 458, 460—461 (1976). Section 6204 makes the retailer liable to the State for any taxes required to be collected regardless of whether he collects the tax. See Bank of America v. State Bd. of Equalization, 209 Cal. App. 2d 780, 793, 26 Cal. Rptr. 348, 355 (1962).
The question presented by this case is whether the Society’s activities at the offices in California provided sufficient nexus between the out-of-state seller appellant and the State—as required by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Commerce Clause—to support the imposition upon the Society of a use-tax-collection liability pursuant to §§ 6203 and 6204, measured by the $83,596.48 of mail-order sales of merchandise from the District of Columbia and Maryland. The California Supreme Court held that the imposition of use-tax-collection liability on the Society violated neither Clause, 16 Cal. 3d 637, 547 P. 2d 458 (1976). We noted probable jurisdiction. 429 U. S. 883 (1976). We affirm.
I
All States that impose sales taxes also impose a corollary-use tax on tangible property bought out of State to protect sales tax revenues and put local retailers subject to the sales tax on a competitive parity with out-of-state retailers exempt from the sales tax. H. R. Rep. No. 565, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 614 (1965). The constitutionality of such state schemes is settled. Henneford v. Silas Mason Co., 300 U. S. 577, 581 (1937); Monamotor Oil Co. v. Johnson, 292 U. S. 86 (1934).
But the limitation of use taxes to consumption within the State so as to avoid problems of due process that might arise from the extension of the sales tax to interstate commerce, see, e. g., Nelson v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 312 U. S. 359, 363 (1941); Monamotor Oil Co. v. Johnson, supra, at 95, does not avoid all constitutional difficulties. States necessarily impose the burden of collecting the tax on the out-of-state seller; the impracticability of its collection from the multitude of individual purchasers is obvious. Miller Bros. Co. v. Maryland, 347 U. S. 340, 343 (1954). However, not every out-of-state seller may constitutionally be made liable for payment of the use tax on merchandise sold to purchasers in the State. The California Supreme Court concluded, based on its survey of the relevant decisions of this Court, that the “slightest presence” of the seller in California established sufficient nexus between the State and the seller constitutionally to support the imposition of the duty to collect and pay the tax. The California court stated, 16 Cal. 3d, at 644, 547 P. 2d, at 462:
“We are satisfied that from the above cited decisions the following principle can be distilled and we thus hold: Where an out-of-state seller conducts a substantial mail order business with residents of a state imposing a use tax on such purchasers and the seller’s connection with the taxing state is not exclusively by means of the instruments of interstate commerce, the slightest presence within such taxing state independent of any connection through interstate commerce will permit the state constitutionally to impose on the seller the duty of collecting the use tax from such mail order purchasers and the liability for failure to do so.” (Emphasis supplied.)
Our affirmance of the California Supreme Court is not to be understood as implying agreement with that court’s "slightest presence” standard of constitutional nexus. Appellant’s maintenance of two offices in the State and solicitation by employees assigned to those offices of advertising copy in the range of $1 million annually, Tr. of Oral Arg. 6, establish a much more substantial presence than the expression “slightest presence” connotes. Our affirmance thus rests upon our conclusion that appellant’s maintenance of the two offices in California and activities there adequately establish a relationship or “nexus” between the Society and the State that renders constitutional the obligations imposed upon appellant pursuant to §§ 6203 and 6204. This conclusion is supported by several of our decisions.
The requisite nexus was held to be shown when the out-of-state sales were arranged by the seller’s local agents working in the taxing State, Felt & Tarrant Co. v. Gallagher, 306 U. S. 62 (1939); General Trading Co. v. Tax Comm’n, 322 U. S. 335 (1944), and in cases of maintenance in the State of local retail store outlets by out-of-state mail-order sellers. Nelson v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., supra; Nelson v. Montgomery Ward, 312 U. S. 373 (1941). In Scripto, Inc. v. Carson, 362 U. S. 207 (1960), the necessary basis was found in the case of a Georgia-based company that had “10 wholesalers, jobbers, or 'salesmen' conducting continuous local solicitation in Florida and forwarding the resulting orders from that State to Atlanta for shipment of the ordered goods,” id., at 211, although maintaining no office or place of business in Florida, and having no property or regular full-time employees there.
Standard Pressed Steel Co. v. Washington Rev. Dept., 419 U. S. 560 (1975), is also instructive. That case involved a direct tax upon the gross receipts of a foreign corporation resulting from sales to a State of Washington customer, and not imposition of use-tax-collection duties. Although “a vice in a tax on gross receipts of a corporation doing an interstate business is the risk of multiple taxation . . . ,” id., at 563, see Monamotor Oil Co. v. Johnson, supra, a concern not present when only imposition of use-tax-collection duty is involved, Standard Pressed Steel held that maintenance in the taxing State of a single employee, an engineer whose office was in his Washington home and whose primary responsibility was to consult with the Washington-based customer regarding its anticipated needs for the out-of-state supplier’s product, established a sufficient relation to activities within the State producing the gross receipts as to support imposition of the tax. It is particularly significant for our purposes in this case that the Court characterized as “frivolous” the argument that the seller’s in-state activities were so thin and inconsequential that the tax had no reasonable relation to the protection and benefits conferred by the taxing State, for the employee “made possible the realization and continuance of valuable contractual relations between [the seller and its Washington customer].” 419 U. S., at 562. Other fairly apportioned, nondiscriminatory direct taxes have also been sustained when the taxes have been shown to be fairly related to the services provided the out-of-state seller by the taxing State. Complete Auto Transit, Inc. v. Brady, ante, p. 274; General Motors Corp. v. Washington, 377 U. S. 436 (1964); Northwestern Cement Co. v. Minnesota, 358 U. S. 450 (1959); Memphis Gas Co. v. Stone, 335 U. S. 80 (1948); Wisconsin v. J. C. Penney Co., 311 U. S. 435, 444 (1940).
The case for the validity of the imposition upon the out-of-state seller enjoying such services of a duty to collect a use tax is even stronger. See Norton Co. v. Illinois Rev. Dept., 340 U. S. 534, 537 (1951). The out-of-state seller runs no risk of double taxation. The consumer’s identification as a resident of the taxing State is self-evident. The out-of-state seller becomes liable for the tax only by failing or refusing to collect the tax from that resident consumer. Thus, the sole burden imposed upon the out-of-state seller by statutes like §§ 6203 and 6204 is the administrative one of collecting it. Compare McLeod v. Dilworth Co., 322 U. S. 327 (1944) (sales tax), with Scripto, Inc. v. Carson, supra, and General Trading Co. v. Tax Comm’n, supra. See also American Oil Co. v. Neill, 380 U. S. 451, 454-455 (1965).
Two decisions that have held fact patterns deficient to establish the necessary nexus to impose the duty to collect the use tax highlight the significance of the inquiry whether the out-of-state seller enjoys services of the taxing State. Miller Bros. Co. v. Maryland, 347 U. S. 340 (1954), struck down a Maryland assessment against a Delaware store near the border between the two States. The store had made over-the-counter sales to Maryland residents and occasionally shipped or delivered goods by truck into that State. The store advertised in Delaware by newspaper and radio, and some of these advertisements reached Maryland residents. These advertisements were sometimes supplemented with “flyers” mailed to customers, some of whom lived in Maryland. The Court concluded that Maryland could not satisfy the due process requirement. In addition to the almost total lack of contacts between Maryland and the Delaware store— Marylanders went to Delaware to make purchases, the seller did not go to Maryland to make sales—the seller obviously could not know whether the goods sold over the counter in Delaware were transported to Maryland prior to their use. See Scripto, Inc. v. Carson, supra, at 212.
National Bellas Hess, Inc. v. Illinois Rev. Dept., 386 U. S. 753 (1967), presented the question in the case of an out-of-state seller whose only connection with customers in the taxing State was by common carrier or mail. Illinois subjected appellant Bellas Hess, a national mail-order house centered in Missouri, to use tax liability based upon mail-order sales to customers in that State. Bellas Hess owned no tangible property in Illinois, had no sales outlets, representatives, telephone listings, or solicitors in that State, and did not advertise there by radio, television, billboards, or newspapers. It communicated with potential customers by mailing catalogues throughout the United States, including Illinois, twice a year and occasionally supplemented this effort by mailing out “flyers.” All orders for merchandise were mailed to Bellas Hess’ Missouri plant, and the goods were sent to customers by mail or common carrier. Bellas Hess held that, constitutionally, the basis for the requisite nexus was not to be found solely in Bellas Hess’ mail-order activities in the State. The Court’s opinion carefully underscored, however, the “sharp distinction . . . between mail order sellers with retail outlets, solicitors, or property within [the taxing] State, and those [like Bellas Hess] who do no more than communicate with customers in the State by mail or common carrier as part of a general interstate business.” Id., at 758. Appellant Society clearly falls into the former category.
II
The Society argues, however, that its contacts with customers in California were related solely to its mail-order sales by means of common carrier or the mail, that the two offices played no part in that activity, and that therefore this case is controlled by Bellas Hess. The Society argues in other words that there must exist a nexus or relationship not only between the seller and the taxing State, but also between the activity of the seller sought to be taxed and the seller’s activity within the State. We disagree. However fatal to a direct tax a “showing that particular transactions are dissociated from the local business . . . ,” Norton Co. v. Illinois Rev. Dept., supra, at 537; American Oil Co. v. Neill, supra; Connecticut Gen. Life Ins. Co. v. Johnson, 303 U. S. 77 (1938), such dissociation does not bar the imposition of the use-tax-collection duty. It is true that Sears, Roebuck and Montgomery Ward, relied on by appellant, involved fact patterns that included proof of assistance by local operations of the mail-order business. Sears maintained 12 retail stores in the taxing State and was qualified to do business there. Sears’ agents in the States, although not directly involved in the solicitation of the mail-order sales, at times assisted in processing such orders. The holding that Sears could not avoid use-tax liability did not, however, turn on that fact. The holding, rather, was that the fact Sears’ business was departmentalized—the mail-order and retail stores operations were separately administered—did not preclude the finding of sufficient nexus. Montgomery Ward, a companion case to Sears, Roebuck, presented a somewhat similar fact pattern. There the local retail stores engaged in local advertising of the mail-order merchandise. But here again we disagree that this fact was crucial to the Court’s decision. Even if, as the Society argues, the fact patterns of Sears and Montgomery Ward may be regarded as the equivalent of the in-state solicitation by local agents found sufficient to supply the nexus for imposition of the use-tax-collection duty in Felt & Tarrant Co. v. Gallagher, 306 U. S. 62 (1939), see also Scripto, Inc. v. Carson, 362 U. S. 207 (1960) (local solicitation by commission “salesmen”); General Trading Co. v. Tax Comm’n, 322 U. S. 335 (1944) (traveling salesmen sent into taxing State); Bowman v. Continental Oil Co., 256 U. S. 642 (1921) (local distributor and dealer); and Monamotor Oil Co. v. Johnson, 292 U. S. 86 (1934) (local refining, storage, and distributing facilities), the relevant constitutional test to establish the requisite nexus for requiring an out-of-state seller to collect and pay the use tax is not whether the duty to collect the use tax relates to the seller’s activities carried on within the State, but simply whether the facts demonstrate “some definite link, some minimum connection, between [the State and] the person . . . it seeks to tax.” Miller Bros. v. Maryland, 347 U. S., at 344—345. (Emphasis added.) Here the Society’s two offices, without regard to the nature of their activities, had the advantage of the same municipal services—fire and police protection, and the like—as they would have had if their activities, as in Sears and Montgomery Ward, included assistance to the mail-order operations that generated the use taxes.
The Society’s reliance on Miller Bros. Co. v. Maryland, supra, is also misplaced. The sales with respect to which Maryland sought to impose upon Miller the duty to collect its tax were of goods sold to residents of Maryland at Miller’s Delaware store, although Miller made occasional deliveries in Maryland. Moreover, the lack of certainty that the merchandise sold over the counter to Maryland customers in Delaware was transported to Maryland prior to its use militated against a finding of adequate nexus with respect to those purchases. Scripto, Inc. v. Carson, supra, at 212-213. The relational defect between the taxing State and the person or property sought to be taxed therefore obviated any relevance of a relationship between the State and the out-of-state retailer.
We conclude that the Society’s continuous presence in California in offices that solicit advertising for its magazine provides a sufficient nexus to justify that State’s imposition upon the Society of the duty to act as collector of the use tax.
Affirmed.
The Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Rehnquist took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
The relevant sections of the Cal. Rev. & Tax. Code provide:
§ 6203 (West Supp. 1976).
“Except as provided by Sections 6292 and 6293 every retailer engaged in business in this state and making sales of tangible personal property for storage, use, or other consumption in this state, not exempted under Chapters 3.5 or 4 of this part, shall, at the time of making the sales or, if the storage, use, or other consumption of the tangible personal property is not then taxable hereunder, at the time the storage, use, or other consumption becomes taxable, collect the tax from the purchaser and give to the purchaser a receipt therefor in the manner and form prescribed by the board.
“ ‘Retailer engaged in business in this state’ as used in this and the preceding section means and includes any of the following:
“(a) Any retailer maintaining, occupying, or using, permanently or temporarily, directly or indirectly, or through a subsidiary, or agent, by whatever name called, an office, place of distribution, sales or sample room or place, warehouse or storage place or other place of business.”
§ 6204 (West 1970).
“The tax required to be collected by the retailer and any amount unreturned to the customer which is not tax but was collected from the customer under the representation by the retailer that it was tax constitutes debts owed by the retailer to this state.”
The magazine is exempted from sales and use taxes as a “periodical.” § 6362.
The offices are in San Francisco and Los Angeles and have been maintained since 1956. Each office was originally staffed with one salesman and one secretary, but each office has since increased its personnel to four. The basic function of the offices is to solicit advertising for the magazine, 16 Cal. 3d, at 640, 547 P. 2d, at 459-460. Sales of advertising copy by the two offices aggregate about $1 million annually. Tr. of Oral Arg. 6. During a nine-month period from August 1, 1963, to May 6, 1964, appellant Society also used these offices to make over-the-counter sales, upon which sales taxes were paid, of maps, atlases, globes, and books totaling $679.20 for the San Francisco office and $2,161.85 for the Los Angeles office. The California Supreme Court found it unnecessary to consider these sales in determining whether sufficient nexus was shown since the Society’s office activities sufficed in its view adequately to prove sufficient nexus. 16 Cal. 3d, at 641 n. 6, 547 P. 2d, at 460 n. 6. We are of the same view.
Although appellant’s potential liability exceeds $180,000 and covers a nine-year period, ibid., the assessment by the California Board of Equalization for the years involved in this case is $3,838.76, including interest and penalties. Appellant paid the assessment under protest and sued for its refund in State Superior Court and recovered a judgment. The California Court of Appeal, First Appellate District, affirmed. 121 Cal. Rptr. 77 (1975). The California Supreme Court reversed and sustained the assessment. 16 Cal. 3d 637, 547 P. 2d 458 (1976).
Henneford obviated the necessity for legislation sought by the National Asssociation of State Tax Administrators in the 73d through 76th Congresses to permit States to extend their sales taxes to certain interstate transactions. See H. R. Rep. No. 565, 89th Cong., 1st Sess., 613-615 (1965). Some 45 States and the District of Columbia require out-of-state sellers to collect use taxes on sales made to state residents. Brief for Direct Mail/Marketing Assn, as Amicus Curiae 4.
Appellant Society argues that under the California Supreme Court’s “slightest presence” test §§ 6203 and 6204 could be applied even if the Society maintained no offices in the State but merely owned a parking lot. But the sections were applied to appellant only because it maintained the offices. Appellant was therefore only subject to the law because it fell within “retailer engaged in business in this state” as defined in § 6203 (a).
Appellant conceded at oral argument that Bellas Hess would have required reversal in the absence of the proof of maintenance of the two offices. Tr. of Oral Arg. 29, 34-35.
Contrary to appellant's argument, Brief for Appellant 6, the fact that it has not registered to do business in California is not determinative against the validity of the application of §§ 6203 and 6204. See General Trading Co. v. Tax Comm’n, 322 U. S. 335 (1944); Felt & Tarrant Co. v. Gallagher, 306 U. S. 62 (1939).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
Respondents in this case are Medicaid providers and physicians who perform abortions in the State of Arkansas. In November 1993, they filed suit against petitioners, who are Arkansas state officials, seeking injunctive and declaratory relief with respect to Amendment 68 of the Arkansas Constitution, § 1 of which prohibits the use of state funds to pay for any abortion “except to save the mother’s life.” Their claim was that this provision is inconsistent with a requirement in Title XIX of the Social Security Act, 79 Stat. 348, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 1396 et seq., as affected by the 1994 version of the “Hyde Amendment,” that States fund medically necessary abortions where the pregnancy resulted from an act of rape or incest. The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas granted summary judgment for respondents and enjoined Amendment 68; the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed. 60 F. 3d 497 (1995). Petitioners sought certiorari with respect to two aspects of the case: (1) the District Court’s holding that “[u]nder the Hyde Amendment. . . federal law requires Arkansas and other states that participate in the federal Medicaid program to pay for abortions in cases where pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, as well as abortions to save the mother’s life,” 860 F. Supp. 609, 612 (1994), and (2) the District Court’s enjoining of Amendment 68 “in its entirety for so -long as the State of Arkansas accepts federal funds pursuant to the Medicaid Act,” id., at 628 (emphasis added). We grant certiorari as to the second of these questions. Accepting (without deciding) that the District Court’s interpretation of the Hyde Amendment is correct, we reverse the decision below insofar as it affirms blanket invalidation of Amendment 68.
In a pre-emption case such as this, state law is displaced only “to the extent that it actually conflicts with federal law.” Pacific Gas & Elec. Co. v. State Energy Resources Conservation and Development Comm’n, 461 U. S. 190, 204 (1983). See, e. g., Gade v. National Solid Wastes Management Assn., 505 U. S. 88, 109 (1992); Exxon Corp. v. Hunt, 475 U. S. 355, 376 (1986). “[T]he rule [is] that a federal court should not extend its invalidation of a statute further than necessary to dispose of the case before it.” Brockett v. Spokane Arcades, Inc., 472 U. S. 491, 502 (1985).
Amendment 68 reads as follows:
“§ 1. Public funding. No public funds will be used to pay for any abortion, except to save the mother’s life.
Ҥ2. Public policy. The policy of Arkansas is to protect the life of every unborn child from conception until birth, to the extent permitted by the Federal Constitution.
“§3. Effect of amendment. This amendment will not affect contraceptives or require an appropriation of public funds.”
Section 1 of this provision is affected by the lower courts’ interpretation of Title XIX and the 1994 Hyde Amendment only in cases where a Medicaid-eligible woman seeks to abort a pregnancy resulting from an act of rape or incest and the abortion is not necessary to save the woman’s life. Respondents do not claim that any other possible application of § 1 is pre-empted by current federal law. It is entirely possible, for example, that § 1 would have application to state programs that receive no federal funding. As the District Court noted, the Arkansas Crime Victims Reparations Act, Ark. Code Ann. § 16-90-701 et seq. (Supp. 1995), established a program which provides compensation and assistance to victims of criminal acts within the State, including compensation for medical expenses, see §16-90-703(7). Without the limitation imposed by Amendment 68, the program might have the authority to reimburse crime victims for. abortions not necessary to save the life of the pregnant woman. Assuming the compensation program is entirely state funded, nothing in respondents’ challenge to Amendment 68 suggests that the application of § 1 to the program would conflict with any federal statute. Because Amendment 68 was challenged only insofar as it conflicted with Title XIX, it was improper to enjoin its application to funding that does not involve the Medicaid program.
The District Court’s injunction is overbroad in its temporal scope as well. The Hyde Amendment is not permanent legislation; it was enacted as part of the statute appropriating funds for certain Executive Departments for one fiscal year. While the versions of the Hyde Amendment applicable to the 1994 and 1995 fiscal years authorized the use of federal funds to pay for an abortion after notice that “such procedure is necessary to save the life of the mother or that the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest,” the version of the amendment applicable to prior years limited federal funding to those abortions necessary to save the life of the mother. See, e. g., § 203, Department of Labor Appropriations Act, 1993, 106 Stat. 1811. Because this history identifies the possibility that a different version of the Hyde Amendment may be enacted in the future, it was improper for the District Court to enjoin enforcement of Amendment 68 “for so long as the State of Arkansas accepts federal funds pursuant to the Medicaid Act.” 860 F. Supp., at 628. See Planned Parenthood Affiliates of Michigan v. Engler, 73 F. 3d 634, 641 (CA6 1996) (modifying injunction in similar case to “tak[e] into account the changeable nature of spending bills in general, and the Hyde Amendment in particular, which in some years are very restrictive and in other years are less so”).
The District Court’s invalidation of §§2 and 3 of the amendment was based on the proposition that these sections “have no function independent of” § 1. 860 F. Supp., at 626. Even assuming that to be true, once § 1 is left with the substantial application that the Supremacy Clause fully allows, §§ 2 and 3 subsist as well.
We therefore reverse the decision of the Eighth Circuit insofar as it affirms the scope of the injunction, and remand for entry of an order enjoining the enforcement of Amendment 68 only to the extent that the amendment imposes obligations inconsistent with federal law.
It is so ordered.
The 1994 Hyde Amendment, so named for its sponsor, Representative Henry Hyde of Illinois, was enacted as § 509 of the Department of Labor Appropriations Act, 1994,107 Stat. 1082. Section 509 directs that “[n]one of the funds appropriated under this Act shall be expended for any abortion except when it is made known to the Federal entity or official to which funds are appropriated under this Act that such procedure is necessary to save the life of the mother or that the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest.” 107 Stat. 1113. The provision was reenacted unchanged for fiscal year 1995. See 108 Stat. 2539.
Any uncertainty as to the scope of the District Court’s injunction was erased by a subsequent order denying petitioners’ motion for stay of judgment. The order declares that “Amendment 68 to the Arkansas Constitution directly conflicts with federal law (the 1994 Hyde Amendment) and is, therefore, null, void and of no effect.” App. to Pet. for Cert. D-2. A footnote to this sentence states: “The Court apologizes for the redundancy, but, apparently the Court’s 35-page order rendered Monday, last, did not make this point clear.” Ibid.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
J
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The question presented is whether the Nebraska Legislature’s practice of opening each legislative day with a prayer by a chaplain paid by the State violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.
I — I
The Nebraska Legislature begins each of its sessions with a prayer offered by a chaplain who is chosen biennially by the Executive Board of the Legislative Council and paid out of public funds. Robert E. Palmer, a Presbyterian minister, has served as chaplain since 1965 at a salary of $319.75 per month for each month the legislature is in session.
Ernest Chambers is a member of the Nebraska Legislature and a taxpayer of Nebraska. Claiming that the Nebraska Legislature’s chaplaincy practice violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, he brought this action under 42 U. S. C. § 1983, seeking to enjoin enforcement of the practice. After denying a motion to dismiss on the ground of legislative immunity, the District Court held that the Establishment Clause was not breached by the prayers, but was violated by paying the chaplain from public funds. 504 F. Supp. 585 (Neb. 1980). It therefore enjoined the legislature from using public funds to pay the chaplain; it declined to enjoin the policy of beginning sessions with prayers. Cross-appeals were taken.
The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit rejected arguments that the case should be dismissed on Tenth Amendment, legislative immunity, standing, or federalism grounds. On the merits of the chaplaincy issue, the court refused to treat respondent’s challenges as separable issues as the District Court had done. Instead, the Court of Appeals assessed the practice as a whole because “[pjarsing out [the] elements” would lead to “an incongruous result.” 675 F. 2d 228, 233 (1982).
Applying the three-part test of Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602, 612-613 (1971), as set out in Committee for Public Education & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist, 413 U. S. 756, 773 (1973), the court held that the chaplaincy practice violated all three elements of the test: the purpose and primary effect of selecting the same minister for 16 years and publishing his prayers was to promote a particular religious expression; use of state money for compensation and publication led to entanglement. 675 F. 2d, at 234-235. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals modified the District Court’s injunction and prohibited the State from engaging in any aspect of its established chaplaincy practice.
We granted certiorari limited to the challenge to the practice of opening sessions with prayers by a state-employed clergyman, 459 U. S. 966 (1982), and we reverse.
I — I I — I
The opening of sessions of legislative and other deliberative public bodies with prayer is deeply embedded in the history and tradition of this country. From colonial times through the founding of the Republic and ever since, the practice of legislative prayer has coexisted with the principles of disestablishment and religious freedom. In the very courtrooms in which the United States District Judge and later three Circuit Judges heard and decided this case, the proceedings opened with an announcement that concluded, “God save the United States and this Honorable Court.” The same invocation occurs at all sessions of this Court.
The tradition in many of the Colonies was, of course, linked to an established church, but the Continental Congress, beginning in 1774, adopted the traditional procedure of opening its sessions with a prayer offered by a paid chaplain. See, e. g., 1 J. Continental Cong. 26 (1774); 2 id., at 12 (1775); 5 id., at 530 (1776); 6 id., at 887 (1776); 27 id., at 683 (1784). See also 1 A. Stokes, Church and State in the United States 448-450 (1950). Although prayers were not offered during the Constitutional Convention, the First Congress, as one of its early items of business, adopted the policy of selecting a chaplain to open each session with prayer. Thus, on April 7, 1789, the Senate appointed a committee “to take under consideration the manner of electing Chaplains.” S. Jour., 1st Cong., 1st Sess., 10 (1820 ed.). On April 9, 1789, a similar committee was appointed by the House of Representatives. On April 25, 1789, the Senate elected its first chaplain, id., at 16; the House followed suit on May 1, 1789, H. R. Jour., 1st Cong., 1st Sess., 26 (1826 ed.). A statute providing for the payment of these chaplains was enacted into law on September 22, 1789. 2 Annals of Cong. 2180; §4, 1 Stat. 71.
On September 25, 1789, three days after Congress authorized the appointment of paid chaplains, final agreement was reached on the language of the Bill of Rights, S. Jour., supra, at 88; H. R. Jour., supra, at 121. Clearly the men who wrote the First Amendment Religion Clauses did not view paid legislative chaplains and opening prayers as a violation of that Amendment, for the practice of opening sessions with prayer has continued without interruption ever since that early session of Congress. It has also been followed consistently in most of the states, including Nebraska, where the institution of opening legislative sessions with prayer was adopted even before the State attained statehood. Neb. Jour, of Council, General Assembly, 1st Sess., 16 (Jan. 22, 1856).
Standing alone, historical patterns cannot justify contemporary violations of constitutional guarantees, but there is far more here than simply historical patterns. In this context, historical evidence sheds light not only on what the draftsmen intended the Establishment Clause to mean, but also on how they thought that Clause applied to the practice authorized by the First Congress — their actions reveal their intent. An Act
“passed by the first Congress assembled under the Constitution, many of whose members had taken part in framing that instrument, ... is contemporaneous and weighty evidence of its true meaning.” Wisconsin v. Pelican Ins. Co., 127 U. S. 265, 297 (1888).
In Walz v. Tax Comm’n, 397 U. S. 664, 678 (1970), we considered the weight to be accorded to history:
“It is obviously correct that no one acquires a vested or protected right in violation of the Constitution by long use, even when that span of time covers our entire national existence and indeed predates it. Yet an unbroken practice ... is not something to be lightly cast aside.”
No more is Nebraska’s practice of over a century, consistent with two centuries of national practice, to be cast aside. It can hardly be thought that in the same week Members of the First Congress voted to appoint and to pay a chaplain for each House and also voted to approve the draft of the First Amendment for submission to the states, they intended the Establishment Clause of the Amendment to forbid what they had just declared acceptable. In applying the First Amendment to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment, Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296 (1940), it would be incongruous to interpret that Clause as imposing more stringent First Amendment limits on the states than the draftsmen imposed on the Federal Government.
This unique history leads us to accept the interpretation of the First Amendment draftsmen who saw no real threat to the Establishment Clause arising from a practice of prayer similar to that now challenged. We conclude that legislative prayer presents no more potential for establishment than the provision of school transportation, Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U. S. 1 (1947), beneficial grants for higher education, Tilton v. Richardson, 403 U. S. 672 (1971), or tax exemptions for religious organizations, Walz, supra.
Respondent cites Justice Brennan’s concurring opinion in Abington School Dist. v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203, 237 (1963), and argues that we should not rely too heavily on “the advice of the Founding Fathers” because the messages of history often tend to be ambiguous and not relevant to a society far more heterogeneous than that of the Framers, id., at 240. Respondent also points out that John Jay and John Rutledge opposed the motion to begin the first session of the Continental Congress with prayer. Brief for Respondent 60.
We do not agree that evidence of opposition to a measure weakens the force of the historical argument; indeed it infuses it with power by demonstrating that the subject was considered carefully and the action not taken thoughtlessly, by force of long tradition and without regard to the problems posed by a pluralistic society. Jay and Rutledge specifically grounded their objection on the fact that the delegates to the Congress “were so divided in religious sentiments . . . that [they] could not join in the same act of worship.” Their objection was met by Samuel Adams, who stated that “he was no bigot, and could hear a prayer from a gentleman of piety and virtue, who was at the same time a friend to his country.” C. Adams, Familiar Letters of John Adams and his Wife, Abigail Adams, during the Revolution 37-38, reprinted in Stokes, at 449.
This interchange emphasizes that the delegates did not consider opening prayers as a proselytizing activity or as symbolically placing the government’s “official seal of approval on one religious view,” cf. 675 F. 2d, at 234. Rather, the Founding Fathers looked at invocations as “conduct whose . . . effect. . . harmonize[d] with the tenets of some or all religions.” McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420, 442 (1961). The Establishment Clause does not always bar a state from regulating conduct simply because it “harmonizes with religious canons.” Id., at 462 (Frankfurter, J., concurring). Here, the individual claiming injury by the practice is an adult, presumably not readily susceptible to “religious indoctrination,” see Tilton, supra, at 686; Colo v. Treasurer & Receiver General, 378 Mass. 550, 559, 392 N. E. 2d 1195, 1200 (1979), or peer pressure, compare Abington, supra, at 290 (Brennan, J., concurring).
In light of the unambiguous and unbroken history of more than 200 years, there can be no doubt that the practice of opening legislative sessions with prayer has become part of the fabric of our society. To invoke Divine guidance on a public body entrusted with making the laws is not, in these circumstances, an “establishment” of religion or a step toward establishment; it is simply a tolerable acknowledgment of beliefs widely held among the people of this country. As Justice Douglas observed, “[w]e are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being.” Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U. S. 306, 313 (1952).
h-H I — i
We turn then to the question of whether any features of the Nebraska practice violate the Establishment Clause. Beyond the bare fact that a prayer is offered, three points have been made: first, that a clergyman of only one denomination — Presbyterian—has been selected for 16 years; second, that the chaplain is paid at public expense; and third, that the prayers are in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Weighed against the historical background, these factors do not serve to invalidate Nebraska’s practice.
The Court of Appeals was concerned that Palmer’s long tenure has the effect of giving preference to his religious views. We cannot, any more than Members of the Congresses of this century, perceive any suggestion that choosing a clergyman of one denomination advances the beliefs of a particular church. To the contrary, the evidence indicates that Palmer was reappointed because his performance and personal qualities were acceptable to the body appointing him. Palmer was not the only clergyman heard by the legislature; guest chaplains have officiated at the request of various legislators and as substitutes during Palmer’s absences. Tr. of Oral Arg. 10. Absent proof that the chaplain’s reappointment stemmed from an impermissible motive, we con-elude that his long tenure does not in itself conflict with the Establishment Clause.
Nor is the compensation of the chaplain from public funds a reason to invalidate the Nebraska Legislature’s chaplaincy; remuneration is grounded in historic practice initiated, as we noted earlier, supra, at 788, by the same Congress that drafted the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The Continental Congress paid its chaplain, see, e. g., 6 J. Continental Cong. 887 (1776), as did some of the states, see, e. g., Debates of the Convention of Virginia 470 (June 26, 1788). Currently, many state legislatures and the United States Congress provide compensation for their chaplains, Brief for National Conference of State Legislatures as Ami-cus Curiae 3; 2 U. S. C. §§61d and 84-2 (1982 ed.); H. R. Res. 7, 96th Cong., 1st Sess. (1979). Nebraska has paid its chaplain for well over a century, see 1867 Neb. Laws 85, §§2-4 (June 21, 1867), reprinted in Neb. Gen. Stat. 459 (1873). The content of the prayer is not of concern to judges where, as here, there is no indication that the prayer opportunity has been exploited to proselytize or advance any one, or to disparage any other, faith or belief. That being so, it is not for us to embark on a sensitive evaluation or to parse the content of a particular prayer.
We do not doubt the sincerity of those, who like respondent, believe that to have prayer in this context risks the beginning of the establishment the Founding Fathers feared. But this concern is not well founded, for as Justice Goldberg aptly observed in his concurring opinion in Abington, 374 U. S., at 308:
“It is of course true that great consequences can grow from small beginnings, but the measure of constitutional adjudication is the ability and willingness to distinguish between real threat and mere shadow.”
The unbroken practice for two centuries in the National Congress and for more than a century in Nebraska and in many other states gives abundant assurance that there is no real threat “while this Court sits,” Panhandle Oil Co. v. Mississippi ex rel. Knox, 277 U. S. 218, 223 (1928) (Holmes, J., dissenting).
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Reversed.
Rules of the Nebraska Unicameral, Rules 1, 2, and 21. These prayers are recorded in the Legislative Journal and, upon the vote of the legislature, collected from time to time into prayerbooks, which are published at public expense. In 1975, 200 copies were printed; prayerbooks were also published in 1978 (200 copies), and 1979 (100 copies). In total, publication costs amounted to $458.56.
Respondent named as defendants State Treasurer Frank Marsh, Chaplain Palmer, and the members of the Executive Board of the Legislative Council in their official capacity. All appear as petitioners before us.
The District Court also enjoined the State from using public funds to publish the prayers, holding that this practice violated the Establishment Clause. Petitioners have represented to us that they did not challenge this facet of the District Court’s decision, Tr. of Oral Arg. 19-20. Accordingly, no issue as to publishing these prayers is before us.
Petitioners also sought review of their Tenth Amendment, federalism, and immunity claims. They did not, however, challenge the Court of Appeals’ decision as to standing and we agree that Chambers, as a member of the legislature and as a taxpayer whose taxes are used to fund the chaplaincy, has standing to assert this claim.
The practice in Colonies with established churches is, of course, not dis-positive of the legislative prayer question. The history of Virginia is instructive, however, because that Colony took the lead in defining religious rights. In 1776, the Virginia Convention adopted a Declaration of Rights that included, as Article 16, a guarantee of religious liberty that is considered the precursor of both the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses. 1 B. Schwartz, The Bill of Rights: A Documentary History 231-236 (1971); S. Cobb, The Rise of Religious Liberty in America 491-492 (1970). Virginia was also among the first to disestablish its church. Both before and after disestablishment, however, Virginia followed the practice of opening legislative sessions with prayer. See, e. g., J. House of Burgesses 34 (Nov. 20, 1712); Debates of the Convention of Virginia 470 (June 2, 1788) (ratification convention); J. House of Delegates of Va. 3 (June 24, 1788) (state legislature).
Rhode Island’s experience mirrored that of Virginia. That Colony was founded by Roger Williams, who was among the first of his era to espouse the principle of religious freedom. Cobb, supra, at 426. As early as 1641, its legislature provided for liberty of conscience. Id., at 430. Yet the sessions of its ratification convention, like Virginia’s, began with prayers, see W. Staples, Rhode Island in the Continental Congress, 1765-1790, p. 668 (1870) (reprinting May 26, 1790, minutes of the convention).
History suggests that this may simply have been an oversight. At one point, Benjamin Franklin suggested that “henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business.” 1 M. Farrand, Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, p. 452 (1911). His proposal was rejected not because the Convention was opposed to prayer, but because it was thought that a midstream adoption of the policy would highlight prior omissions and because “[t]he Convention had no funds.” Ibid.; see also Stokes, at 455-456.
The statute provided:
“[T]here shall be allowed to each chaplain of Congress . . . five hundred dollars per annum during the session of Congress.”
This salary compares favorably with the Congressmen’s own salaries of $6 for each day of attendance, 1 Stat. 70-71.
It bears note that James Madison, one of the principal advocates of religious freedom in the Colonies and a drafter of the Establishment Clause, see, e. g., Cobb, supra n. 5, at 495-497; Stokes, at 537-552, was one of those appointed to undertake this task by the House of Representatives, H. R. Jour., at 11-12; Stokes, at 541-549, and voted for the bill authorizing payment of the chaplains, 1 Annals of Cong. 891 (1789).
Interestingly, September 25, 1789, was also the day that the House resolved to request the President to set aside a Thanksgiving Day to acknowledge “the many signal favors of Almighty God,” H. R. Jour., at 123. See also S. Jour., at 88.
The chaplaincy was challenged in the 1850’s by “sundry petitions praying Congress to abolish the office of chaplain,” S. Rep. No. 376, 32d Cong., 2d Sess., 1 (1853). After consideration by the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, the Senate decided that the practice did not violate the Establishment Clause, reasoning that a rule permitting Congress to elect chaplains is not a law establishing a national church and that the chaplaincy was no different from Sunday Closing Laws, which the Senate thought clearly constitutional. In addition, the Senate reasoned that since prayer was said by the very Congress that adopted the Bill of Rights, the Founding Fathers could not have intended the First Amendment to forbid legislative prayer or viewed prayer as a step toward an established church. Id., at 2-4. In any event, the 35th Congress abandoned the practice of electing chaplains in favor of inviting local clergy to officiate, see Cong. Globe, 35th Cong., 1st Sess., 14,27-28 (1857). Elected chaplains were reinstituted by the 36th Congress, Cong. Globe, 36th Cong., 1st Sess., 162 (1859); id., at 1016 (1860).
See Brief for National Conference of State Legislatures as Amicus Curiae. Although most state legislatures begin their sessions with prayer, most do not have a formal rule requiring this procedure. But see, e. g., Alaska Legislature Uniform Rules 11 and 17 (1981) (providing for opening invocation); Ark. Rule of Senate 18 (1983); Colo. Legislator’s Handbook, H. R. Rule 44 (1982); Idaho Rules of H. R. and Joint Rules 2 and 4 (1982); Ind. H. R. Rule 10 (1983); Kan. Rule of Senate 4 (1983); Kan. Rule of H. R. 103 (1983); Ky. General Assembly H. Res. 2 (1982); La. Rules of Order, Senate Rule 10.1 (1983); La. Rules of Order, H. R. Rule 8.1 (1982); Me. Senate and House Register, Rule of H. R. 4 (1983); Md. Senate and House of Delegates Rules 1 (1982 and 1983); Mo. Rules of Legislature, Joint Rule 1-1 (1983); N. H. Manual for the General Court of N. H., Rule of H. R. 52(a) (1981); N. D. Senate and H. R. Rules 101 and 301 (1983); Ore. Rule of Senate 4.01 (1983); Ore. Rule of H. R. 4.01 (1983) (opening session only); 104 Pa. Code §11.11 (1983), 107 Pa. Code §21.17 (1983); S. D. Official Directory and Rules of Senate and H. R., Joint Rule of the Senate and House 4-1 (1983); Tenn. Permanent Rules of Order of the Senate 1 and 6 (1981-1982) (provides for admission into Senate chamber of the “Chaplain of the Day”); Tex. Rule of H. R. 2, § 6 (1983); Utah Rules of Senate and H. R. 4.04 (1983); Va. Manual of Senate and House of Delegates, Rule of Senate 21(a) (1982) (session opens with “period of devotions”); Wash. Permanent Rule of H. R. 15 (1983); Wyo. Rule of Senate 4-1 (1983); Wyo. Rule of H. R. 2-1 (1983). See also P. Mason, Manual of Legislative Procedure § 586(2) (1979).
It also could be noted that objections to prayer were raised, apparently successfully, in Pennsylvania while ratification of the Constitution was debated, Penn. Herald, Nov. 24, 1787, and that in the 1820’s, Madison expressed doubts concerning the chaplaincy practice. See L. Pfeffer, Church, State, and Freedom 248-249 (rev. ed. 1967), citing Fleet, Madison’s “Detached Memoranda,” 3 Wm. & Mary Quarterly 534, 558-559 (1946).
In comparison, the First Congress provided for the appointment of two chaplains of different denominations who would alternate between the two Chambers on a weekly basis, S. Jour., 1st Cong., 1st Sess., 12 (1820 ed.); H. R. Jour., 1st Cong., 1st Sess., 16 (1826 ed.).
Palmer characterizes his prayers as “nonsectarian,” “Judeo Christian,” and with “elements of the American civil religion.” App. 75 and 87 (deposition of Robert E. Palmer). Although some of his earlier prayers were often explicitly Christian, Palmer removed all references to Christ after a 1980 complaint from a Jewish legislator. Id., at 49.
It is also claimed that Nebraska’s practice of collecting the prayers into books violates the First Amendment. Because the State did not appeal the District Court order enjoining further publications, see n. 3, supra, this issue is not before us and we express no opinion on it.
Nebraska’s practice is consistent with the manner in which the First Congress viewed its chaplains. Reports contemporaneous with the elections reported only the chaplains’ names, and not their religions or church affiliations, see, e. g., 2 Gazette of the U. S. 18 (Apr. 25, 1789); 5 id., at 18 (Apr. 27, 1789) (listing nominees for Chaplain of the House); 6 id., at 23 (May 1, 1789). See also S. Rep. 376, supra n. 10, at 3.
We note that Dr. Edward L. R. Elson served as Chaplain of the Senate of the United States from January 1969 to February 1981, a period of 12 years; Dr. Frederick Brown Harris served from February 1949 to January 1969, a period of 20 years. Senate Library, Chaplains of the Federal Government (rev. ed. 1982).
The states’ practices differ widely. Like Nebraska, several states choose a chaplain who serves for the entire legislative session. In other states, the prayer is offered by a different clergyman each day. Under either system, some states pay their chaplains and others do not. For States providing for compensation statutorily or by resolution, see, e. g., Cal. Gov’t Code Ann. §§ 9170, 9171, 9320 (West 1980), and S. Res. No. 6, 1983-1984 Sess.; Colo. H. R. J., 54th Gen. Assembly, 1st Sess., 17-19 (Jan. 5, 1983); Conn. Gen. Stat. Ann. §2-9 (1983-1984); Ga. H. R. Res. No. 3, § 1(e) (1983); Ga. S. Res. No. 3, § 1(c) (1983); Iowa Code §2.11 (1983); Mo. Rev. Stat. §21.150 (1978); Nev. Rev. Stat. §218.200 (1981); N. J. Stat. Ann. §52:11-2 (West 1970); N. M. Const., Art. IV, §9; Okla. Stat. Ann., Tit. 74, §§291.12 and 292.1 (West Supp. 1982-1983); Vt. Stat. Ann., Tit. 2, § 19 (Supp. 1982); Wis. Stat. Ann. § 13.125 (West Supp. 1982).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice White
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The question presented here is whether state law or federal maritime law governs the suit of a longshoreman injured on a pier while driving a forklift truck which was moving cargo that would ultimately be loaded aboard ship.
The facts are undisputed. When the accident happened, respondent Bill Law, a longshoreman employed by Gulf Stevedore Corp. in Mobile, Alabama, was on the pier driving a forklift loaded with cargo destined for the S. S. Sagamore Hill, a vessel owned by petitioner Victory Carriers, Inc., which was tied up at the pier. Law had picked up the load on the dock and was transferring it to a point alongside the vessel where it was to be subsequently hoisted aboard by the ship’s own gear. The forklift was owned and under the direction of his stevedore employer. As Law returned toward the pickup point, the overhead protection rack of the forklift came loose and fell on him. He subsequently brought an action in a federal District Court against the ship and Victory Carriers, Inc., claiming that the unseaworthiness of the vessel and the negligence of Victory had caused his injuries. His claim invoked both the diversity jurisdiction of the District Court under 28 U. S. C. § 1332 and its admiralty and maritime jurisdiction under 28 U. S. C. § 1333. Victory filed a third-party complaint against Gulf for indemnity in the event Victory was held liable to Law. The unseaworthiness claim became the critical issue. On cross motions for summary judgment, the District Court gave judgment for petitioners on the ground that Law was not engaged in loading thé vessel and that the doctrine of unseaworthiness did not extend to him. The Court of Appeals reversed. Relying on Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U. S. 85 (1946), and Gutierrez v. Waterman S. S. Corp., 373 U. S. 206 (1963), it held that the fundamental question was whether Law at the time was engaged in loading the Sagamore Hill and that since he was so engaged, he should be entitled to prove his allegations of unseaworthiness at a trial. We granted certiorari and now reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
Article III, § 2, cl. 1, of the Constitution of the United States extends the federal judicial power “to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction.” Congress has implemented that provision by 28 U. S. C. § 1333 which now provides that the district courts shall “have original jurisdiction, exclusive of the courts of the States, of ... [a] ny civil case of admiralty or maritime jurisdiction, saving to suitors in all cases all other remedies to which they are otherwise entitled.” Under the saving-to-suitors clause of § 1333, the plaintiff was entitled to assert his claims under the diversity jurisdiction of the District Court, as well as under § 1333 itself, cf. Pope & Talbot, Inc. v. Hawn, 346 U. S. 406, 410-411 (1953), but under either section the claim that a ship or its gear was unseaworthy would be rooted in federal maritime law, not the law of the State of Alabama. Id., at 409. Whether federal maritime law governed this accident in turn depends on whether this is a case within the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction conferred on the district courts by the Constitution and the jurisdictional statutes. More precisely, the threshold issue is whether maritime law governs accidents suffered by a longshoreman who is injured on the dock by allegedly defective equipment owned and operated by his stevedore employer. We hold that under the controlling precedents, federal maritime law does not govern this accident. Nor, in the absence of congressional guidance, are we now inclined to depart from prior law and extend the reach of the federal law to pier-side accidents caused by a stevedore’s pier-based equipment.
The historic view of this Court has been that the maritime tort jurisdiction of the federal courts is determined by the locality of the accident and that maritime law governs only those torts occurring on the navigable waters of the United States. Maritime contracts are differently viewed, but as Mr. Justice Story remarked long ago:
“In regard to torts I have always understood, that the jurisdiction of the admiralty is exclusively dependent upon the locality of the act. The admiralty has not, and never (I believe) deliberately claimed to have any jurisdiction over torts, except such as are maritime torts, that is, such as are committed on the high seas, or on waters within the ebb and flow of the tide.” Thomas v. Lane, 23 F. Cas. 957, 960 (No. 13,902) (CC Me. 1813).
The view has been constantly reiterated.
“The general doctrine that in contract matters admiralty jurisdiction depends upon the nature of the transaction and in tort matters upon the locality, has been so frequently asserted by this court that it must now be treated as settled.” Grant Smith-Porter Ship Co. v. Rohde, 257 U. S. 469, 476 (1922).
The maritime law was thought to reach "[e]very species of tort, however occurring, and whether on board a vessel or not, if upon the high seas or navigable waters . . . ." Atlantic Transport Co. v. Imbrovek, 234 U. S. 52, 60 (1914). But, accidents on land were not within the maritime jurisdiction as historically construed by this Court. Piers and docks were consistently deemed extensions of land; injuries inflicted to or on them were held not compensable under the maritime law. The Plymouth, 3 Wall. 20, 36 (1866); Ex parte Phenix Insurance Co., 118 U. S. 610, 618-619 (1886); Johnson v. Chicago & Pacific Elevator Co., 119 U. S. 388, 397 (1886); Cleveland Terminal & Valley R. Co. v. Cleveland S. S. Co., 208 U. S. 316, 320 (1908). The gangplank has served as a rough dividing line between the state and maritime regimes.
In defense of this boundary and the exclusive jurisdiction of the maritime law, the Court twice rejected congressional efforts to apply state workmen’s compensation statutes to shipboard injuries suffered by maritime workers and longshoremen. Accepting these decisions, Congress passed the Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act in 1927, providing a system of compensation for longshoremen injured on navigable waters but anticipating that dockside accidents would remain under the umbrella of state law and state workmen’s compensation systems. Nacirema Operating Co. v. Johnson, 396 U. S. 212, 217-219 (1969); South Chicago Coal & Dock Co. v. Bassett, 309 U. S. 251, 256-257 (1940). The relative roles of state and federal law nevertheless remained somewhat confused on the seaward side of the pier. But shoreward, absent legislation, the line held fast. The Court refused to permit recovery in admiralty even where a ship or its gear, through collision or otherwise, caused damage to persons ashore or to bridges, docks, or other shore-based property. The Plymouth, supra; Cleveland Terminal & Valley R. Co. v. Cleveland S. S. Co., supra; The Troy, 208 U. S. 321 (1908); Martin v. West, 222 U. S. 191 (1911).
Congress was dissatisfied with these decisions and passed the Admiralty Extension Act of 1948 specifically to overrule or circumvent this line of cases. The law as enacted provided that “[t]he admiralty and maritime jurisdiction of the United States shall extend to and include all cases of damage or injury, to person or property, caused by a vessel on navigable water, notwithstanding that such damage or injury be done or consummated on land.” 62 Stat. 496, 46 U. S. C. § 740. The statute survived constitutional attack in the lower federal courts and was applied without question by this Court in Gutierrez, supra, to provide compensation for a longshoreman injured on a dock by defective cargo containers being unloaded from a ship located on navigable waters. No case in this Court has sustained the application of maritime law to the kind of accident that occurred in this case. State Industrial Comm’n v. Nordenholt Corp., 259 U. S. 263 (1922), has not been overruled. There, the Court held that compensation for a longshoreman injured when he slipped on a dock while stacking bags of cement that had been unloaded from a ship was governed by local law, not federal maritime law.
It is argued, however, that if a longshoreman may recover for unseaworthiness if injured on a ship in the course of the unloading process, Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, supra, and if he has an unseaworthiness claim for injuries sustained on the pier and caused by the ship’s unloading gear, Gutierrez, supra, he is also entitled to sue in admiralty when he is injured on the dock by his own employer’s equipment at the time he is engaged in the service of a ship located on navigable waters. Sieracki, supra, however, did not call into question the extent of federal admiralty and maritime jurisdiction since the accident there occurred on navigable waters. And in Gutierrez, supra, federal admiralty jurisdiction was clearly present since the Admiralty Extension Act on its face reached the injury there involved. The decision in Gutierrez turned, not on the “function” the stevedore was performing at the time of his injury, but, rather, upon the fact that his injury was caused by an appurtenance of a ship, the defective cargo containers, which the Court held to be an “injury, to person . . . caused by a vessel on navigable water” which was consummated ashore under 46 U. S. C. § 740. The Court has never approved an unseaworthiness recovery for an injury sustained on land merely because the injured longshoreman was engaged in the process of “loading” or “unloading.” Nacirema Operating Co. v. Johnson, 396 U. S., at 223, a case decided several years after Gutierrez, makes this quite clear:
“There is much to be said for uniform treatment of longshoremen injured while loading or unloading a ship. But even construing the Extension Act to amend the Longshoremen’s Act would not effect this result, since longshoremen injured on a pier by pier-based equipment would still remain outside the Act.”
See also Rodrigue v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 395 U. S. 352, 360 (1969).
We are not inclined at this juncture to disturb the existing precedents and to extend shoreward the reach of the maritime law further than Congress has approved. We are dealing here with the intersection of federal and state law. As the law now stands, state law has traditionally governed accidents like this one. To afford respondent a maritime cause of action would thus intrude on an area that has heretofore been reserved for state law, would raise difficult questions concerning the extent to which state law would be displaced or pre-empted, and would furnish opportunity for circumventing state workmen’s compensation statutes. In these circumstances, we should proceed with caution in construing constitutional and statutory provisions dealing with the jurisdiction of the federal courts. As the Court declared in Healy v. Ratta, 292 U. S. 263, 270 (1934), “The power reserved to the states, under the Constitution, to provide for the determination of controversies in their courts may be restricted only by the action of Congress in conformity to the judiciary sections of the Constitution. . . . Due regard for the rightful independence of state governments, which should actuate federal courts, requires that they scrupulously confine their own jurisdiction to the precise limits which [a federal] statute has defined.” See also Romero v. Int’l Terminal Operating Co., 358 U. S. 354, 379-380, and 408 (Brennan, J., dissenting and concurring) (1959).
That longshoremen injured on the pier in the course of loading or unloading a vessel are legally distinguished from longshoremen performing similar services on the ship is neither a recent development nor particularly paradoxical. The maritime law is honeycombed with differing treatment for seamen and longshoremen, on and off the ship, and affirmance of the Court of Appeals would not equalize the remedies that both this Court and Congress have recognized are available to longshoremen injured on navigable waters and those injured ashore, whether in service of a ship or not. In part, this differential treatment stems from the geographical and historical accident that personal injuries on land are covered, for the most part, by state substantive law while such injuries on navigable water are generally governed by federal maritime law. These two bodies of law do overlap and interpenetrate in some situations, and the amphibious nature of the longshoreman’s occupation creates frequent taxonomic problems. In the present case, however, the typical elements of a maritime cause of action are particularly attenuated: respondent Law was not injured by equipment that was part of the ship’s usual gear or that was stored on board, the equipment that injured him was in no way attached to the ship, the forklift was not under the control of the ship or its crew, and the accident did not occur aboard ship or on the gangplank. Affirmance of the decision below would raise a host of new problems as to the standards for and limitations on the applicability of maritime law to accidents on land. At least in the absence of explicit congressional authorization, we shall not extend the historic boundaries of the maritime law.
Without necessarily disagreeing with the proposition that the hazards of the longshoreman’s occupation make him especially deserving of a remedy dispensing with proof of fault, we are constrained to note that the longshoreman already has a remedy under state workmen’s compensation laws that does not depend upon proving derelictions on the part of his employer. Recovery without proving negligence is not the issue here; nor is it the equities of the injured longshoreman’s position as against those of the shipowner who has had and exercises no control whatsoever over the use of the stevedore’s equipment on the dock. What is at issue is the amount of the recovery, not against a shipowner, but against the stevedore employer. As this case illustrates, the shipowner’s liability for unseaworthiness would merely be shifted, with attendant transaction costs, to the stevedore by way of a third-party action for indemnity. Ryan Stevedoring Co. v. Pan-Atlantic S. S. Corp., 350 U. S. 124 (1956). The State’s own arrangements for compensating industrial accidents would be effectively circumvented.
Perhaps such laws provide inadequate benefits, but we are poorly positioned to conclude that they do or for that reason to give special remedies to longshoremen when other employees operating forklifts for other employers in perhaps equally hazardous circumstances are left to the mercies of state law. Claims like these are best presented in the legislative forum, not here.
This is particularly true since extending the constitutional boundaries of the maritime law would not require Congress to make an equivalent extension of the jurisdiction of the federal courts sitting in admiralty. Congress might well prefer not to extend the jurisdiction of the federal courts. On the other hand, if denying federal remedies to longshoremen injured on land is intolerable, Congress has ample power under Arts. I and III of the Constitution to enact a suitable solution.
Reversed.
The District Court and the Court of Appeals dealt only with the unseaworthiness claim; the District Court did not pass on the question of whether or not the forklift was in fact defective. 432 F. 2d 376, 378 n. 2 (CA5 1970).
Waring v. Clarke, 5 How. 441, 463-464 (1847); New Jersey Steam Navigation Co. v. Merchants' Bank, 6 How. 344, 394 (1848); The Propeller Commerce, 1 Black 574, 579 (1862); The Plymouth, 3 Wall. 20, 33 (1866); The Rock Island Bridge, 6 Wall. 213, 215 (1867); The Belfast, 7 Wall. 624, 637 (1869); Ex parte Easton, 95 U. S. 68, 72 (1877); Leathers v. Blessing, 105 U. S. 626, 630 (1882); Ex parte Phenix Insurance Co., 118 U. S. 610, 618 (1886); Johnson v. Chicago & Pacific Elevator Co., 119 U. S. 388, 397 (1886); Panama R. Co. v. Napier Shipping Co., 166 U. S. 280, 285 (1897); The Blackheath, 195 U. S. 361, 367 (1904); Cleveland Terminal & Valley R. Co. v. Cleveland S. S. Co., 208 U. S. 316, 319 (1908); Martin v. West, 222 U. S. 191, 197 (1911); Atlantic Transport Co. v. Imbrovek, 234 U. S. 52, 59-60 (1914); Grant Smith-Porter Ship Co. v. Rohde, 257 U. S. 469, 476 (1922); T. Smith & Son v. Taylor, 276 U. S. 179, 181 (1928); O'Donnell v. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., 318 U. S. 36, 41 (1943); Pope & Talbot, Inc. v. Hawn, 346 U. S. 406, 409 (1953); Kermarec v. Compagnie Generale Transatlantique, 358 U. S. 625, 628 (1959); Hess v. United States, 361 U. S. 314, 318 n. 7 (1960); Rodrigue v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 395 U. S. 352, 360-361 (1969); Nacirema Operating Co. v. Johnson, 396 U. S. 212, 214-215 (1969); Thomas v. Lane, 23 F. Cas. 957, 960 (No. 13,902) (CC Me. 1813) (Story, J.); De Lovio v. Boit, 7 F. Cas. 418, 420 (No. 3,776) (CC Mass. 1815) (Story, J.); Lake Shore & M. S. R. Co. v. The Neil Cochran, 14 F. Cas. 949, 950 (No. 7,996) (ND Ohio 1872); The Ottawa, 18 F. Cas. 906, 907 (No. 10,616) (ED Mich. 1872); Holmes v. O. & C. R. Co., 5 F. 75, 77 (Ore. 1880); The Arkansas, 17 F. 383, 384 (SD Iowa 1883); The F. & P. M. No. 2, 33 F. 511, 513 (ED Wis. 1888); The H. S. Pickands, 42 F. 239, 240 (ED Mich. 1890); Hermann v. Port Blakely Mill Co., 69 F. 646, 647 (ND Cal. 1895); The Strabo, 90 F. 110, 113 (EDNY 1898); Chapman v. City of Grosse Pointe Farms, 385 F. 2d 962, 963 (CA6 1967); Scott v. Eastern Air Lines, Inc., 399 F. 2d 14, 31 (CA3 1967) (concurring opinion); Fireman's Fund American Insurance Co. v. Boston Harbor Marina, Inc., 406 F. 2d 917, 919 (CA1 1969); Penn Tanker Co. v. United States, 409 F. 2d 514, 518 (CA5 1969). "The jurisdiction of courts of admiralty, in matters of contract, depends upon the nature and character of the contract; but in torts, it depends entirely on locality." Philadelphia, Wilmington, & Baltimore R. Co. v. Philadelphia & Havre de Grace Steam Towboat Co., 23 How. 209, 215 (1860). "In [maritime] torts . . . jurisdiction [of federal admiralty courts] depends solely upon the place where the tort was committed, which must have been upon the high seas or other navigable waters." State Industrial Comm'n v. Nordenholt Corp., 259 U. S. 263, 271 (1922).
The Plymouth, supra; The Troy, 208 U. S. 321 (1908); Phoenix Construction Co. v. The Steamer Poughkeepsie, 212 U. S. 558 (1908); T. Smith & Son v. Taylor, supra; Rodrigue v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., supra, at 360; Hastings v. Mann, 340 F. 2d 910 (CA4), cert. denied, 380 U. S. 963 (1965). "When an employee, working on board a vessel in navigable waters, sustains personal injuries there, and seeks damages from the employer, the applicable legal principles are very different from those which would control if he had been injured on land while unloading the vessel. In the former situation the liability of employer [sic] must be determined under the maritime law; in the latter, no general maritime rule prescribes the liability, and the local law has always been applied." State Industrial Comm'n v. Nordenholt Corp., supra, at 272-273.
Nacirema Operating Co. v. Johnson, supra, at 214-215; Swanson v. Marra Bros., Inc., 328 U. S. 1, 6 (1946); Minnie v. Port Huron Terminal Co., 295 U. S. 647, 648 (1935); T. Smith & Son v. Taylor, supra, at 182; State Industrial Comm'n v. Nordenholt Corp., supra, at 275; 1 E. Benedict, The Law of American Admiralty §§ 28, 29 (6th ed. 1940); G. Gilmore & C. Black, The Law of Admiralty §§ 6-46, 7-17 (1957); G. Robinson, Handbook of Admiralty Law in the United States § 11 (1939).
Knickerbocker Ice Co. v. Stewart, 253 U. S. 149 (1920); Washington v. W. C. Dawson & Co., 264 U. S. 219 (1924). These congressional attempts were sparked by an earlier Supreme Court decision, Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen, 244 U. S. 205 (1917), which had held unconstitutional a New York workmen’s compensation law as applied to a stevedore injured on the gangplank of a ship.
44 Stat. 1424, 33 U. S. C. §§ 901-950. The Act’s coverage is limited to those injuries and deaths “occurring upon the navigable waters of the United States (including any dry dock).” 33 U. S. C. §903 (a).
This confusion may be traced to the Court's modifying the doctrine of Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen, supra, by preserving certain state remedies for accidents and deaths occurring on navigable waters. See Western Fuel Co. v. Garcia, 257 U. S. 233 (1921); Grant Smith-Porter Ship Co. v. Rohde, supra; Parker v. Motor Boat Sales, Inc., 314 U. S. 244 (1941); Davis v. Dept. of Labor and Industries, 317 U. S. 249 (1942); Calbeck v. Travelers Insurance Co., 370 U. S. 114 (1962). All of these cases of overlapping state-federal jurisdiction have occurred on the seaward side of the Jensen line, however. The Court early upheld the power of States to provide workmen's compensation to longshoremen injured by accidents occurring on the dock, under the theory that since the pier is part of the land, application of state law here would not conflict with the uniform federal maritime law applied on navigable waters. State Industrial Comm'n v. Nordenholt Corp., supra. In Nacirema Operating Co. v. Johnson, supra, the Court held that by limiting coverage under § 3 (a) of the Act, 33 U. S. C. § 903 (a), to accidents occurring "upon . . . navigable waters," Congress had not intended to cover accidents that occurred on piers permanently affixed to the shore: "Calbeck made it clear that Congress intended to exercise its full jurisdiction seaward of the Jensen line and to cover all injuries on navigable waters, whether or not state compensation was also available in particular situations. . . . But removing uncertainties as to the Act's coverage of injuries occurring on navigable waters is a far cry from construing the Act to reach injuries on land traditionally within the ambit of state compensation acts." 396 U. S., at 220-221.
62 Stat. 496, 46 U. S. C. § 740. The House Report on the Admiralty Extension Act stated that the Act was being passed to remedy the “inequities” of cases such as Cleveland Terminal & Valley R. Co., supra; The Troy, supra; and Martin v. West, supra, which had held there was no admiralty jurisdiction to provide a remedy for damage done by ships on navigable water to land structures. H. R. Rep. No. 1523, 80th Cong., 2d Sess., 2 (1948). Congress had also passed the Jones Act, 41 Stat. 1007, 46 U. S. C. § 688, providing a statutory remedy for members of a ship’s crew injured in the course of their employment. The Act covered crewmen injured ashore as well as aboard and was considered by this Court an extension of the ancient remedy of maintenance and cure which itself was a traditional and important exception to the usual rule that maritime law does not provide remedies for injuries on land. O’Donnell v. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., supra. Longshoremen, of course, are not covered by the Jones Act.
United States v. Matson Nav. Co., 201 F. 2d 610, 614-616 (CA9 1953); American Bridge Co. v. The Gloria O, 98 F. Supp. 71, 73-74 (EDNY 1951); Fematt v. City of Los Angeles, 196 F. Supp. 89, 93 (SD Cal. 1961).
In Sieracki, the Court concluded:
“[F]or injuries incurred while working on board the ship in navigable waters the stevedore is entitled to the seaman’s traditional and statutory protections, regardless of the fact that he is employed immediately by another than the owner. For these purposes he is, in short, a seaman because he is doing a seaman’s work and incurring a seaman’s hazards.” 328 U. S., at 99 (footnote omitted).
In Gutierrez, the Court concluded that "things about a ship, whether the hull, the decks, the machinery, the tools furnished, the stowage, or the cargo containers, must be reasonably fit for the purpose for which they are to be used." 373 U. S., at 213 (emphasis added). In Alaska S. S. Co. v. Petterson, 347 U. S. 396 (1954), aff’g 205 F. 2d 478 (CA9 1953), and Rogers v. United States Lines, 347 U. S. 984 (1954), rev’g 205 F. 2d 57 (CA3 1954), the Court decided without opinion that an unseaworthiness recovery would be possible to a longshoreman injured by equipment brought aboard ship by the stevedore company. In both these cases, the accident occurred on navigable water: both longshoremen were injured while in the hold of a ship by defective apparatus attached to the ship's gear.
The Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act does not cover seamen (who are defined there as "master[s] or member[s] of a crew of any vessel," 33 U. S. C. § 903 (a) (1)), and the compensation remedy provided by the Longshoremen's Act is a stevedore's exclusive remedy against his employer for shipboard injuries. 33 U. S. C. § 905. Representatives of maritime employees successfully opposed the efforts of Congress to include seamen under the Longshoremen's Act, see Nogueira v. New York, New Haven & Hartford R. Co., 281 U. S. 128, 136 (1930); Warner v. Goltra, 293 U. S. 155, 159-160 (1934), since seamen preferred to remain free to proceed against their employer under the Jones Act, 41 Stat. 1007, 46 U. S. C. § 688, and under suits for unseaworthiness and/or maintenance and cure. The latter remedy has traditionally been available to seamen but not to longshoremen, Weiss v. Central R. Co., 235 F. 2d 309, 311 (CA2 1956), and the Court has stated that the remedies of an employee covered by the Longshoremen's Act and those of a seaman covered under the maritime doctrine of maintenance and cure are mutually exclusive. Norton v. Warner Co., 321 U. S. 565, 570 (1944). The Jones Act gives seamen, at their election, the benefit of the provisions of the Federal Employers' Liability Act, 35 Stat. 65, 45 U. S. C. § 51 et seq. Longshoremen now have no such election. Swanson v. Marra Bros., Inc., 328 U. S., at 7. Although longshoremen may not obtain maintenance and cure, there are certain circumstances under which they may recover for injuries caused by unseaworthiness whether the accident occurred on board ship, Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, supra, or on the dock, Gutierrez v. Waterman S. S. Corp., supra.
See, e. g., Nacirema Operating Co. v. Johnson, 396 U. S., at 217-220.
The Fifth Circuit's expansive definition of loading (432 F. 2d, at 384) would be difficult to delimit. Already, summary judgment has been denied the shipowner where a warehouseman sued on an unseaworthiness theory after he had been injured by a power shovel he was using to transfer grain from a railroad car to a warehouse where it would be subsequently taken on board a ship. Olvera v. Michalos, 307 F. Supp. 9 (SD Tex. 1968). Summary judgment has also been denied when a longshoreman brought an unseaworthiness suit after he had been injured inside a pier shed; the "squeeze lift" truck he was driving struck an unidentified object on the shed floor causing the steering wheel to spin around and shatter plaintiff's wrist. McNeil v. A/S Havtor, 326 F. Supp. 226 (ED Pa. 1971). The attempt to define the process of "loading" for purposes of determining whether a longshoreman injured on shore can recover on an unseaworthiness claim has produced substantial confusion in the lower courts; the cases are impossible to rationalize. Denying compensation: Forkin v. Furness Withy & Co., 323 F. 2d 638 (CA2 1963), McKnight v. N. M. Paterson & Sons, 286 F. 2d 250 (CA6 1960), cert. denied, 368 U. S. 913 (1961); Henry v. S. S. Mount Evans, 227 F. Supp. 408 (Md. 1964); Sydnor v. Villain & Fassio e Compania, 323 F. Supp. 850 (Md. 1971). Awarding compensation or denying summary judgment for defendant: Spann v. Lauritzen, 344 F. 2d 204 (CA3), cert. denied, 382 U. S. 938 (1965); Chagois v. Lykes Bros. S. S. Co., 432 F. 2d 388 (CA5 1970); Olvera v. Michalos, supra; McNeil v. A/S Havtor, supra. Reliance upon the gangplank line as the presumptive boundary of admiralty jurisdiction, except for cases in which a ship's appurtenance causes damage ashore, recognizes the traditional limitations of admiralty jurisdiction, see nn. 2 and 3, supra, and decreases the arbitrariness and uncertainties surrounding amorphous definitions of "loading." Such uncertainties may prejudice both the longshoreman and the employer.
A 1956 survey, based on 1954 data, concluded that the stevedoring occupation had a higher injury frequency rate than any other high-hazard industry studied. National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council, Maritime Cargo Transportation Conference, Longshore Safety Survey Report, Longshore Safety Survey: A Survey of Occupational Hazards in the Stevedore Industry 23 (1956). See also U. S. Dept. of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Handbook of Labor Statistics 1971, p. 345, for a comparison of the work-injury rate (both by severity and frequency) in the marine cargo handling industry with that in other industries. Cf. Note, Risk Distribution and Seaworthiness. 75 Yale L. J. 1174 (1966).
Cf., e. g., The Propeller Genesee Chief v. Fitzhugh, 12 How. 443, 457-458 (1852); Richardson v. Harmon, 222 U. S. 96, 97 (1911); Panama R. Co. v. Johnson, 264 U. S. 375, 385-388 (1924); Detroit Trust Co. v. The Thomas Barlum, 293 U. S. 21, 52 (1934); Swanson v. Marra Bros., Inc., supra, at 5; O'Donnell v. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., supra, at 40-41.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Stewart
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The State of Michigan has enacted legislation authorizing a system for union representation of local governmental employees. A union and a local government employer are specifically permitted to agree to an “agency shop” arrangement, whereby every employee represented by a union— even though not a union member — must pay to the union, as a condition of employment, a service fee equal in amount to union dues. The issue before us is whether this arrangement violates the constitutional rights of government employees who object to public-sector unions as such or to various union activities financed by the compulsory service fees.
I
After a secret ballot election, the Detroit Federation of Teachers (Union) was certified in 1967 pursuant to Michigan law as the exclusive representative of teachers employed by the Detroit Board of Education (Board), The Union and the Board thereafter concluded a collective-bargaining agreement effective from July 1, 1969, to July 1, 1971. Among the agreement’s provisions was an “agency shop” clause, requiring every teacher who had not become a Union member within 60 days of hire (or within 60 days of January 26, 1970, the effective date of the clause) to pay the Union a service charge equal to the regular dues required of Union members. A teacher who failed to meet this obligation was subject to discharge. Nothing in the agreement, however, required any teacher to join the Union, espouse the cause of unionism, or participate in any other way in Union affairs.
On November 7, 1969 — more than two months before the agency-shop clause was to become effective — Christine Warczak and a number of other named teachers filed a class action in a state court, naming as defendants the Board, the Union, and several Union officials. Their complaint, as amended, alleged that they were unwilling or had refused to pay dues and that they opposed collective bargaining in the public sector. The amended complaint further alleged that the Union “carries on various social activities for the benefit of its members which are not available to nonmembers as a matter of right,” and that the Union is engaged
“in a number and variety of activities and programs which are economic, political, professional, scientific and religious in nature of which Plaintiffs do not approve, and in which they will have no voice, and which are not and will not be collective bargaining activities, i. e., the negotiation and administration of contracts with Defendant Board, and that a substantial part of the sums required to be paid under said Agency Shop Clause are used and will continue to be used for the support of such activities and programs, and not solely for the purpose of defraying the cost of Defendant Federation of its activities as bargaining agent for teachers employed by Defendant Board.”
The complaint prayed that the agency-shop clause be declared invalid under state law and also under the United States Constitution as a deprivation of, inter alia, the plaintiffs’ freedom of association protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments, and for such further relief as might be deemed appropriate.
Upon the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, the trial court dismissed the action for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. Warczak v. Board of Education, 73 LRRM 2237 (Cir. Ct. Wayne County). The plaintiffs appealed, and while their appeal was pending the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in Smigel v. Southgate Community School Dist., 388 Mich. 531, 202 N. W. 2d 305, that state law prohibited an agency shop in the public sector. Accordingly, the judgment in the Warczak case was vacated and remanded to the trial court for further proceedings consistent with the Smigel decision.
Meanwhile, D. Louis Abood and other named teachers had filed a separate action in the same state trial court. The allegations in the complaint were virtually identical to those in Warczak, and similar relief was requested. This second action was held in abeyance pending disposition of the Warczak appeal, and when that case was remanded the two cases were consolidated in the trial court for consideration of the defendants' renewed motion for summary judgment.
On November 5, 1973, that motion was granted. The trial court noted that following the Smigel decision, the Michigan Legislature had in 1973 amended its Public Employment Relations Act so as expressly to authorize an agency shop. 1973 Mich. Pub. Acts, No. 25, codified as Mich. Comp. Laws §423.210 (l)(c). This amendment was applied retraactively by the trial court to validate the agency-shop clause predating 1973 as a matter of state law, and the court ruled further that such a clause does not violate the Federal Constitution.
The plaintiffs’ appeals were consolidated by the Michigan Court of Appeals, which ruled that the trial court had erred in giving retroactive application to the 1973 legislative amendment. The appellate court proceeded, however, to consider the constitutionality of the agency-shop clause, and upheld its facial validity on the authority of this Court’s decision in Railway Employes’ Dept. v. Hanson, 351 U. S. 225, which upheld the constitutionality under the First Amendment of a union-shop clause, authorized by the Railway Labor Act, requiring financial support of the exclusive bargaining representative by every member of the bargaining unit. Id., at 238. Noting, however, that Michigan law also permits union expenditures for legislative lobbying and in support of political candidates, the state appellate court identified an issue explicitly not considered in Hanson — the constitutionality of using compulsory service charges to further “political purposes” unrelated to collective bargaining. Although recognizing that such expenditures “could violate plaintiffs’ First and Fourteenth Amendment rights,” the court read this Court’s more recent decisions to require that an employee who seeks to vindicate such rights must “make known to the union those causes and candidates to which he objects.” Since the complaints had failed to allege that any such notification had been given, the court held that the plaintiffs were not entitled to restitution of any portion of the service charges. The trial court’s error on the retroactivity question, however, led the appellate court to reverse and remand the case. 60 Mich. App. 92, 230 N. W. 2d 322. After the Supreme Court of Michigan denied review, the plaintiffs appealed to this Court, 28 U. S. C. § 1257 (2), and we noted probable jurisdiction, 425 U. S. 949.
II
A
Consideration of the question whether an agency-shop provision in a collective-bargaining agreement covering governmental employees is, as such, constitutionally valid must begin with two cases in this Court that on their face go far toward resolving the issue. The cases are Railway Employes’ Dept. v. Hanson, supra, and Machinists v. Street, 367 U. S. 740.
In the Hanson case a group of railroad employees brought an action in a Nebraska court to enjoin enforcement of a union-shop agreement. The challenged clause was authorized, and indeed shielded from any attempt by a State to prohibit it, by the Railway Labor Act, 45 U. S. C. § 152 Eleventh. The trial court granted the relief requested. The Nebraska Supreme Court upheld the injunction on the ground that employees who disagreed with the objectives promoted by union expenditures were deprived of the freedom of association protected by the First Amendment. This Court agreed that “justiciable questions under the First and Fifth Amendments were presented,” 351 U. S., at 231, but reversed the judgment of the Nebraska Supreme Court on the merits. Acknowledging that “[m]uch might be said pro and con” about the union shop as a policy matter, the Court noted that it is Congress that is charged with identifying “[t]he ingredients of industrial peace and stabilized labor-management relations....’’ Id., at 233-234. Congress determined that it would promote peaceful labor relations to permit a union and an employer to conclude an agreement requiring employees who obtain the benefit of union representation to share its cost, and that legislative judgment was surely an allowable one. Id., at 235.
The record in Hanson contained no evidence that union dues were used to force ideological conformity or otherwise to impair the free expression of employees, and the Court noted that “[i]f ‘assessments’ are in fact imposed for purposes not germane to ■ collective bargaining, a different problem would be presented.” Ibid, (footnote omitted). But the Court squarely held that “the requirement for financial support of the collective-bargaining agency by all who receive the benefits of its work... does not violate... the First... Amendmen[t].” Id., at 238.
The Court faced a similar question several years later in the Street case, which also involved a challenge to the constitutionality of a union shop authorized by the Railway Labor Act. In Street, however, the record contained findings that the union treasury to which all employees were required to contribute had been used “to finance the campaigns of candidates for federal and state offices whom [the plaintiffs] opposed, and to promote the propagation of political and economic doctrines, concepts and ideologies with which [they] disagreed.” 367 U. S., at 744.
’ The Court recognized, id., at 749, that these findings presented constitutional “questions of the utmost gravity” not decided in Hanson, and therefore considered whether the Act could fairly be construed to avoid these constitutional issues. 367 U. S., at 749-750. The Court concluded that the Act could be so construed, since only expenditures related to the union’s functions in negotiating and administering the collective-bargaining agreement and adjusting grievances and disputes fell within “the reasons... accepted by Congress why authority to make union-shop agreements was justified,” id., at 768. The Court ruled, therefore, that the use of compulsory union dues for political purposes violated the Act itself. Nonetheless, it found that an injunction against enforcement of the union-shop agreement as such was impermissible under Hanson, and remanded the case to the Supreme Court of Georgia so that a more limited remedy could be devised.
The holding in Hanson, as elaborated in Street, reflects familiar doctrines in the federal labor laws. The principle of exclusive union representation, which underlies the National Labor Relations Act as well as the Railway Labor Act, is a central element in the congressional structuring of industrial relations. E. g., Emporium Capwell Co. v. Western Addition Community Org., 420 U. S. 50, 62-63; NLRB v. Allis-Chalmers Mfg. Co., 388 U. S. 175, 180; Medo Corp. v. NLRB, 321 U. S. 678, 684-685; Virginian R. Co. v. System Federation No. 40, 300 U. S. 515, 545-549. The designation of a single representative avoids the confusion that would result from attempting to enforce two or more agreements specifying different terms and conditions of employment. It prevents inter-union rivalries from creating dissension within the work force and eliminating the advantages to the employee of collectivization. It also frees the employer from the possibility of facing conflicting demands from different unions, and permits the employer and a single union to reach agreements and settlements that are not subject to attack from rival labor organizations. See generally Emporium Capwell Co. v. Western Addition Community Org., supra, at 67-70; S. Rep. No. 573, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 13 (1935).
The designation of a union as exclusive representative carries with it great responsibilities. The tasks of negotiating and administering a collective-bargaining agreement' and representing the interests of employees in settling disputes and processing grievances are continuing and difficult ones. They often entail expenditure of much time and money. See Street, 367 U. S., at 760. The services of lawyers, expert negotiators, economists, and a research staff, as well as general administrative personnel, may be required. Moreover, in carrying out these duties, the union is obliged “fairly and equitably to represent all employees..., union and nonunion,” within the relevant unit. Id., at 761. A union-shop arrangement has been thought to distribute fairly the cost of these activities among those who benefit, and it counteracts the incentive that employees might otherwise have to become “free riders” — to refuse to contribute to the union while obtaining benefits of union representation that necessarily accrue to all employees. Ibid.; see Oil Workers v. Mobil Oil Corp., 426 U. S. 407, 415-416; NLRB v. General Motors, 373 U. S. 734, 740-741.
To compel employees financially to support their collective-bargaining representative has an impact upon their First Amendment interests. An employee may very well have ideological objections to a wide variety of activities undertaken by the union in its role as exclusive representative. His moral or religious views about the desirability of abortion may not square with the union’s policy in negotiating a medical benefits plan. One individual might disagree with a union policy of negotiating limits on the right to strike, believing that to be the road to serfdom for the working class, while another might have economic or political objections to unionism itself. An employee might object to the union’s wage policy because it violates guidelines designed to limit inflation, or might object to the union’s seeking a clause in the collective-bargaining agreement proscribing racial discrimination. The examples could be multiplied. To be required to help finance the union as a collective-bargaining agent might well be thought, therefore, to interfere in some way with an employee’s freedom to associate for the advancement of ideas, or to refrain from doing so, as he sees fit. But the judgment clearly made in Hanson and Street is that such interference as exists is constitutionally justified by the legislative assessment of the important contribution of the union shop to the system of labor relations established by Congress. “The furtherance of the common cause leaves some leeway for the leadership of the group. As long as they act to promote the cause which justified bringing the group together, the individual cannot withdraw his financial support merely because he disagrees with the group’s strategy. If that were allowed, we would be reversing the Hanson case, sub silentio.” Machinists v. Street, 367 U. S., at 778 (Douglas, J., concurring).
B
The National Labor Relations Act leaves regulation of the labor relations of state and local governments to the States. See 29 U. S. C. § 152 (2). Michigan has chosen to establish for local government units a regulatory scheme which, although not identical in every respect to the NLRA or the Railway Labor Act, is broadly modeled after federal law. E. g., Rockwell v. Crestwood School Dist. Bd. of Ed., 393 Mich. 616, 635-636, 227 N. W. 2d 736, 744-745, appeal dismissed sub nom. Crestwood Ed. Assn. v. Board of Ed. of Crestwood, 427 U. S. 901; Detroit Police Officers Assn. v. Detroit, 391 Mich. 44, 53, 214 N. W. 2d 803, 807-808; Michigan Employment Relations Comm’n v. Reeths-Puffer School Dist., 391 Mich. 253, 260, and n. 11, 215 N. W. 2d 672, 675, and n. 11. Under Michigan law employees of local government units enjoy rights parallel to those protected under federal legislation: the rights to self-organization and to bargain collectively, Mich. Comp. Laws §§ 423.209, 423.215 (1970); see 29 U. S. C. § 157; 45 U. S. C. § 152 Fourth; and the right to secret-ballot representation elections, Mich. Comp. Laws §423.212 (1970); see 29 U. S. C. § 159 (e)(1); 45 U. S. C. § 152 Ninth.
Several aspects of Michigan law that mirror provisions of the Railway Labor Act are of particular importance here. A union that obtains the support of a majority of employees in the appropriate bargaining unit is designated the exclusive representative of those employees. Mich. Comp. Laws § 423.211 (1970). A union so designated is under a duty of fair representation to all employees in the unit, whether or not union members. E. g., Lowe v. Hotel & Restaurant Employees Local 705, 389 Mich. 123, 145-152, 205 N. W. 2d 167, 177-180; Wayne County Community College Federation of Teachers Local 2000 v. Poe, 1976 Mich. Emp. Rel. Comm’n 347, 350-353; Local 836, AFSCME v. Solomon, 1976 Mich. Emp. Rel. Comm’n 84, 89. And in carrying out all of its various responsibilities, a recognized union may seek to have an agency-shop clause included in a collective-bargaining agreement. Mich. Comp. Laws §423.210 (1)(c) (1970). Indeed, the 1973 amendment to the Michigan law was specifically designed to authorize agency shops in order that “employees in the bargaining unit... share fairly in the financial support of their exclusive bargaining representative....” §423.210 (2).
The governmental interests advanced by the agency-shop provision in the Michigan statute are much the same as those promoted by similar provisions in federal labor law. The confusion and conflict that could arise if rival teachers’ unions, holding quite different views as to the proper class hours, class sizes, holidays, tenure provisions, and grievance procedures, each sought to obtain the employer’s agreement, are no different in kind from the evils that the exclusivity rule in the Railway Labor Act was designed to avoid. See Madison School Dist. v. Wisconsin Employment Relations Comm’n, 429 U. S. 167, 178 (Brennan, J., concurring in judgment). The desirability of labor peace is no less important in the public sector, nor is the risk of “free riders” any smaller.
Our province is not to judge the wisdom of Michigan’s decision to authorize the agency shop in public employment. Rather, it is to adjudicate the constitutionality of that decision. The same important government” interests recognized in the Hanson and Street cases presumptively support the impingement upon associations! freedom created by the agency shop here at issue. Thus, insofar as the service charge is used to finance expenditures by the Union for the purposes of collective bargaining, contract administration, and grievance adjustment, those two decisions of this Court appear to require validation of the agency-shop agreement before us.
While recognizing the apparent precedential weight of the Hanson and Street cases, the appellants advance two reasons why those decisions should not control decision of the present case. First, the appellants note that it is government employment that is involved here, thus directly implicating constitutional guarantees, in contrast to the private employment that was the subject of the Hanson and Street decisions. Second, the appellants say that in the public sector collective bargaining itself is inherently “political,” and that to require them to give financial support to it is to require the “ideological conformity” that the Court expressly found absent in the Hanson case. 351 U. S., at 238. We find neither argument persuasive.
Because it is employment by the State that is here involved, the appellants suggest that this case is governed by a long line of decisions holding that public employment cannot be conditioned upon the surrender of First Amendment rights. But, while the actions of public employers surely constitute “state action,” the union shop, as authorized by the Railway Labor Act, also was found to result from governmental action in Hanson. The plaintiffs’ claims in Hanson failed, not because there was no governmental action, but because there was no First Amendment violation. The appellants’ reliance on the “unconstitutional conditions” doctrine is therefore misplaced.
The appellants’ second argument is that in any event collective bargaining in the public sector is inherently “political” and thus requires a different result under the First and Fourteenth Amendments. This contention rests upon the important and often-noted differences in the nature of collective bargaining in the public and private sectors. A public employer, unlike his private counterpart, is not guided by the profit motive and constrained by the normal operation of the market. Municipal services are typically not priced, and where they are they tend to be regarded as in some sense “essential” and therefore are often price-inelastic. Although a public employer, like a private one, will wish to keep costs down, he lacks an important discipline against agreeing to increases in labor costs that in a market system would require price increases. A public-sector union is correspondingly less concerned that high prices due to costly wage demands will decrease output and hence employment.
The government officials making decisions as the public “employer” are less likely to act as a cohesive unit than are managers in private industry, in part because different levels of public authority — department managers, budgetary officials, and legislative bodies — are involved, and in part because each official may respond to a distinctive political constituency. And the ease of negotiating a final agreement with the union may be severely limited by statutory restrictions, by the need for the approval of a higher executive authority or a legislative body, or by the commitment of budgetary decisions of critical importance to others.
Finally, decisionmaking by a public employer is above all a political process. The officials who represent the public employer are ultimately responsible to the electorate, which for this purpose can be viewed as comprising three overlapping classes of voters — taxpayers, users of particular government services, and government employees. Through exercise of their political influence as part of the electorate, the employees have the opportunity to affect the decisions of government representatives who sit on the other side of the bargaining table. Whether these representatives accede to a union’s demands will depend upon a blend of political ingredients, including community sentiment about unionism generally and the involved union in particular, the degree of taxpayer resistance, and the views of voters as to the importance of the service involved and the relation between the demands and the quality of service. It is surely arguable, however, that permitting public employees to unionize and a union to bargain as their exclusive representative gives the employees more influence in the decisionmaking process than is possessed by employees similarly organized in the private sector.
The distinctive nature of public-sector bargaining has led to widespread discussion about the extent to which the law governing labor relations in the private sector provides an appropriate model. To take but one example, there has been considerable debate about the desirability of prohibiting public employee unions from striking, a step that the State of Michigan itself has taken, Mich. Comp. Laws § 423.202 (1970). But although Michigan has not adopted the federal model of labor relations in every respect, it has determined that labor stability will be served by a system of exclusive representation and the permissive use of an agency shop in public employment. As already stated, there can be no' principled basis for according that decision less weight in the constitutional balance than was given in Hanson to the congressional judgment reflected in the Railway Labor Act. The only remaining constitutional inquiry evoked by the appellants' argument, therefore, is whether a public employee has a weightier First Amendment interest than a private employee in not being compelled to contribute to the costs of exclusive union representation. We think he does not.
Public employees are not basically different from private employees; on the whole, they have the same sort of skills, the same needs, and seek the same advantages. “The uniqueness of public employment is not in the employees nor in the work performed; the uniqueness is in the special character of the employer.” Summers, Public Sector Bargaining: Problems of Governmental Decisionmaking, 44 U. Cin. L. Rev. 669, 670 (1975) (emphasis added). The very real differences between exclusive-agent collective bargaining in the public and private sectors are not such as to work any greater infringement upon the First Amendment interests of public employees. A public employee who believes that a union representing him is urging a course that is unwise as a matter of public policy is not barred from expressing his viewpoint. Besides voting in accordance with his convictions, every public employee is largely free to express his views, in public or private, orally or in writing. With some exceptions not pertinent here, public employees are free to participate in the full range of political activities open to other citizens. Indeed, just this Term we have held that the First and Fourteenth Amendments protect the right of a public school teacher to oppose, at a public school board meeting, a position advanced by the teachers' union. Madison School Dist. v. Wisconsin Employment Relations Comm’n, 429 U. S. 167. In so ruling we recognized that the principle of exclusivity cannot constitutionally be used to muzzle a public employee who, like any other citizen, might wish to express his view about governmental decisions concerning labor relations, id., at 174.
There can be no quarrel with the truism that because public employee unions attempt to influence governmental policy-making, their activities — and the views of members who disagree with them — may be properly termed political. But that characterization does not raise the ideas and beliefs of public employees onto a higher plane than the ideas and beliefs of private employees. It is no doubt true that a central purpose of the First Amendment “ 'was to protect the free discussion of governmental affairs.’ ” Post, at 259, quoting Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, 14, and Mills v. Alabama, 384 U. S. 214, 218. But our cases have never suggested that expression about philosophical, social, artistic, economic, literary, or ethical matters — to take a nonexhaustive list of labels — is not entitled to full First Amendment protection. Union members in both the public and private sectors may find that a variety of union activities conflict with their beliefs. Compare, e. g., supra, at 222, with post, at 256-257. Nothing in the First Amendment or our cases discussing its meaning makes the question whether the adjective “political” can properly be attached to those beliefs the critical constitutional inquiry.
The differences between public- and private-sector collective bargaining simply do not translate into differences in First Amendment rights. Even those commentators most acutely aware of the distinctive nature of public-sector bargaining and most seriously concerned with its policy implications agree that “[t]he union security issue in the public sector... is fundamentally the same issue... as in the private sector.... No special dimension results from the fact that a union represents public rather than private employees.” H. Wellington & R. Winter, Jr., The Unions and the Cities 95-96 (1971). We conclude that the Michigan Court of Appeals was correct in viewing this Court’s decisions in Hanson and Street as controlling in the present case insofar as the service charges are applied to collective-bargaining, contract administration, and grievance-adjustment purposes.
C
Because the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled that state law “sanctions the use of nonunion members’ fees for purposes other than collective bargaining,” 60 Mich. App., at 99, 230 N. W. 2d, at 326, and because the complaints allege that such expenditures were made, this case presents constitutional issues not decided in Hanson or Street. Indeed Street embraced an interpretation of the Railway Labor Act not without its difficulties, see 367 U. S., at 784-786 (Black, J., dissenting); id., at 799-803 (Frankfurter, J., dissenting), precisely to avoid facing the constitutional issues presented by the use of union-shop dues for political and ideological purposes unrelated to collective bargaining, id., at 749-750. Since the state court’s construction of the Michigan statute is authoritative, however, we must confront those issues in this case.
Our decisions establish with unmistakable clarity that the freedom of an individual to associate for the purpose of advancing beliefs and ideas is protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments. E. g., Elrod v. Burns, 427 U. S. 347, 355-357 (plurality opinion); Cousins v. Wigoda, 419 U. S. 477, 487; Kusper v. Pontikes, 414 U. S. 51, 56-57; NAACP v. Alabama ex rel. Patterson, 357 U. S. 449, 460-461. Equally clear is the proposition that a government may not require an individual to relinquish rights guaranteed him by the First Amendment as a condition of public employment. E. g., Elrod v. Burns, supra, at 357-360, and cases cited; Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U. S. 593; Keyishian v. Board of Regents, 385 U. S. 589. The appellants argue that they fall within the protection of these cases because they have been prohibited, not from actively associating, but rather from refusing to associate. They specifically argue that they may constitutionally prevent the Union’s spending a part of their required service fees to contribute to political candidates and to express political views unrelated to its duties as exclusive bargaining representative. We have concluded that this argument is a meritorious one.
One of the principles underlying the Court’s decision in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U. S. 1, was that contributing to an organization for the purpose of spreading a political message is protected by the First Amendment. Because “[m]aking a contribution... enables like-minded persons to pool their resources in furtherance of common political goals,” id., at 22, the Court reasoned that limitations upon the freedom to contribute “implicate fundamental First Amendment interests,” id., at 23.
The fact that the appellants are compelled to make, rather than prohibited from making, contributions for political purposes works no less an infringement of their constitutional rights. For at the heart of the First Amendment is the notion that an individual should be free to believe as he will, and that in a free society one’s beliefs should be shaped by his mind and his conscience rather than coerced by the State. See Elrod v. Burns, supra, at 356-357; Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U. S. 557, 565; Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U. S. 296, 303-304. And the freedom of belief is no incidental or secondary aspect-of the First Amendment’s protections:
“If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.” West Virginia Bd. of Ed. v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624, 642.
These principles prohibit a State from compelling any individual to affirm his belief in God, Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U. S. 488, or to associate with a political party, Elrod v. Burns, supra; see 427 U. S., at 363-364, n. 17, as a condition of retaining public employment. They are no less applicable to the case at bar, and they thus prohibit the appellees from requiring any of the appellants to contribute to the support of an ideological cause he may oppose as a condition of holding a job as a public school teacher.
We do not hold that a union cannot constitutionally spend funds for the expression of political views, on behalf of political candidates, or toward the advancement of other ideological causes not germane to its duties as collective-bargaining representative. Rather, the Constitution requires only that such expenditures be financed from charges, dues, or assessments paid by employees who do not object to advancing those ideas and who are not coerced into doing so against their will by the threat of loss of governmental employment.
There will, of course, be difficult problems in drawing lines between collective-bargaining activities, for which contributions may be compelled, and ideological activities unrelated to collective bargaining, for which such compulsion is prohibited. The Court held in Street, as a matter of statutory construction, that a similar line must be drawn under the Railway Labor Act, but in the public sector the line may be somewhat hazier. The process of establishing a written collective-bargaining agreement prescribing the terms and conditions of public employment may require not merely concord at the bargaining table, but subsequent approval by other public authorities; related budgetary and appropriations decisions might be seen as an integral part of the bargaining process. We have no occasion in this case, however, to try to define such a dividing line. The case comes to us after a judgment on the pleadings, and there is no evidentiary record of any kind. The allegations in the complaints are general ones, see supra, at 212-213, and the parties have neither briefed nor argued the question of what specific Union activities in the present context properly fall under the definition of collective bargaining. The lack of factual concreteness and adversary presentation to aid us in approaching the difficult line-drawing questions highlights the importance of avoiding unnecessary decision of constitutional questions.. All that we decide is that the general allegations in the complaints, if proved, establish a cause of action under the First and Fourteenth Amendments.
Ill
In determining what remedy will be appropriate if the appellants prove their allegations, the objective must be to devise a way of preventing compulsory subsidization of ideological activity by employees who object thereto without restricting the Union’s ability to require every employee to contribute to the cost of collective-bargaining activities. This task is simplified by the guidance to be had from prior decisions. In Street, the plaintiffs had proved at trial that expenditures were being made for political purposes of various kinds, and the Court found those expenditures illegal under the Railway-Labor Act. See supra, at 219-220. Moreover, in that case each plaintiff had “made known to the union representing his craft or class his dissent from the use of his money for political causes which he opposes.” 367 U. S., at 750; see id., at 771. The Court found that “[i]n that circumstance, the respective unions were without power to use payments thereafter tendered by them for such political causes.” Ibid. Since, however, Hanson had established that the union-shop agreement was not unlawful as such, the Court held that to enjoin its enforcement would “[sweep] too broadly.” 367 U. S., at 771. The Court also found that an injunction prohibiting the union from expending dues for political purposes would be inappropriate, not only because of the basic policy reflected in the Norris-La Guardia Act against enjoining labor unions, but also because those union members who do wish part of their dues to be used for political purposes have a right to associate to that end “without being silenced by the dissenters.” Id., at 772-773.
After noting that “dissent is not to be presumed” and that only employees who have affirmatively made known to the union their opposition to political uses of their funds are entitled to relief, the Court sketched two possible remedies: First, “an injunction against expenditure for political causes opposed by each complaining employee of a sum, from those moneys to be spent by the union for political purposes, which is so much of the moneys exacted from him as is the proportion of the union’s total expenditures made for such political activities to the union’s total budget”; and second, restitution of a fraction of union dues paid equal to' the fraction of total union expenditures that were made for political purposes opposed by the employee. Id., at 774-775.
The Court again considered the remedial question in Railway Clerks v. Allen, 373 U. S. 113. In that case employees who had refused to pay union-shop dues obtained injunctive relief in state court against enforcement of the union-shop agreement. The employees had not notified the union prior to bringing the lawsuit of their opposition to political expenditures, and at trial, their testimony was principally that they opposed such expenditures, as a general matter. Id., at 118— 119, n. 5. The Court held that the employees had adequately established their cause of action by manifesting “opposition to any political expenditures by the union,” id., at 118 (emphasis in original), and that the requirement in Street that dissent be affirmatively indicated was satisfied by the allegations in the complaint that
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
G
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Clark
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This proceeding tests the jurisdiction, as well as the discretion, of the Federal Power Commission in the certificating of the sale of natural gas under § 7 (e) of the Natural Gas Act of 1938, 52 Stat. 821, 56 Stat. 84, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 717 et seq. . The Commission has issued a certificate of public convenience and necessity to petitioners, producers of natural gas, to sell to petitioner Tennessee Gas Transmission Co. 1.67 trillion cubic feet of natural gas at an initial price of 22.4 cents per MCF, including a tax of 1 cent per MCF. Continental Oil Co., 17 F. P. C. 880. In the same proceeding and on the same evidence it had twice refused to issue such an unconditional certificate because of insufficient evidence or testimony “on which to-base a finding that the public convenience and necessity requires the sale of these volumes of gas at the particular rate level here proposed.” On the second occasion it proposed to petitioners that the certificates be conditioned upon an initial price of 18 cents per MCF (including the 1-cent tax), to' be increased to 22.4 cents per MCF (including "the I-cent tax) after the first 24-hour delivery period, the latter rate to be subjected to the “just and reasonable” provisions of § 4 of the Act, 15 U. S. C. § 717c. The petitioners refused this proposal, and Tennessee advised the Commission that unless the certificates were issued without such'conditions, CATCO would not dedicate’its gas to the interstate market. Upon'rehearing, after argument but without additional evidence, the Commission issued the certificates declaring “important as is the issue of price, that as far as the public is concerned, the precise charge . that is made initially is less important than the assurance of this great supply of gas” for interstate markets. 17 F. P. C., at 881.
The respondents, other than the Public Service Commission of the State of New York, are public utilities in New York and New Jersey. They buy gas from petitioner Tennessee for distribution in those States. They’ and the New York Commission oppose the issuance of the certificates on the ground that their issuance will.increase the price of gas to consumers in those States, of whom there are over a million, using Tennessee’s gas. Upon the issuance of the certificates the respondents filed petitions for review with the Court of Appeals. It held that “Congress has not given thé Commission power to inquire into the issue of public convenience and necessity where, as here, the applicant circumscribes the scope of that inquiry by attaching a condition to its application requiring the Commission to forego the consideration of an element which may be necessary in the formulation of its judgment.” Public Service Comm’n of N. Y. v. Federal Power Comm’n, 257 F. 2d 717, 723. Concluding that'the Commission had no jurisdiction to conduct such “a limited inquiry,!’ ibid., it vacated the order granting the certificates and remanded the case to the Commission. The importance in the administration of the Act of the questions thus posed required the granting of certiorari, 358 U. S. 926 (1959). We have concluded that the Court of Appeals was in error in deciding that the Commission had no jurisdiction. However, for reasons hereafter developed we hold that the order of the Commission in granting the certificates was in error and we, therefore, affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
The natural gas involved here is of a Miocene sand located below seabed out in the Gulf of Mexico some 15 to 25 miles offshore from Cameron and Vermilion Parishes, Louisiana. The petitioners in No. 518’ are each' independent natural gas producers. They jointly own oil and gas leases (25% to each company) which they obtained from Louisiana covering large acreages of the Continental Shelf off the Louisiana coast. Jurisdiction over the Continental Shelf is claimed by the United States and the question is now in litigation. The .Congress has continued existing leases in effect pending the outcome of the controversy over the title. 67 Stat. 462, 43 U. S. C. (Supp. I, 1954) §§ 1331-1343. The four companies’ joint venture has resulted in the .discovery of huge fields of natural gas and they have dedicated some 1.75 trillion cubic feet of gas from 95,000 acres of their leases to the petitioner Tennessee Gas Transmission Company, a natural gas company subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission. The latter is the petitioner in No. 536 which has been consolidated with No. 518.
The four contracts dedicating the gas to Tennessee run from each of the petitioner producers. The contracts call for an initial price of 22.4 cents per MCF for the gas, including 1-cent tax, with escalator clauses calling for periodic increases in specific amounts. In addition, they provide for Tennessee to receive the gas at platforms on the well sites out some 15 to 25 miles in- the Gulf. This requires it to build approximately 107 miles of pipeline from its nearest existing pipeline point to the offshore platforms at wellhead. The estimated cost was $16,315,412. It further appears that the necessity for the certificates was based on an application of Tennessee, Docket G-11107, in which Tennessee requested certification to enlarge and extend its facilities.. This program included the building of a pipeline from southeast Louisiana to Portland, Tennessee, which would carry a large proportion of the gas from these leases. Its cost was estimated at $85,000,000. In addition the contracts provide that Tennessee give free carriage from .the wells to the shore of all condensate or distillate in the gas for the account of producers who have the option to separate it from the gas at shore stations. We need not discuss the contract provisions more minutely, though respondents do claim that other requirements place a greater burden on Tennessee and in practical effect increase the stated price of the gas to it.
The Presiding Examiner on March 29, 1957, found that the sales were required by the public convenience and necessity. Continental Oil Co., 17 F. P. C. 563. While he found that the proposed price was higher than any price Tennessee was then paying, he pointed to other prices currently paid for onshore sales “for smaller reserves and smaller future potentials.” Id., at 571. The average weighted cost of gas to Tennessee he found would be increased, if the contract price was certificated, by .97 cent per MCF. However, he said that no showing had been made that this would lead to an increase in Tennessee’s rates to jurisdictional customers or result in an increase in the price governing its other purchases. He refused to condition the certificates on the acceptance of a lower price by the parties on the ground that no “showing of imprudence or of abuse of discretion by management,” ibid., had been made that indicated the proposed price could not be accepted temporarily as consistent with the. public convenience and necessity, pending review in a §. 5 (a) proceeding. However, he did condition his recommendation on the approval of Tennessee’s application in Docket G-11107 above mentioned.
The Commission, as we have indicated, took three strikes at the recommendations of the Examiner. On April 22 it reversed his-finding on public convenience and necessity because the evidence was insufficient as to price. It said:
“The importance of this issue in certificating this sale cannot easily be overemphasized. This is the largest reserve ever committed to one sale. This is the first sale from the newly developed .offshore fields from which large proportions of future gas supplies will be taken. This is the highest price level at which the sale of gas to Tennessee; Gas has been proposed.
“These factors make it abundantly evident that, in the public interest, this crucial sale should not be permanently certificated unless the rate level has been-shown to be in the public interest.” Id., at 575.
The Commission granted petitioners temporary certificates and remanded the proceeding to the Examiner “to determine at what rates the public convenience and necessity requires these sales” of natural gas to Tennessee under a permanent certificate. Id., at 576. The producers immediately moved for modification,- asserting that they could not present sufficient evidence “within any reasonable period in the. future” to meet the necessities of the remand and, further, could not “afford to commence, construction until at least the initial rate [question] is resolved.” The Commission on May 20, however, reiterated its belief that “the record does not contain sufficient evidence on which to base a finding that the public convenience and necessity requires the sale of the gas at that particular rate level.” 17 F. P. C. 732, 733-734. In an effort to ameliorate the situation represented by the producers, the Commission did grant the certificates but conditioned them upon the producers’, acceptance of an initial price of 17 cents per MCF (plus the 1-cent tax), which was the highest price theretofore paid by Tennessee in the Southwest. . It also agreed "that one day after the commencement of deliveries of gas the 17-cent price would be escalated to 21.4 cents (plusi.l cent for taxes), the increase to be collected under bond, subject to proof and refund under , the provisions of § 4 of the Act. This time Tennessee sought rehearing advising the Commission that the producers, would not accept the 17-cent initial price order of May 20 and that “the contracts will be terminated” with the consequent “loss of natural gas supplies” required for Tennessee’s customers. The Commission, after oral argument, did- not withdraw its previous findings in the matter but predicated its third order on “the primary consideration that the public served through the Tennessee Gas system is greatly in need of increased supplies of natural gas. ¡ . . In view of these circumstances and the fact that the record does not show that the 21.4-cent [plus 1 cent for taxes] rate is necessarily excessivej we agree with the presiding examiner that this certificate proceeding . . . should not assume the character of a rate proceeding under Section 5 (a).” 17 F. P. C. 880, 881. Asserting that it was of the opinion that it would be able “to adequately protect the public interest with respect to the matter of price,” ibid., it ordered the certificates issued and directed that since the price “is higher than Tennessee Gas is paying under any other contract, it should be subject to prompt investigation under Section- 5 (a) as to its reasonableness.” Id., at 882.
We note that the Commission did not seek certiorari here but has filed a brief amicus curiae. It does not urge reversal of the judgment but attacks the ground upon which the Court of Appeals bottomed its-remand, namely, lack of Commission jurisdiction to consider the limited proposal of petitioners. The Commission’s brief suggests that the Court not reach the issue tendered by petitioners, i. e., must the Commission, in a § 7 proceeding, decide whether the pro'poséd initial rate is just and reasonable? Instead, the Commission says, if the judgment must be affirmed it would be better to base the affirmance on the ground that its order “was not supported by sufficient evidence, and hénce constituted an abuse of discretion in. the circumstances of the particular case . . . .” Brief for the Federal Power Commission, p. .31. Petitioners oppose such a disposition, contending the evidence was quite substantial.
I. Jurisdiction of the Commission.
The Court of Appeals thought that the Commission had no jurisdiction to consider petitioners’ proposal because it was limited to a firm price agreed upon by the., parties applicant. Their refusal to accept certification at a lower price, even to the extent of canceling their, contracts and withholding the gas from interstate commerce, the court held, resulted in the Commission’s losing jurisdiction.- We do not believe that this follows. No sales, intrastate or interstate, of gas had ever been made from the leases involved here. The contracts under which the petitioners proposed to sell the gas in the interstate market were all conditioned on the issuance of certificates of phblic convenience and necessity. A failure by either party to secure such • certificates rendered the contracts subject to termination. Certainly the filing of the application for a certificate did not constitute a dedication to the interstate market of the gas recoverable under these leases. Nor is there doubt that the producers were at liberty to refuse conditional certificates proposed by the Commission’s second order. While the refusal might have been couched in more diplomatic language, it had no effect on the Commission’s power to act on the rehearing requested. Even, though the Commission did march up the hill only to march down again upon reaching the summit we cannot say that this about-face deprived, it of jurisdiction. We find nothing illegal' in- the petitioners’ rejection of the alternative price proposed by the Commission and their standing firm on their own. •
II.'The Validity of the Order:
The purpose of the Natural Gas Act was- to underwrite just and reasonable rates to the. consumers of natural gas. Federal Power Comm’n v. Hope Natural Gas Co., 320 U. S. 591 (1944). As the.original § 7 (c) provided, it Was “the intention of Congress; that natural gas shall be sold in interstate commerce for resale for, ultimate public consumption for domestic, commercial, industrial, or any other use at the lowest possible reasonable rate consistent with the maintenance of adequate service in the public interest.” 52 Stat. 825. The Act was so framed as to . afford consumers a complete, permanent and effective bond of protection from excessive rates and charges. The heart of the Act is found in those provisions requiring initially that any “proposed servicé, sale., operation, construction,. extension, or acquisition . . . will be required by the present or future public convenience and necessity,” § 7 (e), 15 U. S. C. § 717f (e), and that all rates and charges “made, demanded, or received” shall be “just and -reasonable,” § 4, 15 U. S. C. § 717c. . The Act prohibits such movements unless and until the Commission issues a certificate of public convenience and necessity therefor, § 7 (c), 15 U. S. C. § 717f (c). Section 7 (e) vests in the Commission control over the conditions under which gas may be initially dedicated to interstate use. Moreover, once so dedicated there can be no withdrawal of that supply from continued interstate movement without Commission approval. The gas operator, although to this extent a captive subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission, is not without remedy to protect himself. He may, unless otherwise bound by contract, United Gas Pipe Line Co. v. Mobile Gas Service Corp., 350 U. S. 332 (1956), file new rate schedules with the Commission. This rate becomes effective upon its filing, subject to .the 5-month suspension provision of § 4 and the posting of a bond, where required. This not only gives the natural gas company opportunity to increase its rates where justified but likewise guarantees that the consumer may recover refunds for moneys paid under excessive increases. The overriding intent of the Congress to give full protective coverage to the consumer as to price is further emphasized in § 5 of the Act, 15 U. S. C. § 717d, which authorizes the Commission sua sponte, or otherwise, to institute an investigation into existing rates and charges and to fix them at a just and reasonable level. Under this section, however) the rate found by the Commission to be just and reasonable becomes effective prospectively only. Gas purchasers, therefore, have no protection from excessive charges collected during the pendency of a § 5 proceeding.
In view of this framework in which the Commission is authorized and directed to act, the initial certificating of a proposal under § 7 (e) of the Act as being required, by the public convenience and necessity becomes crucial. This is true because the delay incident to determination in § 5 proceedings through which initial certificated rates are reviewable appears nigh interminable. Although Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Wisconsin, 347 U. S. 672, was decided in 1954, cases instituted under § 5 are still in the investigative stage. This long delay, without the protection of refund, as is possible in a § 4 proceeding, would provide a windfall for the natural gas company with a consequent squall for the consumers. This the Congress did not intend. Moreover, the fact that the Commission was not given the power to suspend initial rates under. § 7 makes it the more important, as the Commission, itself says; that “this crucial sale should not be permanently certificated unless the rate level has been shown to-, be in the public interest.” 17 F. P. C. 563, 575.
This is especially true where, as here, the initial price will set a pattern in an area where enormous reserves of gas appear to be present. We note that in petitioners’ proof a map of the Continental Shelf area off of the coast of Louisiana shows that the leases here involved cover but 17 out of a blocked-out area covering some 900 blocks of 5,000 acres each. The potential of this vast acreage, in light of discoveries already' made as shown by the record, is stupendous. The Commission has found that the transaction here covers the largest reserve "ever committed to interstate commerce in a single sale. Indications are that it is but a puff in comparison to the enormous potentials present under the seabed of the- Gulf. The price certificated will in effect become the floor for future contracts in the area. This has been proven by conditions in southern Louisiána where prices have now vaulted from 17 cents to over 23 cents per MCF. New price plateaus will thus be created as new contracts are made and unless controlled will result in “exploitation” at the expense of the consumer, who eventually pays for the increases in his monthly bill.
It is true that the Act does not require a determination of just and reasonable rates in a § 7 proceeding as it does in one under- either § 4 or § 5. Nor 'do we. hold that a “just and reasonable” rate hearing is a prerequisite to the issuance of producer certificates. "What we do say is that the inordinate delay presently existing in the processing of § 5 proceedings requires a most careful scrutiny and responsible reaction to initial price proposals of producers under § 7. Their proposals must be supported by evidence showing their necessity to “the present or future public convenience and necessity” before permanent certificates are issued. This is not to say that rates are the only factor bearing on the public convenience and necessity, for § 7 (e) requires the Commission to evaluate all factors bearing on the public interest. The fact that prices have leaped from one plateau to the higher levels of another, as is indicated here,' does make price a consideration of primé importance. This is the more important during this formative period when the ground rules of producer regulation are being evolved. Where the application on its face or on presentation of evidence signals the existence of a situation that probably would not be in the public interest, ■ a permanent certificate should not be issued.
There is, of course, available in such a situation, a method by which the applicant and the Commission can arrive at a rate that is in keeping with the public convenience and necessity. The Congress, in § 7 (e), has authorized the Commission to. condition certificates in such manner as the public convenience and necessity may require. Where the proposed price is not in keeping with the public interest because it is out of line or because its approval might result in a triggering of general price rises or an increase in the applicant’s existing rates by reason of “favored nation” clauses or otherwise, the Commission in the exercise of its discretion might attach such conditions as it believes necessary.
This, is not an encroachment upon the initial rate-making privileges allowed natural gas companies under the' Act, United Gas Pipe Line Co. v. Mobile Gas Service Corp., supra, but merely the exercise of that duty imposed on the Commission to protect the public interest in determining whether the issuance of the certificate is required by the public convenience and necessity, which is the Act’s standard in § 7 applications. In granting such conditional certificates, • the Commission does not determine initial prices nor does it overturn those agreed upon by the parties. Rather, it so conditions the certificate that the consuming public may be protected while the justness and reasonableness- of the price fixed by the parties is being determined under other sections of the Act. Section 7 procedures in such situations thus act to hold the line awaiting adjudication of a just and reasonable rate. Thus the purpose of the Congress “to create a comprehensive and ” effective regulatory scheme,” Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co. v. Public Service Comm’n of Indiana, 332 U. S. 507, 520 (1947), is given full recognition. And § 7 is given onfy that scope necessary for “a single statutory scheme ^under which all rates are established initially by the natural gas companies, by contract or otherwise, and all rates are subject to being modified by the Commission . ...” United Gas Pipe Line Co. v. Mobile Gas Service Corp., supra, at 341. On the other hand, if unconditional certificates are issued where the rate is hot clearly shown to be required by the public convenience an'd necessity, relief is limited to § 5 proceedings, and, as we. have indicated, full protection of the public interest is not afforded.
Our examination of the record here indicates that there was insufficient evidence to support a finding of public convenience and necessity prerequisite to the issuance of the permanent certificates. The witnesses tendered developed little more information than was included in the printed contracts. As the proposed contract price was. higher than any paid by Tennessee, including offshore production in the West Delta area of Louisiana, it is surprising that evidence, if available, was not introduced as to the relative costs of production in the two submerged areas. Moreover the record indicates that the proposed price was some 70% higher than the weighted average cost of gas to Tennessee; still no effort was made to give the “reason why.” -More damaging, was the evidence that this price was greatly in excess of that which Tennessee pays, from any lease in southern Louisiana. Likewise the ■$16,000,000 pipeline to the producers’ wells was unsupported by evidence of practice or custom. Respondents contend — and it stands undenied — that this alone would add 2 cents per MCF to the cost of the gas. Again the free movement f distillates retained by the producers was “shrugged off” as being de.minimis, without any supporting data whatever. Nor was the evidence as to whether the certification of this price would “trigger” increases in leases with “favored nation” clauses convincing, and the claim that it would not lead to an increase in rates by Tennessee was not only unsupported but has already proven.unfounded.
Nor do we find any support whatever in the record for the conclusory finding on which the order was. based -that “the public served through the Tennessee Gas system is greatly, in need of increased supplies of natural gas.” 17 F. P. C. 880, 881. Admittedly any such- need was. ■wrapped up in the Commission’s action in Docket .G-11107, where Tennessee was asking for permission to enlarge its facilities. However, the two dockets were not consolidated and the Presiding Examiner conditioned his approval here on the granting of the application in Docket G-11Í07, no part of which record is here. Neither is there evidence supporting the finding that the producers “would seek to dispose of their gas elsewhere than to Tennessee Gas and the interstate market,” ibid. While the Commission says that statements were made in argument, apparently by counsel, that this was the ease, we find no such testimony. Since some 90% of all commercial gas moves into the interstate market, the sale of such vast quantities as available here would hardly be profitable except- interstate.
-These considerations require an affirmance of the judgment with instructions that the applications be remanded to the Commission for further proceedings.
It is so ordered.
Section 7(e), 15 U. S. C. § 717f (e), provides:
“(e) Except in the cases governed by the provisos contained in subsection (c) of this section, a certificate shall be issued to any qualified applicant therefor, authorizing the whole or any part of the operation, sale, service, construction, extension, or acquisition covered by the application, if it is found that the applicant is able and willing properly to do the acts and to perforin the service proposed and to conform to the provisions of the Act and the requirements, rules, and regulations of the Commission thereunder, and that the proposed service, sale, operation, construction; extension, or acquisition, to the extent authorized by the certificate, is or Will be required by the present or future, public'convenience arid necessity; otherwise such application ■ shall be denied. The Commission shall have’the power to attach to the issuance -of the certificate and to the exercise of the rights granted thereunder such reasonable terms and conditions as the public convenience and necessity may require.”
These are the Atlantic Refining. Company, Cities Service Production Company, Continental Oil Company, and Tidewater Oil Cpmpany, all petitioners in. No. 518 and sometimes known as CATCO.
Tennessee operates a pipeline system extending from gas fields in Texas and Louisiana through Arkansas, Mississippi,. Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York and into Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Connecticut. It serves some 80 distributing companies which in turn serve millions of consumers in the various States which its pipeline traverses.
These increases were'later limited to 2 cents per MCF. The escalator, clauses apparently were inserted in lieu of “favored nation” clauses, but by letter, not a part of the contracts, “favored nation” clauses were to be substituted at a later date on certain contingencies.
The exact finding is as follows:
“Including the gas .which Tennessee proposes to purchase under these, contracts, some 240,000 M. c. f. per day (14.73 p. s. i. a.), it is estimated that the weighted average cost of all gas to Tennessee in 1958 will be some 13.70 cents per M. c. f., as compared with 12.73 cents if'the gas here, proposed to be purchased is excluded.” 17 F. P. C. 563, 570.
Thus is the .97-cent figure derived. It is, however, a misleading figure, for- the estimate for 1958 includes the 22.4-cent gas for only two months of 1958, November and December. There is no indication in the record as to what the cost increase .would be if the weighted average were calculated .by including the 22.4-cent gas for the full year.
The brief is not signed by the Solicitor General but by both the General'Counsel and the Solicitor of the Federal Power Commission.
The 1942 amendments to § 7, 56 Stat. 83, were not intended to change this declaration of purpose. See Hearings, House Interstate. and Foreign Commerce Committee, on H. R. 5249, 77th Cong., 1st Sess. 18-19; H. R. Rep. No. 1290, 77th Cong., 1st Sess.; S. Rep. No. 948, 77th Cong., 2d Sess.
Tennessee has subsequently filed an application with the F. P. C. requesting higher rates designed to produce some $19,000,000 additional annual revenue; Tennessee Gas Transmission Co., Docket G-17166.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Brennan
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We have long held, see Blockburger v. United States, 284 U. S. 299, 304 (1932), that the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment prohibits successive prosecutions for the same criminal act or transaction under two criminal statutes whenever each statute does not “requir[e] proof of a fact which the other does not.” In Illinois v. Vitale, 447 U. S. 410 (1980), we suggested that even if two successive prosecutions were not barred by the Blockburger test, the second prosecution would be barred if the prosecution sought to establish an essential element of the second crime by proving the conduct for which the defendant was convicted in the first prosecution. Today we adopt the suggestion set forth in Vitale. We hold that the Double Jeopardy Clause bars a subsequent prosecution if, to establish an essential element of an offense charged in that prosecution, the government will prove conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted.
I
For purposes of this proceeding, we take the following facts as true. At approximately 6:35 p.m. on October 3, 1987, respondent Thomas Corbin drove his automobile across the double yellow line of Route 55 in LaGrange, New York, striking two oncoming vehicles. Assistant District Attorney (ADA) Thomas Dolan was called to the scene, where he learned that both Brenda Dirago, who had been driving the second vehicle to be struck, and her husband Daniel had been seriously injured. Later that evening, ADA Dolan was informed that Brenda Dirago had died from injuries sustained in the accident. That same evening, while at the hospital being treated for his own injuries, respondent was served with two uniform traffic tickets directing him to appear at the LaGrange Town Justice Court on October 29, 1987. One ticket charged him with the misdemeanor of driving while intoxicated in violation of N. Y. Veh. & Traf. Law § 1192(3) (McKinney 1986); the other charged him with failing to keep right of the median in violation of § 1120(a). A blood test taken at the hospital that evening indicated a blood alcohol level of 0.19%, nearly twice the level at which it is per se illegal to operate a motor vehicle in New York. § 1192(2).
Three days later, ADA Frank Chase began gathering evidence for a homicide prosecution in connection with the accident. “Despite his active involvement in building a homicide case against [Corbin], however, Chase did not attempt to ascertain the date [Corbin] was scheduled to appear in Town Justice Court on the traffic tickets, nor did he inform either the Town Justice Court or the Assistant District Attorney covering that court about his pending investigation. ” In re Corbin v. Hillery, 74 N. Y. 2d 279, 284, 543 N. E. 2d 714, 716 (1989). Thus, ADA Mark Gliek never mentioned Brenda Dirago’s death in the statement of readiness for trial and other pretrial pleadings he submitted to respondent and the LaGrange Town Justice Court on October 14, 1987. App. 5-10.
Accordingly, when respondent pleaded guilty to the two traffic tickets on October 27, 1987, a date on which no member of the District Attorney’s office was present in court, the presiding judge was unaware of the fatality stemming from the accident. Corbin was never asked if any others had been injured on the night in question and did not voluntarily incriminate himself by providing such information. The presiding judge accepted his guilty plea, but because the District Attorney’s office had not submitted a sentencing recommendation, the judge postponed sentencing until November 17, 1987, when an ADA was scheduled to be present in court. The ADA present at sentencing on that date, Heidi Sauter, was unaware that there had been a fatality, was unable to locate the case file, and had not spoken to ADA Glick about the case. Nevertheless, she did not seek an adjournment so that she could ascertain the facts necessary to make an informed sentencing recommendation. 74 N. Y. 2d, at 284, 543 N. E. 2d, at 716. Instead, she recommended a “minimum sentence,” and the presiding judge sentenced Corbin to a $350 fine, a $10 surcharge, and a 6-month license revocation. App. 12.
Two months later, on January 19, 1988, a grand jury investigating the October 3, 1987, accident indicted Corbin, charging him with reckless manslaughter, second-degree vehicular manslaughter, and criminally negligent homicide for causing the death of Brenda Dirago; third-degree reckless assault for causing physical injury to Daniel Dirago; and driving while intoxicated. The prosecution filed a bill of particulars that identified the three reckless or negligent acts on which it would rely to prove the homicide and assault charges: (1) operating a motor vehicle on a public highway in an intoxicated condition, (2) failing to keep right of the median, and (3) driving approximately 45 to 50 miles per hour in heavy rain, “which was a speed too fast for the weather and road conditions then pending.” App. 20. Respondent moved to dismiss the indictment on statutory and constitutional double jeopardy grounds. After a hearing, the Dutchess County Court denied respondent’s motion, ruling that the failure of Corbin or his counsel to inform the Town Justice Court at the time of the guilty plea that Corbin had been involved in a fatal accident constituted a “material misrepresentation of fact” that “was prejudicial to the administration of justice.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 8c.
Respondent then sought a writ of prohibition barring prosecution on all counts of the indictment. The Appellate Division denied the petition without opinion, but the New York Court of Appeals reversed. The court prohibited prosecution of the driving while intoxicated counts pursuant to New York’s statutory double jeopardy provision, N. Y. Crim. Proc. Law §40.20 (McKinney 1971 and Supp. 1970-1989). The court further ruled that prosecution of the two vehicular manslaughter counts would violate the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment pursuant to the Blockburger test because, as a matter of state law, driving while intoxicated “is unquestionably a lesser included offense of second degree vehicular manslaughter.” 74 N. Y. 2d, at 290, and n. 7, 543 N. E. 2d, at 720, and n. 7. Finally, relying on the “pointed dictum” in this Court’s opinion in Vitale, the court barred prosecution of the remaining counts because the bill of particulars expressed an intention to “rely on the prior traffic offenses as the acts necessary to prove the homicide and assault charges.” 74 N. Y. 2d, at 289, 290, 543 N. E. 2d, at 719-720. Two judges dissented, arguing that respondent had deceived the Town Justice Court when pleading guilty to the traffic tickets. We granted certiorari, 493 U. S. 953 (1989), and now affirm.
II
The facts and contentions raised here mirror almost exactly those raised in this Court 10 years ago in Illinois v. Vitale, 447 U. S. 410 (1980). Like Thomas Corbin, John Vitale allegedly caused a fatal car accident. A police officer at the scene issued Vitale a traffic citation charging him with failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident in violation of §ll-601(a) of the Illinois Vehicle Code. Vitale was convicted of that offense and sentenced to pay a $15 fine. The day after his conviction, the State charged Vitale with two counts of involuntary manslaughter based on his reckless driving. Vitale argued that this subsequent prosecution was barred by the Double Jeopardy Clause.
This Court held that the second prosecution was not barred under the traditional Blockburger test because each offense “requirefd] proof of a fact which the other [did] not.” See Blockburger, 284 U. S., at 304. Although involuntary manslaughter required proof of a death, failure to reduce speed did not. Likewise, failure to slow was not a statutory element of involuntary manslaughter. Vitale, supra, at 418-419. Thus, the subsequent prosecution survived the Block-burger test.
But the Court did not stop at that point. Justice White, writing for the Court, added that, even though the two prosecutions did not violate the Blockburger test:
“[I]t may be that to sustain its manslaughter case the State may find it necessary to prove a failure to slow or to rely on conduct necessarily involving such failure; it may concede as much prior to trial. In that case, because Vitale has already been convicted for conduct that is a necessary element of the more serious crime for which he has been charged, his claim of double jeopardy would be substantial under Brown [v. Ohio, 432 U. S. 161 (1977),] and our later decision in Harris v. Oklahoma, 433 U. S. 682 (1977).” 447 U. S., at 420.
We believe that this analysis is correct and governs this case. To determine whether a subsequent prosecution is barred by the Double Jeopardy Clause, a court must first apply the traditional Blockburger test. If application of that test reveals that the offenses have identical-statutory elements or that one is a lesser included offense of the other, then the inquiry must cease, and the subsequent prosecution is barred. Brown v. Ohio, 432 U. S. 161, 166 (1977).
The State argues that this should be the last step in the inquiry and that the Double Jeopardy Clause permits successive prosecutions whenever the offenses charged satisfy the Blockburger test. We disagree. The Double Jeopardy Clause embodies three protections: “It protects against a second prosecution for the same offense after acquittal. It protects against a second prosecution for the same offense after conviction. And it protects against multiple punishments for the same offense.” North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U. S. 711, 717 (1969) (footnotes omitted). The Blockburger test was developed “in the context of multiple punishments imposed in a single prosecution.” Garrett v. United States, 471 U. S. 773, 778 (1985). In that context, “the Double Jeopardy Clause does no more than prevent the sentencing court from prescribing greater punishment than the legislature intended.” Missouri v. Hunter, 459 U. S. 359, 366 (1983). See also Brown, supra, at 165. The Blockburger test is simply a “rule of statutory construction,” a guide to determining whether the legislature intended multiple punishments. Hunter, supra, at 366.
Successive prosecutions, however, whether following acquittals or convictions, raise concerns that extend beyond merely the possibility of an enhanced sentence:
“The underlying idea, one that is deeply ingrained in at least the Anglo-American system of jurisprudence, is that the State with all its resources and power should not be allowed to make repeated attempts to convict an individual for an alleged offense, thereby subjecting him to embarrassment, expense and ordeal and compelling him to live in a continuing state of anxiety and insecurity ____” Green v. United States, 355 U. S. 184, 187 (1957).
Multiple prosecutions also give the State an opportunity to rehearse its presentation of proof, thus increasing the risk of an erroneous conviction for one or more of the offenses charged. See, e. g., Tibbs v. Florida, 457 U. S. 31, 41 (1982) (noting that the Double Jeopardy Clause “prevents the State from honing its trial strategies and perfecting its evidence through successive attempts at conviction”); Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U. S. 436, 447 (1970) (the State conceded that, after the defendant was acquitted in one trial, the prosecutor did, at a subsequent trial, “what every good attorney would do-he refined his presentation in light of the turn of events at the first trial”); Hoag v. New Jersey, 356 U. S. 464 (1958) (after an alleged robber was acquitted, the State altered its presentation of proof in a subsequent, related trial-calling only the witness who had testified most favorably in the first trial- and obtained a conviction). Even when a State can bring multiple charges against an individual under Blockburger, a tremendous additional burden is placed on that defendant if he must face each of the charges in a separate proceeding.
Because of these independent concerns, we have not relied exclusively on the Blockburger test to vindicate the Double Jeopardy Clause’s protection against multiple prosecutions. As we stated in Brown v. Ohio:
“The Blockburger test is not the only standard for determining whether successive prosecutions impermissibly involve the same offense. Even if two offenses are sufficiently different to permit the imposition of consecutive sentences, successive prosecutions will be barred in some circumstances where the second prosecution requires the relitigation of factual issues already resolved by the first.” 432 U. S., at 166-167, n. 6.
Justice Powell, writing for the Court in Brown, provided two examples. In Ashe v. Swenson, supra, the Court had held that the Double Jeopardy Clause barred a prosecution for robbing a participant in a poker game because the defendant’s acquittal in a previous trial for robbing a different participant in the same poker game had conclusively established that he was not present at the robbery. In In re Nielsen, 131 U. S. 176 (1889), the Court had held that a conviction for cohabiting with two wives over a 214-year period barred a subsequent prosecution for adultery with one of the wives on the day following the end of that period. Although application of the Blockburger test would have permitted the imposition of consecutive sentences in both cases, the Double Jeopardy Clause nonetheless barred these successive prosecutions. Brown, supra, at 166-167, n. 6.
Furthermore, in the same Term we decided Brown, we reiterated in Harris v. Oklahoma, 433 U. S. 682 (1977), that a strict application of the Blockburger test is not the exclusive means of determining whether a subsequent prosecution violates the Double Jeopardy Clause. In Harris, the defendant was first convicted of felony murder after his companion shot a grocery store clerk in the course of a robbery. The State then indicted and convicted him for robbery with a firearm. The two prosecutions were not for the “same offense” under Blockburger since, as a statutory matter, felony murder could be established by proof of any felony, not just robbery, and robbery with a firearm did not require proof of a death. Nevertheless, because the State admitted that “ fit was necessary for all the ingredients of the underlying felony of Robbery with Firearms to be proved’ ” in the felony-murder trial, the Court unanimously held that the subsequent prosecution was barred by the Double Jeopardy Clause. Harris, supra, at 682-683, and n. (quoting Brief in Opposition 4). See also Payne v. Virginia, 468 U. S. 1062 (1984). As we later described our reasoning: “[W]e did not consider the crime generally described as felony murder as a separate offense distinct from its various elements. Rather, we treated a killing in the course of a robbery as itself a separate statutory offense, and the robbery as a species of lesser-included offense.” Vitale, 447 U. S., at 420.
These cases all recognized that a technical comparison of the elements of the two offenses as required by Blockburger does not protect defendants sufficiently from the burdens of multiple trials. This case similarly demonstrates the limitations of the Blockburger analysis. If Blockburger constituted the entire double jeopardy inquiry in the context of successive prosecutions, the State could try Corbin in four consecutive trials: for failure to keep right of the median, for driving while intoxicated, for assault, and for homicide. Tr. of Oral Arg. 17-18. The State could improve its presentation of proof with each trial, assessing which witnesses gave the most persuasive testimony, which documents had the greatest impact, and which opening and closing arguments most persuaded the jurors. Corbin would be forced either to contest each of these trials or to plead guilty to avoid the harassment and expense.
Thus, a subsequent prosecution must do more than merely survive the Blockburger test. As we suggested in Vitale, the Double Jeopardy Clause bars any subsequent prosecution in which the government, to establish an essential element of an offense charged in that prosecution, will prove conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted. This is not an “actual evidence” or “same evidence” test. The critical inquiry is what conduct the State will prove, not the evidence the State will use to prove that conduct. As we have held, the presentation of specific evidence in one trial does not forever prevent the government from introducing that same evidence in a subsequent proceeding. See Dowling v. United States, 493 U. S. 342 (1990). On the other hand, a State cannot avoid the dictates of the Double Jeopardy Clause merely by altering in successive prosecutions the evidence offered to prove the same conduct. For example, if two bystanders had witnessed Corbin’s accident, it would make no difference to our double jeopardy analysis if the State called one witness to testify in the first trial that Corbin’s vehicle crossed the median (or if nobody testified in the first trial because Corbin, as he did, pleaded guilty) and called the other witness to testify to the same conduct in the second trial.
Applying this analysis to the facts of this case is straightforward. Respondent concedes that Blockburger does not bar prosecution of the reckless manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, and third-degree reckless assault offenses. Tr. of Oral Arg. 25-26. The rest of our inquiry in this case is simplified by the bill of particulars filed by the State on January 25, 1988. That statement of the prosecution’s theory of proof is binding on the State until amended, 74 N. Y. 2d, at 290, 543 N. E. 2d, at 720, and the State has not amended it to date. Tr. of Oral Arg. 8. The bill of particulars states that the prosecution will prove the following:
“[T]he defendant [(1)] operated a motor vehicle on a public highway in an intoxicated condition having more than .10 percent of alcohol content in his blood, [(2)] failed to keep right and in fact crossed nine feet over the median of the highway [,and (3) drove] at approximately forty-five to fifty miles an hour in heavy rain, which was a speed too fast for the weather and road conditions then pending .... By so operating his vehicle in the manner above described, the defendant was aware of and consciously disregarded a substantial and unjustifiable risk of the likelihood of the result which occurred. . . . By his failure to perceive this risk while operating a vehicle in a criminally negligent and reckless manner, he caused physical injury to Daniel Dirago and the death of his wife, Brenda Dirago.” App. 20.
By its own pleadings, the State has admitted that it will prove the entirety of the conduct for which Corbin was convicted — driving while intoxicated and failing to keep right of the median — to establish essential elements of the homicide and assault offenses. Therefore, the Double Jeopardy Clause bars this successive prosecution, and the New York Court of Appeals properly granted respondent’s petition for a writ of prohibition. This holding would not bar a subsequent prosecution on the homicide and assault charges if the bill of particulars revealed that the State would not rely on proving the conduct for which Corbin had already been convicted (i. e., if the State relied solely on Corbin’s driving too fast in heavy rain to establish recklessness or negligence).
Ill
Drunken driving is a national tragedy. ' Prosecutors’ offices are often overworked and may not always have the time to monitor seemingly minor cases as they wind through the judicial system. But these facts cannot excuse the need for scrupulous adherence to our constitutional principles. See Santobello v. New York, 404 U. S. 257, 260 (1971) (“This record represents another example of an unfortunate lapse in orderly prosecutorial procedures, in part, no doubt, because of the enormous increase in the workload of the often understaffed prosecutor’s offices. The heavy workload may well explain these episodes, but it does not excuse them”). With adequate preparation and foresight, the State could have prosecuted Corbin for the offenses charged in the traffic tickets and the subsequent indictment in a single proceeding, thereby avoiding this double jeopardy question. We have concluded that the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment demands application of the standard announced today, but we are confident that with proper planning and attention prosecutors will be able to meet this standard and bring to justice those who make our Nation’s roads unsafe.
The judgment of the New York Court of Appeals is
Affirmed.
The Double Jeopardy Clause states: “[N]or shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” It is enforceable against the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. Benton v. Maryland, 395 U. S. 784, 794 (1969).
This issue has been raised before us twice in recent years without resolution. See Fugate v. Neio Mexico, 470 U. S. 904 (1985) (affirming by an equally divided Court); Thigpen v. Roberts, 468 U. S. 27 (1984) (deciding on alternative grounds).
The record does not indicate why the return dates for the traffic tickets were changed from October 29 to October 27. In any event, the District Attorney was not deprived of a meaningful opportunity to participate in this prosecution. If the District Attorney had wanted to prevent Corbin from pleading guilty to the traffic tickets so that the State could combine all charges into a single prosecution containing the later-charged felony counts, he could have availed himself of N. Y. Crim. Proc. Law § 170.20(2) (McKinney 1982), which states:
“At any time before entry of a plea of guilty to or commencement of a trial of an accusatory instrument [containing a charge of misdemeanor], the district attorney may apply for an adjournment of the proceedings in the local criminal court upon the ground that he intends to present the misdemeanor charge in question to a grand jury with a view to prosecuting it by indictment in a superior court. In such ease, the local criminal court must adjourn the proceedings to a date which affords the district attorney reasonable opportunity to pursue such action, and may subsequently grant such further adjournments for that purpose as are reasonable under the circumstances.”
Furthermore, the District 'Attorney’s participation in this prosecution amounted to more than a failure to move for an adjournment. ADA Glick filed papers indicating a readiness to proceed to trial, and ADA Heidi Sauter appeared at Corbin’s sentencing on behalf of the People of the State of New York.
The New York Court of Appeals held that, although an attorney may not misrepresent facts, “a practitioner representing a client at a traffic violation prosecution should not be expected to volunteer information that is likely to be highly damaging to his client’s position.” In re Corbin v. Hillery, 74 N. Y. 2d 279, 288, and n. 6, 543 N. E. 2d 714, 718, and n. 6 (1989) (emphasis in original). Because the Court of Appeals refused to characterize as misconduct the behavior of either Corbin or his attorney, we need not decide whether our double jeopardy analysis would be any different if affirmative misrepresentations of fact by a defendant or his counsel were to mislead a court into accepting a guilty plea it would not otherwise accept.
The Town Justice Court notes of the sentencing proceeding state:
“Atty: My client is willing to plea [sic] guilty and I request minimum sentence.
“Judge: Read charges. We will accept your plea of guilty. Any recommendation on sentence?
“Atty: Minimum sentence.” App. 12.
The State contends that these notes indicate that the sentencing recommendation was made by respondent’s counsel, not by ADA Sauter. We do not so interpret the notes, but even if this were an accurate interpretation, the record nevertheless establishes that ADA Sauter was present at the sentencing proceeding yet neither objected to a minimum sentence nor mentioned that the accident had resulted in a fatality.
The New York Court of Appeals found no misrepresentations and no misconduct during the guilty plea colloquy on October 27, 1987. 74 N. Y. 2d, at 287-288, and n. 6, 543 N. E. 2d, at 718-719, and n. 6. We accept its characterization of the proceedings. See n. 4, supra. ■
We recognized in Brown v. Ohio, 432 U. S. 161, 169, and n. 7 (1977), that when application of our traditional double jeopardy analysis would bar a subsequent prosecution, “[a]n exception may exist where the State is unable to proceed on the more serious charge at the outset because the additional facts necessary to sustain that charge have not occurred or have not been discovered despite the exercise of due diligence. See Diaz v. United States, 223 U. S. 442, 448-449 (1912); Ashe v. Swenson, [397 U. S. 436, 453, n. 7 (1970)] (Brennan, J., concurring).” Because ADA Dolan was informed of Brenda Dirago’s death on the night of the accident, such an exception is inapplicable here.
Justice Scalia’s dissent contends that Blockburger is not just a guide to legislative intent, but rather an exclusive definition of the term “same offence” in the Double Jeopardy Clause. Post, at 528-530. To support this contention, Justice Scalia asserts that “[w]e have applied the [Block-burger test] in virtually every case defining the ‘same offense’ decided since Blockburger.” Post, at 535-536. Every one of the eight cases cited in support of that proposition, however, describes Blockburger as a test to determine the permissibility of cumulative punishments. None of the cases even suggests that Blockburger is the exclusive definition of “same offence” in the context of successive prosecutions. See Jones v. Thomas, 491 U. S. 376, 380-381 (1989) (case involved Double Jeopardy Clause’s protection against multiple punishments, not successive prosecutions); United States v. Woodward, 469 U. S. 105, 108 (1985) (per curiam) (describing Block-burger as a “rule for determining whether Congress intended to permit cumulative punishment”); Ohio v. Johnson, 467 U. S. 493, 499, n. 8 (1984) (Blockburger test determines “whether cumulative punishments may be imposed”); Albernaz v. United States, 450 U. S. 333, 337 (1981) (“[T]his Court has looked to the Blockburger rule to determine whether Congress intended that two statutory offenses be punished cumulatively”); Whalen v. United States, 445 U. S. 684, 691 (1980) (Blockburger relied on “to determine whether Congress has in a given situation provided that two statutory offenses may be punished cumulatively”); Simpson v. United States, 435 U. S. 6, 11 (1978) (Blockburger established “the test for determining ‘whether two offenses are sufficiently distinguishable to permit the imposition of cumulative punishment’”), quoting Brown v. Ohio, supra, at 166; Iannelli v. United States, 420 U. S. 770, 785, n. 17 (1975) (Blockburger test used to identify “congressional intent to impose separate sanctions for multiple offenses arising in the course of a single act or transaction”); Gore v. United States, 357 U. S. 386 (1958) (case involved imposition of multiple sentences in a single proceeding).
To further support its contention that Blockburger is the exclusive means of defining “same offence” within the meaning of the Double Jeopardy Clause, Justice Scalia’s dissent relies on a lengthy historical discussion. Post, at 530-536. But this Court has not interpreted the Double Jeopardy Clause as Justice Scalia would interpret it since at least 1889. See infra, at 519 (discussing In re Nielsen). We have not previously found, and we do not today find, history to be dispositive of double jeopardy claims. Compare post, at 532-533 (Scalia, J., dissenting) (relying on Turner’s Case, Kelyng 30, 84 Eng. Rep. 1068 (K. B.), decided in England in 1708, which held that a defendant acquitted of stealing from a homeowner could lawfully be prosecuted for stealing from the homeowner’s servant during the same breaking and entering), with Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U. S. 436 (1970) (holding that the Double Jeopardy Clause prevents a defendant acquitted of robbing one participant at a poker game from being prosecuted for robbing any of the other participants at the same game).
See, e. g., Ohio v. Johnson, 467 U. S. 493, 498-499 (1984); Ex parte Lange, 18 Wall. 163, 169 (1874).
The State recognizes that under state law it would have to prosecute all of the homicide charges in the same proceeding. Tr. of Oral Arg. 17.
Similarly, if in the course of securing a conviction for one offense the State necessarily has proved the conduct comprising all of the elements of another offense not yet prosecuted (a “component offense”), the Double Jeopardy Clause would bar subsequent prosecution of the component offense. See Harris v. Oklahoma, 433 U. S. 682 (1977) (“When, as here, conviction of a greater crime, murder, cannot be had without conviction of the lesser crime, robbery with firearms, the Double Jeopardy Clause bars prosecution for the lesser crime after conviction of the greater one”) (footnote omitted); cf. Brown, 432 U. S., at 168 (noting that it is irrelevant for the purposes of the Double Jeopardy Clause whether the conviction of the greater offense precedes the conviction of the lesser offense or vice versa).
Terminology in the double jeopardy area has been confused at best. Commentators and judges alike have referred to the Blockburger test as a “same evidence” test. See, e. g., Note, The Double Jeopardy Clause as a Bar to Reintroducing Evidence, 89 Yale L. J. 962, 965 (1980); Ashe, 397 U. S., at 448 (Brennan, J., concurring). This is a misnomer. The Blockburger test has nothing to do with the evidence presented at trial. It is concerned solely with the statutory elements of the offenses charged. A true “same evidence” or “actual evidence” test would prevent the government from introducing in a subsequent prosecution any evidence that was introduced in a preceding prosecution. It is in this sense that we discuss, and do not adopt, a “same evidence” or “actual evidence” test.
Because the State does not contest the New York Court of Appeals’ ruling that the driving while intoxicated and vehicular manslaughter charges are barred under state law and Blockburger, respectively, Pet. for Cert. 12; Tr. of Oral Arg. 18, we need decide only whether the Double Jeopardy Clause prohibits the State from prosecuting Corbin on the homicide and assault charges.
Application of the test we adopt today will not depend, as Justice Scalia’s dissent argues, on whether the indictment “happens to show that the same evidence is at issue” or whether the jurisdiction “happen[s] to require the prosecution to submit a bill of particulars that cannot be exceeded.” Post, at 529-530. The Courts of Appeals, which long ago recognized that the Double Jeopardy Clause requires more than a technical comparison of statutory elements when a defendant is confronting successive prosecutions, have adopted an essential procedural mechanism for assessing double jeopardy claims prior to a second trial. All nine Federal Circuits which have addressed the issue have held that “when a defendant puts double jeopardy in issue with a non-frivolous showing that an indictment charges him with an offense for which he was formerly placed in jeopardy, the burden shifts to the government to establish that there were in fact two separate offenses.” United States v. Ragins, 840 F. 2d 1184, 1192 (CA4 1988) (collecting cases). This procedural mechanism will ensure that the test set forth today is in fact “implementable,” post, at 529 (Scalia, J., dissenting).
Adoption of a “same transaction” test would bar the homicide and assault prosecutions even if the State were able to establish the essential elements of those crimes without proving the conduct for which Corbin previously was convicted. The Court, however, has “steadfastly refused to adopt the ‘single transaction’ view of the Double Jeopardy Clause.” Garrett v. United States, 471 U. S. 773, 790 (1985). But see Jones v. Thomas, 491 U. S. 376, 388-389 (1989) (Brennan, J., joined by Marshall, J., dissenting) (maintaining that “the Double Jeopardy Clause requires, except in very limited circumstances, that all charges against a defendant growing-out of a single criminal transaction be tried in one proceeding”).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The judgment of the Circuit Court of Arlington County of the Commonwealth of Virginia is reversed and the case is remanded to that court. Blodgett v. Silberman, 277 U. S. 1, 18.
Mr. Justice Black dissents for the same reason expressed by Mr. Justice Holmes in Union Transit Co. v. Kentucky, 199 U. S. 194, 211:
“It seems to me that the result reached by the Court probably is a desirable one, but I hardly understand how it can be deduced from the Fourteenth Amendment . . . .”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
This action was commenced by the petitioners against the respondent railroad in a Texas State District Court, under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act; 35 Stat.'65, as amended, 45 U. S. C. §§51-60, to recover-damages for the death of petitioners’ decedent, Claude Baker, allegedly caused by the negligence of the respondent. Baker had been hired as a workman by W. H. Nichols & Co., Inc., which was engaged in work along the main line right of way of the respondent under a contract with it. The work consisted of “grouting,” or pumpipg sand and cement into the roadbed to strengthen and stabilize it. Baker was struck and killed by a train while engaged at this job. It was petitioners’ contention in the trial court that Baker was killed while he was “employed” by respondent, within the meaning of § 1 of the Act. Evidence on the question was introduced by the parties, and a special issue for the jury’s determination was framed, but thé judge declined to submit the issue to the jury, holding as a matter of law that Baker was not in such a relationship to the railroad at the time of his death as tp entitle him to the protection of the Act. The Court of Civil Appeals affirmed the trial court’s judgment for the respondent, 309 S. W. 2d 92, and the Texas Supreme Court refused an application for a writ of error. We granted certiorari, 358 U. S. 878, to investigate whether such an issue is properly one for determination by the. jury.
The Federal Employers’ Liability Act does not use the terms “employee” and “employed” in any special sense, Robinson v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co., 237 U. S. 84, 94, so that the familiar general legal problems as to whose “employee” or “servant” á worker is at a given time pre-seht themselves as matters of federal law under the Act. See Linstead v. Chesapeake & Ohio R. Co., 276 U. S. 28, 33-34. It has been well said of the question that “ [e] ach case must be decided on its peculiar facts and ordinarily no one feature of the relationship is determinative.” Cimorelli v. New York Central R. Co., 148 F. 2d 575, 577. Although we find no decision of this Court that-has discussed the matter, we think it perfectly plain that the •question, like that of fault or of causation under the Act, contains factual elements such as to make it one for the jury under appropriate instructions as to the various relevant factors under law. See Restatement, Agency 2d, § 220, comment c; § 227, comment a. Only if reasonable men could not reach'differing conclusions on the issue may the question be taken from the jury. See Chicago, R. I. & P. R. Co. v. Bond, 240 U. S. 449. Here the petitioners introduced evidence tending to prove that the grouting work was part of the maintenance task of the railroad; that the road furnished the material to be pumped into the roadbed; and that a supervisor, admittedly in the employ of the railroad, in the daily course of the work exercised directive control over the details of the job performed by the individual workmen, including the precise point where the mixture should be pumped, when they should move to the next point, and the consistency of the mixture. The railroad introduced evidence tending to controvert this and further evidence tending to show that an employment relationship did not exist between it and Baker at the time of the accident. An issue for determination by the jury was presented. “The very essence of . . . [the jury’s] function is to select from among conflicting inferences and conclusions that which it considers most reasonable.” Tennant v. Peoria & Pekin Union R. Co., 321 U. S. 29, 35.
Reversed.
Mr. Justice Frankfurter would dismiss this writ of certiorari as improvidently granted. See Rogers v. Missouri Pacific R. Co., 352 U. S. 500, 524. As the Court itself notes, “ ‘[ejaeh'case must be decided on its peculiar, facts ....’” Such cases are unique and of no preceden-, tial value and are, therefore, outside of the criteria justifying a grant of certiorari. See Houston Oil Co. v. Goodrich, 245 U. S. 440.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Powell
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents the question whether a State, consistently with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, may refuse to employ as elementary and secondary school teachers aliens who are eligible for United States citizenship but who refuse to seek naturalization.
I
New York Education Law § 3001 (3) (McKinney 1970) forbids certification as a public school teacher of any person who is not a citizen of the United States, unless that person has manifested an intention to apply for citizenship. The Commissioner of Education is authorized to create exemptions from this prohibition, and has done so with respect to aliens who are not yet eligible for citizenship. Unless a teacher obtains certification, he may not work in a public elementary or secondary school in New York.
Appellee Norwick was born in Scotland and is a subject of Great Britain. She has resided in this country since 1965 and is married to a United States citizen. Appellee Dachinger is a Finnish subject who came to this country in 1966 and also is married to a United States citizen. Both Norwick and Dachinger currently meet all of the educational requirements New York has set for certification as a public school teacher, but they consistently have refused to seek citizenship in spite of their eligibility to do so. Norwick applied in 1973 for a teaching certificate covering nursery school through sixth grade, and Dachinger sought a certificate covering the same grades in 1975. Both applications were denied because of appellees’ failure to meet the requirements of §3001 (3). Norwick then filed this suit seeking to enjoin the enforcement of § 3001 (3), and Dachinger obtained leave to intervene as a plaintiff.
A three-judge District Court was convened pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 2281 (1970 ed.). Applying the "close judicial scrutiny” standard of Graham v. Richardson, 403 U. S. 365, 372 (1971), the court held that § 3001 (3) discriminated against aliens in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. Norwick v. Nyquist, 417 F. Supp. 913 (SDNY 1976). The court believed that the statute was overbroad, because it excluded all resident aliens from all teaching jobs regardless of the subject sought to be taught, the alien’s nationality, the nature of the alien’s relationship to this country, and the alien’s willingness to substitute some other sign of loyalty to this Nation’s political values, such as an oath of allegiance. Id., at 921. We noted probable jurisdiction over the state school officials’ appeal, 436 U. S. 902 (1978), and now reverse.
II
A
The decisions of this Court regarding the permissibility of statutory classifications involving aliens have not formed air unwavering line over the years. State regulation of the employment of aliens long has been subject to constitutional constraints. In Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U. S. 356 (1886), the Court struck down an ordinance which was applied to prevent aliens from running laundries, and in Truax v. Raich, 239 U. S. 33 (1915), a law requiring at least 80% of the employees of certain businesses to be citizens was held to be an unconstitutional infringement of an alien’s “right to work for a living in the common occupations of the community. ...” Id., at 41. At the same time, however, the Court also has recognized a greater degree of latitude for the States when aliens were sought to be excluded from public employment. At the time Truax was decided, the governing doctrine permitted States to exclude aliens from various activities when the restriction pertained to “the regulation or distribution of the public domain, or of the common property or resources of the people of the State . . . .” Id., at 39. Hence, as part of a larger authority to forbid aliens from owning land, Frick v. Webb, 263 U. S. 326 (1923); Webb v. O’Brien, 263 U. S. 313 (1923); Porterfield v. Webb, 263 U. S. 225 (1923); Terrace v. Thompson, 263 U. S. 197 (1923); Blythe v. Hinckley, 180 U. S. 333 (1901); Hauenstein v. Lynham, 100 U. S. 483 (1880); harvesting wildlife, Patsone v. Pennsylvania, 232 U. S. 138 (1914); McCready v. Virginia, 94 U. S. 391 (1877); or maintaining an inherently dangerous enterprise, Ohio ex rel. Clarke v. Deckebach, 274 U. S. 392 (1927), States permissibly could exclude aliens from working on public construction projects, Crane v. New York, 239 U. S. 195 (1915), and, it appears, from engaging in any form of public employment at all, see Truax, supra, at 40.
Over time, the Court’s decisions gradually have restricted the activities from which States are free to exclude aliens. The first sign that the Court would question the constitutionality of discrimination against aliens even in areas affected with a “public interest” appeared in Oyama v. California, 332 U. S. 633 (1948). The Court there held that statutory presumptions designed to discourage evasion of California’s ban on alien landholding discriminated against the citizen children of aliens. The same Term, the Court held that the “ownership” a State exercises over fish found in its territorial waters “is inadequate to justify California in excluding any or all aliens who are lawful residents of the State from making a living by fishing in the ocean off its shores while permitting all others to do so.” Takahashi v. Fish & Game Comm’n, 334 U. S. 410, 421 (1948). This process of withdrawal from the former doctrine culminated in Graham v. Richardson, supra, which for the first time treated classifications based on alien-age as “inherently suspect and subject to close judicial scrutiny.” 403 U. S., at 372. Applying Graham, this Court has held invalid statutes that prevented aliens from entering a State’s classified civil service, Sugarman v. Dougall, 413 U. S. 634 (1973), practicing law, In re Griffiths, 413 U. S. 717 (1973), working as an engineer, Examining Board v. Flores de Otero, 426 U. S. 572 (1976), and receiving state educational benefits, Nyquist v. Mauclet, 432 U. S. 1 (1977).
Although our more recent decisions have departed substantially from the public-interest doctrine of Truax’s day, they have not abandoned the general principle that some state functions are so bound up with the operation of the State as a governmental entity as to permit the exclusion from those functions of all persons who have not become part of the process of self-government. In Sugar-man, we recognized that a State could, “in an appropriately defined class of positions, require citizenship as a qualification for office.” We went on to observe:
“Such power inheres in the State by virtue of its obligation, already noted above, 'to preserve the basic conception of a political community.’. . . And this power and responsibility of the State applies, not only to the qualifications of voters, but also to persons holding state elective or important nonelective executive, legislative, and judicial positions, for officers who participate directly in the formulation, execution, or review of broad public policy perform functions that go to the heart of representative government.” 413 U. S., at 647 (citation omitted).
The exclusion of aliens from such governmental positions would not invite as demanding scrutiny from this Court. Id., at 648. See also Nyquist v. Mauclet, supra, at 11; Perkins v. Smith, 370 F. Supp. 134 (Md. 1974), summarily aff’d, 426 U. S. 913 (1976).
Applying the rational-basis standard, we held last Term that New York could exclude aliens from the ranks of its police force. Foley v. Connelie, 435 U. S. 291 (1978). Because the police function fulfilled “a most fundamental obligation of government to its constituency” and by necessity cloaked policemen with substantial discretionary powers, we viewed the police force as being one of those appropriately defined classes of positions for which a citizenship requirement could be imposed. Id., at 297. Accordingly, the State was required to justify its classification only “by a showing of some rational relationship between the interest sought to be protected and the limiting classification.” Id., at 296.
The rule for governmental functions, which is an exception to the general standard applicable to classifications based on alienage, rests on important principles inherent in the Constitution. The distinction between citizens and aliens, though ordinarily irrelevant to private activity, is fundamental to the definition and government of a State. The Constitution itself refers to the distinction no less than 11 times, see Suffarman v. Dougall, supra, at 651-652 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting), indicating that the status of citizenship was meant to have significance in the structure of our government. The assumption of that status, whether by birth or naturalization, denotes an association with the polity which, in a democratic republic, exercises the powers of governance. See Foley v. Connelie, supra, at 295. The form of this association is important: an oath of allegiance or similar ceremony cannot substitute for the unequivocal legal bond citizenship represents. It is because of this special significance of citizenship that governmental entities, when exercising the functions of government, have wider latitude in limiting the participation of noncitizens.
B
In determining whether, for purposes of equal protection analysis, teaching in public schools constitutes a governmental function, we look to the role of public education and to the degree of responsibility and discretion teachers possess in fulfilling that role. See Foley v. Connelie, supra, at 297. Each of these considerations supports the conclusion that public school teachers may be regarded as performing a task “that go[es] to the heart of representative government.” Sugarman v. Dougall, supra, at 647.
Public education, like the police function, “fulfills a most fundamental obligation of government to its constituency.” Foley, supra, at 297. The importance of public schools in the preparation of individuals for participation as citizens, and in the preservation of the values on which our society rests, long has been recognized by our decisions:
“Today, education is perhaps the most important function of state and local governments. Compulsory school attendance laws and the great expenditures for education both demonstrate our recognition of the importance of education to our democratic society. It is required in the performance of our most basic public responsibilities, even service in the armed forces. It is the very foundation of good citizenship. Today it is a principal instrument in awakening the child to cultural values, in preparing him for later professional training, and in helping him to adjust normally to his environment.” Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483, 493 (1954).
See also Keyes v. School Dist. No. 1, Denver, Colo., 413 U. S. 189, 246 (1973) (Powell, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part); San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 1, 29-30 (1973); Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U. S. 205, 213 (1972); id., at 238-239 (White, J., concurring); Abington School Dist. v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203, 230 (1963) (Brennan, J., concurring); Adler v. Board of Education, 342 U. S. 485, 493 (1952); McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U. S. 203, 212 (1948) (opinion of Frankfurter, J.); Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U. S. 510 (1925); Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390 (1923); Interstate Consolidated Street R. Co. v. Massachusetts, 207 U. S. 79 (1907). Other authorities have perceived public schools as an “assimilative force” by which diverse and conflicting elements in our society are brought together on a broad but common ground. See, e. g., J. Dewey, Democracy and Education 26 (1929); N. Edwards & H. Richey, The School in the American Social Order 623-624 (2d ed. 1963). These perceptions of the public schools as inculcating fundamental values necessary to the maintenance of a democratic political system have been confirmed by the observations of social scientists. See R. Dawson & K. Prewitt, Political Socialization 146-167 (1969); R. Hess & J. Torney, The Development of Political Attitudes in Children 114, 168-171, 217-220 (1967); V. Key, Public Opinion and American Democracy 323-343 (1961).
Within the public school system, teachers play a critical part in developing students’ attitude toward government and understanding of the role of citizens in our society. Alone among employees of the system, teachers are in direct, day-today contact with students both in the classrooms and in the other varied activities of a modern school. In shaping the students’ experience to achieve educational goals, teachers by necessity have wide discretion over the way the course material is communicated to students. They are responsible for presenting and explaining the subject matter in a way that is both comprehensible and inspiring. No amount of standardization of teaching materials or lesson plans can eliminate the personal qualities a teacher brings to bear in achieving these goals. Further, a teacher serves as a role model for his students, exerting a subtle but important influence over their perceptions and values. Thus, through both the presentation of course materials and the example he sets, a teacher has an opportunity to influence the attitudes of students toward government, the political process, and a citizen’s social responsibilities. This influence is crucial to the continued good health of a democracy.
Furthermore, it is clear that all public school teachers, and not just those responsible for teaching the courses most directly related to government, history, and civic duties, should help fulfill the broader function of the public school system. Teachers, regardless of their specialty, may be called upon to teach other subjects, including those expressly dedicated to political and social subjects. More importantly, a State properly may regard all teachers as having an obligation to promote civic virtues and understanding in their classes, regardless of the subject taught. Certainly a State also may take account of a teacher’s function as an example for students, which exists independently of particular classroom subjects. In light of the foregoing considerations, we think it clear that public school teachers come well within the “governmental function” principle recognized in Sugarman and Foley. Accordingly, the Constitution requires only that a citizenship requirement applicable to teaching in the public schools bear a rational relationship to a legitimate state interest. See Massachusetts Board of Retirement v. Murgia, 427 U. S. 307, 314 (1976):
III
As the legitimacy of the State’s interest in furthering the educational goals outlined above is undoubted, it remains only to consider whether § 3001 (3) bears a rational relationship to this interest. The restriction is carefully framed to serve its purpose, as it bars from teaching only those aliens who have demonstrated their unwillingness to obtain United States citizenship. Appellees, and aliens similarly situated, in effect have chosen to classify themselves. They prefer to retain citizenship in a foreign country with the obligations it entails of primary duty and loyalty. They have rejected the open invitation extended to qualify for eligibility to teach by applying for citizenship in this country. The people of New York, acting through their elected representatives, have made a judgment that citizenship should be a qualification for teaching the young of the State in the public schools, and § 3001 (3) furthers that judgment.
Reversed
The statute provides:
“No person shall be employed or authorized to teach in the public schools of the state who is:
“3. Not a citizen. The provisions of this subdivision shall not apply, however, to an alien teacher now or hereafter employed, provided such teacher shall make due application to become a citizen and thereafter within the time prescribed by law shall become a citizen. The provisions of this subdivision shall not apply after July first, nineteen hundred sixty-seven, to an alien teacher employed pursuant to regulations adopted by the commissioner of education permitting such employment.” N. Y. Educ. Law § 3001 (3) (McKinney 1970).
The statute contains an exception for persons who are ineligible for United States citizenship solely because of an oversubscribed quota. §3001-a (McKinney 1970). Because this statutory provision is in all respects narrower than the exception provided by regulation, see n. 2, infra, as a practical matter it has no effect.
The State does not certify the qualifications of teachers in the private schools, although it does require that such teachers be “competent.” N. Y. Educ. Law § 3204 (2) (McKinney Supp. 1978-1979). Accordingly, we are not presented with the question of, and express no view as to, the permissibility of a citizenship requirement pertaining to teachers in private schools.
The following regulation governs here:
“Citizenship. A teacher who is not a citizen of the United States or who has not declared intention of becoming a citizen may be issued a provisional certificate providing such teacher has the appropriate educational qualifications as defined in the regulations and (1) possesses skills or competencies not readily available among teachers holding citizenship, or (2) is unable to declare intention of becoming a citizen for valid statutory reasons.” 8 N. Y. C. R. R. § 80.2 (i) (1978).
Certification by the Commissioner of Education is not required of teachers at state institutions of higher education and the citizenship restriction accordingly does not apply to them. Brief for Appellants 13 n. *.
At the time of her application Norwick had not yet met the postgraduate educational requirements for a permanent certificate and accordingly applied only for a temporary certificate, which also is governed by § 3001 (3). She since has obtained the necessary graduate degree for full certification. Dachinger previously had obtained a temporary certificate, which had lapsed at the time of her 1975 application. The record does not indicate whether Dachinger previously had declared an intent to obtain citizenship or had obtained the temporary certificate because of some applicable exception to the citizenship requirement.
That the significance of citizenship has constitutional dimensions also has been recognized by several of our decisions. In Trop v. Dulles, 356 U. S. 86 (1958), a plurality of the Court held that the expatriation of an American citizen constituted cruel and unusual punishment for the crime of desertion in time of war. In Afroyim v. Rusk, 387 U. S. 253 (1967), the Court held that the Constitution forbade Congress from depriving a person of his citizenship against his will for any reason.
The dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Blackmun, in reaching an opposite conclusion, appears to apply a different analysis from that employed in our prior decisions. Rather than considering whether public school teachers perform a significant government function, the inquiry mandated by Foley v. Connelie, 435 U. S. 291 (1978), and Sugarman v. Dougall, the dissent focuses instead on the general societal importance of primary and secondary school teachers both public and private. Thus, the dissent on the one hand depreciates the importance of New York’s citizenship requirement because it is not applied to private school teachers, and on the other hand argues that the role teachers perform in our society is no more significant than that filled by attorneys. This misses the point of Foley and Sugarman. New York’s citizenship requirement is limited to a governmental function because it applies only to teachers employed by and acting as agents of the State. The Connecticut statute held unconstitutional in In re Griffiths, 413 U. S. 717 (1973), by contrast, applied to all attorneys, most of whom do not work for the government. The exclusion of aliens from access to the bar implicated the right to pursue a chosen occupation, not access to public employment. Cf. Nyquist v. Mauclet, 432 U. S. 1, 15-16, n. (1977) (Powell, J., dissenting). The distinction between a private occupation and a government function was noted expressly in Griffiths:
“Lawyers do indeed occupy professional positions of responsibility and influence that impose on them duties correlative with their vital right of access to the courts. Moreover, by virtue of their professional aptitudes and natural interests, lawyers have been leaders in government throughout the history of our country. Yet, they are not officials of government by virtue of being lawyers.” 413 U. S., at 729.
As San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez recognized, there is no inconsistency between our recognition of the vital significance of public education and our holding that access to education is not guaranteed by the Constitution. 411 U. S., at 30-35.
The curricular requirements of New York’s public school system reflect some of the ways a public school system promotes the development of the understanding that is prerequisite to intelligent participation in the democratic process. The schools are required to provide instruction “to promote a spirit of patriotic and civic service and obligation and to foster in the children of the state moral and intellectual qualities which are essential in preparing to meet the obligations of citizenship in peace or in war . . ..” N. Y. Educ. Law § 801 (1) (McKinney 1969). Flag and other patriotic exercises also are prescribed, as loyalty is a characteristic of citizenship essential to the preservation of a country. § 802 (McKinney 1969 and Supp. 1978-1979). In addition, required courses include classes in civics, United States and New York history, and principles of American government. §§ 3204 (3) (a) (1), (2) (McKinney 1970).
Although private schools also are bound by most of these requirements, the State has a stronger interest in ensuring that the schools it most directly controls, and for which it bears the cost, are as effective as possible in teaching these courses.
Although the findings of scholars who have written on the subject are not conclusive, they generally reinforce the common-sense judgment, and the experience of most of us, that a teacher exerts considerable influence over the development of fundamental social attitudes in students, including those attitudes which in the broadest sense of the term may be viewed as political. See, e. g., R. Dawson & K. Prewitt, Political Socialization 158-167 (1969); R. Hess & J. Torney, The Development of Political Attitudes in Children 162-163, 217-218 (1967). Cf. Note, Aliens’ Right to Teach: Political Socialization and the Public Schools, 85 Yale L. J. 90, 99-104 (1975).
Appellees contend that restriction of an alien’s freedom to teach in public schools is contrary to principles of diversity of thought and academic freedom embodied in the First Amendment. See also id., at 106-109. We think that the attempt to draw an analogy between choice of citizenship and political expression or freedom of association is wide of the mark, as the argument would bar any effort by the State to promote particular values and attitudes toward government. Section 3001 (3) does not inhibit appellees from expressing freely their political or social views or from associating with whomever they please. Cf. Givhan v. Western Line Consol. School Dist., 439 U. S. 410, 415-416 (1979); Mt. Healthy City Board of Education v. Doyle, 429 U. S. 274 (1977); Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U. S. 563 (1968). Nor are appellees discouraged from joining with others to advance particular political ends. Cf. Shelton v. Tucker, 364 U. S. 479 (1960). The only asserted liberty of appellees withheld by the New York statute is the opportunity to teach in the State’s schools so long as they elect not to become citizens of this country. This is not a liberty that is accorded constitutional protection.
At the primary school level, for which both appellees sought certification, teachers are responsible for all of the basic curriculum.
In New York, for example, all certified teachers, including those in the secondary schools, are required to be available for up to five hours of teaching a week in subjects outside their specialty. 8 N. Y. C. R. R. § 80.2(c) (1978).
See n. 2, supra.
As our cases have emphasized, resident aliens pay taxes, serve in the Armed Forces, and have made significant contributions to our country in private and public endeavors. See In re Griffiths, 413 U. S., at 722; Sugarman v. Dougall, 413 U. S., at 645; Graham v. Richardson, 403 U. S. 365, 376 (1971). No doubt many of them, and we do not exclude appellees, would make excellent public school teachers. But the legislature, having in mind the importance of education to state and local governments, see Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U. S. 483, 493 (1954), may determine eligibility for the key position in discharging that function on the assumption that generally persons, who are citizens, or who have not declined the opportunity to seek United States citizenship, are better qualified than are those who have elected to remain aliens.' We note in this connection that regulations promulgated pursuant to § 3001 (3) do provide for situations where a particular alien’s special qualifications as a teacher outweigh the policy primarily served by the statute. See 8 N. Y. C. R. R. §80.2 (i) (1) (1978). The appellants inform us, however, that the authority conferred by this regulation has not been exercised. Brief for Appellants 7 n. *.
Appellees argue that the State cannot rationally exclude aliens from teaching positions and yet permit them to vote for and sit on certain local school boards. We note, first, that the State’s legislature has not expressly endorsed this policy. Rather, appellants as an administrative matter have interpreted the statute governing New York City’s unique community school boards, N. Y. Educ. Law § 2590-c (4) (McKinney Supp. 1978-1979), to permit aliens who are the parents of public school students to participate in these boards. See App. 27, 29. We also may assume, without having to decide, that there is a rational basis for a distinction between teachers and board members based on their respective responsibilities. Although possessing substantial responsibility for the administration of the schools, board members teach no classes, and rarely if ever are known or identified by the students.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Reitnquist
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Section 13 of the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act, 44 Stat. 1432, 33 U. S. C. § 913, provided: “The right to compensation for disability under this chapter shall be barred unless a claim therefor is filed within one year after the injury.” We must decide in this case whether § 22 of the same Act, as amended, 33 U. S. C. § 922, bars consideration of a claim timely filed under § 13, which has not been the subject of an order by the deputy commissioner within one year after the cessation of voluntary compensation payments.
Petitioners in the instant case are Intercounty Construction Corp., an employer, and Hartford Accident and Indemnity Co., its insurance carrier. Respondents are Noah C. A. Walter, a deputy commissioner of the Bureau of Employees’ Compensation which was charged with administration of the Act, and Mary Jones, an intervenor below who is the personal representative of Charles Jones, an employee claimant under the Act. Claimant was injured in 1960 while working for the employer in the District of Columbia. Shortly thereafter, well within the one-year statute of limitations established by § 13 of the Act, he filed a claim for total permanent disability with the Bureau of Employees’ Compensation. The insurance carrier, admitting claimant’s injury in the course of employment while denying permanent disability to the extent stated in the claim, filed notice that it had begun payment of $54 per week, the amount payable for total disability, in advance of an award by the deputy commissioner.
In 1965, the carrier filed notice that it was controverting the pending claim on the ground, inter alia, of extent of disability and that it was reducing claimant’s weekly compensation to $27 per week, the rate for 50% temporary disability. In 1966 a claims examiner from the Bureau held a hearing on the pending claim for total permanent disability benefits but the hearing was adjourned without action on the claim. On January 23, 1968, the carrier stopped payment of compensation to the claimant since its payments to claimant totaled $17,280, its maximum liability under the Act at the time for any condition other than permanent total disability or death. On February 11, 1970, two years after his last receipt of a voluntary payment of compensation from the carrier, claimant requested a hearing on his previously filed claim for total permanent disability. Although the claim had been pending since its timely filing in 1960, neither the carrier nor the claimant had requested action by the Bureau in the intervening 10 years to adjudicate its merits and no order or award had been entered during this period resolving it.
Deputy Commissioner Walter, reversing his own initial determination that the claim was time barred under § 22 of the Act, concluded that § 22 was not applicable to this claim and entered an order awarding claimant compensation for permanent total disability. Petitioners then brought this suit under 33 U. S. C. § 921 (b) against respondent Walter to enjoin enforcement of the award. The United States District Court for the District of Columbia granted summary judgment for the petitioners, holding that § 22 of the Act barred the claim. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed, holding that § 22 of the Act, applicable only to' the power of the deputy commissioner to modify prior orders, erected no barrier to consideration of claims which had not been the subject of a prior order by the deputy commissioner.
Because of the conflict between the holding of the Court of Appeals in this case and that of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Strachan Shipping Co. v. Hollis, 460 F. 2d 1108, cert. denied sub nom. Lewis v. Strachan Shipping Co., 409 U. S. 887 (1972), we granted certiorari. 419 U. S. 1119 (1975).
Section 22 of the Act, as amended, provides:
“Modification of awards
“Upon his own initiative, or upon the application of any party in interest, on the ground of a change in conditions or because of a mistake in a determination of fact by the deputy commissioner, the deputy commissioner may, at any time prior to one year after the date of the last payment of compensation, whether or not a compensation order has been issued, or at any time prior to one year after the rejection of a claim, review a compensation case in accordance with the procedure prescribed in respect of claims in section 919 of this title, and in accordance with such section issue a new compensation order which may terminate, continue, reinstate, increase, or decrease such compensation, or award compensation. Such new order shall not affect any compensation previously paid, except that an award increasing the compensation rate may be made effective from the date of the injury, and if any part of the compensation due or to become due is unpaid, an award decreasing the compensation rate may be made effective from the date of the injury, and any payment made prior thereto in excess of such decreased rate shall be deducted from any unpaid compensation, in such manner and by such method as may be determined by the deputy commissioner with the approval of the Secretary.”
Petitioners urge, and the Fifth Circuit in Strachan Shipping Co. held, that this provision superimposes on the express statute of limitations contained in § 13 of the Act, providing a time period for the filing of claims, an additional limitations period requiring action by the deputy commissioner on pending claims within one year after the date of the last voluntary payment of compensation where such payments have been made. In their view, since no action was taken on the pending claim in the instant case until more than one year after the claimant's last receipt of a voluntary compensation payment, the claim was time barred under § 22.
In contrast, respondents argue, and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held, that § 22 is applicable only to the power of the deputy commissioner to modify prior orders and awards issued by him. In their view, it has no application to timely filed claims on which no prior action has been taken by the deputy commissioner. In this case they say that since the timely filed and still-pending 1960 claim had never been the subject of action by the Deputy Commissioner prior to the order here in issue, § 22 has no application to it.
We agree with the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that § 22 speaks ambiguously to the question before us. The statutory references to “new order,” “new compensation order,” and “the rejection of a claim,” and the limitation of the granted authority to “a change in conditions or because of a mistake in a determination of fact by the deputy commissioner” support an interpretation of the section's one-year time limit as applicable only to the power of the deputy commissioner to modify previously entered orders. Such an interpretation would make the section inapplicable to the authority of the deputy commissioner to enter an initial order with respect to a claim timely filed. On the other hand, the language “whether or not a compensation order has been issued” points to the applicability of the section's one-year time limit to all previously filed claims, even though not the subject of any prior order by the deputy commissioner. Strachan Shipping Co. v. Hollis, 460 F. 2d, at 1116. This phrase might also merely mean, when read in context, that the time limit established by this provision, applicable only to the modification of previously entered orders, runs from the date of the last voluntary payment even though the order sought to be modified is entered after receipt of the last voluntary payment. 163 U. S. App. D. C., at 150, 500 F. 2d, at 818; Strachan Shipping Co. v. Hollis, supra, at 1117 (Ainsworth, J., dissenting). These conflicting indicia are not completely reconcilable if the language in the statute is considered alone, and so we must resort to the legislative history of the provision.
Section 22 was first enacted as part of the original Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act in 1927. 44 Stat. 1424 — 1446. As petitioners concede, the provision as originally drafted applied only to the modification of orders previously entered by the deputy commissioner:
“modification of awards
“Sec. 22. Upon his own initiative, or upon application of any party in interest, on the ground of a change in conditions, the deputy commissioner may at any time during the term of an award and after the compensation order in respect of such award has become final, review such order in accordance with the procedure prescribed in respect of claims in section 19, and in accordance with such section issue a new compensation order which may terminate, continue, increase, or decrease such compensation. Such new order shall not affect any compensation paid under authority of the prior order.” Id., at 1437.
As originally adopted, § 22 provided power to the deputy commissioner to modify a prior order only “during the term of an award” and the provision was construed to constrict the power to modify a previous order to the period of payments pursuant to an award. Cf. F. Jarka Co. v. Monahan, 29 F. 2d 741, 742 (Mass. 1928). The United States Employees’ Compensation Commission (USECC), then charged with the administration of the Act, repeatedly recommended that § 22 be amended to allow continuing review of previously entered orders. 14th Ann. Rep. USECC 75 (1930); 15th Ann. Rep. USECC 77 (1931); 16th Ann. Rep. USECC 49 (1932); 17th Ann. Rep. USECC 18 (1933). See Banks v. Chicago Grain Trimmers, 390 U. S. 459, 463-465 (1968). In none of the annual reports of the USECC is there any indication that amendment of this provision was sought for any purpose other than broadening the length of time during which the deputy commissioner could exercise his power to modify previously entered orders.
In 1934 Congress responded by amending this provision to read:
“modification of compensation cases
“Sec. 22. Upon his own initiative, or upon the application of any party in interest, on the ground of a change in conditions or because of a mistake in a determination of fact by the deputy commissioner, the deputy commissioner may, at any time prior to one year after the date of the last payment of compensation, whether or not a compensation order has been issued, review a compensation case in accordance with the procedure prescribed in respect of claims in section 19, and in accordance with such section issue a new compensation order which may terminate, continue, reinstate, increase, or decrease such compensation. Such new order shall not affect any compensation previously paid, except that an award increasing the compensation rate may be made effective from the date of the injury, and if any part of the compensation due or to become due is unpaid, an award decreasing the compensation rate may be made effective from the date of the injury, and any payment made prior thereto in excess of such decreased rate shall be deducted from any unpaid compensation, in such manner and by such method as may be determined by the deputy commissioner with the approval of the commission.” 48 Stat. 807.
This amendment inserted the phrase “whether or not a compensation order has been issued,” the phrase upon which the petitioners’ statutory claim rests, and they naturally urge that it was intended to apply the one-year time limit of § 22, formerly applicable only to the modification of previously entered orders, to all pending claims. But the legislative history does not bear out petitioners’ contention.
The committee reports of both Houses of Congress accompanying this change explain it in the following language:
“[This bill] amends section 22 of the existing act so as to broaden the grounds on which a deputy commissioner can modify an award and also while strictly limiting the period, extends the time within which such modification may be made. . . .
“The amendment is in line with the recommendation of the [USECC] except that it limits to 1 year after the date of the last payment of compensation the time during which such modification may be made.” S. Rep. No. 588, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 3-4 (1934); H. R. Rep. No. 1244, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 4 (1934).
As we similarly stated in Banks v. Chicago Grain Trimmers, supra, at 464: “The purpose of this amendment was to 'broaden the grounds on which a deputy commissioner can modify an award.’ ” See, e. g., O’Keeffe v. Aerojet General Shipyards, 404 U. S. 254, 255-256 (1971). There is no indication that Congress sought by this amendment to superimpose a new statute of limitations, in addition to the required period for filing provided by § 13, on all claims filed under the Act upon which payments are made. Taken in historical and statutory context, the phrase “whether or not a compensation order has been issued” is properly interpreted to mean merely that the one-year time limit imposed on the power of the deputy commissioner to modify existing orders runs from the date of final payment of compensation even if the order sought to be modified is actually entered only after such date.
Section 22 was amended in 1938 to read as it presently does. 52 Stat. 1167. The chief change was permitting the deputy commissioner to review a case “at any time prior to one year after the rejection of a claim.” Such amendment would have been largely superfluous if Congress in 1934 had already extended this provision to cover claims whether or not previously disposed of by the deputy commissioner. And in fact the legislative history surrounding the 1938 amendment reveals a clear congressional understanding that § 22 applied only to modification of prior orders of the deputy commissioner. Thus, for example, the House Report accompanying the 1938 amendment stated that “[t]he purpose of this amendment is to extend to such cases the same provisions which now apply in connection with other cases finally acted upon by the deputy commissioner.” H. R. Rep. No. 1945, 75th Cong., 3d Sess., 9 (1938). (Emphasis added.) See also H. R. Rep. No. 1807, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 5 (1935); S. Rep. No. 1199, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 4 (1935); H. R. Rep. No. 2237, 74th Cong., 2d Sess., 5 (1936); S. Rep. No. 1988, 75th Cong., 3d Sess., 8-9 (1938). Regulations issued under the Act by the USECC, contemporaneously with passage of the 1938 amendment, reflect an administrative understanding that § 22 governed “application [s] to the deputy commissioner for review of a compensation case for modification of an award.” 20 CFR § 31.15 (1938); 20 CFR § 31.16 (1949).
The Fifth Circuit in Strachan Shipping Co. v. Hollis, supra, indicated its belief that the absence of a procedure for orderly conclusion of compensation cases was incompatible with a scheme of cooperation and voluntary payments by employers and insurers envisaged by the Act. 460 F. 2d, at 1116. The court below disagreed, indicating its belief that the present procedures giving a carrier the right to compel the deputy commissioner to adjudicate claims eliminate any unfairness which might result from the absence of a fixed conclusion to such cases. 163 U. S. App. D. C., at 152, 500 F. 2d, at 820. Cf. 33 U. S. C. § 919 (c); 5 U. S. C. § 706 (1); Atlantic & Gulf Stevedores, Inc. v. Donovan, 274 F. 2d 794 (CA5 1960). Whatever the merits of a fixed period for resolution of pending compensation claims not previously the subject of an order, Congress did not in § 22 establish such a period. The decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is therefore
Affirmed.
In 1972, this responsibility was transferred to the Office of Workmen’s Compensation Programs of the Department of Labor. See 20 CFR §§701.101-701.103 (1973).
The District of Columbia Workmen’s Compensation Act incorporates by reference the Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act, 33 U. S. C. § 901 et seq. as amended. See D. C. Code Ann. § 36-501 (1973).
Section 13 of the Act, 33 U. S. C. §913, provided in part:
“The right to compensation for disability under this chapter shall be barred unless a claim therefor is filed within one year after the
injury . . . except that if payment of compensation has been made without an award on account of such injury ... a claim may be filed within one year after the date of the last payment. . . .”
Section 12 of the Act, 33 U. S. C. § 912 (1970 ed. and Supp, III), requires the employee to give notice of injury unless the employer has actual notice of the injury.
Since the Act requires the employer to begin making the payments called for by the Act within 14 days after receiving notice of injury without awaiting resolution of the compensation claim and permits withholding of payments only to the extent of any dispute, voluntary payment in advance of an actual order is common under the Act. See § 14 of the Act, 33 U. S. C. § 914 (1970 ed. and Supp. III). Either party may obtain resolution of a pending claim by request under § 19 (c) of the Act, 33 U. S. C. § 919 (c), but in practice many pending claims are amicably settled through voluntary payments without the necessity of a formal order by the deputy commissioner.
See n. 4, supra.
The decision of the District Court is unreported.
The decision of the Court of Appeals is reported a.t 163 U. S. App. D. C. 147, 500 F. 2d 815 (1974).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Chief Justice Rehnquist
delivered the opinion of the Court.
As Enron Corporation’s financial difficulties became public in 2001, petitioner Arthur Andersen LLP, Enron’s auditor, instructed its employees to destroy documents pursuant to its document retention policy. A jury found that this action made petitioner guilty of violating 18 U. S. C. §§ 1512(b) (2)(A) and (B). These sections make it a crime to “knowingly us[e] intimidation or physical force, threate[n], or corruptly persuad[e] another person... with intent to ... cause” that person to “withhold” documents from, or “alter” documents for use in, an “official proceeding.” The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed. We hold that the jury instructions failed to convey properly the elements of a “corrup[t] persuasión]” conviction under § 1512(b), and therefore reverse.
Enron Corporation, during the 1990’s, switched its business from operation of natural gas pipelines to an energy conglomerate, a move that was accompanied by aggressive accounting practices and rapid growth. Petitioner audited Enron’s publicly filed financial statements and provided internal audit and consulting services to it. Petitioner’s “engagement team” for Enron was headed by David Duncan. Beginning in 2000, Enron’s financial performance began to suffer, and, as 2001 wore on, worsened. On August 14, 2001, Jeffrey Skilling, Enron’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), unexpectedly resigned. Within days, Sherron Watkins, a senior accountant at Enron, warned Kenneth Lay, Enron’s newly reappointed CEO, that Enron could “implode in a wave of accounting scandals.” Brief for United States 2. She likewise informed Duncan and Michael Odom, one of petitioner’s partners who had supervisory responsibility over Duncan, of the looming problems.
On August 28, an article in the Wall Street Journal suggested improprieties at Enron, and the SEC opened an informal investigation. By early September, petitioner had formed an Enron “crisis-response” team, which included Nancy Temple, an in-house counsel. On October 8, petitioner retained outside counsel to represent it in any litigation that might arise from the Enron matter. The next day, Temple discussed Enron with other in-house counsel. Her notes from that meeting reflect that “some SEC investigation” is “highly probable.” Id., at 8.
On October 10, Odom spoke at a general training meeting attended by 89 employees, including 10 from the Enron engagement team. Odom urged everyone to comply with the firm’s document retention policy. He added: “ ‘[I]f it’s destroyed in the course of [the] normal policy and litigation is filed the next day, that’s great.... [W]e’ve followed our own policy, and whatever there was that might have been of interest to somebody is gone and irretrievable.’” 374 F. 3d 281, 286 (CA5 2004). On October 12, Temple entered the Enron matter into her computer, designating the “Type of Potential Claim” as “Professional Practice — Government/Regulatory Inv[estigation].” App. JA-127. Temple also e-mailed Odom, suggesting that he “ ‘remin[d] the engagement team of our documentation and retention policy.’” Brief for United States 6.
On October 16, Enron announced its third quarter results. That release disclosed a $1.01 billion charge to earnings. The following day, the SEC notified Enron by letter that it had opened an investigation in August and requested certain information and documents. On October 19, Enron forwarded a copy of that letter to petitioner.
On the same day, Temple also sent an e-mail to a member of petitioner’s internal team of accounting experts and attached a copy of the document policy. On October 20, the Enron crisis-response team held a conference call, during which Temple instructed everyone to “[m]ake sure to follow the [document] policy.” Brief for United States 7 (brackets in original). On October 23, Enron CEO Lay declined to answer questions during a call with analysts because of “potential lawsuits, as well as the SEC inquiry.” Ibid. After the call, Duncan met with other Andersen partners on the Enron engagement team and told them that they should ensure team members were complying with the document policy. Another meeting for all team members followed, during which Duncan distributed the policy and told everyone to comply. These, and other smaller meetings, were followed by substantial destruction of paper and electronic documents.
On October 26, one of petitioner’s senior partners circulated a New York Times article discussing the SEC’s response to Enron. His e-mail commented that “the problems are just beginning and we will be in the cross hairs. The marketplace is going to keep the pressure on this and is going to force the SEC to be tough.” Id., at 8. On October 30, the SEC opened a formal investigation and sent Enron a letter that requested accounting documents.
Throughout this time period, the document destruction continued, despite reservations by some of petitioner’s managers. On November 8, Enron announced that it would issue a comprehensive restatement of its earnings and assets. Also on November 8, the SEC served Enron and petitioner with subpoenas for records. On November 9, Duncan’s secretary sent an e-mail that stated: “Per Dave— No more shredding. . . . We have been officially served for our documents.” Id., at 10. Enron filed for bankruptcy less than a month later. Duncan was fired and later pleaded guilty to witness tampering.
In March 2002, petitioner was indicted in the Southern District of Texas on one count of violating §§ 1512(b)(2)(A) and (B). The indictment alleged that, between October 10 and November 9, 2001, petitioner “did knowingly, intentionally and corruptly persuade . . . other persons, to wit: [petitioner’s] employees, with intent to cause” them to withhold documents from, and alter documents for use in, “official proceedings, namely: regulatory and criminal proceedings and investigations.” App. JA-139. A jury trial followed. When the case went to the jury, that body deliberated for seven days and then declared that it was deadlocked. The District Court delivered an “Allen charge,” Allen v. United States, 164 U. S. 492 (1896), and, after three more days of deliberation, the jury returned a. guilty verdict. The District Court denied petitioner’s motion for a judgment of acquittal.
The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed. 374 F. 3d, at 284. It held that the jury instructions properly conveyed the meaning of “corruptly persuades” and “official proceeding”; that the jury need not find any consciousness of wrongdoing; and that there was no reversible error. Because of a split of authority regarding the meaning of § 1512(b), we granted certiorari. 543 U. S. 1042 (2005).
Chapter 73 of Title 18 of the United States Code provides criminal sanctions for those who obstruct justice. Sections 1512(b)(2)(A) and (B), part of the witness tampering provisions, provide in relevant part:
“Whoever knowingly uses intimidation or physical force, threatens, or corruptly persuades another person, or attempts to do so, or engages in misleading conduct toward another person, with intent to .. . cause or induce any person to ... withhold testimony, or withhold a record, document, or other object, from an official proceeding [or] alter, destroy, mutilate, or conceal an object with intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding... shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.”
In this case, our attention is focused on what it means to “knowingly . . . corruptly persuad[e]” another person “with intent to . . . cause” that person to “withhold” documents from, or “alter” documents for use in, an “official proceeding.”
“We have traditionally exercised restraint in assessing the reach of a federal criminal statute, both out of deference to the prerogatives of Congress, Dowling v. United States, 473 U. S. 207 (1985), and out of concern that ‘a fair warning should be given to the world in language that the common world will understand, of what the law intends to do if a certain line is passed,’ McBoyle v. United States, 283 U. S. 25, 27 (1931).” United States v. Aguilar, 515 U. S. 593, 600 (1995).
Such restraint is particularly appropriate here, where the act underlying the conviction — “persua[sion]”—is by itself innocuous. Indeed, “persuading]” a person “with intent to . . . cause” that person to “withhold” testimony or documents from a Government proceeding or Government official is not inherently malign. Consider, for instance, a mother who suggests to her son that he invoke his right against compelled self-incrimination, see U. S. Const., Amdt. 5, or a wife who persuades her husband not to disclose marital confidences, see Trammel v. United States, 445 U. S. 40 (1980).
Nor is it necessarily corrupt for an attorney to “per-suad[e]” a client “with intent to . . . cause” that client to “withhold” documents from the Government. In Upjohn Co. v. United States, 449 U. S. 383 (1981), for example, we held that Upjohn was justified in withholding documents that were covered by the attorney-client privilege from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). See id., at 395. No one would suggest that an attorney who “persuade[d]” Upjohn to take that step acted wrongfully, even though he surely intended that his client keep those documents out of the IRS’ hands.
“Document retention policies,” which are created in part to keep certain information from getting into the hands of others, including the Government, are common in business. See generally Chase, To Shred or Not to Shred: Document Retention Policies and Federal Obstruction of Justice Statutes, 8 Ford. J. Corp. & Fin. L. 721 (2003). It is, of course, not wrongful for a manager to instruct his employees to comply with a valid document retention policy under ordinary circumstances.
Acknowledging this point, the parties have largely focused their attention on the word “corruptly” as the key to what may or may not lawfully be done in the situation presented here. Section 1512(b) punishes not just “corruptly persuading]” another, but “knowingly . . . corruptly persuading]” another. (Emphasis added.) The Government suggests that “knowingly” does not modify “corruptly persuades,” but that is not how the statute most naturally reads. It provides the mens rea — “knowingly”—and then a list of acts — “uses intimidation or physical force, threatens, or corruptly persuades.” We have recognized with regard to similar statutory language that the mens rea at least applies to the acts that immediately follow, if not to other elements down the statutory chain. See United States v. X-Citement Video, Inc., 513 U. S. 64, 68 (1994) (recognizing that the “most natural grammatical reading” of 18 U. S. C. §§ 2252(a)(1) and (2) “suggests that the term ‘knowingly’ modifies only the surrounding verbs: transports, ships, receives, distributes, or reproduces”); see also Liparota v. United States, 471 U. S. 419 (1985). The Government suggests that it is “questionable whether Congress would employ such an inelegant formulation as ‘knowingly . . . corruptly persuades.’” Brief for United States 35, n. 18. Long experience has not taught us to share the Government’s doubts on this score, and we must simply interpret the statute as written.
The parties have not pointed us to another interpretation of “knowingly . . . corruptly” to guide us here. In any event, the natural meaning of these terms provides a clear answer. See Bailey v. United States, 516 U. S. 137, 144-145 (1995). “[K]nowledge” and “knowingly” are normally associated with awareness, understanding, or consciousness. See Black’s Law Dictionary 888 (8th ed. 2004) (hereinafter Black’s); Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 1252-1253 (1993) (hereinafter Webster’s 3d); American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language 725 (1981) (hereinafter Am. Hert.). “Corrupt” and “corruptly” are normally associated with wrongful, immoral, depraved, or evil. See Black’s 371; Webster’s 3d 512; Am. Hert. 299-300. Joining these meanings together here makes sense both linguisti-eally and in the statutory scheme. Only persons conscious of wrongdoing can be said to “knowingly . . . corruptly per-suadí].” And limiting criminality to persuaders conscious of their wrongdoing sensibly allows § 1512(b) to reach only those with the level of “culpability ... we usually require in order to impose criminal liability.” United States v. Aguilar, 515 U. S., at 602; see also Liparota v. United States, supra, at 426.
The outer limits of this element need not be explored here because the jury instructions at issue simply failed to convey the requisite consciousness of wrongdoing. Indeed, it is striking how little culpability the instructions required. For example, the jury was told that, “even if [petitioner] honestly and sincerely believed that its conduct was lawful, you may find [petitioner] guilty.” App. JA-213. The instructions also diluted the meaning of “corruptly” so that it covered innocent conduct. Id., at JA-212.
The parties vigorously disputed how the jury would be instructed on “corruptly.” The District Court based its instruction on the definition of that term found in the Fifth Circuit Pattern Jury Instruction for § 1503. This pattern instruction defined “corruptly” as “ ‘knowingly and dishonestly, with the specific intent to subvert or undermine the integrity’ ” of a proceeding. Brief for Petitioner 3, n. 3 (emphasis deleted). The Government, however, insisted on excluding “dishonestly” and adding the term “impede” to the phrase “subvert or undermine.” Ibid, (internal quotation marks omitted). The District Court agreed over petitioner’s objections, and the jury was told to convict if it found petitioner intended to “subvert, undermine, or impede” governmental factfinding by suggesting to its employees that they enforce the document retention policy. App. JA-212.
These changes were significant. No longer was any type of “dishonest[y]” necessary to a finding of guilt, and it was enough for petitioner to have simply “impede[d]” the Government’s factfinding ability. As the Government conceded at oral argument, “ ‘[ijmpede’ ” has broader connotations than “‘subvert’” or even ‘“[u]ndermine,’” see Tr. of Oral Arg. 38, and many of these connotations do not incorporate any “corrupt[ness]” at all. The dictionary defines “impede” as “to interfere with or get in the way of the progress of” or “hold up” or “detract from.” Webster’s 3d 1132. By definition, anyone who innocently persuades another to withhold information from the Government “get[s] in the way of the progress of” the Government. With regard to such innocent conduct, the “corruptly” instructions did no limiting work whatsoever.
The instructions also were infirm for another reason. They led the jury to believe that it did not have to find any nexus between the “persua[sion]” to destroy documents and any particular proceeding. In resisting any type of nexus element, the Government relies heavily on § 1512(e)(1), which states that an official proceeding “need not be pending or about to be instituted at the time of the offense.” It is, however, one thing to say that a proceeding “need not be pending or about to be instituted at the time of the offense,” and quite another to say a proceeding need not even be foreseen. A “knowingly . . . corrup[t] persaude[r]” cannot be someone who persuades others to shred documents under a document retention policy when he does not have in contemplation any particular official proceeding in which those documents might be material.
We faced a similar situation in Aguilar, supra. Respondent Aguilar lied to a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent in the course of an investigation and was convicted of “ 'corruptly endeavoring] to influence, obstruct, and impede [a]... grand jury investigation’ ” under § 1503. 515 U. S., at 599. All the Government had shown was that Aguilar had uttered false statements to an investigating agent “who might or might not testify before a grand jury.” Id., at 600. We held that § 1503 required something more — specifically, a “nexus” between the obstructive act and the proceeding. Id., at 599-600. “[I]f the defendant lacks knowledge that his actions are likely to affect the judicial proceeding,” we explained, “he lacks the requisite intent to obstruct.” Id., at 599.
For these reasons, the jury instructions here were flawed in important respects. 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.
We refer to the 2000 version of the statute, which has since been amended by Congress.
During this time, petitioner faced problems of its own. In June 2001, petitioner entered into a settlement agreement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) related to its audit work of Waste Management, Inc. As part of the settlement, petitioner paid a massive fine. It also was censured and enjoined from committing further violations of the securities laws. In July 2001, the SEC filed an amended complaint alleging improprieties by Sunbeam Corporation, and petitioner’s lead partner on the Sunbeam audit was named.
A key accounting problem involved Enron’s use of “Raptors,” which were special purpose entities used to engage in “off-balance-sheet” activities. Petitioner’s engagement team had allowed Enron to “aggregate” the Raptors for accounting purposes so that they reflected a positive return. This was, in the words of petitioner’s experts, a “black-and-white” violation of Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. Brief for United States 2.
The firm's policy called for a single central engagement file, which “should contain only that information which is relevant to supporting our work.” App. JA-45. The policy stated that, “[i]n cases of threatened litigation, ... no related information will be destroyed.” Id., at JA-44. It also separately provided that, if petitioner is “advised of litigation or subpoenas regarding a particular engagement, the related information should not be destroyed. See Policy Statement No. 780 — Notification of Litigation.” Id., at JA-65 (emphasis deleted). Policy Statement No. 780 set forth “notification” procedures for whenever “professional practice litigation against [petitioner] or any of its personnel has been commenced, has been threatened or is judged likely to occur, or when governmental or professional investigations that may involve [petitioner] or any of its personnel have been commenced or are judged likely.” Id., at JA-29 to JA-30.
The release characterized the charge to earnings as “non-recurring.” Brief for United States 6, n. 4. Petitioner had expressed doubts about this characterization to Enron, but Enron refused to alter the release. Temple wrote an e-mail to Duncan that “suggested deleting some language that might suggest we have concluded the release is misleading.” App. JA-95.
For example, on October 26, John Riley, another partner with petitioner, saw Duncan shredding documents and told him “this wouldn’t be the best time in the world for you guys to be shredding a bunch of stuff.” Brief for United States 9. On October 31, David Stulb, a forensics investigator for petitioner, met with Duncan. During the meeting, Duncan picked up a document with the words “smoking gun” written on it and began to destroy it, adding “we don’t need this.” Ibid. Stulb cautioned Duncan on the need to maintain documents and later informed Temple that Duncan needed advice on the document retention policy.
Compare, e.g., United States v. Shotts, 145 F. 3d 1289, 1301 (CA11 1998), with United States v. Farrell, 126 F. 3d 484, 489-490 (CA3 1997).
Section 1512(b)(2) addresses testimony, as well as documents. Section 1512(b)(1) also addresses testimony. Section 1512(b)(3) addresses “persuade[rs]” who intend to prevent “the communication to a law enforcement officer or judge of the United States of information” relating to a federal crime.
The parties have pointed us to two other obstruction provisions, 18 U. S. C. §§ 1503 and 1505, which contain the word “corruptly.” But these provisions lack the modifier “knowingly,” making any analogy inexact.
We disagree with the Government’s suggestion that petitioner’s “nexus” argument is not preserved or that it is only subject to plain-error review for failure to comply with Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 30(d). Petitioner plainly argued for, and objected to the instructions’ lack of, a nexus requirement. See, e. g., Record 425 (arguing for a “nexus” and explaining that “it is insufficient for the government to show that the defendant intended to affect some hypothetical future federal proceeding”); id., at 931-932, 938; Tr. 4339-4345 (May 25, 2002). In so doing, it reasonably relied on language in United States v. Shively, 927 F. 2d 804, 812-813 (CA5 1991). Although the instruction petitioner proposed, based on Shively, does not mirror the nexus requirement it now proposes, its actions were sufficient to satisfy Rule 30(d). This argument also was preserved in the Court of Appeals, which recognized that petitioner was challenging “the concreteness of the defendant’s expeetation[s] of a proceeding.” 374 F. 3d 281, 298 (CA5 2004); see United States v. Williams, 504 U. S. 36, 41-42 (1992). However, the Court of Appeals did not address, and petitioner did not preserve, its argument that informal inquiries are not covered by the statute. See ibid.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Thomas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In this case, we decide whether a federal court of appeals has jurisdiction to review a district court’s order that remands a case to state court after declining to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over state-law claims under 28 U. S. C. § 1867(c). The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that appellate review of such an order is barred by § 1447(d) because it viewed the remand order in this case as resting on the District Court’s lack of subject-matter jurisdiction over the state-law claims. We disagree and reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
I
In 2005, respondents filed a complaint against petitioner and others in California state court, alleging that petitioner had violated state and federal law in connection with a patent dispute. Petitioner removed the case to the United States District Court for the Central District of California pursuant to § 1441(c), which allows removal of an “entire case” when it includes at least one claim over which the federal district court has original jurisdiction. Petitioner then filed a motion to dismiss the only federal claim in the lawsuit, which arose under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), 18 U. S. C. §§ 1961-1968, for failure to adequately allege a pattern of racketeering. HIF Bio, Inc. v. Yung Shin Pharmaceuticals Indus. Co., 508 F. 3d 659, 662 (CA Fed. 2007). The District Court agreed that respondents had failed to state a RICO claim upon which relief could be granted and dismissed the claim pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). The District Court also declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining state-law claims pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1367(c)(3), which provides that a district court “may decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over a claim” if “the district court has dismissed all claims over which it has original jurisdiction.” The District Court then remanded the case to state court as authorized by this Court’s decision in Carnegie-Mellon Univ. v. Cohill, 484 U. S. 343 (1988).
Petitioner appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, arguing that the District Court should have exercised supplemental jurisdiction over the state-law claims because they implicate federal patent-law rights. 508 F. 3d, at 663. The Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal, finding that the remand order could “be colorably characterized as a remand based on lack of subject matter jurisdiction” and, therefore, could not be reviewed under §§ 1447(c) and (d), which provide in part that remands for “lack of subject matter jurisdiction” are “not reviewable on appeal or otherwise.” See id., at 667.
This Court has not yet decided whether a district court’s order remanding a case to state court after declining to exercise supplemental jurisdiction is a remand for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction for which appellate review is barred by §§ 1447(c) and (d). See Powerex Corp. v. Reliant Energy Services, Inc., 551 U. S. 224, 235, n. 4 (2007) (“We have never passed on whether Cohill remands are subject-matter jurisdictional for purposes of . . . § 1447(c) and § 1447(d)”). We granted certiorari to resolve this question, 555 U. S. 943 (2008), and now hold that such remand orders are not based on a lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand for further proceedings.
II
Appellate review of remand orders is limited by 28 U. S. C. § 1447(d), which states:
“An order remanding a case to the State court from which it was removed is not reviewable on appeal or otherwise, except that an order remanding a case to the State court from which it was removed pursuant to section 1443 of this title shall be reviewable by appeal or otherwise.”
This Court has consistently held that § 1447(d) must be read in pari materia with § 1447(c), thus limiting the remands barred from appellate review by § 1447(d) to those that are based on a ground specified in § 1447(e). See Thermtron Products, Inc. v. Hermansdorfer, 423 U. S. 336, 345-346 (1976); see also Powerex, supra, at 229; Quackenbush v. Allstate Ins. Co., 517 U. S. 706, 711-712 (1996); Things Remembered, Inc. v. Petrarca, 516 U. S. 124, 127 (1995).
One type of remand order governed by § 1447(c) — the type at issue in this case — is a remand order based on a lack of “subject matter jurisdiction.” § 1447(c) (providing, in relevant part, that “[i]f at any time before final judgment it appears that the district court lacks subject matter jurisdiction, the case shall be remanded”). The question presented in this case is whether the District Court’s remand order, which rested on its decision declining to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over respondents’ state-law claims, is a remand based on a “lack of subject matter jurisdiction” for purposes of §§ 1447(c) and (d). It is not.
“Subject matter jurisdiction defines the court’s authority to hear a given type of case,” United States v. Morton, 467 U. S. 822, 828 (1984); it represents “the extent to which a court can rule on the conduct of persons or the status of things,” Black’s Law Dictionary 870 (8th ed. 2004). This Court’s precedent makes clear that whether a court has subject-matter jurisdiction over a claim is distinct from whether a court chooses to exercise that jurisdiction. See, e.g., Quackenbush, supra, at 712 (holding that an abstention-based remand is not a remand for “lack of subject matter jurisdiction” for purposes of §§ 1447(c) and (d)); Ankenbrandt v. Richards, 504 U. S. 689, 704 (1992) (questioning whether, “even though subject-matter jurisdiction might be proper, sufficient grounds exist to warrant abstention from the exercise of that jurisdiction”); Iowa Mut. Ins. Co. v. LaPlante, 480 U. S. 9, 16, n. 8 (1987) (referring to exhaustion requirement as “a matter of comity” that does “not deprive the federal courts of subject-matter jurisdiction” but does “rende[r] it appropriate for the federal courts to decline jurisdiction in certain circumstances”).
With respect to supplemental jurisdiction in particular, a federal court has subject-matter jurisdiction over specified state-law claims, which it may (or may not) choose to exercise. See §§ 1367(a), (c). A district court’s decision whether to exercise that jurisdiction after dismissing every claim over which it had original jurisdiction is purely discretionary. See § 1367(c) (“The district courts may decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over a claim ... if... the district court has dismissed all claims over which it has original jurisdiction” (emphasis added)); Osborn v. Haley, 549 U. S. 225, 245 (2007) (“Even if only state-law claims remained after resolution of the federal question, the District Court would have discretion, consistent with Article III, to retain jurisdiction”); Arbaugh v. Y & H Corp., 546 U. S. 500, 514 (2006) (“[W]hen a court grants a motion to dismiss for failure to state a federal claim, the court generally retains discretion to exercise supplemental jurisdiction, pursuant to 28 U. S. C. §1367, over pendent state-law claims”); see also 13D C. Wright, A. Miller, E. Cooper, & R. Freer, Federal Practice and Procedure §3567.3, pp. 428-432 (3d ed. 2008) (“Once it has dismissed the claims that invoked original bases of subject matter jurisdiction, all that remains before the federal court are state-law claims.... The district court retains discretion to exercise supplemental jurisdiction [over them]”). As a result, “the [district] court’s exercise of its discretion under § 1367(c) is not a jurisdictional matter. Thus, the court’s determination may be reviewed for abuse of discretion, but may not be raised at any time as a jurisdictional defect.” 16 J. Moore et al., Moore’s Federal Practice §106.05[4], p. 106-27 (3d ed. 2009).
It is undisputed that when this case was removed to federal court, the District Court had original jurisdiction over the federal RICO claim pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1331 and supplemental jurisdiction over the state-law claims because they were “so related to claims in the action within such original jurisdiction that they form[ed] part of the same case or controversy under Article III of the United States Constitution,” § 1367(a). Upon dismissal of the federal claim, the District Court retained its statutory supplemental jurisdiction over the state-law claims. Its decision declining to exercise that statutory authority was not based on a jurisdictional defect but on its discretionary choice not to hear the claims despite its subject-matter jurisdiction over them. See Chicago v. International College of Surgeons, 522 U. S. 156, 173 (1997) (“Depending on a host of factors, then — including the circumstances of the particular case, the nature of the state law claims, the character of the governing state law, and the relationship between the state and federal claims — district courts may decline to exercise jurisdiction over supplemental state law claims”). The remand order, therefore, is not based on a “lack of subject matter jurisdiction” for purposes of the bar to appellate review created by §§ 1447(c) and (d).
The Court of Appeals held to the contrary based on its conclusion that “every § 1367(c) remand necessarily involves a predicate finding that the claims at issue lack an independent basis of subject matter jurisdiction.” 508 F. 3d, at 667. But, as explained above, §§ 1367(a) and (c) provide a basis for subject-matter jurisdiction over any properly removed state claim. See Osborn, supra, at 245; Arbaugh, supra, at 514. We thus disagree with the Court of Appeals that the remand at issue here “can be colorably characterized as a lack of subject matter jurisdiction.” 508 F. 3d, at 667.
* * *
When a district court remands claims to a state court after declining to exercise supplemental jurisdiction, the remand order is not based on a lack of subject-matter jurisdiction for purposes of §§ 1447(c) and (d). The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
We do not revisit today whether Thermtron was correctly decided. Neither the brief for petitioner nor the brief for respondents explicitly asked the Court to do so here, and counsel for both parties clearly stated at oral argument that they were not asking for Thermtron to be overruled. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 16, 22; cf. South Central Bell Telephone Co. v. Alabama, 526 U. S. 160, 171 (1999). We also note that the parties in Powerex, Quackenbush, and Things Remembered did not ask for Therm-tron to be overruled.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Warren
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case concerns the power of the Civil Aeronautics Board to alter a certificate of public convenience and necessity, granted to respondent Delta Air Lines, after that certificate had become effective under § 401 (f) of the Federal Aviation Act of 1958. 72 Stat. 731, 755, 49 U. S. C. § 1371 (f). The administrative proceedings from which the present dispute arises date back to May 1955, and involve consideration by the Board of a number of applications for new service between cities located in an area extending from the Great Lakes to Florida. The Board divided the proceedings into two general categories, consolidating the applications for long-haul service in the Great Lakes-Southeast Service Case and those for short-haul flights in the Great Lakes Local Service Investigation Case. In order to protect fully the interests of local service carriers, the Board allowed these carriers, including petitioner Lake Central Airlines, to intervene in the hearings on the long-haul applications.
At the conclusion of the Great Lakes-Southeast Service Case a number of awards were made, including one permitting Delta to extend an existing route northwest so as to provide service from Miami to Detroit and to add Indianapolis and Louisville as intermediate points on its existing Chicago-to-Miami route. Certain restrictions for the protection of local carriers were imposed on many of the awards, these restrictions generally providing that flights between specified intermediate cities had to originate at or beyond given distant points. The stated purpose of these restrictions was to prevent the long-haul carrier from duplicating so-called “turn-around” service already provided by existing local carriers. One such restriction was applied to Delta’s run between Detroit and various locations in Ohio but, by and large, Delta’s award was free of protective, limitations.
The Board’s order issued on September 30, 1958, and it specified that Delta’s certificate was to become effective on November 29, 1958, unless postponed by the Board prior to that date. Shortly thereafter,within time limits set by the Board, numerous petitions for reconsideration were filed, including one by Lake Central protesting the breadth of Delta’s certificate. Lake Central requested that, if the Board should be unable to decide its petition for reconsideration before November 29, the effective date of the certificate be put off. On November 28, one day before Delta’s certificate was to become effective, the Board issued a lengthy memorandum and order, which stated in substance that the requests for stays, with one immaterial exception, were denied, but that judgment on the merits of the petitions for reconsideration would be reserved. The Board explained that the parties had not made a sufficient showing of error to justify postponements and that, in view of the advent of the peak winter season, further delay would be particularly inappropriate; the Board then said:
“To the extent that we have considered the petitions for reconsideration in the present order we have done so only for the purposes of assessing the probability of error in our original decision. We feel that such action is necessary to a fair consideration of the stay requests, and is in no way prejudicial to the legal rights of those parties seeking reconsideration. Nothing in the present order forecloses the Board from full and complete consideration of the pending petitions for reconsideration on their merits.”
For reasons not presently pertinent, Delta’s certificate became effective on December 5, rather than November 29, 1958, and Delta commenced its newly authorized operations shortly thereafter. On May 7, 1959, the Board issued a new order disposing of the still-pending petitions for reconsideration. By this order, the Board amended Delta’s certificate in response to the restrictions proposed by Lake Central. Specifically, the Board barred Delta’s operations between ten pairs of intermediate cities unless the flights initiated at Atlanta or points farther south; the effect of this order was to bar certain •flights Delta was then operating. Even then, the Board’s action was not final; the Board reserved the power to lift these restrictions pending the outcome of the Great Lakes Local Service Case. , The Board’s disposition of the petitions was taken summarily, without formal notice to the parties or the opportunity for a hearing prior to decision.
Delta sought review of this order before the Board, challenging the Board’s power to change the terms of its certificate after the effective date thereof without notice or hearing. The Board overruled Delta’s objection, stating that: “[W]e believe we have such power, and we have exercised it in the past. Moreover, there is no showing, and we are unable to conclude, that any significant adverse effect will result to either Delta or the public from observance of the conditions here involved.” On review in the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, however, the Board’s order was overturned, the court reasoning that Congress had made notice and hearing a prerequisite to the exercise of the Board’s power to change an existing certificate. Delta Air Lines, Inc., v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 280 F. 2d 43.
The issue in this case is narrow and can be stated briefly: Has Congress authorized the Board to alter, without formal notice or hearing, a certificate of public convenience and necessity once that certificate has gone into effect? If not, should it make any difference that the Board has purported to reserve jurisdiction prior to certification to make summary modifications pursuant to petitions for reconsideration? We think that both these questions must be answered in the negative.
Whenever a question concerning administrative, or judicial, reconsideration arises, two opposing policies immediately demand recognition: the desirability of finality, on the one hand, and the public interest in reaching what, ultimately, appears to be the right result on the other. Since these policies are in tension, it is necessary to reach a compromise in each case and petitioners have argued at length that the Board’s present procedure is a happy resolution of conflicting interests. However, the fact is that the Board is entirely a creature of Congress and the determinative question is not what the Board thinks it should do but what Congress has said it can do. See United States v. Seatrain Lines, 329 U. S. 424, 433. Cf. Delta Air Lines v. Summerfield, 347 U. S. 74, 79-80. This proposition becomes clear beyond question when it is noted that Congress has been anything but inattentive to this issue in the acts governing the various administrative agencies. A review of these statutes reveals a wide variety of detailed provisions concerning reconsideration, each one enacted in an attempt to tailor the agency’s discretion to the particular problems in the area. In this respect, the Federal Aviation Act is no exception since, in § 401 (f) and (g) of the Act, Congress has stated the limits of the Board’s power to reconsider in unequivocal terms. Section 401 (f) provides that “Each certificate shall be effective from the date specified therein, and shall continue in effect until suspended or revoked as hereinafter provided.” The phrase “as hereinafter provided” refers to § 401(g), which states:
“Authority to Modify, Suspend, or Revoke
“(g) The Board upon petition or complaint or upon its own initiative, after notice and hearings, may alter, amend, modify, or suspend any such certificate, in whole or in part, if the public convenience and necessity so require, or may revoke any such certificate, in whole or in part, for intentional failure to comply with any provision of this title or any order, rule, or regulation issued hereunder or any term, condition, or limitation of such certificate: Provided, That no such certificate shall be revoked unless the holder thereof fails to comply, within a reasonable time to be fixed by the Board, with an order of the Board commanding obedience to the provision, or to the order (other than an order issued in accordance with this proviso), rule, regulation, term, condition, or limitation found by the Board to have been violated. Any interested person may file with the Board a protest or memorandum in support of or in opposition to the alteration, amendment, modification, suspension, or revocation of the certificate.” (Emphasis added.)
This language represents to us an attempt by Congress to give the Board comprehensive instructions to meet all contingencies and the Board’s duty is to follow these instructions, particularly in light of the fact that obedience thereto raises no substantial obstacles. It is true, of course, that statutory language necessarily derives much of its meaning from the surrounding circumstances. However, we think that, while there is no legislative history directly on point, the background of the Aviation Act strongly supports what we believe to be the plain meaning of § 401 (f) and (g). It is clear from the statements of the supporters of the predecessor of the Aviation Act — the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 — that Congress was vitally concerned with what has been called “security of route” — i. e., providing assurance to the carrier that its investment in operations would be protected insofar as reasonably possible. And there is no other explanation but that Congress delimited the Board’s power to reconsider its awards with precisely this factor in mind; hence the language that a certificate “shall he effective . . . until suspended or revoked as hereinafter provided” (emphasis supplied), language which is absent from several of the Acts to which reference has been made. Thus, the structure of the statute, when considered in light of the factor persuading Congress, indicates to us that the critical date in the mind of Congress was the date on which the carrier commenced operations, with the concomitant investment in facilities and personnel, not the date that abstract legal analysis might indicate as the “final” date. In other words, it seems clear to us that Congress was relatively indifferent to the fluctuations an award might undergo prior to the time it affected practical relationships, but that Congress was vitally concerned with its security after the wheels had been set in motion. In light of this, we think the result we reach follows naturally: to the extent there are uncertainties over the Board’s power to alter effective certificates, there is an identifiable congressional intent that these uncertainties be resolved in favor of the certificated carrier and that the specific instructions set out in the statute should not be modified by resort to such generalities as “administrative flexibility” and “implied powers.” We do not quarrel with those who would grant the Board great discretion to conjure with certificates prior to effectuation. But, we feel that we would be paying less than adequate deference to the intent of Congress were we not to hold that, after a certificate has gone into effect, the instructions set out in the statute are to be followed scrupulously.
However, petitioners argue that there is an implied exception to the statutory mandate when the Board, pursuant to a petition for reconsideration filed before the certificate’s effective date, makes a statement that the certificate is subject to later amendment after further deliberation upon the petition. Petitioners admit that there is no express statutory authority for the Board to entertain petitions for reconsideration even prior to the effective date of the certificate, but they assert, and we assume arguendo they are correct, that the Board has implied power to accept such petitions. This being the case, petitioners claim that the existence of an outstanding petition for reconsideration gives a double meaning to the term "effective” as used in the Act: certificates are "effective” on the date specified therein for the purpose of allowing the certificated carrier to commence operations, but they are not “effective” as the term is used in § 401 (f) so as to preclude modification outside the procedures specified in § 401 (g).
The appeal of this argument comes, in the main, from the general notion that an administrative order is not “final,” for the purposes of judicial review, until outstanding petitions for reconsideration have been disposed of. See, e. g., Outland v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 109 U. S. App. D. C. 90, 284 F. 2d 224; Braniff Airways, Inc., v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 79 U. S. App. D. C. 341, 147 F. 2d 152. Once it is established that the certificate is not “final” for one purpose, the argument runs, then it is logical to assume that the certificate lacks “finality” for another. The difficulties with this line of reasoning, however, are many. First, insofar as it is bottomed on cases such as Outland and Braniff, the argument relies on holdings that were never made. The Courts of Appeals in these cases decided only that petitions for review were timely if filed in time from the date on which the Board disposed of pending petitions for reconsideration; the question whether the Board’s action on the petitions for reconsideration should have been taken after notice and hearing did not arise. Furthermore, petitioners’ argument skips an important logical step; it assumes, without explanation, that questions of administrative finality present the same problems, and therefore deserve the same solutions, as questions concerning the timeliness of an appeal. In point of fact, this assertion is not only unsupported but erroneous. The pertinent statutory language is not similar in the two instances. and the other points under analysis are different. Thus, a court considering the timeliness of a litigant's appeal is concerned with the wisdom of exercising its own power to act, and the result depends on such factors as fairness to the appellant and the intent of Congress in passing a general statute — § 10 (c) of the Administrative Procedure Act— which applies equally to almost all administrative agencies. There is no call, as Outland, and similar cases illustrate by their omissions, for considering either the sections of a particular act which are not concerned with appellate review or the problem — which at that point is of historical interest only — whether the petition for reconsideration should have been decided summarily or after notice and hearing. One might argue, of course, that the question is similar in both instances because, if the Board’s action on the petition for reconsideration is too late, then an appeal which is timely only from the Board’s action on reconsideration is also too late. However, this line of reasoning overlooks the confines of the result we are reaching in this case. We are not saying that the Board cannot entertain petitions for reconsideration after effective certification, nor are we holding that such petitions cannot be denied summarily; all we hold is that the petitions cannot be granted and the certificated carrier’s operations curtailed without notice or hearing. Therefore, since the cases such as Outland concerned the denial of a petition for reconsideration, there is no conflict, express or implied, between those decisions and this one. In this connection, the statement of a leading commentator seems particularly pertinent:
. “The tendency to assume that a word which appears in two or more legal rules, and so in connection with more than one purpose, has, and should have precisely the same scope in all of them runs all through legal discussions. It has all the tenacity of original sin and must constantly be guarded against.” Cook, The Logical and Legal Bases of the Conflict of Laws, 159.
Thirdly, were we to adopt the position urged by petitioners, we would have to hold that, in the words of a former chairman of the Board, the power to reconsider a case may be the lever for “nullify [ing] an express provision of the Act.” Ryan, The Revocation of an Airline Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity, 15 J. Air L. & Comm. 377, 384. As Commissioner Ryan indicated, the power the Board asks for in this case seems nothing more or less than the power to do indirectly what it cannot do directly. Parenthetically, it should be noted that, for purposes of this dispute, it is difficult to draw a distinction between a petition for reconsideration filed by a party and one initiated by the Board sua sponte. Sprague v. Woll, 122 F. 2d 128. This being the case, it is all the more significant that the Court in United States v. Seatrain Lines, 329 U. S. 424, while overruling the Interstate Commerce Commission’s contention that it had inherent power to reconsider effective certificates, paid no attention to the fact that the Commission had made the original certificate effective, subject “to such terms, conditions, and limitations as are now, or may hereafter be, attached to the exercise of such authority by this Commission.”
Although we feel that the language and background of the statute are sufficiently clear so that affirmance can rest solely on that basis, it seems appropriate, in light of petitioners’ vigorous assertion that policy reasons compel their result, to discuss some of the ramifications of our decision. In the first place, it bears repetition that we are not deciding that the Board is barred from reconsidering its initial decision. All we hold is that, if the Board wishes to do so, it must proceed in the manner authorized by statute. Thus, for example, the Board may reconsider an effective certificate at any time if it affords the certificated carrier notice and hearing prior to decision; or, if it feels uncertain about the decision prior to its effective date, it may postpone the effective date until all differences have been resolved; and, if neither of these procedures seem practical in a given case, the Board may issue a temporary certificate set to expire on the date the Board -prescribes for re-examination. Indeed, with all these weapons at its command, it is difficult to follow the argument that the Board should be allowed to improvise on the powers granted by Congress in order to preserve administrative flexibility.
Furthermore, it would seem that any realistic appraisal of the relative hardships involved in this case cuts in favor of the respondent. To be sure, the Board may be able to act quicker under the rule it espouses and, by eliminating the necessity of a new hearing, Lake Central will be spared the expense of preparing a new record. However, were the Board correct, respondent would be subjected to the loss of valuable routes, routes it had already begun to operate after considerable initial investment, without being heard in opposition. The Board points out that respondent had notice that the Board had reserved the right to amend the certificate. But it is not clear what comfort respondent could take from such notice; respondent could not hedge, since § 401 (f) of the Act provides that a certificated carrier may lose the right to conduct any service it does not initiate within 90 days of certification. Concededly, the fact of notice gives considerable surface appeal to petitioners’ assertions; they can and do argue that respondent knew what it was getting into and should not be heard to complain when the gamble turns out unfavorably. However, it must be remembered that the problem is not presented to us in the abstract; we are dealing with it in the context of this particular statute. And, as stated above, a major purpose behind the enactment of the Aviation Act was to eliminate the element of risk from a carrier’s operations. With Congress on record as affirmatively desiring to eliminate the necessity of gambling, we do not feel that the “assumption of the risk” argument carries much weight. The Board also argues that respondent “in substance” enjoyed the hearing contemplated by § 401 (g) because the matters impelling the Board to change its mind were matters that had been thrashed out during the hearings on the original certificate. However, this contention assumes a fact that we do not have before us — that a hearing would not have disclosed any further evidence or, perhaps more importantly, any post-certification events weighty enough to alter the Board’s thinking.
In short, our conclusion is that Congress wanted certificated carriers to enjoy “security of route” so that they might invest the considerable sums required to support their operations; and, to this end, Congress provided certain minimum protections before a certificated operation could be cancelled. We do not think it too much to ask that the Board furnish these minimum protections as a matter of course, whether or not the Board in a given case might think them meaningless. It might be added that some authorities have felt strongly enough about the practical significance of these protections to suggest that their presence may be required by the Fifth Amendment. See Seatrain Lines v. United States, 64 F. Supp. 156, 161; Handlon v. Town of Belleville, 4 N. J. 99, 71 A. 2d 624; see also 63 Harv. L. Rev. 1437, 1439.
Petitioners’ final argument is that their position is supported by consistent administrative construction and analogous case authority. The administrative construction argument appears less than substantial in light of the fact that, on the last and, it appears, only occasion when the present question was expressly considered, the Board said in dictum that it had “grave doubts” about proceeding in the manner followed in this case. Kansas City-Memphis-Florida Case, 9 C. A. B. 401; cf. Smith Bros., Revocation of Certificate, 33 M. C. C. 465. See generally Ryan, supra, where Commissioner Ryan went to great lengths to expose what he felt were the fallacies in the contentions now advanced by petitioners. With respect to prior cases, petitioners again are unable to cite any holdings on point. Petitioners rely heavily on Frontier Airlines, Inc., v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 104 U. S. App. D. C. 78, 259 F. 2d 808, but the dispute here involved was not raised in that case. The closest analogy in Frontier is to the argument put forward by a party whose petition for reconsideration had been denied; and the Court of Appeals reported this argument and the reasons for overruling it as follows:
“[T]he order on reconsideration is a nullity because it was rendered after the petition for judicial review had been filed and after the certificates previously issued had become effective; and, if that order is a nullity, the basic order is also a nullity because it fails to cover certain points.
“We do not find the order denying reconsideration invalid because rendered after this petition was filed. No harm was done. Had the Board been of a mind to grant reconsideration, it could have so indicated and a motion to remand would have been in order.”
Perhaps more favorable to petitioners is this Court’s decision in United States v. Rock Island Motor Transport Co., 340 U. S. 419, where it was held that the Interstate Commerce Commission could modify a motor carrier’s effective certificate pursuant to a reservation in the initial order. However, two important distinctions between that case and this are apparent: (1) the Motor Carrier Act makes express provision for summary modifications after certification, 49 U. S. C. § 308, and (2) the Court in Rock Island was very careful to limit its holding to the particular modification made in that case. Finally, the decision which is analytically most relevant to this case, United States v. Seatrain Lines, supra, furnishes support for respondent, rather than petitioners. While Seatrain may be distinguishable on its facts, the Court spoke in general terms of the rule that supervising agencies desiring to change existing certificates must follow the procedures “specifically authorized” by Congress and cannot rely on their own notions of implied powers in the enabling act. In short, we do not find that prior authority clearly favors either side; however, to the extent that a broad observation is permissible, we think that both administrative and judicial feelings have been opposed to the proposition that the agencies may expand their powers of reconsideration without a solid foundation in the language of the statute. Therefore, since the language and background of the statute are against, rather than for, the Board, the judgment of the Court of Appeals must be
Affirmed.
This section provides:
“Each certificate shall be effective from the date specified therein, and shall continue in effect until suspended or revoked as hereinafter provided, or until the Board shall certify that operation thereunder has ceased, or, if issued for a limited period of time under subsection (d) (2) of this section, shall continue in effect until the expiration thereof, unless, prior to the date of expiration, such certificate shall be suspended or revoked as provided herein, or the Board shall certify that operations thereunder have ceased: Provided, That if any service authorized by a certificate is not inaugurated within such period, not less than ninety days, after the date of the authorization as shall be fixed by the Board, or if, for a period of ninety days or such other period as may be designated by the Board any such service is not operated, the Board may by order, entered after notice and hearing, direct that such certificate shall thereupon cease to be effective to the extent of such service.”
The Board’s regulations concerning petitions for reconsideration, 14 CFR § 302.37, provide in part that:
“Petition for reconsideration — (a) Time for filing. A petition for reconsideration, rehearing or reargument may be filed by any party to a proceeding within thirty (30) days after the date of service of a final order by the Board in such proceeding unless the time is shortened or enlarged by the Board, except that such petition may not be filed with respect to an initial decision which has become final through failure to file exceptions thereto. However, neither the filing nor the granting of such a petition shall operate as a stay of such final order unless specifically so ordered by the Board. After the expiration of the period of filing a petition, a motion for leave to file such petition may be filed; but no such motion shall be granted except on a showing of unusual and exceptional circumstances, constituting good cause for failure to make timely filing. Within ten (10) days after a petition for reconsideration, rehearing, or reargument is filed, any party to the proceeding may file an answer in support of or in opposition to the petition.”
A temporary stay was granted from November 29 to December 5 to enable the Court of Appeals to consider a request by Eastern Air Lines for a judicial stay of certain awards made in the original proceeding. Eastern did not get its stay nor was its challenge on the merits upheld. Eastern Air Lines v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 271 F. 2d 752.
We are informed that this case has now been completed but no further action has been taken on Delta’s restrictions.
See Tobias, Administrative Reconsideration: Some Recent Developments in New York, 28 N. Y. U. L. Rev. 1262, where the author observed:
“Re-examination and reconsideration are among the normal processes of intelligent living. Admittedly no warranty of correctness or fitness attaches to a decision or an action simply because it is a thing of the past. Every-day experience teaches the contrary: while the choice first made may well remain the course ultimately followed, often enough it is found on further consideration to require revision. On the other hand, constant re-examination and endless vacillation may become ludicrous, self-defeating, and even oppressive. Whether for better or for worse so far as the merits of the chosen course are concerned, a point may be reached at which the die needs to be cast with some 'finality.' An opposition may thus develop between the right result and the final one.”
See also the statement of the Board in its original opinion in this ease, denying a motion to reopen the record:
“Our general policy with respect to motions to reopen the record for receipt of data on the most recent operating experience has consistently reflected the requirement of the public interest that the record in major route cases be brought to a close as expeditiously as possible, consistent with the requirements of full hearings; so that final decision may be rendered promptly. Institution of needed new services could be endlessly delayed were we to permit the record to be reopened in the final procedural stages of a case for the submission of more recent operating data (and the attendant cross-examination and exchange of rebuttal-evidence). Only in the cases where the situation under consideration has changed radically would such a course of action be justified.”
Generally speaking, the less interested Congress has been in what has been called “security of certificate,” the wider the scope of reconsideration Congress has allowed to the supervising agency. See generally Davis, Res Judicata in Administrative Law, 25 Texas L. Rev. 199. It cannot be doubted that Congress was powerfully interested in “security of certificate” when it passed the Aviation Act. See 83 Cong. Rec. 6407.
No one contends that the changes made upon reconsideration constituted the correction of inadvertent errors. See American Trucking Assns., Inc., v. Frisco Transportation Co., 358 U. S. 133.
Speaking on behalf of the bill which became the predecessor of the Federal Aviation Act — the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938— Congressman Lea, Chairman of the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce which reported the bill, said:
“One hundred and twenty million dollars has already been invested in commercial aviation in the United States. It is the information of the committee that $60,000,000 of this sum has been wiped out. The fact that so much money has been put into commercial aviation shows the faith, the genius, and the courage of the American people in that they are willing to invest as they have in aviation up to this date. However, in the absence of legislation such as we have now before us these lines are going to find it very difficult if not impossible to finance their operations because of the lack of stability and assurance in their operations. You would not want to invest $200 or $2,000 a mile in a line that has no assurance of security of its route and no protection against cutthroat competition.
“Part of the proposal here is that the regulatory body created by the bill will have authority to issue certificates of convenience and necessity to the operators. This will give assurance of security of route. The authority will also exejcise rate control, requiring that rates be reasonable and giving power to protect against cutthroat competition. In my judgment, those two things are the fundamental and essential needs of aviation at this time, security and stability in the route and protection against cutthroat competition.
“These are the two economic fundamentals presented and it is this necessity that the bill seeks to meet. We want to give financial stability to these companies so they can finance their operations and finance them to advantage.” 83 Cong. Rec. 6406-6407.
The “finality” of an order for purposes of judicial review depends on § 10 (c) of the Administrative Procedure Act, 60 Stat. 243, 5 U. S. C. § 1009 (c). See 6 Stan. L. Rev. 531.
In addition to the reasons mentioned in the text, those cases involving orders, rather than certificates—see Western Air Lines v. Civil Aeronautics Board, 194 F. 2d 211—are distinguishable for the reasons stated in Seatrain, supra, at 432. Similarly, the cases involving certificates under the Federal Communications Act are distinguishable for the reasons stated by Commissioner Ryan. See Ryan, The Revocation of an Airline Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity, 15 J. Air L. & Comm. 377, 384-385.
See also Hancock, Fallacy of the Transplanted Category, 37 Can. B. Rev. 535. One might argue, of course, that judicial review and administrative reconsideration are the same since both threaten a reversal of the prior award. However, Congress has shown no intent to preclude reconsideration, either judicial or administrative, after notice and hearing.
Although the Board did not purport to issue a temporary certificate as prescribed in §401 (d)(2), petitioners now argue that the Board’s action was “equivalent” to a temporary certification. However, we do not find this proposition persuasive. As stated in the text, supra, we think that the Board must bow to the statutory procedure and cannot take short cuts. See note 15, infra. Moreover, the most natural reading of § 401 (d) (2) — which says that temporary certificates may be issued for “limited periods” — is that Congress was authorizing the Board to issue certificates running until a specified date. One reason for this construction is obvious; if a temporary certificate had unlimited duration, only subject to immediate revocation when the Board got around to considering various objections, it might play havoc with the ability of the carrier to accept advance reservations. Just such a contention was made by Delta before the Board in its petition for a stay of the Board’s May 7, 1959, order on reconsideration. Delta pointed out:
“It is a fact that schedules for May and June, and timetables showing this early morning Chicago-Indianapolis-Evansville and Evansville-Indianapolis-Chicago service, have been released to the public and many reservations have been booked for these months. Furthermore, pilot bidding procedures and problems involving equipment rotation prohibit the immediate cancellation of this flight on short notice.”
It appears clear, and the Board does not disagree, that the “hearing” specified in § 401 (g) means a “hearing” prior to decision. And, the Board does not contend that this requirement could have been satisfied by the allowance of a hearing after the decision on reconsideration was handed down. This course of action seems wise since (1) it is generally accepted on both principle and authority that a hearing after decision, although permissible in special circumstances, is not the equivalent of a predetermination hearing, see, e. g., Gelhorn and Byse, Administrative Law, 774; (2) it is not entirely clear that Delta could have procured a hearing after the Board’s decision. Delta sought a stay of the Board’s May 7 order until after the Great Lakes Local Service Investigation Case was decided, presumably with a view to introducing further evidence on the present point in that ease; the request for a stay was denied.
Since Kansas City, the Board has reconsidered an effective award on three occasions. United Western, Acquisition of Air Carrier Property, 11 C. A. B. 701; Service to Phoenix Case, Order E-12039 (1957); South Central Area Local Service Case, Order E-14219 (1959). United Western did not involve a certificate of public convenience and necessity and, thus, has no relevance. See note 10, supra. Service to Phoenix involved a denial of reconsideration except on one point, which might arguably be termed the correction of inadvertent error. See note 7, supra. South Central did involve the alteration of a certificated carrier’s rights. As stated, the present point was not raised in any of these three cases.
The potentially distinguishing feature about Seatrain is that the Court’s holding may rest on an alternate ground — viz.: that the Commission had no power to impose the conditions it did in the first instance. However, Seatrain cannot be distinguished on the grounds that the Court said “the certificate, when finally granted and the time fixed for rehearing has passed, is not subject to revocation in whole or in part except as specifically authorized . . . The point is that, under the Water Carrier Act, the Commission had express authority to entertain petitions for reconsideration at any time. See 49 U. S. C. § 916 (a), incorporating 49 U. S. C. § 17 (6) and (7). Therefore, it is clear that the Commission in Seatrain could have reached with impunity the result it wanted to reach by following the procedures set out by Congress. The force of the Seatrain decision is, then, that the commissions and boards must follow scrupulously the statutory procedures before they can alter existing operations and that arguments to the effect that “this is just another way of doing it” will not prevail.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Frankfurter
delivered the opinion of the Court.
After extended negotiations eight States entered into a Compact to control pollution in the Ohio River system. See Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Compact, 54 Stat. 752. Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia recognized that they were faced with one of the problems of government that are defined by natural rather than political boundaries. Accordingly, they pledged themselves to cooperate in maintaining waters in the Ohio River basin in a sanitary condition through the administrative mechanism of the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission, consisting of three members from each State and three representing the United States.
The heart of the Compact is Article VI. This provides that sewage discharged into boundary streams or streams flowing from one State into another “shall be so treated, within a time reasonable for the construction of the necessary works, as to provide for substantially complete removal of settleable solids, and the removal of not less than forty-five per cent (45%) of the total suspended solids; provided that, in order to protect the public health or to preserve the waters for other legitimate purposes, ... in specific instances such higher degree of treatment shall be used as may be determined to be necessary by the Commission after investigation, due notice and hearing.” Industrial wastes are to be treated “to such degree as may be determined to be necessary by the Commission after investigation, due notice and hearing.” Sewage and industrial wastes discharged into streams located wholly within one State are to be treated “to that extent, if any, which may be necessary to maintain such waters in a sanitary and satisfactory condition at least equal to the condition of the waters of the interstate stream immediately above the confluence.”
Article IX provides that the Commission may, after notice and hearing, issue orders for compliance enforceable in the State and federal courts. It further provides: “No such order shall go into effect unless and until it receives the assent of at least a majority of the commissioners from each of not less than a majority of the signatory States; and no such order upon a municipality, corporation, person or entity in any State shall go into effect unless and until it receives the assent of not less than a majority of the commissioners from such state.”
By Article X the States also agree “to appropriate for the salaries, office and other administrative expenses, their proper proportion of the annual budget as determined by the Commission and approved by the Governors of the signatory States . . . .”
The present controversy arose because of conflicting views between officials of West Virginia regarding the responsibility of West Virginia under the Compact.
The Legislature of that State ratified and approved the Compact on March 11, 1939. W. Va. Acts 1939, c. 38. Congress gave its consent on July 11, 1940, 54 Stat. 752, and upon adoption by all the signatory States the Compact was formally executed by the Governor of West Virginia on June 30, 1948. At its 1949 session the West Virginia Legislature appropriated $12,250 as the State’s contribution to the expenses of the Commission for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1949. W. Va. Acts 1949, c. 9, Item 93. Respondent Sims, the'auditor of the State, refused to issue a warrant upon its treasury for payment of this appropriation. To compel him to issue it, the West Virginia Commissioners to the Compact Commission and the members of the West Virginia. State Water Commission instituted this original mandamus proceeding in the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia. The court denied relief on the merits, 134 W. Va.-, 58 S. E. 2d 766, and we brought the case here, 340 U. S. 807, because questions of obviously important public interest are raised.
The West Virginia court found that the “sole question” before it was the validity of the Act of 1939 approving West Virginia’s adherence to the Compact. It found that Act invalid in that (1) the Compact was deemed to delegate West Virginia’s police power to other States and to the Federal Government, and (2) it was deemed to bind future legislatures to make appropriations for the continued activities of the Sanitation Commission and thus to violate Art. X, § 4 of the West Virginia Constitution.
Briefs filed on behalf of the United States and other States, as amid, invite the Court to consider far-reaching issues relating to the Compact Clause of the United States Constitution. Art. I, § 10, cl. 3. The United States urges that the Compact be so read as to allow any signatory State to withdraw from its obligations at any time. Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and New York contend that the Compact Clause precludes any State from limiting its power to enter into a compact to which Congress has consented. We must not be tempted by these inviting vistas. We need not go beyond the issues on which the West Virginia court found the Compact not binding on that State. That these are issues which give this Court jurisdiction to review the State court proceeding, 28 U. S. C. § 1257, needs no discussion after Delaware River Comm’n v. Colburn, 310 U. S. 419, 427.
Control of pollution in interstate streams might, on occasion, be an appropriate subject for national legislation. Compare Oklahoma v. Atkinson Co., 313 U. S. 508. But, with prescience, the Framers left the States free to settle regional controversies in diverse ways. Solution of the problem underlying this case may be attempted directly by the affected States through contentious litigation before this Court. Missouri v. Illinois, 180 U. S. 208, 200 U. S. 496; New York v. New Jersey, 256 U. S. 296. Adjudication here of conflicting State interests affecting stream pollution does not rest upon the law of a particular State. This Court decides such controversies according to “principles it must have power to declare.” Missouri v. Illinois, supra, 200 U. S. at 519. But the delicacy of interstate relationships and the inherent limitations upon this Court’s ability to deal with multifarious local problems have naturally led to exacting standards of judicial intervention and have inhibited the formulation of a code for dealing with such controversies. As Mr. Justice Holmes put it: “Before this court ought to intervene the case should be of serious magnitude, clearly and fully proved, and the principle to be applied should be one which the court is prepared deliberately to maintain against all considerations on the other side.” Missouri v. Illinois, supra, 200 U. S. at 521.
Indeed, so awkward and unsatisfactory is the available litigious solution for these problems that this Court deemed it appropriate to emphasize the practical constitutional alternative provided by the Compact Clause. Experience led us to suggest that a problem such as that involved here is “more likely to be wisely solved by cooperative study and by conference and mutual concession on the part of representatives of the States so vitally interested in it than by proceedings in any court however constituted.” New York v. New Jersey, supra, at 313. The suggestion has had fruitful response.
The growing interdependence of regional interests, calling for regional adjustments, has brought extensive use of compacts. A compact is more than a supple device for dealing with interests confined within a region. That it is also a means of safeguarding the national interest is well illustrated in the Compact now under review. Not only was congressional consent required, as for all compacts; direct participation by the Federal Government was provided in the President’s appointment of three members of the Compact Commission. Art. IV; Art. XI, § 3.
But a compact is after all a legal document. Though the circumstances of its drafting are likely to assure great care and deliberation, all avoidance of disputes as to scope and meaning is not within human gift. Just as this Court has power to settle disputes between States where there is no compact, it must have final power to pass upon the meaning and validity of compacts. It requires no elaborate argument to reject the suggestion that an agreement solemnly entered into between States by those who alone have political authority to speak for a State can be unilaterally nullified, or given final meaning by an organ of one of the contracting States. A State cannot be its own ultimate judge in a controversy with a sister State. To determine the nature and scope of obligations as between States, whether they arise through the legislative means of compact or the “federal common law” governing interstate controversies (Hinderlider v. La Plata Co., 304 U. S. 92, 110), is the function and duty of the Supreme Court of the Nation. Of course every deference will be shown to what the highest court of a State deems to be the law and policy of its State, particularly when recondite or unique features of local law are urged. Deference is one thing; submission to a State’s own determination of whether it has undertaken an obligation, what that obligation is, and whether it conflicts with a disability of the State to undertake it is quite another.
The Supreme Court of Appeals of the State of West Yirginia is, for exclusively State purposes, the ultimate tribunal in construing the meaning of her Constitution. Two prior decisions of this Court make clear, however, that we are free to examine determinations of law by State courts in the limited field where a compact brings in issue the rights of other States and the United States.
Kentucky v. Indiana, 281 U. S. 163, dealt with a compact to build a bridge across the Ohio River. In an original action brought before this Court, Indiana defended on the ground that she should not be compelled to perform until the Indiana courts decided, in a pending case, whether her officials had been authorized to enter into the compact. Mr. Chief Justice Hughes, speaking for a unanimous Court, dismissed the argument: “Where the States themselves are before this Court for the determination of a controversy between them, neither can determine their rights inter ‘sese, and this Court must pass upon every question essential to such a determination, although local legislation and questions of state authorization may be involved. Virginia v. West Virginia, 11 Wall. 39, 56; 220 U. S. 1, 28. A decision in the present instance by the state court would not determine the controversy here.” 281 U. S. at 176-177.
In reaching this conclusion the Chief Justice could hardly avoid analogizing the situation to that where a question is raised whether a State has impaired the obligation of a contract. “It has frequently been held that when a question is suitably raised whether the law of a State has impaired the obligation of a contract, in violation of the constitutional provision, this Court must determine for itself whether a contract exists, what are its obligations, and whether they have been impaired by the legislation of the State. ■ While this Court always examines with appropriate respect the decisions of state courts bearing upon such questions, such decisions do not detract from the responsibility of this Court in reaching its own conclusions as to the contract, its obligations and impairment, for otherwise the constitutional guaranty could not properly be enforced. Larson v. South Dakota, 278 U. S. 429, 433, and cases there cited.” 281 U. S. at 176. And see Indiana ex rel. Anderson v. Brand, 303 U. S. 95, 100.
Hinderlider v. La Plata Co., supra, is the second of these cases. It also makes clear, if authority be needed, that the fact the compact questions reach us on a writ of certiorari rather than by way of an original action brought by a State does not affect the power of this Court. In the Hinderlider case, an action was brought in the Colorado courts to enjoin performance of a compact between Colorado and New Mexico concerning water rights in the La Plata River. The State court held that the compact was invalid because it affected appropriation rights guaranteed by the Colorado State Constitution. 101 Colo. 73, 70 P. 2d 849; see also 93 Colo. 128, 25 P. 2d 187. Mr. Justice Brandéis, likewise speaking for a unanimous Court, held that the relative claims of New Mexico and Colorado citizens could be determined by compact and reversed the decision of the State court.
The issue in the Hinderlider case was whether the Colorado Legislature had authority, under the State Constitution, to enter into a compact which affected the water rights of her citizens. The issue before us is whether the West Virginia Legislature had authority, under her Constitution, to enter into a compact which involves delegation of power to an interstate agency and an agreement to appropriate funds for the administrative expenses of the agency.
That a legislature may delegate to an administrative body the power to make rules and decide particular cases is one of the axioms of modern government. The West Virginia court does not challenge the general proposition but objects to the delegation here involved because it is to a body outside the State and because its Legislature may not be free, at any time, to withdraw the power delegated. We are not here concerned, and so need not deal, with specific language in a State constitution requiring that the State settle its problems with other States without delegating power to an interstate agency. What is involved is the conventional grant of legislative power. We find nothing in that to indicate that West Virginia may not.solve a problem such as the control of river pollution by compact and by the delegation, if such it be, necessary to effectuate such solution by compact. If this Court, in the exercise of its original jurisdiction, were to enter a decree requiring West Virginia to abate pollution of interstate streams, that decree would bind the State. The West Virginia Legislature would have no part in determining the State’s obligation. The State Legislature could not alter it; it could not disregard it, as West Virginia on another occasion so creditably recognized. The obligation would be fixed by this Court on the basis of a master’s report. Here, the State has bound itself to control pollution by the more effective means of an agreement with other States. The Compact involves a reasonable and carefully limited delegation of power to an interstate agency. Nothing in its Constitution suggests that, in dealing with the problem dealt with by the Compact, West Virginia must wait for the answer to be dictated by this Court after harassing and unsatisfactory litigation.’
What Mr. Justice Brandéis said of the Colorado court decision in Hinderlider v. La Plata Co., supra, applies to the decision of the West Virginia court: “It ignores the history and order of development of the two means provided by the Constitution for adjusting interstate controversies. The compact — the legislative means — adapts to our Union of sovereign States the age-old treaty-making power of independent sovereign nations. Adjustment by compact without a judicial or quasi-judicial determination of existing rights had been practiced in the Colonies, was practiced by the States before the adoption of the Constitution, and had been extensively practiced in the United States for nearly half a century before this Court first applied the judicial means in settling the boundary dispute in Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 12 Pet. 657, 723-25.” 304 U. S. at 104.
The State court also held that the Compact is in conflict with Art. X, § 4, of the State Constitution and for that reason is not binding on West Virginia. This section provides:
“No debt shall be contracted by this State, except to meet casual deficits in the revenue, to redeem a previous liability of the State, to suppress insurrection, repel invasion, or defend the State in time of war; but the payment of any liability, other than that for the ordinary expenses of the State, shall be equally distributed over a period of at least twenty years.”
The Compact was evidently drawn with great care to meet the problem of debt limitation in light of this section and similar restrictive provisions in the constitutions of other States. Although, under Art. X of the Compact, the States agree to appropriate funds for administrative expenses, the annual budget must be approved by the Governors of the signatory States. In addition, Article V provides: “The Commission shall not incur any obligations of any kind prior to the making of appropriations adequate to meet the same; nor shall the Commission pledge the credit of any of the signatory States, except by and with the authority of the legislature thereof.” In view of these provisions, we conclude that the obligation of the State under the Compact is not in conflict with Art. X, § 4 of the State Constitution.
Reversed and remanded.
Mr. Justice Black concurs in the result.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
K
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Stewart
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In these six cases we review judgments of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, which affirmed convictions obtained in the District Court under 2 U. S. C. § 192. Each of the petitioners was convicted for refusing to answer certain questions when summoned before a congressional subcommittee. The cases were separately briefed and argued here, and many issues were presented. We decide each case upon a single ground common to all, and we therefore reach no other questions.
In each case the indictment returned by the grand jury failed to identify the subject under congressional subcommittee inquiry at the time the witness was interrogated. The indictments were practically identical in this respect, stating only that the questions to which answers were refused “were pertinent to the question then under inquiry” by the subcommittee. In each case a motion was filed to quash the indictment before trial upon the ground that the indictment failed to state the subject under investigation at the time of the subcommittee’s interrogation of the defendant. In each case the motion was denied. In each case the issue thus raised was preserved on appeal, in the petition for writ of certiorari, and in brief and argument here.
Congress has expressly provided that no one can be prosecuted under 2 U. S. C. § 192 except upon indictment by a grand jury. This. Court has never decided whether the indictment must identify the subject which was under inquiry at the time of the defendant’s alleged default or refusal to answer. For the reasons that follow, we hold that the indictment must contain such an averment, and we accordingly reverse the judgments before us.
In enacting the criminal statute under which these petitioners were convicted Congress invoked the aid of the federal judicial system in protecting itself against contumacious conduct. Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S. 178, 207. The obvious consequence, as the Court has repeatedly emphasized, was to confer upon the federal courts the duty to accord a person prosecuted for this statutory offense every safeguard which the law accords in all other federal criminal cases. Sinclair v. United States, 279 U. S. 263, 296-297; Watkins v. United States, supra, at 208; Sacher v. United States, 356 U. S. 576, 577; Flaxer v. United States, 358 U. S. 147, 151; Deutch v. United States, 367 U. S. 456, 471.
Recognizing this elementary concept, the Sinclair case established several propositions which provide.a relevant starting point here. First, there can be criminality under the statute only if the question which the witness refused to answer pertained to a subject then under investigation by the congressional body which summoned him. “[A] witness rightfully may refuse to answer where... the questions asked are not pertinent to the matter under inquiry.” Sinclair v. United States, supra, at 292. Secondly, because the defendant is presumed to be innocent, it is “incumbent upon the United States to plead and show that the question [he refused to answer] pertained to some matter under investigation.” Id., at 296-297. Finally, Sinclair held that the question of pertinency is one for determination by the court as a matter of law. Id,., at 298.
In that case the Court had before it an indictment which set out in specific and lengthy detail the subject under investigation by the Senate Committee which had summoned Sinclair. The Court was thereby enabled to make an enlightened and precise determination that the question he had refused to answer was pertinent to that subject. Id., at 285-289, 296-298.
That the making of such a determination would be a vital function of the federal judiciary in a prosecution brought under 2 U. S. C. § 192 was clearly foreseen by the Congress which originally enacted the law in 1857. Congress not only provided that'a person could be prosecuted only upon an indictment by a grand jury, but, as the record of the legislative debates shows, Congress was expressly aware that pertinency to the subject under inquiry was the basic preliminary question which the federal courts were going to have to decide in determining whether a criminal offense had been alleged or proved. The principal spokesman for the bill, Senator Bayard, repeatedly made this very point:
“The bill provides for punishing a witness who shall refuse to answer any question ‘pertinent’ to the matter of inquiry under consideration before the House or its committee. If he refuses to answer an irrelevant question, he is not subject to the penalties of the bill. The question must be pertinent to the subject-matter, and that will have to be decided by the courts of justice on the indictment. That power is not given to Congress; it is given appropriately to the judiciary.” Cong. Globe, 34th Cong., 3d Sess. 439 (1857).
“This law does not propose to give to this miscellaneous political body the power of punishment; but one of its greatest recommendations is, that it transfers that power of punishment to a court of justice after judicial inquiry. All that is to be done in the case of a refusal to testify is to certify the fact to the district attorney, who is to lay it before the grand jury, and if the party is indicted he is bound to answer according to the terms of the law, as any other person would for an offense against the laws of the land.... I am aware that legislative bodies have transcended their powers — that under the influence of passion and political excitement they have very often invaded the rights of individuals, and may have invaded the rights of coordinate branches of the Government; but if our institutions are to last, there can be no greater safeguard than will result from transferring that which now stands on an indefinite power (the punishment as well as the offense resting in the breast of either House) from Congress to the courts of justice. When a case of this kind comes before a court, will not the first inquiry be,, have Congress jurisdiction of the subject-matter? — has the House which undertakes to inquire, jurisdiction of the subject? If they have not, the whole proceedings are coram non judice and void, and the party cannot be held liable under indictment. The Court would quash the indictment if this fact appeared on its face; and if it appeared on the trial they would direct the jury to acquit.” Cong. Globe, 34th Cong., 3d Sess. 440 (1857).
“... The law prescribes that, in case of such refusal, the House shall certify the fact to the district attorney, and he shall bring the matter before the grand jury. When that comes up by indictment before the court, must not the court decide whether the question put was pertinent to the inquiry? Of course they must; and they cannot hold the party guilty without doing it.” Cong. Globe, 34th Cong., 3d Sess. 440 (1857).
These forecasts of the office which the federal courts would be called upon to perform under 2 U. S. C. § 192 have been amply borne out by the cases which have arisen under the statute. The crucial importance of determining the issue of pertinency is reflected in many cases which have come here since Sinclair, supra. Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S. 178, 208; Sacher v. United States, 356 U. S. 576, 577; Barenblatt v. United States, 360 U. S. 109, 123-125; Wilkinson v. United States, 365 U. S. 399, 407-409, 413; Braden v. United States, 365 U. S. 431, 435-436; Deutch v. United States, 367 U. S. 456, 467-471. Our decisions have pointed out that the obvious first step in determining whether the questions asked were pertinent to the subject under inquiry is to ascertain what that subject was. See, e. g., Deutch v. United States, supra, at 469. Identification of the subject under inquiry is also an essential preliminary to the determination of a host of other issues which typically arise in prosecutions under the statute. In Wilkinson v. United States, supra, for example, the Court pointed out that in order properly to consider any of the many issues there presented, “the starting point must be to determine the subject matter of the subcommittee’s inquiry.” 365 U. S., at 407.
Where, as in the Sinclair case, the subject under inquiry has been identified in the indictment, this essential first step has presented no problem. Where, as in the more recent cases, the indictment has not identified the topic under inquiry, the Court has often found it difficult or impossible to ascertain what the subject was. The difficulty of such a determination in the absence of an allegation in the indictment is illustrated by Deutch v. United States, supra. In that case the members of this Court were in sharp disagreement as to what the subject under subcommittee inquiry had been. Moreover, all of us disagreed with the District Court’s theory, and the Court of Appeals had not even ventured a view on the question. 367 U. S., at 467. In Watkins v. United States, supra, the Court found it not merely difficult, but actually impossible, to determine what the topic under subcommittee inquiry had been at the time the petitioner had refused to answer the questions addressed to him. “Having exhausted the several possible indicia of the ‘question under inquiry,’ we remain unenlightened as to the subject to which the questions asked petitioner were pertinent.” 354 U. S., at 214.
To be sure, the fact that difficulties and doubts have beset the federal courts in trying to ascertain the subject under inquiry in cases arising under 2 U. S. C. § 192 could hardly justify, in the abstract, a requirement that indictments under the statute contain averments which would simplify the courts’ task. Difficult and doubtful questions are inherent in the judicial process, particularly under a system of criminal law which places heavy emphasis upon the protection of the rights and liberties of the individual. Courts sit to resolve just such questions, and rules of law are not to be made merely to suit judicial convenience. But a proliferation of doubtful issues which not only burden the judiciary, but, because of uncertainties inherent in their resolution, work a hardship upon both the prosecution and the defense in criminal cases, is hardly a desideratum. And the repeated appearance in prosecutions under a particular criminal statute of the same critical and difficult question, which could be obviated by a simple averment in the indictment, invites inquiry into the purposes and functions which a grand jury indictment is intended to serve. The cases we have discussed, therefore, furnish an appropriate background for the inquiry to which we now turn.
Any discussion of the purpose served by a grand jury indictment in the administration of federal criminal law must begin with the Fifth and Sixth Amendments to the Constitution. The Fifth Amendment provides that “No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger;...” We need not pause to consider whether an offense under 2 U. S. C. § 192 is an “infamous crime,” Duke v. United States, 301 U. S. 492, since Congress has from the beginning explicitly conferred upon those prosecuted under the statute the protection which the Fifth Amendment confers, by providing that no one can be prosecuted for this offense except.upon an indictment by a grand jury. This specific guaranty, as well as the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, are, therefore, both brought to bear here. Of like relevance is the guaranty of the Sixth Amendment that “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right... to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation;...”
The constitutional provision that a trial may be held in a serious federal criminal case only if a grand jury has first intervened reflects centuries of antecedent development of common law, going back to the Assize of Clarendon in 1166. “The grand jury is an English institution, brought to this country by the early colonists and incorporated in the Constitution by the Founders. There is every reason to believe that our constitutional grand jury was intended to operate substantially like its English progenitor. The basic purpose of the English grand jury was to provide a fair method for instituting criminal proceedings against persons believed to have committed crimes.” Costello v. United States, 350 U. S. 359, 362. See McClintock, Indictment by a Grand Jury, 26 Minn. L. Rev. 153; Orfield, Criminal Procedure from Arrest to Appeal, 137-140, 144-146.
For many years the federal courts were guided in their judgments concerning the construction and sufficiency of grand jury indictments by the common law alone. Not until 1872 did Congress enact general legislation touching upon the subject. In that year a statute was enacted which reflected the drift of the law away from the rules of technical and formalized pleading which had characterized an earlier era. The 1872 statute provided that “no indictment found and presented by a grand jury in any district or circuit or other court of the United States shall be deemed insufficient, nor shall the trial, judgment, or other proceeding thereon be affected by reason of any defect or imperfection in matter of form only, which shall not tend to the prejudice of the defendant.” 17 Stat. 198. This legislation has now been repealed, but its substance is preserved in the more generalized provision of Rule 52 (a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which states that “Any error, defect, irregularity or variance which does not affect substantial rights shall be disregarded.”
There was apparently no other legislation dealing with the subject of indictments generally until the promulgation of Rule 7 (c), Fed. Rules Crim. Proc., in 1946. The Rule provides:
“The indictment or the information shall be a plain, concise and definite written statement of the essential facts constituting the offense charged. It shall be signed by the attorney for the government. It need not contain a formal commencement, a formal conclusion or any other matter not necessary to such statement. Allegations made in one count may be incorporated by reference in another count. It may be alleged in a single count that the means by which the defendant committed the offense are unknown or that he committed it by one or more specified means. The indictment or information shall state for each count the official or customary citation of the statute, rule, regulation or other provision of law which the defendant is alleged therein to have violated. Error in the citation or its omission shall not be ground for dismissal of the indictment or information or for reversal of a conviction if the error or omission did not mislead the defendant to his prejudice.”
As we have elsewhere noted, “This Court has, in recent years, upheld many convictions in the face of questions concerning the sufficiency of the charging papers. Convictions are no longer reversed because of minor and technical deficiencies which did not prejudice the accused. [Citing cases.] This has been a salutary development in the criminal law.” Smith v. United States, 360 U. S. 1, 9. “But,” as the Smith opinion went on to point out, “the substantial safeguards to those charged with serious crimes cannot be eradicated under the guise of technical departures from the rules.” Ibid. Resolution of the issue presented in the cases before us thus ultimately depends upon the nature of “the substantial safeguards” to a criminal defendant which an indictment is designed to provide. Stated concretely, does the omission from an indictment under 2 U. S. C. § 192 of the subject under congressional committee inquiry amount to no more than a technical deficiency of no prejudice to the defendant? Or does such an omission deprive the defendant of one of the significant protections which the guaranty of a grand jury indictment was intended to confer?
In a number of cases the Court has emphasized two of the protections which an indictment is intended to guarantee, reflected by two of the criteria by which the sufficiency of an indictment is to be measured. These criteria are, first, whether the indictment “contains the elements of the offense intended to be charged, ‘and sufficiently apprises the defendant of what he must be prepared to meet/ ” and, secondly, “ 'in case any other proceedings are taken against him for a similar offence, whether the record shows with accuracy to what extent he may plead a former acquittal or conviction.’ Cochran and Sayre v. United States, 157 U. S. 286, 290; Rosen v. United States, 161 U. S. 29, 34.” Hagner v. United States, 285 U. S. 427, 431. See Potter v. United States, 155 U. S. 438, 445; Bartell v. United States, 227 U. S. 427, 431; Berger v. United States, 295 U. S. 78, 82; United States v. Debrow, 346 U. S. 374, 377-378.
Without doubt the second of these preliminary criteria was sufficiently met by the indictments in these cases. Since the indictments set out not only the times and places of the hearings at which the petitioners refused to testify, but also specified the precise questions which they then and there refused to answer, it can hardly be doubted that the petitioners would be fully protected from again being put in jeopardy for the same offense, particularly when it is remembered that they could rely upon other parts of the present record in the event that future proceedings should be taken against them. See McClintock, Indictment by a Grand Jury, 26 Minn. L. Rev. 153, 160; Bartell v. United States, 227 U. S. 427, 433. The vice of these indictments, rather, is that they failed to satisfy the first essential criterion by which the sufficiency of an indictment is to be tested, i. e., that they failed to sufficiently apprise the defendant “of what he must be prepared to meet.”
As has been pointed out, the very core of criminality under 2 U. S. C. § 192 is pertinency to the subject under inquiry of the questions which the defendant refused to answer. What the subject actually was, therefore, is central to every prosecution under the statute. Where guilt depends so crucially upon such a specific identification of fact, our cases have uniformly held that an indictment must do more than simply repeat the language of the criminal statute.
“It is an elementary principle of criminal pleading, that where the definition of an offence, whether it be at common law or by statute, ‘includes generic terms, it is not sufficient that the indictment shall charge the offence in the same generic terms as in the definition; but it must state the species, — it must descend to particulars.’ ” United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 558. An indictment not framed to apprise the defendant “with reasonable certainty, of the nature of the accusation against him... is defective, although it may follow the language of the statute.” United States v. Simmons, 96 U. S. 360, 362. “In an indictment upon a statute, it is not sufficient to set forth the offence in the words of the statute, unless those words of themselves fully, directly, and expressly, without any uncertainty or ambiguity, set forth all the elements necessary to constitute the offence intended to be punished;...” United States v. Carll, 105 U. S. 611, 612. “Undoubtedly the language of the statute may be used in the general description of an offence, but it must be accompanied with such a statement of the facts and circumstances as will inform the accused of the specific offence, coming under the general description, with which he is charged.” United States v. Hess, 124 U. S. 483, 487. See also Pettibone v. United States, 148 U. S. 197, 202-204; Blitz v. United States, 153 U. S. 308, 315; Keck v. United States, 172 U. S. 434, 437; Morissette v. United States, 342 U. S. 246, 270, n. 30. Cf. United States v. Petrillo, 332 U. S. 1, 10-11. That these basic principles of fundamental fairness retain their full vitality under modern concepts of pleading, and specifically under Rule 7 (c) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, is illustrated by many recent federal decisions.
The vice which inheres in the failure of an indictment under 2 U. S. C. § 192 to identify the subject under inquiry is thus the violation of the basic principle “that the accused must be apprised by the indictment, with reasonable certainty, of the nature of the accusation against him,...” United States v. Simmons, supra, at 362. A cryptic form of indictment in cases of this kind requires the defendant to go to trial with the chief issue undefined. It enables his conviction to rest on one point and the affirmance of the conviction to rest on another. It gives the prosecution free hand on appeal to fill in the gaps of proof by surmise or conjecture. The Court has had occasion before now to condemn just such a practice in a quite different factual setting. Cole v. Arkansas, 333 U. S. 196, 201-202. And the unfairness and uncertainty which have characteristically infected criminal proceedings under this statute which were based upon indictments which failed to specify the subject under inquiry are illustrated by the cases in this Court we have already discussed. The same uncertainty and unfaírnéss are underscored by the records of the cases now before us. A single example will suffice to illustrate the point.
In No. 12, Price v. United States, the petitioner refused to answer a number of questions put to him by the Internal Security Subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee. At the beginning of the hearing in question, the Chairman and other subcommittee members made widely meandering statements purporting to identify the subject under inquiry. It was said that the hearings were “not... an attack upon the free press,” that the investigation was of “such attempt as may be disclosed on the part of the Communist Party... to influence or to subvert the American press.” It was also said that “We are simply investigating communism wherever we find it.” In dealing with a witness who testified shortly before Price, counsel for the subcommittee emphatically denied that it was the subcommittee’s purpose “to investigate Communist infiltration of the press and other forms of communication.” But when Price was called to testify before the subcommittee no one offered even to attempt to inform him of what subject the subcommittee did have under inquiry. <4t the trial the Government took the position that the subject under inquiry had been Communist activities generally. The district judge before whom the case was tried found that “the questions put were pertinent to the matter under inquiry” without indicating what he thought the subject under inquiry was. The Court of Appeals, in affirming the conviction, likewise omitted to state what it thought the subject under inquiry had been. In this Court the Government contends that the subject under inquiry at the time the petitioner was called to testify was “Communist activity in news media.”
It is difficult to imagine a case in which an indictment’s insufficiency resulted so clearly in the indictment’s failure to fulfill its primary office — to inform the defendant of the nature of the accusation against him. Price refused to answer some questions of a Senate subcommittee. He was not told at the time what subject the subcommittee was investigating. The prior record of the subcommittee hearings, with which Price may or may not have been familiar, gave a completely confused and inconsistent account of what, if anything, that subject was. Price was put to trial and convicted upon an indictment which did not even purport to inform him in any way of the identity of the topic under subcommittee inquiry. At every stage in the ensuing criminal proceeding Price was met with a different theory, or by no theory at all, as to what the topic had been. Far from informing Price of the nature of the accusation against him, the indictment instead left the prosecution free to roam at large — to shift its theory of criminality so as to take advantage of each passing vicissitude of the trial and appeal. Yet Price could be guilty of no criminal offense unless the questions he refused to answer were in fact pertinent to a specific topic under subcommittee inquiry at the time he was interrogated. Sinclair v. United States, 279 U. S. 263, at 292.
It has long been recognized that there is an important corollary purpose to be served by the requirement that an indictment set out “the specific offence, coming under the general description,” with which the defendant is charged. This purpose, as defined in United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 558, is “to inform the court of the facts alleged, so that it may decide whether they are sufficient in law to support a conviction, if one should be had.” This criterion is of the greatest relevance here, in the light of the difficulties and uncertainties with which the federal trial and reviewing courts have had to deal in cases arising under 2 U. S. C. § 192, to which reference has already been made. See, e. g., Watkins v. United States, 354 U. S. 178; Deutch v. United States, 367 U. S. 456. Viewed in this context, the rule is designed not alone for the protection of the defendant, but for the benefit of the prosecution as well, by making it possible for courts called upon to pass on the validity of convictions under the statute to bring an enlightened judgment to that task. Cf. Watkins v. United States, supra.
It is argued that any deficiency in the indictments in these cases could have been cured by bills of particulars. But it is a settled rule that a bill of particulars cannot save an invalid indictment. See United States v. Norris, 281 U. S. 619, 622; United States v. Lattimore, 215 F. 2d 847; Babb v. United States, 218 F. 2d 538; Steiner v. United States, 229 F. 2d 745; United States v. Dierker, 164 F. Supp. 304; 4 Anderson, Wharton’s Criminal Law and Procedure, § 1870. When Congress provided that no one could be prosecuted under 2 U. S. C. § 192 except upon an indictment, Congress made the basic decision that only a grand jury could determine whether a person should be held to answer in a criminal trial for refusing to give testimony pertinent to a question under congressional committee inquiry. A grand jury, in order to make that ultimate determination, must necessarily determine what the question under inquiry was. To allow the prosecutor, or the court, to make a subsequent guess as to what was in the minds of the grand jury at the time they returned the indictment would deprive the defendant of a basic protection which the guaranty of the intervention of a grand jury was designed to secure. For a defendant could then be convicted on the basis of facts not found by, and perhaps not even presented to, the grand jury which indicted him. See Orfield, Criminal Procedure from Arrest to Appeal, 243.
This underlying principle is reflected by the settled rule in the federal courts that an indictment may not be amended except by resubmission to the grand jury, unless the change is merely a matter of form. Ex parte Bain, 121 U. S. 1; United States v. Norris, 281 U. S. 619; Stirone v. United States, 361 U. S. 212. “If it lies within the province of a court to change the charging part of an indictment to suit its own notions of what it ought to have been, or what the grand jury would probably have made it if their attention had been called to suggested changes, the great importance which the common law attaches to an indictment by a grand Jury, as a prerequisite to a prisoner’s trial for a crime, and without which the Constitution says ‘no person shall be held to answer,’ may be frittered away until its value is almost destroyed.... Any other doctrine would place the rights of the citizen, which were intended to be protected by the constitutional provision, at the mercy or control of the court or prosecuting attorney; for, if it be once held that changes can be made by the consent or the order of the court in the body of the indictment as presented by the grand jury, and the prisoner can be called upon to answer to the indictment as thus changed, the restriction which the Constitution places upon the power of the court, in regard to the prerequisite of an indictment, in reality no longer exists.” Ex parte Bain, supra, at 10, 13. We reaffirmed this rule only recently, pointing out that “The very purpose of the requirement that a man be indicted by grand jury is to limit his jeopardy to offenses charged by a group of his fellow citizens acting independently of either prosecuting attorney or judge.” Stirone v. United States, supra, at 218.
For these reasons we conclude that an indictment under 2 U. S. C. § 192 must state the question under congressional committee inquiry as found by the grand jury. Only then can the federal courts responsibly carry out the duty which Congress imposed upon them more than a century ago:
“The question must be pertinent to the subject-matter, and that will have to be decided by the courts of justice on the indictment.”
Reversed.
MR. Justice Frankfurter took no part in the decision of these cases.
Mr. Justice Brennan took no part in the consideration or decision of No. 10, Whitman v. United States.
Mr. Justice White took no part in the consideration or decision of these cases.
108 U. S. App. D. C. 140, 280 F. 2d 688; 108 U. S. App. D. C. 153, 280 F. 2d 701; 108 U. S. App. D. C. 226, 281 F. 2d 59; 108 U. S. App. D. C. 160, 280 F. 2d 708; 108 U. S. App. D. C. 167, 280 F. 2d 715; 108 U. S. App. D. C. 130, 280 F. 2d 678.
“Every person who having been summoned as a witness by the authority of either House of Congress to give testimony or to produce papers upon any matter under inquiry before either House, or any joint committee established by a joint or concurrent resolution of the two Houses of Congress, or any committee of either House of Congress, willfully makes default, or who, having appeared, refuses to answer any question pertinent to the question under inquiry, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not more than $1,000 nor less than $100 and imprisonment in a common jail for not less than one month nor more than twelve months.” 2 U. S. C. §192.
No. 8 and No. 128 grew out of hearings before subcommittees of the House Committee on Un-American Activities. The other four cases grew out of hearings before the Internal Security Subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The indictment in No. 8 is typical:
“The Grand Jury charges:
“INTRODUCTION
“On November 17, 1954, in the District of Columbia, a subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities of the House of Representatives was conducting hearings, pursuant to Public Law 601, Section 121, 79th Congress, 2d Session, (60 Stat. 828), and to H. Res. 5, 83d Congress.
“Defendant, Norton Anthony Russell, appeared as a witness before that subcommittee, at the place and on the date above stated, and was asked questions which were pertinent to the question then under inquiry. Then and there'the defendant unlawfully refused to answer those pertinent questions. The allegations of this introduction are adopted and incorporated into the counts of this indictment which follow, each of which counts will in addition merely describe the question which was asked of the defendant and which he refused to answer.”
(The questions which Russell allegedly refused to answer were then quoted verbatim under separately numbered counts.)
The motion in No. 9 is typical:
“The defendant moves that the indictment be dismissed on the following grounds:
“1. The indictment fails to plead the following essential and material elements of the offense:
“e. the nature of the ‘question then under inquiry’ to which the questions addressed to defendant are alleged to be relevant.”
2 U. S. C. § 194 provides:
“Whenever a witness summoned as mentioned in section 192 of this title fails to appear to testify or fails to produce any books, papers, records, or documents, as required, or whenever any witness so summoned refuses to answer any question pertinent to the subject under inquiry before either House, or any joint committee established by a joint or concurrent resolution of the two Houses of Congress, or any committee or subcommittee of either House of Congress, and the fact of such failure or failures is reported to either House while Congress is in session, or when Congress is not in session, a statement of fact constituting such failure is reported to and filed with the President of the Senate or the Speaker of the House, it shall be the duty of the said President of the Senate or Speaker of the House, as the case may be, to certify, and he shall so certify, the statement of facts aforesaid under the seal of the Senate or House, as the case may be, to the appropriate United States attorney, whose duty it shall be to bring the matter before the grand jury for its action.”
The question was presented but not reached in Sacher v. United States, 356 U. S. 576, where the conviction was reversed on other grounds. The question was also raised in the petition for certiorari in Braden v. United States, 365 U. S. 431, but was abandoned when the case was briefed and argued on the merits. Although the question was decided by the lower court in Barenblatt v. United States, 100 U. S. App. D. C. 13, 240 F. 2d 875, it was not raised in this Court, 360 U. S. 109.
The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has passed on the question, holding that the indictment need not set forth the subject under committee inquiry. See Barenblatt v. United States, 100 U. S. App. D. C. 13, 240 F. 2d 875; Sacher v. United States, 102 U. S. App. D. C. 264, 252 F. 2d 828. Indictments returned in that circuit of course reflect this rule. See cases cited in Mr. Justice Harlan’s dissenting opinion, post, p. 782, n. 2. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit sustained an indictment under 2 U. S. C. § 192 which did not set forth the subject under inquiry in United States v. Josephson, 165 F. 2d 82. However, Josephson appears to have been substantially limited by the same court in United States v. Lamont, 236 F. 2d 312, and indictments under 2 U. S. C. § 192 currently being returned in the Second Circuit do in fact set forth the subject under inquiry. See the unreported indictments in United States v. Yarus (D. C. S. D. N. Y.) No. C 152-239 (the opinion acquitting defendant Yarus is reported at 198 F. Supp. 425); United
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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C
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Jackson
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Interstate Commerce Commission, acting under § 19 (a) of the Interstate Commerce Act, ordered the appellant to furnish certain inventories, schedules, maps and charts of its pipe line property. Champlin’s objections that the Act does not authorize the order, or if it be construed to do so is unconstitutional, were overruled by the Commission and again by the District Court which dismissed the company’s suit for an injunction. These questions of law are brought here by appeal. Judicial Code § 238, 28 U. S. C. § 345.
Champlin owns and operates a line of six-inch pipe five hundred and sixteen miles in length lying in five states. Originating at Champlin’s Enid, Oklahoma refinery, it crosses Kansas, Nebraska, a part of South Dakota, and ends in Iowa. It is used only to convey the company’s own refinery products to its own terminal stations at Hutchinson, Kansas; Superior, Nebraska; and Rock Rapids, Iowa, at each of which the line connects with storage facilities from which deliveries are made.
The statute, so far as relevant, says that it shall apply “to common carriers engaged in” “transportation of oil or other commodity” by pipe line from one state to another. It provides also that “common carrier” includes “all pipeline companies.” This language on its face would seem to cover the appellant’s operation.
Champlin contends, however, that the “transportation” mentioned in the Act does not refer to the carriage of one’s -own goods. The District Court has found that Champlin is the sole owner of the products transported through its pipe line; it has never transported, offered to transport, or been asked to transport any products belonging to any other company or person; its pipe line does not connect with any other pipe line but only with storage tanks at the three terminal points; there are no facilities for putting any petroleum product into the line other than at the Enid refinery; delivery of the products at the three terminal points is made from Champlin’s storage tanks by means of truck racks or railroad tank car racks and is not made directly from the pipe line in any instance; no tariffs stating ‘ transportation charges have been filed with the Interstate Commerce Commission or with any state commission or regulatory body.
Because of these facts the appellant suggests that the language and holding of this Court concerning the Uncle Sam Oil Company in The Pipe Line Cases, 234 U. S. 548, approved in Valvoline Oil Company v. United States, 308 U. S. 141, govern this case. The Uncle Sam Company operation is described as “simply drawing oil from its own wells across a state line to its own refinery for its own use, and that is all . . . .” The Pipe Line Cases, 234 U. S. 548, 562. The Court considered this was not “transportation” within the meaning of the Act.
But we think it would expand the actual holding of that case to apply its conclusion to Champlin. The controlling fact under the statute is transporting commodities from state to state by pipe line. Admittedly Champlin is not a common carrier in the sense of the common law carrier for hire. However, the Act does not stop at this but goes on to say that its use of the term “common carrier” is to include all pipe line companies — a meaningless addition if it thereby included only what the term without more always had included. While Champlin technically is transporting its own oil, manufacturing processes have been completed; the oil is not being moved for Champlin’s own use. These interstate facilities are operated to put its finished products in the market in interstate commerce at the greatest economic advantage.
Examination of Champlin’s pricing methods supports the view that appellant is engaged in transportation even though the products are still its own when moved. The District Court found that price at the terminal points includes f. o. b. price at the Enid refinery and an additional sum called a differential. The differential is the through railroad freight rate from Enid to the final destination (usually the purchaser’s place of business), less the carrying charges from the pipe line terminal to final destination. The District Court found, however, that competitive and other conditions “sometimes cause departures from the prices arrived at in accordance with the formula above described.” Appellant states that as to some deliveries “rail rates were used merely as a basis for calculating a delivered price, not as a charge for transportation.” Even so, and even though departures from the calculated differential are substantial and frequent, we think this practice points up a significant distinction'from the Uncle Sam case.
We hold that Champlin’s operation is transportation within the meaning of the Act and that the statute supports the Commission’s order to furnish information.
Appellant further contends that, as so construed, the Act exceeds the commerce power of Congress and violates the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment because, it is argued, this interpretation converts a private pipe line into a public utility and requires a private carrier to become a common carrier. But our conclusion rests on no such basis and affords no such implication. The power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce is not dependent on the technical common carrier status but is quite as extensive over a private carrier. This power has yet been invoked only to the extent of requiring Champlin to furnish certain information as to facilities being used in interstate marketing of its products. The commerce power is adequate to support this requirement whether appellant be considered a private carrier or a common carrier.
• The contention that the statute as so construed violates the due process clause by imposing upon a private carrier the obligations of a conventional common carrier for hire is too premature and hypothetical to warrant consideration on this record. The appellant in its entire period of operation has never been asked to carry the products of another and may never be. So far, the Commission has made no order which changes the appellant’s obligations to-any other company or person. If it does, it will be timely to consider concrete requirements and their specific effects on appellant. At present, appellant is asked only to provide information about a subject within the power possessed by Congress and delegated to the Commission, and that cannot be considered a taking of property even if it arouses appellant’s premonitions.
We hold that the order before us is authorized by statute and that in this respect the statute is within the commerce power and does not offend the Fifth Amendment.
Affirmed.
“. . . the commission shall . . . investigate, ascertain, and report the value of all the property owned or used by every common carrier subject to the provisions of this Act. . . . The commission shall make an inventory which shall list the property of every common carrier subject to the provisions of this Act in detail, and show the value thereof as hereinafter provided, and shall classify the physical property, as nearly as practicable, in conformity with the classification of expenditures for road and equipment, as prescribed by the Interstate Commerce Commission.” 37 Stat. 701, 49 U. S. C. § 19a.
On May 15, 1941, the Interstate Commerce Commission, by letter addressed to the president of the Champlin Refining Company, requested that the company prepare and file with the Commission “a complete inventory of the pipe line property of the Champlin Refining Company, except land, showing the quantities, units, classes, kinds, and condition thereof.” The Commission enclosed with its letter copies of its Valuation Orders Nos. 26 and 27, with which the inventory was to comply. The Champlin company did not respond to the request in a manner satisfactory to the Commission, and on June 12, 1944, the Commission made the order of which the company here complains. It directed the company to comply with the provisions of Valuation Orders Nos. 26 and 27 within ninety days of the service of the order.
In response to the Commission’s letter of May 15, 1941, the Champlin company filed with the Commission information and charts which it believed would satisfy the Commission’s request. The Commission, however, returned that report to the company, because in it the company had not recognized that it was a statutory common carrier and had not compiled the report from that viewpoint. The company then requested a hearing before the Commission to determine its status. On December 14, 1942, and on reargument, June 12, 1944, the Commission decided that appellant is a common carrier subject to the provisions of the Act. After the Commission had issued its supplementary order of June 12, 1944, appellant petitioned the district court for an injunction against the order. In accordance with §§ 46 and 47 of Title 28, U. S. C., the district judge convened a three judge court, which heard the case and dismissed appellant's petition.
§ 1. “(1) That the provisions of this Act shall apply to common carriers engaged in—
“(b) The transportation of oil or other commodity ... by pipe line . . . from one State ... to any other State . . .
“(3) (a) The term‘common carrier’as used in this Act shall include all pipe-line companies; express companies; sleeping-car companies; and all persons, natural or artificial, engaged in such transportation as aforesaid as common carriers for hire.” 41 Stat. 474, as amended, 48 Stat. 1102, 49 U. S. C. § 1. The last words of § 1 (3) (a), “engaged in such transportation as aforesaid as common carriers for hire,” do “not affect the generality of the first clause as to pipe-line companies.” Valvoline Oil Co. v. United States, 308 U. S. 141, 146.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
2. Subject to paragraph B(3), Montana may place a call on the Tongue River whenever (a) a pre-1950 direct flow right in Montana is not receiving the water to which it is entitled, or (b) Montana reasonably believes, based on substantial evidence, that the Tongue River Reservoir might not fill before the end of the water year.
3. Montana cannot place a call under Article V(A) when it can remedy shortages of pre-1950 appropriators in Montana through purely intrastate means that do not prejudice Montana's other rights under the Compact.
4. A call need not take any particular form, use any specific language, or be delivered by or to any particular official, but should be sufficient to place Wyoming on clear notice that Montana needs additional water to satisfy its pre-1950 appropriative rights.
5. A call is effective upon receipt by Wyoming and continues in effect until Montana notifies Wyoming that Montana is lifting the call.
6. Montana shall promptly notify Wyoming that it is lifting a call when (a) pre-1950 direct flow rights in Montana are receiving the water to which they are entitled, and (b) Montana reasonably believes, based on substantial evidence, that the Tongue River Reservoir will fill before the end of the water year. Montana may place a new call at a later date if the conditions of paragraph B(2) are again met.
7. Upon receiving a call, Wyoming shall promptly initiate action to ensure, to the degree physically possible, that only pre-1950 appropriators in Wyoming are diverting or storing surface water and only to the degree permitted by their appropriative rights and this Decree. Wyoming also shall promptly initiate any action needed to ensure, to the degree physically possible, that any groundwater withdrawals under post-January 1, 1950 appropriative rights are not interfering with the continued enjoyment of pre-1950 surface rights in Montana. Wyoming shall be liable for diversions, storage, or withdrawals in violation of Article V(A) of the Compact even if it was not physically possible for Wyoming to prevent the diversions, storage, or withdrawals during a call (including depletions caused by groundwater withdrawals occurring before the call). Where it is initially not physically possible to prevent the storage of water in violation of Article V(A), Wyoming shall deliver such water to Montana as soon as it is physically possible to do so after a request from Montana.
C. Pre-1950 Appropriative Rights
1. The Compact assigns the same seniority level to all pre-1950 water users in Montana and Wyoming. Except as otherwise provided in this Decree, the exercise of pre-1950 appropriative rights in Wyoming does not violate the Compact rights of pre-1950 appropriative rights in Montana.
2. Article V(A) does not prohibit Montana or Wyoming from allowing a pre-1950 appropriator to conserve water through the adoption of improved irrigation techniques and then use that water to irrigate the lands to which the specific pre-1950 appropriative right attaches, even when the increased consumption interferes with pre-1950 uses in Montana. Article V(A) protects pre-1950 appropriators in Montana from the use of such conserved water in Wyoming on new lands or for new purposes. Such uses fall within Article V(B) of the Compact and cannot interfere with pre-1950 appropriative rights in Montana.
3. Pre-1950 appropriators in Montana and Wyoming may change their place of use, type of use, and point of diversion pursuant to applicable state law, so long as any such changes do not injure appropriators in the other States as evaluated at the time of the change.
D. Wyoming Storage Reservoirs
1. Post-January 1, 1950 appropriators in Wyoming may not store water when Montana has issued a call, except as provided in paragraph B(7) of this Decree. Post-January 1, 1950 appropriators in Wyoming may store water during periods when a call is not in effect.
2. Water stored under post-January 1, 1950 appropriative rights in Wyoming when a call is not in effect has been legally stored under the Compact and can be subsequently used at any time, including when pre-1950 appropriative rights in Montana are unsatisfied. The Compact does not require Wyoming to release such water to Montana in response to a call.
E. Tongue River Reservoir
1. Article V(A) protects Montana's right to store each water year (October 1 to September 30) up to, but not more than, 72,500 acre feet of water in the Tongue River Reservoir, less carryover storage in excess of 6,571 acre feet. If the Tongue River Reservoir begins the water year on October 1 with over 6,571 acre feet of carryover water, Article V(A) protects Montana's right to fill the Tongue River Reservoir to its current capacity of 79,071 acre feet.
2. Montana must avoid wasting water in its operation of the Tongue River Reservoir by not permitting outflows during winter months that are not dictated by good engineering practices. Any wasteful outflows reduce the amount of water storage protected under Article V(A) for that water year by an equal volume.
3. The reasonable range for winter outflows from the Tongue River Reservoir is 75 to 175 cubic feet per second. The appropriate outflow at any particular point of time varies within this range and depends on the specific conditions, including, but not limited to, the needs of downstream appropriative water rights and risks such as ice jams and flooding. Montana enjoys significant discretion in setting the appropriate outflow within this range and in other reservoir operations.
F. General Reservoir Rules
1. Article V(A) of the Compact does not protect water stored exclusively for non-depletive purposes, such as hydroelectric generation and fish protection.
2. Montana and Wyoming must operate and regulate reservoirs on the Tongue River and its tributaries in a fashion that is generally consistent with the appropriation laws and rules that govern similar reservoirs elsewhere in each respective State.
G. Exchange of Information
1. Within 30 days of the entry of this Decree, Montana and Wyoming each shall provide the other State with a list of its current surface water rights in the Tongue River basin, including information on which rights are pre-1950 and which are post-January 1, 1950. Montana and Wyoming thereafter will annually inform the other State of any changes in these water rights, unless such information is publicly and readily available to the other State.
2. If requested, Montana and Wyoming also shall provide the other State annually with any data available in the ordinary course of water administration that shows the location and amount of groundwater pumping in the Tongue River and Powder River basins, except where the groundwater is used exclusively for domestic or stock water uses as defined in Article II of the Compact.
3. Montana and Wyoming shall exchange information, as reasonable and appropriate, relevant to the effective implementation of Article V(A) of the Compact. In particular, Wyoming in response to a call shall notify Montana of the actions that it intends to take and has taken in response to the call, and when requested, provide Montana with reasonable assurances and documentation of these actions. In making a call, Montana in turn will notify Wyoming of any intrastate actions it has taken to remedy shortages of pre-1950 appropriators, and when requested, provide Wyoming with reasonable assurances and documentation of these actions.
4. The Yellowstone River Compact Commission remains free to modify or supplement the terms of the provisions of paragraph G of this Decree pursuant to its authority under the Compact.
H. Rights of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe
Nothing in this Decree addresses or determines the water rights of any Indian Tribe or Indian reservation or the status of such rights under the Yellowstone River Compact.
I. Retention of Jurisdiction
Any of the parties may apply at the foot of this Decree for its amendment or for further relief. The Court retains jurisdiction to entertain such further proceedings, enter such orders, and issue such writs as it may from time to time deem necessary or desirable to give proper force and effect to this Decree.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
K
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Kennedy
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1974, Congress enacted the Legal Services Corporation Act, 88 Stat. 378, 42 U. S. C. §2996 et seq. The Act establishes the Legal Services Corporation (LSC) as a District of Columbia nonprofit corporation. LSC’s mission is to distribute funds appropriated by Congress to eligible local grantee organizations “for the purpose of providing financial support for legal assistance in noncriminal proceedings or matters to persons financially unable to afford legal assistance.” § 2996b(a).
LSC grantees consist of hundreds of local organizations governed, in the typical case, by local boards of directors. In many instances the grantees are funded by a combination of LSC funds and other public or private sources. The grantee organizations hire and supervise lawyers to provide free legal assistance to indigent clients. Each year LSC appropriates funds to grantees or recipients that hire and supervise lawyers for various professional activities, including representation of indigent clients seeking welfare benefits.
This suit requires us to decide whether one of the conditions imposed by Congress on the use of LSC funds violates the First Amendment rights of LSC grantees and their clients. For purposes of our decision, the restriction, to be quoted in further detail, prohibits legal representation funded by recipients of LSC moneys if the representation involves an effort to amend or otherwise challenge existing welfare law. As interpreted by the LSC and by the Government, the restriction prevents an attorney from arguing to a court that a state statute conflicts with a federal statute or that either a state or federal statute by its terms or in its application is violative of the United States Constitution.
Lawyers employed by New York City LSC grantees, together with private LSC contributors, LSC indigent clients, and various state and local public officials whose governments contribute to LSC grantees, brought suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York to declare the restriction, among other provisions of the Act, invalid. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit approved an injunction against enforcement of the provision as an impermissible viewpoint-based discrimination in violation of the First Amendment, 164 F. 3d 757 (1999). We granted certiorari, and the parties who commenced the suit in the District Court are here as respondents. The LSC as petitioner is joined by the Government of the United States, which had intervened in the District Court. We agree that the restriction violates the First Amendment, and we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
I
From the inception of the LSC, Congress has placed restrictions on its use of funds. For instance, the LSC Act prohibits recipients from making available LSC funds, program personnel, or equipment to any political party, to any political campaign, or for use in “advocating or opposing any ballot measures.” 42 U. S. C. § 2996e(d)(4). See § 2996e(d)(3). The Act further proscribes use of funds in most criminal proceedings and in litigation involving non-therapeutic abortions, secondary school desegregation, military desertion, or violations of the Selective Service statute. §§2996f(b)(8)-(10) (1994 ed. and Supp. IV). Fund recipients are barred from bringing class-action suits unless express approval is obtained from LSC. § 2996e(d)(5).
The restrictions at issue were part of a compromise set of restrictions enacted in the Omnibus Consolidated Rescis-sions and Appropriations Act of 1996 (1996 Act), §604, 110 Stat. 1321-53, and continued in each subsequent annual appropriations Act. The relevant portion of §504(a)(16) prohibits funding of any organization
“that initiates legal representation or participates in any other way, in litigation, lobbying, or rulemaking, involving an effort to reform a Federal or State welfare system, except that this paragraph shall not be construed to preclude a recipient from representing an individual eligible client who is seeking specific relief from a welfare agency if such relief does not involve an effort to amend or otherwise challenge existing law in effect on the date of the initiation of the representation.”
The prohibitions apply to all of the activities of an LSC grantee, including those paid for by non-LSC funds. §§ 504(d)(1) and (2). We are concerned with the statutory provision which excludes LSC representation in cases which “involve an effort to amend or otherwise challenge existing law in effect on the date of the initiation of the representation.”
In 1997, LSC adopted final regulations clarifying § 504(a)(16). 45 CFR pt. 1639 (1999). LSC interpreted the statutory provision to allow indigent clients to challenge welfare agency determinations of benefit ineligibility under interpretations of existing law. For example, an LSC grantee could represent a welfare claimant who argued that an agency made an erroneous factual determination or that an agency misread or misapplied a term contained in an existing welfare statute. According to LSC, a grantee in that position could argue as well that an agency policy violated existing law. §1639.4. Under LSC’s interpretation, however, grantees could not accept representations designed to change welfare laws, much less argue against the constitutionality or statutory validity of those laws. Brief for Petitioner in No. 99-603, p. 7. Even in cases where constitutional or statutory challenges .became apparent after representation was well under way, LSC advised that its attorneys must withdraw. Ibid.
After the instant suit was filed in the District Court alleging the restrictions on the use of LSC funds violated the First Amendment, see 985 F. Supp. 323 (1997), the court denied a preliminary injunction, finding no probability of success on the merits. Id., at 344.
On appeal, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. 164 F. 3d 757 (1999). As relevant for our purposes, the court addressed respondents’ challenges to the restrictions in §504(a)(16). It concluded the section specified four categories of prohibited activities, of which “three appeared] to prohibit the type of activity named regardless of viewpoint, while one might be read to prohibit the activity only when it seeks reform.” Id., at 768. The court upheld the restrictions on litigation, lobbying, and rulemaking “involving an effort to reform a Federal or State welfare system,” since all three prohibited grantees’ involvement in these activities regardless of the side of the issue. Id., at 768-769.
The court next considered the exception to §504(a)(16) that allows representation of “ ‘an individual eligible client who is seeking specific relief from a welfare agency.’” The court invalidated, as impermissible viewpoint discrimination, the qualification that representation could “not involve an effort to amend or otherwise challenge existing law,” because it “clearly seeks to discourage challenges to the status quo.” Id., at 769-770.
Left to decide what part of the 1996 Act to strike as invalid, the court concluded that congressional intent regarding severability was unclear. It decided to “invalidate the smallest possible portion of the statute, excising only the viewpoint-based proviso rather than the entire exception of which it is a part.” Id., at 773.
Dissenting in part, Judge Jacobs agreed with the majority except for its holding that the proviso banning challenges to existing welfare laws effected impermissible viewpoint-based discrimination. The provision, in his view, was permissible because it merely defined the scope of services to be funded. Id., at 773-778 (opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part).
LSC filed a petition for certiorari challenging the Court of Appeals’ conclusion that the § 504(a)(16) suits-for-benefits proviso was unconstitutional. We granted certiorari, 529 U. S. 1052 (2000).
II
The United States and LSC rely on Rust v. Sullivan, 500 U. S. 173 (1991), as support for the LSC program restrictions. In Rust, Congress established program clinics to provide subsidies for doctors to advise patients on a variety of family planning topics. Congress did not consider abortion to be within its family planning objectives, however, and it forbade doctors employed by the program from discussing abortion with their patients. Id., at 179-180. Recipients of funds under Title X of the Public Health Service Act, §§ 1002, 1008, as added, 84 Stat. 1506, 1508, 42 U.S.C. §§300a, 300a-6, challenged the Act’s restriction that provided that none of the Title X funds appropriated for family planning services could “be used in programs where abortion is a method of family planning.” §3Q0a-6. The recipients argued that the regulations constituted impermissible viewpoint discrimination favoring an antiabortion position over a proabortion approach in the sphere of family planning. 500 U. S., at 192. They asserted as well that Congress had imposed an unconstitutional condition on recipients of federal funds by requiring them to relinquish their right to engage in abortion advocacy and counseling in exchange for the subsidy. Id., at 196.
We upheld the law, reasoning that Congress had not discriminated against viewpoints on abortion, but had “merely chosen to fund one activity to the exclusion of the other.” Id., at 193. The restrictions were considered necessary “to ensure that the limits of the federal program [were] observed.” Ibid. Title X did not single out a particular idea for suppression because it was dangerous or disfavored; rather, Congress prohibited Title X doctors from counseling that was outside the scope of the project. Id., at 194-195.
The Court in Rust did not place explicit reliance on the rationale that the counseling activities of the doctors under Title X amounted to governmental speech; when interpreting the holding in later cases, however, we have explained Rust on this understanding. We have said that viewpoint-based funding decisions can be sustained in instances in which the government is itself the speaker, see Board of Regents of Univ. of Wis. System v. Southworth, 529 U. S. 217, 229, 235 (2000), or instances, like Rust, in which the government “used private speakers to transmit specific information pertaining to its own program.” Rosenberger v. Rector and Visitors of Univ. of Va., 515 U. S. 819, 833 (1995). As we said in Rosenberger, “[w]hen the government disburses public funds to private entities to convey a governmental message, it may take legitimate and appropriate steps to ensure that its message is neither garbled nor distorted by the grantee.” Ibid. The latitude which may exist for restrictions on speech where the government’s own message is being delivered flows in part from our observation that, “[w]hen the government speaks, for instance to promote its own policies or to advance a particular idea, it is, in the end, accountable to the electorate and the political process for its advocacy. If the citizenry objects, newly elected officials later could espouse some different or contrary position.” Board of Regents of Univ. of Wis. System v. Southworth, supra, at 235.
Neither the latitude for government speech nor its rationale applies to subsidies for private speech in every instance, however. As we have pointed out, “[i]t does not follow . . . that viewpoint-based restrictions are proper when the [government] does not itself speak or subsidize transmittal of a message it favors but instead expends funds to encourage a diversity of views from private speakers.” Rosenberger, supra, at 834.
Although the LSC program differs from the program at issue in Rosenberger in that its purpose is not to “encourage a diversity of views,” the salient point is that, like the program in Rosenberger, the LSC program was designed to facilitate private speech, not to promote a governmental message. Congress funded LSC grantees to provide attorneys to represent thé interests of indigent clients. In the specific context of § 504(a)(16) suits for benefits, an LSC-funded attorney speaks on the behalf of the client in a claim against the government for welfare benefits. The lawyer is not the government’s speaker. The attorney defending the decision to deny benefits will deliver the government’s message in the litigation. The LSC lawyer, however, speaks on the behalf of his or her private, indigent client. Cf. Polk County v. Dodson, 454 U. S. 312, 321-322 (1981) (holding that a public defender does not act “under color of state law” because he “works under canons of professional responsibility that mandate his exercise of independent judgment on behalf of the client” and because there is an “assumption that counsel will be free of state control”).
The Government has designed this program to use the legal profession and the established Judiciary of the States and the Federal Government to accomplish its end of assisting welfare claimants in determination or receipt of their benefits. The advice from the attorney to the client and the advocacy by the attorney to the courts cannot be classified as governmental speech even under a generous understanding of the concept. In this vital respect this suit is distinguishable from Rust.
The private nature of the speech involved here, and the extent of LSC’s regulation of private expression, are indicated further by the circumstance that the Government seeks to use an existing medium of expression and to control it, in a class of eases, in ways which distort its usual functioning. Where the government uses or attempts to regulate a particular medium, we have been informed by its accepted usage in determining whether a particular restriction on speech is necessary for the program’s purposes and limitations. In FCC v. League of Women Voters of Cal., 468 U. S. 364 (1984), the Court was instructed by its understanding of the dynamics of the broadcast industry in holding that prohibitions against editorializing by public radio networks were an impermissible restriction, even though the Government enacted the restriction to control the use of public funds. The First Amendment forbade the Government from using the forum in an unconventional way to suppress speech inherent in the nature of the medium. See id., at 396-397. In Arkansas Ed. Television Common v. Forbes, 523 U. S. 666, 676 (1998), the dynamics of the broadcasting system gave station programmers the right to use editorial judgment to exclude certain speech so that the broadcast message could be more effective. And in Rosenberger, the fact that student newspapers expressed many different points of view was an important foundation for the Court’s decision to invalidate viewpoint-based restrictions. 515 U. S., at 836.
When the government creates a limited forum for speech, certain restrictions may be necessary to define the limits and purposes of the program. Perry Ed. Assn. v. Perry Local Educators’ Assn., 460 U. S. 37 (1983); see also Lamb’s Chapel v. Center Moriches Union Free School Dist., 508 U. S. 384 (1993). The same is true when the government establishes a subsidy for specified ends. Rust v. Sullivan, 500 U. S. 173 (1991). As this suit involves a subsidy, limited forum cases such as Perry, Lamb’s Chapel, and Rosenberger may not be controlling in a strict sense, yet they do provide some instruction. Here the program presumes that private, nongovernmental speech is necessary, and a substantial restriction is placed upon that speech. At oral argument and in its briefs the LSC advised us that lawyers funded in the Government program may not undertake representation in suits for benefits if they must advise clients respecting the questionable validity of a statute which defines benefit eligibility and the payment structure. The limitation forecloses advice or legal assistance to question the validity of statutes under the Constitution of the United States. It extends further, it must be noted, so that state statutes inconsistent with federal law under the Supremacy Clause may be neither challenged nor questioned.
By providing subsidies to LSC, the Government seeks to facilitate suits for benefits by using the state and federal courts and the independent bar on which those courts depend for the proper performance of their duties and responsibilities. Restricting LSC attorneys in advising their clients and in presenting arguments and analyses to the courts distorts the legal system by altering the traditional role of the attorneys in much the same way broadcast systems or student publication networks were changed in the limited forum cases we have cited. Just as government in those cases could not elect to use a broadcasting network or a college publication structure in a regime which prohibits speech necessary to the proper functioning of those systems, see Arkansas Ed. Television Comm’n, supra, and Rosenberger, supra, it may not design a subsidy to effect this serious and fundamental restriction on advocacy of attorneys and the functioning of the judiciary.
LSC has advised us, furthermore, that upon determining a question of statutory validity is present in any anticipated or pending ease or controversy, the LSC-funded attorney must cease the representation at once. This is true whether the validity issue becomes apparent during initial attorney-client consultations or in the midst of litigation proceedings. A disturbing example of the restriction was discussed during oral argument before the Court. It is well understood that when there are two reasonable constructions for a statute, yet one raises a constitutional question, the Court should prefer the interpretation which avoids the constitutional issue. Gomez v. United States, 490 U. S. 858, 864 (1989); Ashwander v. TVA, 297 U. S. 288, 346-348 (1936) (Brandeis, J., concurring). Yet, as the LSC advised the Court, if, during litigation, a judge were to ask an LSC attorney whether there was a constitutional concern, the LSC attorney simply could not answer. Tr. of Oral Arg. 8-9.
Interpretation of the law and the Constitution is the primary mission of the judiciary when it acts within the sphere of its authority to resolve a case or controversy. Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 177 (1803) (“It is emphatically the province and the duty of the judicial department to say what the law is”). An informed, independent judiciary presumes an informed, independent bar. Under §504(a)(16), however, eases would be presented by LSC attorneys who could not advise the courts of serious questions of statutory validity. The disability is inconsistent with the proposition that attorneys should present all the reasonable and well-grounded arguments necessary for proper resolution of the case. By seeking to prohibit the analysis of certain legal issues and to truncate presentation to the courts, the enactment under review prohibits speech and expression upon which courts must depend for the proper exercise of the judicial power. Congress cannot wrest the law from the Constitution which is its source. “Those then who controvert the principle that the constitution is to be considered, in court, as a paramount law, are reduced to the necessity of maintaining that courts must close their eyes on the constitution, and see only the law.” Id., at 178.
The restriction imposed by the statute here threatens severe impairment of the judicial function. Section 504(a)(16) sifts out cases presenting constitutional challenges in order to insulate the Government’s laws from judicial inquiry. If the restriction on speech and legal advice were to stand, the result would be two tiers of cases. In cases where LSC counsel were attorneys of record, there would be lingering doubt whether the truncated representation had resulted in complete analysis of the case, full advice to the client, and proper presentation to the court. The courts and the public would come to question the adequacy and fairness of professional representations when the attorney, either consciously to comply with this statute or unconsciously to continue the representation despite the statute, avoided all reference to questions of statutory validity and constitutional authority. A scheme so inconsistent with accepted separation-of-powers principles is an insufficient basis to sustain or uphold the restriction on speech.
It is no answer to say the restriction on speech is harmless because, under LSC’s interpretation of the Act, its attorneys can withdraw. This misses the point. The statute is an attempt to draw lines around the LSC program to exclude from litigation those arguments and theories Congress finds unacceptable but which by their nature are within the province of the courts to consider.
The restriction on speech is even more problematic because in cases where the attorney withdraws from a representation, the client is unlikely to find other counsel. The explicit premise for providing LSC attorneys is the necessity to make available representation “to persons financially unable to afford legal assistance.” 42 U. S. C. § 2996(a)(3). There often will be no alternative source for the client to receive vital information respecting constitutional and statutory rights bearing upon claimed benefits. Thus, with respect to the litigation services Congress has funded, there is no alternative channel for expression of the advocacy Congress seeks to restrict. This is in stark contrast to Rust. There, a patient could receive the approved Title X family planning counseling funded by the Government and later could consult an affiliate or independent organization to receive abortion counseling. Unlike indigent clients who seek LSC representation, the patient in Rust was not required to forfeit the Government-funded advice when she also received abortion counseling through alternative channels. Because LSC attorneys must withdraw whenever a question of a welfare statute’s validity arises, an individual could not obtain joint representation so that the constitutional challenge would be presented by a non-LSC attorney, and other, permitted, arguments advanced by LSC counsel.
Finally, LSC and the Government maintain that § 504(a)(16) is necessary to define the scope and contours of the federal program, a condition that ensures funds can be spent for those cases most immediate to congressional concern. In support of this contention, they suggest the challenged limitation takes into account the nature of the grantees’ activities and provides limited congressional funds for the provision of simple suits for benefits. In petitioners’ view, the restriction operates neither to maintain the current welfare system nor insulate it from attack; rather, it helps the current welfare system function in a more efficient and fair manner by removing from the program complex challenges to existing welfare laws.
The effect of the restriction, however, is to prohibit advice or argumentation that existing welfare laws are unconstitutional or unlawful. Congress cannot recast a condition on funding as a mere definition of its program in every case, lest the First Amendment be reduced to a simple semantic exercise. Here, notwithstanding Congress’ purpose to confine and limit its program, the restriction operates to insulate current welfare laws from constitutional scrutiny and certain other legal challenges, a condition implicating central First Amendment concerns. In no lawsuit funded by the Government can the LSC attorney, speaking on behalf of a private client, challenge existing welfare laws. As a result, arguments by indigent clients that a welfare statute is unlawful or unconstitutional cannot be expressed in this Government-funded program for petitioning the courts, even though the program was created for litigation involving welfare benefits, and even though the ordinary course of litigation involves the expression of theories and postulates on both, or multiple, sides of an issue. “
It is fundamental that the First Amendment “ Vas fashioned to assure unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people.”’ New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 269 (1964) (quoting Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476, 484 (1957)). There can be little doubt that the LSC Act funds constitutionally protected expression; and in the context of this statute there is no programmatic message of the kind recognized in Rust and which sufficed there to allow the Government to specify the advice deemed necessary for its legitimate objectives. This serves to distinguish §504(a)(16) from any of the Title X program restrictions upheld in Rust, and to place it beyond any congressional funding condition approved in the past by this Court.
Congress was not required to fund an LSC attorney to represent indigent clients; and when it did so, it was not required to fund the whole range of legal representations or relationships. The LSC and the United States, however, in effect ask us to permit Congress to define the scope of the litigation it funds to exclude certain vital theories and ideas. The attempted restriction is designed to insulate the Government’s interpretation of the Constitution from judicial challenge. The Constitution does not permit the Government to confine litigants and their attorneys in this manner. We must be vigilant when Congress imposes rules and conditions which in effect insulate its own laws from legitimate judicial challenge. Where private speech is involved, even Congress’ antecedent funding decision cannot be aimed at the suppression of ideas thought inimical to the Government’s own interest. Regan v. Taxation With Representation of Wash., 461 U. S. 540, 548 (1988); Speiser v. Randall, 357 U. S. 513, 519 (1958).
For the reasons we have set forth, the funding condition is invalid. The Court of Appeals considered whether the language restricting LSC attorneys could be severed from the statute so that the remaining portions would remain operative. It reached the reasoned conclusion to invalidate the fragment of §504(a)(16) found contrary to the First Amendment, leaving the balance of the statute operative and in place. That determination was not discussed in the briefs of either party or otherwise contested here, and in the exercise of our discretion and prudential judgment we decline to address it.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Affirmed.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Ginsburg
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents a question of statutory interpretation regarding revocation of a federal sentence of probation. The law at issue provides that if a person serving a sentence of probation possesses illegal drugs, “the court shall revoke the sentence of probation and sentence the defendant to not less than one-third of the original sentence.” 18 U. S. C. § 3565(a). Congress did not further define the critical term “original sentence,” nor are those words, unmodified, used elsewhere in the Federal Criminal Code chapter on sentencing. Embedded in that context, the words “original sentence” in § 3565(a) are susceptible to at least three interpretations.
Read in isolation, the provision could be taken to mean the reimposition of a sentence of probation, for a period not less than one-third of the original sentence of probation. This construction, however, is implausible, and has been urged by neither party, for it would generally demand no increased sanction, plainly not what Congress intended.
The Government, petitioner here, reads the provision to draw the time period from the initially imposed sentence of probation, but to require incarceration, not renewed probation, for not less than one-third of that period. On the Government’s reading, accepted by the District Court, respondent Granderson would face a 20-month mandatory minimum sentence of imprisonment.
Granderson maintains that “original sentence” refers to the sentence of incarceration he could have received initially, in lieu of the sentence of probation, under the United States Sentencing Guidelines. Granderson’s construction calls for a 2-month mandatory minimum. The Court of Appeals accepted Granderson’s interpretation, see 969 F. 2d 980 (CA11 1992); returns in other Circuits are divided.
The “original sentence” prescription of § 3565(a) was a late-hour addition to the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988, a sprawling enactment that takes up 364 pages in the Statutes at Large. Pub. L. 100-690,102 Stat. 4181-4545. The provision appears not to have received Congress’ careful attention. It may have been composed, we suggest below, with the pre-1984 federal sentencing regime in the drafters’ minds; it does not easily adapt to the regime established by the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984.
According the statute a sensible construction, we recognize, in common with all courts that have grappled with the “original sentence” conundrum, that Congress prescribed imprisonment as the type of punishment for drug-possessing probationers. As to the duration of that punishment, we rest on the principle that “‘the Court will not interpret a federal criminal statute so as to increase the penalty . . . when such an interpretation can be based on no more than a guess as to what Congress intended.’” Bifulco v. United States, 447 U. S. 381, 387 (1980), quoting Ladner v. United States, 358 U. S. 169, 178 (1958). We therefore adopt Granderson’s interpretation and affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
I
Granderson, a letter carrier, pleaded guilty to one count of destruction of mail, in violation of 18 U. S. C. § 1703(a). Under the Sentencing Guidelines, the potential imprisonment range, derived from the character of the offense and the offender’s criminal history category, was 0-6 months. The District Court imposed no prison time, but sentenced Granderson to five years’ probation and a $2,000 fine. As a standard condition of probation, Granderson was required to submit periodically to urinary testing for illegal drug use.
Several weeks after his original sentencing, Granderson tested positive for cocaine, and his probation officer petitioned for revocation of the sentence of probation. Finding that Granderson had possessed cocaine, the District Court revoked Granderson’s sentence of probation and undertook to resentence him, pursuant to § 3565(a), to incarceration for “not less than one-third of the original sentence.” The term “original sentence,” the District Court concluded, referred to the term of probation actually imposed (60 months) rather than the imprisonment range authorized by the Guidelines (0-6 months). The court accordingly sentenced Granderson to 20 months’ imprisonment.
The Court of Appeals upheld the revocation of the sentence of probation but vacated Granderson’s new sentence. 969 F. 2d 980 (CA11 1992). That court observed that the probation revocation sentence of 20 months’ imprisonment imposed by the District Court was far longer than the sentence that could have been imposed either for the underlying crime of destroying mail (six months) or for the crime of cocaine possession (one year). Id., at 983, and n. 2. The Court of Appeals called it “legal alchemy” to convert an “original sentence” of “ ‘conditional liberty/ ” with a correspondingly long term, into a sentence of imprisonment with a time span geared to the lesser restraint. Id., at 984, quoting United States v. Gordon, 961 F. 2d 426, 432 (CA3 1992). Invoking the rule of lenity, 969 F. 2d, at 983, the court concluded that the phrase “original sentence” referred to “the [0-6 month] sentence of incarceration faced by Granderson under the Guidelines,” not to the 60-month sentence of probation, id., at 984. Because Granderson had served 11 months of his revocation sentence — more than the 6-month maximum — the Court of Appeals ordered him released from custody. Id., at 985.
II
The text of § 3565(a) reads:
“If the defendant violates a condition of probation at any time prior to the expiration or termination of the term of probation, the court may . ..
“(1) continue him on probation, with or without extending the term or modifying [or] enlarging the conditions; or
“(2) revoke the sentence of probation and impose any other sentence that was available ... at the time of the initial sentencing.
“Notwithstanding any other provision of this section, if a defendant is found by the court to be in possession of a controlled substance . . . the court shall revoke the sentence of probation and sentence the defendant to not less than one-third of the original sentence.” (Emphasis added.)
The Government argues that the italicized proviso is unambiguous. The “original sentence” that establishes the benchmark for the revocation sentence, the Government asserts, can only be the very sentence actually imposed, i. e., the sentence of probation. In this case, the sentence of probation was 60 months; “one-third of the original sentence” is thus 20 months. But for two reasons, the Government continues, Granderson’s 20-month revocation sentence must be one of imprisonment rather than probation. First, the contrast in subsections (1) and (2) between “continuing]” and “revoking]” probation suggests that a revocation sentence must be a sentence of imprisonment, not a continuation of probation. Second, the Government urges, it would be absurd to “punish” drug-possessing probationers by revoking their probation and imposing a new term of probation no longer than the original. Congress could not be taken to have selected drug possessors, from the universe of all probation violators, for more favorable treatment, the Government reasons, particularly not under a provision enacted as part of a statute called “The Anti-Drug Abuse Act.”
We agree, for the reasons stated by the Government, that a revocation sentence must be a term of imprisonment. Otherwise the proviso at issue would make little sense. We do not agree, however, that the term “original sentence” relates to the duration of the sentence set for probation. The statute provides that if a probationer possesses drugs, “the court shall revoke the sentence of probation and sentence the defendant to not less than one-third of the original sentence.” This language appears to differentiate, not to equate or amalgamate, “the sentence of probation” and “the original sentence.” See United States v. Penn, 17 F. 3d 70, 73 (CA4 1994) (“a sentence of probation does not equate to a sentence of incarceration”). If Congress wished to convey the meaning pressed by the Government, it could easily have instructed that the defendant be incarcerated for a term “not less than one-third of the original sentence of probation,” or “not less than one-third of the revoked term of probation.”
The Government’s interpretation has a further textual difficulty. The Government reads the word “sentence,” when used as a verb in the proviso’s phrase “sentence the defendant,” to mean “sentence to imprisonment” rather than “sentence to probation.” Yet, when the word “sentence” next appears, this time as a noun (“original sentence”), the Government reads the word to mean “sentence of probation.” Again, had Congress designed the language to capture the Government’s construction, the proviso might have read: “[T]he court shall revoke the sentence of probation and sentence the defendant to a term of imprisonment whose length is not less than one-third the length of the original sentence of probation.” Cf. Reves v. Ernst & Young, 507 U. S. 170, 177 (1993) (“it seems reasonable to give ... a similar construction” to a word used as both a noun and a verb in a single statutory sentence).
As the Court of Appeals commented, “[probation and imprisonment are not fungible”; they are sentences fundamentally different in character. 969 F. 2d, at 984. One-third of a 60-month term of probation or “conditional liberty” is a sentence scarcely resembling a 20-month sentence of imprisonment. The Government insists and, as already noted, we agree, that the revocation sentence, measured as one-third of the “original sentence,” must be a sentence of imprisonment. But that “must be” suggests that “original sentence” refers the resentencer back to an anterior sentence of imprisonment, not a sentence of probation.
HH HH HH
Granderson s reading of the § 3565(a) proviso entails such a reference back. The words “original sentence,” he contends, refer back to § 3565(a)(2), the prescription immediately preceding the drug-possession proviso: the “other sentence that was available under subchapter A [the general sentencing provisions] at the time of the initial sentencing.” The Guidelines sentence of imprisonment authorized by subchapter A was the “original sentence,” Granderson argues, for it was the presumptive sentence, the punishment that probation, as a discretionary alternative, replaced. The Guidelines range of imprisonment available at Granderson’s initial sentencing for destruction of mail was 0-6 months. Starting at the top of this range, Granderson arrives at two months as the minimum revocation sentence.
A
Granderson’s interpretation avoids linguistic anomalies presented by the Government’s construction. First, Granderson’s reading differentiates, as does the proviso, between “the sentence of probation” that the resentencer must revoke and “the original sentence” that determines the duration of the revocation sentence. See supra, at 46. Second, Granderson’s construction keeps constant the meaning of “sentence” in the phrases “sentence the defendant” and “original sentence.” See ibid. While the Government cannot easily explain how multiplying a sentence of probation by one-third can yield a sentence of imprisonment, Granderson’s construction encounters no such shoal. See Gordon, 961 F. 2d, at 433 (“one-third of three years probation is one year probation, not one year imprisonment”).
Granderson’s reading of the proviso also avoids the startling disparities in sentencing that would attend the Government’s interpretation. A 20-month minimum sentence would exceed not only the 6-month maximum punishment under the Guidelines for Granderson’s original offense; it would also exceed the 1-year statutory maximum, see 21 U. S. C. § 844(a), that Granderson could have received, had the Government prosecuted him for cocaine possession and afforded him the full constitutional protections of a criminal trial, rather than the limited protections of a revocation hearing. Indeed, a 20-month sentence would exceed consecutive sentences for destruction of mail and cocaine possession (18 months in all).
Furthermore, 20 months is only the minimum revocation sentence, on the Government’s reading of the proviso. The Government’s interpretation would have allowed the District Court to sentence Granderson to a term of imprisonment equal in length to the revoked term of probation. This prison term — five years — would be 10 times the exposure to imprisonment Granderson faced under the Guidelines for his original offense, and 5 times the applicable statutory maximum for cocaine possession. It seems unlikely that Congress could have intended so to enlarge the District Court’s discretion. See Penn, 17 F. 3d, at 73.
B
Two of the Government’s arguments against Granderson’s interpretation are easily answered. First, the Government observes that the purpose of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act was to impose tough sanctions on drug abusers. See Brief for United States 22-26 (listing new penalties and quoting statements from Members of Congress that they intended to punish drug offenders severely). But we cannot divine from the legislators’ many “get tough on drug offenders” statements any reliable guidance to particular provisions. None of the legislators’ expressions, as the Government admits, focuses on “the precise meaning of the provision at issue in this case.” Id., at 24, and n. 4; cf. Busic v. United States, 446 U. S. 398, 408 (1980) (“[W]hile Congress had a general desire to deter firearm abuses, that desire was not unbounded. Our task here is to locate one of the boundaries, and the inquiry is not advanced by the assertion that Congress wanted no boundaries.”). Under Granderson’s interpretation, moreover, drug possessors are hardly favored. Instead, they are singled out among probation violators for particularly adverse treatment: They face mandatory, rather than optional, terms of imprisonment.
Next, the Government argues that the drug-possession proviso must be construed in pari materia with the parallel provision, added at the same time, governing revocation of supervised release upon a finding of drug possession. In the latter provision, the Government observes, Congress ordered a revocation sentence of “not less than one-third of the term of supervised release,” and it expressly provided that the revocation sentence should be “serve[d] in prison.” 18 U. S. C. § 3583(g). Correspondingly, the Government maintains, the probation revocation proviso should be construed to require a minimum prison term of one-third the term of probation. The Government acknowledges that, while Congress spelled out “one-third of the term of supervised release,” Congress did not similarly say “one-third of the term of probation.” However, the Government attributes this difference to the fact that, unlike probation under the current sentencing regime, supervised release is not itself an “original sentence,” it is only a component of a sentence that commences with imprisonment.
We are not persuaded that the supervised release revocation prescription should control construction of the probation revocation proviso. Supervised release, in contrast to probation, is not a punishment in lieu of incarceration. Persons serving postincarceration terms of supervised release generally are more serious offenders than are probationers. But terms of supervised release, because they follow up prison terms, are often shorter than initial sentences of probation. Thus, under the Government’s in pari materia approach, drug possessors whose original offense warranted the more serious sanction of prison plus supervised release would often receive shorter revocation sentences than would drug-possessing probationers.
The Government counters that Congress might have intended to punish probationers more severely because they were “extended special leniency.” Reply Brief for United States 13, n. 14. A sentence of probation, however, even if “lenient,” ordinarily reflects the judgment that the offense and offender’s criminal history were not so serious as to warrant imprisonment. In sum, probation sans imprisonment and supervised release following imprisonment are sentences of unlike character. This fact weighs heavily against the argument that the discrete, differently worded probation and supervised release revocation provisions should be construed in pari materia.
C
The history of the probation revocation proviso’s enactment gives us additional cause to resist the Government’s interpretation. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act, in which the proviso was included, was a large and complex measure, described by one Member of the House of Representatives as “more like a telephone book than a piece of legislation.” 134 Cong. Rec. 33290 (1988) (remarks of Rep. Conte). The proviso seems first to have appeared in roughly its present form as a Senate floor amendment offered after both the House and the Senate had passed the bill. See id., at 24924-24925 (House passage, Sept. 22); id., at 30826 (Senate passage, Oct. 14); id., at 30945 (proviso included in lengthy set of amendments proposed by Sen. Nunn, Oct. 14). No conference report addresses the provision, nor are we aware of any post-conference discussion of the issue. The proviso thus seems to have been inserted into the Anti-Drug Abuse Act without close inspection. Cf. United States v. Bass, 404 U. S. 336, 344 (1971) (applying rule of lenity, noting that statutory provision “was a last-minute Senate amendment” to a long and complex bill and “was hastily passed, with little discussion, no hearings, and no report”).
Another probation-related provision of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act, proposed shortly before the proviso, casts further doubt on the Government’s reading. That provision amends the prohibition against using or carrying an explosive in the commission of a federal felony, to provide in part: “Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the court shall not place on probation or suspend the sentence of any person convicted of a violation of this subsection . . . .” Pub. L. 100-690, § 6474(b), 102 Stat. 4380, codified at 18 U. S. C. § 844(h) (emphasis added). This provision, notwithstanding its 1988 date of enactment, is intelligible only under pre-1984 law: The 1984 Sentencing Reform Act had abolished suspended sentences, and the phrase “place on probation” had yielded to the phrase “impose a sentence of probation.”
Granderson’s counsel suggested at oral argument, see Tr. of Oral Arg. 22-23, 29-31, 36-41, that the proviso’s drafters might similarly have had in mind the pre-1984 sentencing regime, in particular, the pre-1984 practice of imposing a sentence of imprisonment, suspending its execution, and placing the defendant on probation. See 18 U. S. C. § 3651 (1982) (for any offense “not punishable by death or life imprisonment,” the court may “suspend the imposition or execution of sentence and place the defendant on probation for such period and upon such terms and conditions as the court deems best”). The proviso would fit the suspension-of-execution scheme precisely: The “original sentence” would be the sentence imposed but not executed, and one-third of that determinate sentence would be the revocation sentence. In that application, the proviso would avoid incongruities presented in Granderson’s and the Government’s interpretations of the words “original sentence”: An imposed, albeit unexecuted, term of imprisonment would be an actual, rather than a merely available, sentence, and one-third of that sentence would be a term of imprisonment, not probation. If Granderson could demonstrate that the proviso’s drafters in fact drew the prescription to match the pre-1984 suspension-of-execution scheme, Granderson’s argument would be all the more potent: The closest post-1984 analogue to the suspended sentence is the Guidelines sentence of imprisonment, that could have been implemented, but was held back in favor of a probation sentence.
We cannot say with assurance that the proviso’s drafters chose the term “original sentence” with a view toward pre1984 law. The unexacting process by which the proviso was enacted, however, and the evident anachronism in another probation-related section of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act, leave us doubtful that it was Congress’ design to punish drug-possessing probationers with the extraordinarily disproportionate severity the Government urges.
In these circumstances — where text, structure, and history fail to establish that the Government’s position is unambiguously correct — we apply the rule of lenity and resolve the ambiguity in Granderson’s favor. See, e. g., Bass, 404 U. S., at 347-349. We decide that the “original sentence” that sets the duration of the revocation sentence is the applicable Guidelines sentence of imprisonment, not the revoked term of probation.
IV
We turn, finally, to the Government’s argument that Granderson’s theory, and the Court of Appeals’ analysis, are fatally flawed because the Guidelines specify not a term but a range — in this case, 0-6 months. Calculating the minimum revocation sentence as one-third of that range, the mandatory minimum term of imprisonment would be 0-2 months, the Government asserts, which would permit a perverse result: A resentencing court could revoke a drug possessor’s sentence of probation, and then impose no sentence at all. Recognizing this curiosity, lower courts have used not 0-6 months as their starting place, but the top of that range, as the “original sentence,” which yields 2 months as the minimum revocation sentence. The Government complains that no court has explained why the top, rather than the middle or the bottom of the range, is the appropriate point of reference.
The reason for starting at the top of the range, however, is evident: No other solution yields as sensible a response to the “original sentence” conundrum. Four measures of the minimum revocation sentence could be hypothesized as possibilities, if the applicable Guidelines range is the starting point: The sentence could be calculated as (1) one-third of the Guidelines maximum, (2) one-third of the Guidelines minimum, (3) one-third of some point between the minimum and maximum, such as the midpoint, or (4) one-third of the range itself. The latter two possibilities can be quickly eliminated. Selecting a point between minimum and maximum, whether the midpoint or some other point, would be purely arbitrary. Calculating the minimum revocation sentence as one-third of the Guidelines range, in practical application, yields the same result as setting the minimum revocation sentence at one-third of the Guidelines minimum: To say, for example, that a 2-4 month sentence is the minimum revocation sentence is effectively to say that a 2-month sentence is the minimum.
Using the Guidelines minimum in cases such as the present one (0-6 month range), as already noted, would yield a minimum revocation sentence of zero, a result incompatible with the apparent objective of the proviso — to assure that those whose probation is revoked for drug possession serve a term of imprisonment. The maximum Guidelines sentence as the benchmark for the revocation sentence, on the other hand, is “a sensible construction” that avoids attributing to the legislature either “an unjust or an absurd conclusion.” In re Chapman, 166 U. S. 661, 667 (1897).
V
We decide, in sum, that the drug-possession proviso of § 3565(a) establishes a mandatory minimum sentence of imprisonment, but we reject the Government’s contention that the proviso unambiguously calls for a sentence based on the term of probation rather than the originally applicable Guidelines range of imprisonment. Granderson’s interpretation, if not flawless, is a securely plausible reading of the statutory language, and it avoids the textual difficulties and sentencing disparities we identified in the Government’s position. In these circumstances, in common with the Court of Appeals, we apply the rule of lenity and resolve the ambiguity in Granderson’s favor. The minimum revocation sentence, we hold, is one-third the maximum of the originally applicable Guidelines range, and the maximum revocation sentence is the Guidelines maximum.
In this case, the maximum revocation sentence is six months. Because Granderson had served 11 months imprisonment by the time the Court of Appeals issued its decision, that court correctly ordered his release. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore
Affirmed.
Compare United States v. Penn, 17 F. 3d 70 (CA4 1994); United States v. Alese, 6 F. 3d 85 (CA2 1993) (per curiam); United States v. Diaz, 989 F 2d 391 (CA10 1993); United States v. Clay, 982 F. 2d 959 (CA6 1993), cert. pending, No. 93-52; United States v. Gordon, 961 F. 2d 426 (CA3 1992) (all interpreting “original sentence” to mean the period of incarceration originally available under the United States Sentencing Guidelines), with United States v. Sosa, 997 F. 2d 1130 (CA5 1993); United States v. Byrkett, 961 F. 2d 1399 (CA8 1992); United States v. Corpuz, 953 F. 2d 526 (CA9 1992) (all reading “original sentence” to refer to the term of the revoked probation).
The interpretation offered by Justice Kennedy — a reduced sentence of probation as the mandatory minimum — is notable for its originality. No court that has essayed construction of the prescription at issue has come upon the answer Justice Kennedy finds clear in “the text and structure of the statute.” Post, at 60, 68. But cf. post, at 67 (describing the statute as “far from transparent”).
The Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, for the first time, classified probation as a sentence; before 1984, probation had been considered an alternative to a sentence. See S. Rep. No. 98-225, p. 88 (1983).
Justice Kennedy’s novel interpretation would authorize revocation sentences under which drug possessors could profit from their violations. The present case is an example. The District Court determined, just over 4 months into Granderson’s 60-month sentence of probation, that Grander-son had violated his conditions of probation by possessing drugs. If Justice Kennedy were correct that the proviso allows a revocation sentence of probation, one-third as long as the sentence of probation originally imposed, then the District Court could have “punished” Granderson for his cocaine possession by reducing his period of probation from 60 months to just over 24 months. Justice Kennedy’s interpretation would present a similar anomaly whenever the drug-possessing probationer has served less than two-thirds of the sentence of probation initially imposed. Surely such an interpretation is implausible.
The dissent notes that the term “original sentence” has been used in a number of this Court’s opinions and in other statutes and rules, in each instance to refer to a sentence actually imposed. See post, at 72-73, and nn. 4-5. None of those cases, statutes, or rules, however, involves an interpretive problem such as the one presented here, where, if the “original sentence” is the sentence actually imposed, a “plain meaning” interpretation of the proviso leads to an absurd result. See supra, at 41, 45, and n. 4.
The dissent observes, further, that other federal sentencing provisions “us[e] the word ‘sentence’ to refer to the punishment actually imposed on a defendant.” ' Post, at 71, n. 2. In each of the cited instances, however, this reference is made clear by context, either by specifying the type of sentence (e. g., “sentence to pay a fine,” “sentence to probation,” 18 U. S. C. § 3551(c)), or by using a variant of the phrase “impose sentence” (see §§ 3553(a), (b), (c), (e); 3554-3558).
At a revocation hearing, in contrast to a full-scale criminal trial, the matter is tried to the court rather than a jury; also, the standard of proof has been held to be less stringent than the reasonable-doubt standard applicable to criminal prosecutions. See 18 U. S. C. § 3565(a); Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 32.1; United States v. Gordon, 961 F. 2d 426, 429 (CA3 1992) (citing cases).
The dissent suggests that the statutory maximum for the original offense (five years in this case, see 18 U. S. C. § 1703(a)) is the maximum revocation sentence. See post, at 77, n. 8. The District Court, however, could not have imposed this sentence originally, without providing “the specific reason” for departing from the Guidelines range, 18 U. S. C. § 3553(c), and explaining in particular why “an aggravating . . . circumstance [exists,] of a kind, or to a degree, [that was] not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines . . . .” §3553(b). Upward departures from the presumptive Guidelines range to the statutory maximum are thus appropriate only in exceptional cases. See infra, at 56, n. 14. The dissent’s interpretation, however, would allow district courts to impose the statutory maximum as a revocation sentence in the routine exercise of their ordinary discretion.
A probation term of 1-5 years is available for Class C and D felonies; the corresponding term of supervised release is not more than 3 years. For Class E felonies, a 1-5 year probation term is available, but not more than a 1-year term of supervised release. For misdemeanors, a probation term of not more than 5 years is available; the corresponding term of supervised release is not more than 1 year. See 18 U. S. C. §§ 3661(b), 3583(b).
Debate over the conference bill took place in the middle of the night, see 134 Cong. Rec. 32633 (1988) (“I am cognizant that it is 2:20 in the morning, and I will not take long”) (remarks of Sen. Dole); id., at 33318 (House vote taken at 1 a.m.), with Congress anxious to adjourn and return home for the 1988 elections that were little more than two weeks away. Section-by-section analyses were produced after conference in both the Senate and the House, but neither publication casts much light on the proviso. See id., at 32707 (Senate); id., at 33236 (House).
See Cunningham, Levi, Green, & Kaplan, Plain Meaning and Hard Cases, 103 Yale L. J. 1561, 1579-1581 (1994).
The chief difficulty with such an interpretation is that pre-1984 law recognized two kinds of suspended sentences, each of which could lead to probation. While suspension of the execution of sentence, as mentioned, neatly fits Granderson’s theory, suspension of the imposition of sentence fits the theory less well: In that situation, no determinate “original sentence” would be at hand for precise calculation of the revocation sentence.
Justice Kennedy suggests that our interpretation of the proviso “read[s] a criminal statute against a criminal defendant,” post, at 67, and that to the extent the rule of lenity is applicable, it would “deman[d] the interpretation” advanced in his opinion — that the proviso establishes a mandatory minimum sentence of probation, one-third as long as the sentence of probation initially imposed, post, at 69. We note that Grander-son, the criminal defendant in this case, does not urge the interpretation Justice Kennedy presents. More to the point, both of Justice Kennedy’s assertions presuppose that his interpretation of the proviso is a permissible one. For reasons set out above, we think it is not. See supra, at 45, and n. 4.
Justice Scalia suggests that on our interpretation of the proviso, the mandatory minimum revocation sentence should include a fine as well as a term of imprisonment. See post, at 58. The term of probation, however, was imposed in lieu of a sentence of imprisonment, not in lieu of a fine. Revocation of the sentence of probation, we think, implies replacing the sentence of probation with a sentence of imprisonment, but does not require changing an unrevoked sentence earlier imposed.
See United States v. Penn, 17 F. 3d 70 (CA4 1994) (expressly declaring that the minimum revocation sentence is one-third of the top of the Guidelines range); United States v. Alese, 6 F. 3d 85 (CA2 1993) (per curiam) (same); United States v. Gordon, 961 F. 2d 426 (CA3 1992) (same); United States v. Clay, 982 F. 2d 959 (CA6 1993) (holding that the maximum revocation sentence is the top of the Guidelines range), cert. pending, No. 93-52; United States v. Diaz, 989 F. 2d 391 (CA10 1993) (vacating a revocation sentence that exceeded the top of the original Guidelines range). The Court of Appeals in the present case was not required to identify the minimum term, because Granderson had served five months more than the top of the Guidelines range by the time the opinion was issued. See 969 F. 2d 980, 985 (CA11 1992).
The Government observes that “in appropriate circumstances” the sentencing court may depart upward from the presumptive Guidelines range, limited in principle only by the statutory maximum. See 18 U. S. C. § 3663(b). According to the Government, it follows that if the “original sentence” is the “maximum available sentence,” then the statutory maximum rather than the top of the presumptive Guidelines range is the appropriate basis for the revocation sentence. Brief for United States 22. The short answer to the Government’s argument is that for cases in which the sentencing judge considers an upward departure warranted, a sentence of probation, rather than one of imprisonment, is a most unlikely prospect. It makes scant sense, then, to assume that an “original sentence” for purposes of probation revocation is a sentence beyond the presumptively applicable Guidelines range.
At oral argument the Government suggested that its own interpretation is more lenient than Granderson’s, in those rare cases in which the court has departed downward from the Guidelines to impose a sentence of probation. In United States v. Harrison, 815 F. Supp. 494 (DC 1993), for example, the court, on the Government’s motion, had departed downward from a 97-121 month Guidelines range and a 10-year statutory mandatory minimum to impose only a sentence of probation. When the Government moved to revoke probation for drug possession, the court held that the statute required basing the revocation sentence upon the term of probation rather than the Guidelines range, and, in the alternative, that even if the statute were ambiguous, the rule of lenity would so require. Having found §3565(a)’s drug-possession proviso ambiguous, we agree that the rule of lenity would support a shorter sentence, whether on Harrison’s analysis, or on the theory that the “applicable Guidelines range” is the maximum of a Guidelines range permitting a sentence of probation.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
This appeal seeks review of judgments of the Supreme Court of Illinois which affirmed orders of the Circuit Court of Cook County permanently enjoining the appellants from showing certain motion pictures in public places in the City of Chicago, 38 Ill. 2d 53, 230 N. E. 2d 241. The questions presented are whether the Chicago Motion Picture Censorship Ordinance is unconstitutional on its face and as applied, and whether the films involved are obscene.
The Chicago Motion Picture Censorship Ordinance prohibits the exhibition in any public place of “any picture . . . without first having secured a permit therefor from the superintendent of police.” The Superintendent is required “within three days of receipt” of films to “inspect such . . . films ... or cause them to be inspected by the Film Review Section . . . and within three days after such inspection” either to grant or deny the permit. If the permit is denied the exhibitor may within seven days seek review by the Motion Picture Appeal Board. The Appeal Board must review the film within 15 days of the request for review, and thereafter within 15 days afford the exhibitor, his agent or distributor a hearing. The Board must serve the applicant with written notice of its ruling within five days after close of the hearing. If the Board denies the permit, “the Board, within ten days from the hearing, shall file with the Circuit Court of Cook County an action for an injunction against the showing of the film.” A Circuit Court Rule, General Order 3-3, promulgated May 26, 1965, provides that a “complaint for injunction . . . shall be given priority over all other causes. The Court shall set the cause for hearing within five (5) days after the defendant has answered . ...” However, neither the rule nor any statutory or other provision assures a prompt judicial decision of the question of the alleged obscenity of the film.
The Illinois Supreme Court held “that the administration of the Chicago Motion Picture Ordinance violates no constitutional rights of the defendants.” 38 Ill. 2d, at 63, 230 N. E. 2d, at 247. We disagree. In Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U. S. 51, 58-59, we held “. . . that a noncriminal process which requires the prior submission of a film to a censor avoids constitutional infirmity only if it takes place under procedural safeguards designed to obviate the dangers of a censorship system. ... To this end, the exhibitor must be assured, by statute or authoritative judicial construction, that the censor will, within a specified brief period, either issue a license or go to court to restrain showing the film. ... [T]he procedure must also assure a prompt-final judicial decision, to minimize the deterrent effect of an interim and possibly erroneous denial of a license.” (Emphasis supplied.) The Chicago censorship procedures violate these standards in two respects. (1) The 50 to 57 days provided by the ordinance to complete the administrative process before initiation of the judicial proceeding does not satisfy the standard that the procedure must assure “that the censor will, within a specified brief period, either issue a license or go to court to restrain showing the film.” (2) The absence of any provision for a prompt judicial decision by the trial court violates the standard that “. . . the procedure must also assure a prompt final judicial decision . . . .”
Accordingly, we reverse the judgments of the Supreme Court of Illinois and remand the case for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Douglas, agreeing that Freedman v. Maryland, 380 U. S. 51, 58-59, requires reversal of this case, base their reversal also on Redrup v. New York, 386 U. S. 767.
Mr. Justice Harlan concurs in the result.
Mr. Justice Stewart bases his concurrence in this judgment upon Redrup v. New York, 386 U. S. 767.
In light of our decision, we do not reach, and intimate no view upon, the question whether the films are obscene.
The ordinance was amended during the pendency of the case before the Illinois Supreme Court to require inspection within three days after submission of the films. The members of the Superintendent’s Film Review Section, upon his request, “review each motion picture submitted and . . . recommend in writing to the superintendent of police whether to grant or deny a permit.”
Comments of the trial judge in this case suggest doubt whether the trial court regarded compliance with this rule to be mandatory:
“Mr. Aspen [counsel for the City]: As far as the Court is concerned, it is my understand [sic] that Judge Boyle in General Rule 3-3, which has nothing to do with the ordinance has said there will be a hearing within five days of either the filing of an answer—
“The Court: I am going to have it changed because we just cannot set everything aside to give priority to this kind of litigation.
“The Court: First amendment matters cannot be anymore important than any other constitutional right or any other citizen's right to have his case heard.
“As I said before, it is far more important in my judgment to take care of the broken heads and fractured legs than it is to take care of the bleeding hearts.”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice O’Connor
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In this case, we consider the “look-back” period for obtaining a refund of overpaid taxes in the United States Tax Court under 26 U. S. C. § 6512(b)(3)(B), and decide whether the Tax Court can award a refund of taxes paid more than two years prior to the date on which the Commissioner of Internal Revenue mailed the taxpayer a notice of deficiency, when, on the date the notice of deficiency was mailed, the taxpayer had not yet filed a return. We hold that in these circumstances the 2-year look-back period set forth in § 6512(b)(3)(B) applies, and the Tax Court lacks jurisdiction to award a refund.
I
During 1987, respondent Robert F. Lundy and his wife had $10,131 in federal income taxes withheld from their wages. This amount was substantially more than the $6,594 the Lundys actually owed in taxes for that year, but the Lundys did not file their 1987 tax return when it was due, nor did they file a return or claim a refund of the overpaid taxes in the succeeding 2Nz years. On September 26, 1990, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue mailed Lundy a notice of deficiency, informing him that he owed $7,672 in additional taxes and interest for 1987 and that he was liable for substantial penalties for delinquent filing and negligent underpayment of taxes. See 26 U. S. C. §§ 6651(a)(1) and 6653(1).
Lundy and his wife mailed their joint tax return for 1987 to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on December 22,1990. This return indicated that the Lundys had overpaid their income taxes for 1987 by $3,537 and claimed a refund in that amount. Six days after the return was mailed, Lundy filed a timely petition in the Tax Court seeking a redetermination of the claimed deficiency and a refund of the couple’s overpaid taxes. The Commissioner filed an answer generally denying the allegations in Lundy’s petition. Thereafter, the parties negotiated towards a settlement of the claimed deficiency and refund claim. On March 17, 1992, the Commissioner filed an amended answer acknowledging that Lundy had filed a tax return and that Lundy claimed to have overpaid his 1987 taxes by $3,537.
The Commissioner contended in this amended pleading that the Tax Court lacked jurisdiction to award Lundy a refund. The Commissioner argued that if a taxpayer does not file a tax return before the IRS mails the taxpayer a notice of deficiency, the Tax Court can only award the taxpayer a refund of taxes paid within two years prior to the date the notice of deficiency was mailed. See 26 U. S. C. § 6512(b)(3)(B). Under the Commissioner’s interpretation of § 6512(b)(3)(B), the Tax Court lacked jurisdiction to award Lundy a refund because Lundy’s withheld taxes were deemed paid on the date that his 1987 tax return was due (April 15, 1988), see § 6513(b)(1), which is more than two years before the date the notice was mailed (September 26, 1990).
The Tax Court agreed with the position taken by the Commissioner and denied Lundy’s refund claim. Citing an unbroken line of Tax Court cases adopting a similar interpretation of § 6512(b)(3)(B), e. g., Allen v. Commissioner, 99 T. C. 475, 479-480 (1992); Galuska v. Commissioner, 98 T. C. 661, 665 (1992); Berry v. Commissioner, 97 T. C. 339, 344-345 (1991); White v. Commissioner, 72 T. C. 1126, 1131-1133 (1979) (renumbered statute); Hosking v. Commissioner, 62 T. C. 635, 642-643 (1974) (renumbered statute), the Tax Court held that if a taxpayer has not filed a tax return by the time the notice of deficiency is mailed, and the notice is mailed more than two years after the date on which the taxes are paid, the look-back period under § 6512(b)(3)(B) is two years and the Tax Court lacks jurisdiction to award a refund. 65 TCM 3011, 3014-3015 (1993), ¶ 93,278 RIA Memo TC.
The Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit reversed, finding that the applicable look-back period in these circumstances is three years and that the Tax Court had jurisdiction to award Lundy a refund. 45 F. 3d 856, 861 (1995). Every other Court of Appeals to have addressed the question has affirmed the Tax Court’s interpretation of § 6512(b)(3)(B). See Davison v. Commissioner, 9 F. 3d 1538 (CA2 1993) (judgt. order); Allen v. Commissioner, 23 F. 3d 406 (CA6 1994) (judgt. order); Galuska v. Commissioner, 5 F. 3d 195, 196 (CA7 1993); Richards v. Commissioner, 37 F. 3d 587, 589 (CA10 1994); see also Rossman v. Commissioner, 46 F. 3d 1144 (CA9 1995) (judgt. order) (aff’g on other grounds). We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict, 515 U. S. 1102 (1995), and now reverse.
II
A taxpayer seeking a refund of overpaid taxes ordinarily must file a timely claim for a refund with the IRS under 26 U. S. C. §6511. That section contains two separate provisions for determining the timeliness of a refund claim. It first establishes a filing deadline: The taxpayer must file a claim for a refund “within 3 years from the time the return was filed or 2 years from the time the tax was paid, whichever of such periods expires the later, or if no return was filed by the taxpayer, within 2 years from the time the tax was paid.” § 6511(b)(1) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)). It also defines two “look-back” periods: If the claim is filed “within 3 years from the time the return was filed,” ibid., then the taxpayer is entitled to a refund of “the portion of the tax paid within the 3 years immediately preceding the filing of the claim.” §6511(b)(2)(A) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)). If the claim is not filed within that 3-year period, then the taxpayer is entitled to a refund of only that “portion of the tax paid during the 2 years immediately preceding the filing of the claim.” § 6511(b)(2)(B) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)).
Unlike the provisions governing refund suits in United States District Court or the United States Court of Federal Claims, which make timely filing of a refund claim a jurisdictional prerequisite to bringing suit, see 26 U. S. C. § 7422(a); Martin v. United States, 833 F. 2d 655, 658-659 (CA7 1987), the restrictions governing the Tax Court’s authority to award a refund of overpaid taxes incorporate only the look-back period and not the filing deadline from §6511. See 26 U. S. C. § 6512(b)(3). Consequently, a taxpayer who seeks a refund in the Tax Court, like respondent, does not need to actually file a claim for refund with the IRS; the taxpayer need only show that the tax to be refunded was paid during the applicable look-back period.
In this case, the applicable look-back period is set forth in § 6512(b)(3)(B), which provides that the Tax Court cannot award a refund of any overpaid taxes unless it first determines that the taxes were paid:
“within the period which would be applicable under section 6511(b)(2)... if on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency a claim had been filed (whether or not filed) stating the grounds upon which the Tax Court finds that there is an overpayment.”
The analysis dictated by § 6512(b)(3)(B) is not elegant, but it is straightforward. Though some courts have adverted to the filing of a “deemed claim,” see Galuska, 5 F. 3d, at 196; Richards, 37 F. 3d, at 589, all that matters for the proper application of § 6512(b)(3)(B) is that the “claim” contemplated in that section be treated as the only mechanism for determining whether a taxpayer can recover a refund. Section 6512(b)(3)(B) defines the look-back period that applies in Tax Court by incorporating the look-back provisions from § 6511(b)(2), and directs the Tax Court to determine the applicable period by inquiring into the timeliness of a hypothetical claim for refund filed “on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency.”
To this end, § 6512(b)(3)(B) directs the Tax Court’s attention to § 6511(b)(2), which in turn instructs the court to apply either a 3-year or a 2-year look-back period. See §§ 6511(b)(2)(A) and (B) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)); see supra, at 240. To decide which of these look-back periods to apply, the Tax Court must consult the filing provisions of § 6511(a) and ask whether the claim described by §6512(b)(3)(B) — a claim filed “on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency” — would be filed “within 3 years from the time the return was filed.” See § 6511(b)(2)(A) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)). If a claim filed on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency would be filed within that 3-year period, then the look-back period is also three years and the Tax Court has jurisdiction to award a refund of any taxes paid within three years prior to the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency. §§ 6511(b)(2)(A) and 6512(b)(3)(B). If the claim would not be filed within that 3-year period, then the period for awarding a refund is only two years. §§ 6511(b)(2)(B) and 6512(b)(3)(B).
In this case, we must determine which of these two look-back periods to apply when the taxpayer fails to file a tax return when it is due, and the Commissioner mails the taxpayer a notice of deficiency before the taxpayer gets around to filing a late return. The Fourth Circuit held that a taxpayer in this situation is entitled to a 3-year look-back period if the taxpayer actually files a timely claim at some point in the litigation, see infra, at 246, and respondent offers additional reasons for applying a 3-year look-back period, see infra, at 249-252. We think the proper application of § 6512(b)(3)(B) instead requires that a 2-year look-back period be applied.
We reach this conclusion by following the instructions set out in § 6512(b)(3)(B). The operative question is whether a claim filed “on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency” would be filed “within 3 years from the time the return was filed.” See § 6512(b)(3)(B) (incorporating §§ 6511(b)(2) and 6511(a)). In the case of a taxpayer who does not file a return before the notice of deficiency is mailed, the claim described in § 6512(b)(3)(B) could not be filed “within 3 years from the time the return was filed.” No return having been filed, there is no date from which to measure the 3-year filing period described in § 6511(a). Consequently, the claim contemplated in § 6512(b)(3)(B) would not be filed within the 3-year window described in § 6511(a), and the 3-year look-back period set out in § 6511(b)(2)(A) would not apply. The applicable look-back period is instead the default 2-year period described in § 6511(b)(2)(B), which is measured from the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency, see § 6512(b)(3)(B). The taxpayer is entitled to a refund of any taxes paid within two years prior to the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency.
Special rules might apply in some cases, see, e. g., § 6511(c) (extension of time by agreement); § 6511(d) (special limitations periods for designated items), but in the ease where the taxpayer has filed a timely tax return and the IRS is claiming a deficiency in taxes from that return, the interplay of §§ 6512(b)(3)(B) and 6511(b)(2) generally ensures that the taxpayer can obtain a refund of any taxes against which the IRS is asserting a deficiency. In most cases, the notice of deficiency must be mailed within three years from the date the tax return is filed. See 26 U. S. C. §§ 6501(a) and 6503(a)(1); Badaracco v. Commissioner, 464 U. S. 386, 389, 392 (1984). Therefore, if the taxpayer has already filed a return (albeit perhaps a faulty one), any claim filed “on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency” would necessarily be filed within three years from the date the return is filed. In these circumstances, the applicable look-back period under § 6512(b)(3)(B) would be the 3-year period defined in § 6511(b)(2)(A), and the Tax Court would have jurisdiction to award a refund.
Therefore, in the case of a taxpayer who files a timely tax return, § 6512(b)(3)(B) usually operates to toll the filing period that might otherwise deprive the taxpayer of the opportunity to seek a refund. If a taxpayer contesting the accuracy of a previously filed tax return in Tax Court discovers for the first time during the course of litigation that he is entitled to a refund, the taxpayer can obtain a refund from the Tax Court without first filing a timely claim for refund with the IRS. It does not matter, as it would in district court, see § 7422 (incorporating § 6511), that the taxpayer has discovered the entitlement to a refund well after the period for filing a timely refund claim with the IRS has passed, because § 6512(b)(3)(B) applies “whether or not [a claim is] filed,” and the look-back period is measured from the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency. Ibid. Nor does it matter, as it might in a refund suit, see 26 CFR § 301.6402-2(b)(1) (1995), whether the taxpayer has previously apprised the IRS of the precise basis for the refund claim, because 26 U. S. C. § 6512(b)(3)(B) posits the filing of a hypothetical claim “stating the grounds upon which the Tax Court finds that there is an overpayment.”
Section 6512(b)(3)(B) treats delinquent filers of income tax returns less charitably. Whereas timely filers are virtually assured the opportunity to seek a refund in the event they are drawn into Tax Court litigation, a delinquent filer’s entitlement to a refund in Tax Court depends on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency. Section 6512(b)(3)(B) tolls the limitations period, in that it directs the Tax Court to measure the look-back period from the date on which the notice of deficiency is mailed and not the date on which the taxpayer actually files a claim for refund. But in the case of delinquent filers, § 6512(b)(3)(B) establishes only a 2-year look-back period, so the delinquent filer is not assured the opportunity to seek a refund in Tax Court: If the notice of deficiency is mailed more than two years after the taxes were paid, the Tax Court lacks jurisdiction to award the taxpayer a refund.
The Tax Court properly applied this 2-year look-back period to Lundy’s case. As of September 26, 1990 (the date the notice was mailed), Lundy had not filed a tax return. Consequently, a claim filed on that date would not be filed within the 3-year period described in § 6511(a), and the 2-year period from § 6511(b)(2)(B) applies. Lundy’s taxes were withheld from his wages, so they are deemed paid on the date his 1987 tax return was due (April 15, 1988), see § 6513(b)(1), which is more than two years prior to the date the notice of deficiency was mailed (September 26, 1990). Lundy is therefore seeking a refund of taxes paid outside the applicable look-back period, and the Tax Court lacks jurisdiction to award such a refund.
Ill
In deciding Lundy’s case, the Fourth Circuit adopted a different approach to interpreting § 6512(b)(3)(B) and applied a 3-year look-back period. Respondent supports the Fourth Circuit’s rationale, but also offers an argument for applying a uniform 3-year look-back period under § 6512(b)(3)(B). We find neither position persuasive.
The Fourth Circuit held:
“[T]he Tax Court, when applying the limitation provision of § 6511(b)(2) in light of § 6512(b)(3)(B), should substitute the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency for the date on which the taxpayer filed the claim for refund, but only for the purpose of determining the benchmark date for measuring the limitation period and not for the purpose of determining whether the two-year or three-year limitation period applies.” 45 F. 3d, at 861.
In other words, the Fourth Circuit held that the look-back period is measured from the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency (i. e., the taxpayer is entitled to a refund of any taxes paid within either two or three years prior to that date), but that that date is irrelevant in calculating the length of the look-back period itself. The look-back period, the Fourth Circuit held, must be defined in terms of the date that the taxpayer actually filed a claim for refund. Ibid. (“[T]he three-year limitation period applies because Lundy filed his claim for refund... within three years of filing his tax return”). Thus, under the Fourth Circuit’s view, Lundy was entitled to a 3-year look-back period because Lundy’s late-filed 1987 tax return contained a claim for refund, and that claim was filed within three years from the filing of the return. Ibid, (taxpayer entitled to same look-back period that would apply in district court).
Contrary to the Fourth Circuit’s interpretation, the fact that Lundy actually filed a claim for a refund after the date on which the Commissioner mailed the notice of deficiency has no bearing in determining whether the Tax Court has jurisdiction to award Lundy a refund. See supra, at 240-241. Once a taxpayer files a petition with the Tax Court, the Tax Court has exclusive jurisdiction to determine the existence of a deficiency or to award a refund, see 26 U. S. C. § 6512(a), and the Tax Court’s jurisdiction to award a refund is limited to those circumstances delineated in § 6512(b)(3). Section 6512(b)(3)(C) is the only provision that measures the look-back period based on a refimd claim that is actually filed by the taxpayer, and that provision is inapplicable here because it only applies to refund claims filed “before the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency.” § 6512(b)(3)(C). Under § 6512(b)(3)(B), which is the provision that does apply, the Tax Court is instructed to consider only the timeliness of a claim filed “on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency,” not the timeliness of any claim that the taxpayer might actually file.
The Fourth Circuit’s rule also leads to a result that Congress could not have intended, in that it subjects the timely, not the delinquent, filer to a shorter limitations period in Tax Court. Under the Fourth Circuit’s rule, the availability of a refund turns entirely on whether the taxpayer has in fact filed a claim for refund with the IRS, because it is the date of actual filing that determines the applicable look-back period under § 6511(b)(2) (and, by incorporation, § 6512(b)(3)(B)). See 45 F. 3d, at 861; supra, at 246. This rule might “eliminate] the inequities resulting” from adhering to the 2-year look-back period, 45 F. 3d, at 863, but it creates an even greater inequity in the case of a taxpayer who dutifully files a tax return when it is due, but does not initially claim a refund. We think our interpretation of the statute achieves an appropriate and reasonable result in this case: The taxpayer who files a timely income tax return could obtain a refund in the Tax Court under § 6512(b)(3)(B), without regard to whether the taxpayer has actually filed a timely claim for refund. See supra, at 244-245.
If it is the actual filing of a refund claim that determines the length of the look-back period, as the Fourth Circuit held, the filer of a timely income tax return might be out of luck. If the taxpayer does not file a claim for refund with his tax return, and the notice of deficiency arrives shortly before the 3-year period for filing a timely claim expires, see §§ 6511(a) and (b)(1), the taxpayer might not discover his entitlement to a refund until well after the commencement of litigation in the Tax Court. But having filed a timely return, the taxpayer would be precluded by the passage of time from filing an actual claim for refund “within 3 years from the time the return was filed,” as § 6511(b) (2)(A) requires. § 6511(b)(2)(A) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)). The taxpayer would therefore be entitled only to a refund of taxes paid within two years prior to the mailing of the notice of deficiency. See § 6511(b)(2)(B); 45 F. 3d, at 861-862 (taxpayer entitled to same look-back period as would apply in district court, and look-back period is determined based on date of actual filing). It is unlikely that Congress intended for a taxpayer in Tax Court to be worse off for having filed a timely return, but that result would be compelled under the Fourth Circuit’s approach.
Lundy offers an alternative reading of the statute that avoids this unreasonable result, but Lundy’s approach is similarly defective. The main thrust of Lundy’s argument is that the “claim” contemplated in § 6512(b)(3)(B) could be filed “within 3 years from the time the return was filed,” such that the applicable look-back period under § 6512(b)(3)(B) would be three years, if the claim were itself filed on a tax return. Lundy in fact argues that Congress must have intended the claim described in § 6512(b)(3)(B) to be a claim filed on a return, because there is no other way to file a claim for refund with the IRS. Brief for Respondent 28, 30 (citing 26 CFR § 301.6402-3(a)(l) (1995)). Lundy therefore argues that § 6512(b)(3)(B) incorporates a uniform 3-year look-back period for Tax Court cases: If the taxpayer files a timely return, the notice of deficiency (and the “claim” under § 6512(b)(3)(B)) will necessarily be filed within three years of the return and the look-back period is three years; if the taxpayer does not file a return, then the claim contemplated in § 6512(b)(3)(B) is deemed to be a claim filed with, and thus within three years of, a return and the look-back period is again three years.
Like the Fourth Circuit’s approach, Lundy’s reading of the statute has the convenient effect of ensuring that taxpayers in Lundy’s position can almost always obtain a refund if they file in Tax Court, but we are bound by the terms Congress chose to use when it drafted the statute, and we do not think that the term “claim” as it is used in § 6512(b)(3)(B) is susceptible of the interpretation Lundy has given it. The Internal Revenue Code does not define the term “claim for refund” as it is used in § 6512(b)(3)(B), cf. 26 U. S. C. § 6696(e)(2) (“For purposes of sections 6694 and 6695... [t]he term ‘claim for refund’ means a claim for refund of, or credit against, any tax imposed by subtitle A”), but it is apparent from the language of § 6512(b)(3)(B) and the statute as a whole that a claim for refund can be filed separately from a return. Section 6512(b)(3)(B) provides that the Tax Court has jurisdiction to award a refund to the extent the taxpayer would be entitled to a refund “if on the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency a claim had been filed.” (Emphasis added.) It does not state, as Lundy would have it, that a taxpayer is entitled to a refund if on that date “a claim and a return had been filed.”
Perhaps the most compelling evidence that Congress did not intend the term “claim” in § 6512 to mean a “claim filed on a return” is the parallel use of the term “claim” in § 6511(a). Section 6511(a) indicates that a claim for refund is timely if it is “filed by the taxpayer within 3 years from the time the return was filed,” and it plainly contemplates that a claim can be filed even “if no return was filed.” If a claim could only be filed with a return, as Lundy contends, these provisions of the statute would be senseless, cf. 26 U. S. C. § 6696 (separately defining “claim for refund” and “return”), and we have been given no reason to believe that Congress meant the term “claim” to mean one thing in §6511 but to mean something else altogether in the very next section of the statute. The interrelationship and close proximity of these provisions of the statute “presents a classic case for application of the ‘normal rule of statutory construction that identical words used in different parts of the same act are intended to have the same meaning.’” Sullivan v. Stroop, 496 U. S. 478, 484 (1990) (quoting Sorenson v. Secretary of Treasury, 475 U. S. 851, 860 (1986) (internal quotation marks omitted)).
The regulation Lundy cites in support of his interpretation, 26 CFR § 301.6402-3(a)(l) (1995), is consistent with our interpretation of the statute. That regulation states only that a claim must “[i]n general” be filed on a return, ibid., inviting the obvious conclusion that there are some circumstances in which a claim and a return can be filed separately. We have previously recognized that even a claim that does not comply with federal regulations might suffice to toll the limitations periods under the Tax Code, see, e. g., United States v. Kales, 314 U. S. 186,194 (1941) (“notice fairly advising the Commissioner of the nature of the taxpayer’s claim” tolls the limitations period, even if “it does not comply with formal requirements of the statute and regulations”), and we must assume that if Congress had intended to require that the “claim” described in § 6512(b)(3)(B) be a “claim filed on a return,” it would have said so explicitly.
IV
Lundy offers two policy-based arguments for applying a 3-year look-back period under § 6512(b)(3)(B). He argues that the application of a 2-year period is contrary to Congress’ broad intent in drafting § 6512(b)(3)(B), which was to preserve, not defeat, a taxpayer’s claim to a refund in Tax Court, and he claims that our interpretation creates an incongruity between the limitations period that applies in Tax Court litigation and the period that would apply in a refund suit filed in district court or the Court of Federal Claims. Even if we were inclined to depart from the plain language of the statute, we would find neither of these arguments persuasive.
Lundy correctly argues that Congress intended § 6512(b) (3)(B) to permit taxpayers to seek a refund in Tax Court in circumstances in which they might otherwise be barred from filing an administrative claim for refund with the IRS. This is in fact the way § 6512(b)(3)(B) operates in a large number of cases. See supra, at 244-245. But that does not mean that Congress intended that § 6512(b)(3)(B) would always preserve taxpayers’ ability to seek a refund. Indeed, it is apparent from the face of the statute that Congress also intended § 6512(b)(3)(B) to act sometimes as a bar to recovery. To this end, the section incorporates both the 2-year and the 3-year look-back periods from § 6511(b)(2), and we must assume (contrary to Lundy’s reading, which provides a uniform 3-year period, see supra, at 248-249) that Congress intended for both those look-back periods to have some effect. Cf. Badaracco, 464 U. S., at 405 (Stevens, J., dissenting) (“Whatever the correct standard for construing a statute of limitations... surely the presumption ought to be that some limitations period is applicable”). (Emphasis deleted.)
Lundy also suggests that our interpretation of the statute creates a disparity between the limitations period that applies in Tax Court and the periods that apply in refund suits filed in district court or the Court of Federal Claims. In this regard, Lundy argues that the claim for refund he filed with his tax return on December 28 would have been timely for purposes of district court litigation because it was filed “within 3 years from the time the return was filed,” § 6511(b)(1) (incorporating by reference § 6511(a)); see also Rev. Rui. 76-511, 1976-2 Cum. Bull. 428, and within the 3-year look-back period that would apply under § 6511(b)(2)(A). Petitioner disagrees that there is any disparity, arguing that Lundy’s interpretation of the statute is wrong and that Lundy’s claim for refund would not have been considered timely in district court. See Brief for Petitioner 12, 29-30, and n. 11 (citing Miller v. United States, 38 F. 3d 473, 475 (CA9 1994)).
We assume without deciding that Lundy is correct, and that a different limitations period would apply in district court, but nonetheless find in this disparity no excuse to change the limitations scheme that Congress has crafted. The rules governing litigation in Tax Court differ in many ways from the rules governing litigation in the district court and the Court of Federal Claims. Some of these differences might make the Tax Court a more favorable forum, while others may not. Compare 26 U. S. C. § 6213(a) (taxpayer can seek relief in Tax Court without first paying an assessment of taxes) with Flora v. United States, 362 U. S. 145, 177 (1960) (28 U. S. C. § 1346(a)(1) requires full payment of the tax assessment before taxpayer can file a refund suit in district court); and compare 26 U. S. C..§ 6512(b)(3)(B) (Tax Court must assume that the taxpayer has filed a claim “stating the grounds upon which the Tax Court” intends to award a refund) with 26 CFR §301.6402-2(b)(l) (1995) (claim for refund in district court must state grounds for refund with specificity). To the extent our interpretation of § 6512(b) (3)(B) reveals a further distinction between the rules that apply in these forums, it is a distinction compelled by the statutory language, and it is a distinction Congress could rationally make. As our discussion of § 6512(b)(3)(B) demonstrates, see swpra, at 244-245, all a taxpayer need do to preserve the ability to seek a refund in the Tax Court is comply with the law and file a timely return.
We are bound by the language of the statute as it is written, and even if the rule Lundy advocates might “accor[d] with good policy,” we are not at liberty “to rewrite [the] statute because [we] might deem its effects susceptible of improvement.” Badaracco, supra, at 398. Applying § 6512(b)(3)(B) as Congress drafted it, we find that the applicable look-back period in this case is two years, measured from the date of the mailing of the notice of deficiency. Accordingly, we find that the Tax Court lacked jurisdiction to award Lundy a refund of his overwithheld taxes. The judgment is reversed.
It is so ordered.
In relevant part, § 6511 provides:
“(a) Period of limitation on filing claim
“Claim for credit or refund of an overpayment of any tax imposed by this title in respect of which tax the taxpayer is required to file a return shall be filed by the taxpayer within 3 years from the time the return was filed or 2 years from the time the tax was paid, whichever of such periods expires the later, or if no return was filed by the taxpayer, within 2 years from the time the tax was paid. Claim for credit or reftmd of an overpayment of any tax imposed by this title which is required to be paid by means of a stamp shall be filed by the taxpayer within 3 years from the time the tax was paid.
“(b) Limitation on allowance of credits and refunds “(1) Filing of claim within prescribed period
“No credit or refund shall be allowed or made after the expiration of the period of limitation prescribed in subsection (a) for the filing of a claim for credit or refund, unless a claim for credit or refund is filed by the taxpayer within such period.
“(2) Limit on amount of credit or refund
“(A) Limit where claim filed within 3-year period
“If the claim was filed by the taxpayer during the 3-year period prescribed in subsection (a), the amount of the credit or refund shall not exceed the portion of the tax paid within the period, immediately preceding the filing of the claim, equal to 3 years plus the period of any extension of time for filing the return. If the tax was required to be paid by means of a stamp, the amount of the credit or refund shall not exceed the portion of the tax paid within the 3 years immediately preceding the filing of the claim.
“(B) Limit where claim not filed within 3-year period
“If the claim was not filed within such
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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L
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Douglas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
These are actions brought by the Secretary of Labor under § 17 of the Fair Labor Standards Act, 52 Stat. 1060, 63 Stat. 910, 29 U. S. C. § 201, to enjoin respondents from violating the minimum wage, § 6, and record-keeping provisions, § 11, of the Act. The employees concerned work in tobacco-bulking plants operated by respondents in Quincy, Florida, which has a population in excess of 2,500. Respondents claim these employees are exempt from the Act. The District Court ruled against the respondents. 114 F. Supp. 865. The Court of Appeals reversed. 221 F. 2d 406. We granted certiorari, 350 U. S. 859, because of the importance of the problems presented and of the apparent conflicts between the decision below and Tobin v. Traders Compress Co., 199 F. 2d 8, and Maneja v. Waialua Agricultural Co., 349 U. S. 254.
The processing operations involve U. S. Type 62 Sumatra tobacco, a leaf tobacco used exclusively for cigar wrappers. This type of tobacco requires special cultivation. It is grown in fields that are completely enclosed and covered with cheesecloth shade. The leaves of the plant are picked in stages, as each matures. The leaves are taken immediately to a tobacco barn, located on the farm, where they are strung on sticks and dried by heat. Before the drying process is completed, the leaves are allowed to absorb moisture. Then they are dried again. There is some fermentation at this stage. But the treatment in the tobacco barns is essentially a drying operation during which the moisture content is reduced to between 10% and 25%.
At the end of the drying operation, the leaves are packed in boxes and taken from the farm to a bulking plant for further processing. At the bulking plant, the leaves are placed in piles, known as “bulks,” aggregating from 3,500 to 4,500 pounds of tobacco. This is the “sweating” or fermentation process, which requires carefully controlled regulation of temperature and humidity. Proper heat control includes, among other things, breaking up the bulk, redistributing the tobacco, and adding water. Proper fermentation or aging requires the bulk to be reconstructed several times. The bulking process lasts from four to eight months, after which the tobacco is baled. The bulking process requires a large amount of equipment, including a steam-heated plant, platforms, thermometers, bulk covers, baling boxes and presses, baling mats and packing, sorting and grading tables. The bulking process substantially changes the physical properties and chemical content of the tobacco, improving the color, increasing combustibility, and eliminating the rawness and harshness of the freshly cured leaf.
The overwhelming majority of farmers in the region in litigation in this case have their tobacco processed by others. In that region there are 300 farmers who grow this type of tobacco. Of these, only 9 maintain and operate bulking plants; and only 5 maintain and operate bulking plants processing tobacco grown only by themselves. It appears that bulking cannot be economically done by the ordinary small farmer growing less than 100 acres. Of the 300 farmers in the present group, 80% grow less than 25 acres per year, while the majority grow from iy2 to 10 acres a year.
Respondent Budd grows no tobacco itself and confines its operations to processing the tobacco grown on 263 acres by 52 farmers. Budd employs about 108 workers for bulking, sorting, grading, and baling tobacco.
Respondent King Edward processes in the bulking plant involved in this litigation only tobacco produced on farms operated by it. (It has two other bulking plants that process tobacco purchased from other growers.) The bulking plant involved here is about 13 miles from King Edward’s farms. A majority of the 120 employees in the bulking plant also work on King Edward’s farms.
May has its own bulking plant and processes there only the tobacco which it grows on its own farms. This plant is about 10 miles from the farms. The employees, who work the farms, work in the bulking plant, being transported back and forth by May. Seventy are employed in the bulking plant.
Area of Production. — Section 13 (a) of the Act creates several exemptions from the minimum wage and maximum hours provisions of the Act. One of those exemptions contained in § 13 (a) (10) includes:
“any individual employed within the area of production (as defined by the Administrator), engaged in handling, packing, storing, ginning, compressing, pasteurizing, drying, preparing in their raw or natural state, or canning of agricultural or horticultural commodities for market, or in making cheese or butter or other dairy products.”
The Administrator’s definition of “area of production” provides that a plant is within the “area of production” if it is located (1) “in the open country or in a rural community,” which is defined as not including “any city, town or urban place of 2,500 or greater population,” and (2) within a specified mileage distance from the source of 95% of its commodities.
The Court of Appeals, following its earlier decisions in Jenkins v. Durkin, 208 F. 2d 941, and Lovvorn v. Miller, 215 F. 2d 601, held that the regulation was invalid. It concluded that once “geographic lines of the area of production have been established, the act makes the exemption effective within that area,” and that any qualification by reason of size of the town where the establishment is located is invalid. 215 F. 2d, at 603. For that conclusion the Court of Appeals found comfort in Addison v. Holly Hill Fruit Products, Inc., 322 U. S. 607.
Holly Hill involved one of the alternative definitions of “area of production.” That alternative defined “area of production” in geographic terms and then added another standard — whether the employee was in an establishment having no more than seven employees. We held that “. . . Congress did not leave it to the Administrator to decide whether within geographic bounds defined by him the Act further permits discrimination between establishment and establishment based upon the number of employees.” Id., at 616. We said that the phrase “area of production” had “plain geographic implications” with which the size of a plant within the area was not consistent. Id., at 618. That definition, therefore, was struck down. But its alternative, substantially the one that is involved here, was not passed upon. In fact, we reserved decision in Holly Hill as to whether the population criterion, now presented for decision, was valid. Id., 610.
We think the present regulation is a valid definition of “area of production.” We think it valid by the standard we used in Holly Hill. In that case we said that “. . . ‘area’ calls for delimitation of territory in relation to the complicated economic factors that operate between agricultural labor conditions and the labor market of enterprises concerned with agricultural commodities and more or less near their production.” Id., at 613-614. The aim of Congress was to exempt employees “employed in agriculture,” § 13 (a) (6), and those engaged in agricultural enterprises in the “area of production,” § 13 (a) (10). That meant drawing a line between agricultural enterprises operating under rural-agricultural conditions and those subject to urban-industrial conditions. An individual working in an agricultural packing plant on the edge of Los Angeles is in a strikingly different environment from one doing the same work in a small town in the heart of Kansas. Nearness to a large city has relation to the problem of the Administrator in making his definition. For the proximity of the plant to a metropolitan center, like the size of the town where the plant is located, may make the decisive difference between an agricultural and an urban environment. Likewise, nearness of the plant to its supplies cannot be considered an irrelevancy. For “area” is understandable in terms of nearness and farness. Distance is an important factor in any formula which seeks to treat more or less as a unity labor on farms and labor in agricultural enterprises in the “area of production.”
No definition of “area of production” could produce complete equality, for the variables are too numerous. The Administrator fulfills his role when he makes a reasoned definition. See Gray v. Powell, 314 U. S. 402, 411. On no phase of this problem can we say that the Administrator proceeded capriciously or by the use of inadmissible standards. Experts might disagree over the desirability of one formula rather than another. It is enough for us that the expert stayed within the allowable limits. We think he did here and that the definition of “area of production” under § 13 (a) (10) is a valid one.
Agriculture. — The Court of Appeals held that the employees in the bulking plants of King Edward and May were exempt under § 13 (a)(6) which covers “any employee employed in agriculture.” It relied on the broad definition of “agriculture” contained in § 3 (f) of the Act which provides, in relevant part, that the term “includes farming in all its branches and among other things includes . . . any practices (including any forestry or lumbering operations) performed by a farmer or on a farm as an incident to or in conjunction with such farming operations, including preparation for market, delivery to . . . market or to carriers for transportation to market.” The work in the bulking plants, the court ruled, was “preparation for market” within the meaning of § 3 (f).
The exemption of § 13 (a) (6) read with § 3 (f) covers large operators as well as small ones, as we recently said in Maneja v. Waialua Agricultural Co., supra, at 260. It also includes “extraordinary methods” of agriculture as well as the more conventional ones. Id., at 261. The question in the Waialua case was whether sugar milling was included in the agriculture exemption of §13 (a)(6). We said that it was necessary to look to all the facts surrounding the process to determine whether that process was incident to farming. Id., at 264-265. We held that sugar milling was not, even when done by the grower. We think like considerations indicate that in this case the agriculture operation does not extend through the bulking plants but ends, as the District Court ruled, with the delivery of the tobacco at the receiving platform of the bulking plant. That is the “delivery ... to market” within the meaning of § 3 (f) of the Act.
It is true that King Edward and May are farmers and process in their bulking plants only the tobacco they raise. It is also true that many employees who work their farms also work in their bulking plants. These are heavily stressed as indicia that bring the bulking plants into the agriculture exemption. But there are two other factors which in our view tip the scales the other way.
First, tobacco farmers do not ordinarily perform the bulking operation. As already mentioned, of the 300 farmers who grow this type of tobacco in this area, only 9 maintain and operate their own bulking plants. The remaining farmers have their crops processed by others. The bulking operation is for the most part divorced from the cultivation of tobacco and from the drying operation in the tobacco barns on the farm. The bulking process for the most part is a separate processing stage.
Second, the bulking operation is a process which changes the natural state of the freshly cured tobacco as significantly as milling changes sugar cane. As indicated above, the bulking process changes and improves the leaf in many ways and turns it into an industrial product. What we said in Waialua concerning sugar milling is apt here: a process that results in such important changes is “more akin to manufacturing than to agriculture.” 349 U. S., at 265.
The judgments of the Court of Appeals are reversed and those of the District Court affirmed.
It is so ordered.
APPENDIX TO OPINION OF THE COURT.
The Administrator defined “area of production,” as used in § 13 (a) (10) of the Fair Labor Standards Act, as follows (29 CFR, c. V, § 536.2):
(a) An individual shall be regarded as employed in the “area of production” within the meaning of section 13 (a) (10) of the Fair Labor Standards Act in handling, packing, storing, ginning, compressing, pasteurizing, drying, preparing in their raw or natural state, or canning of agricultural or horticultural commodities for market, or in making cheese or butter or other dairy products:
(1) If the establishment where he is employed is located in the open country or in a rural community and 95 percent of the commodities on which such operations are performed by the establishment come from normal rural sources of supply located not more than the following air line distances from the establishment:
(i) With respect to the ginning of cotton — 10 miles;
(ii) With respect to operations on fresh fruits and vegetables — 15 miles;
(iii) With respect to the storing of cotton and any operations on commodities not otherwise specified in this subsection — 20 miles;
(iv) With respect to the compressing and compress-warehousing of cotton, and operations on tobacco, grain, soybeans, poultry or eggs — 50 miles.
(b) For the purposes of this section:
(1) “open country or rural community” shall not include any city, town or urban place of 2,500 or greater population or any area within:
(i) One air-line mile of any city, town, or urban place with a population of 2,500 up to but not including 50,000 or
(ii) Three air-line miles of any city, town or urban place with a population of 50,000 up to but not including 500,000, or
(iii) Five air-line miles of any city with a population of 500,000 or greater,
according to the latest available United States Census.
(2) The commodities shall be considered to come from “normal rural sources of supply” within the specified distances from the establishment if they are received
(i) from farms within such specified distances, or
(ii) from farm assemblers or other establishments through which the commodity customarily moves, which are within such specified distances and located in the open country or in a rural community, or
(iii) from farm assemblers or other establishments not located in the open country or in a rural community provided it can be demonstrated that the commodities were produced on farms within such specified distances.
(3) The period for determining whether 95 percent of the commodities are received from normal rural sources of supply shall be the last preceding calendar month in which operations were carried on for two workweeks or more, except that until such time as an establishment has operated for such a calendar month the period shall be the time during which it has been in operation.
(4) The percentage of commodities received from normal rural sources of supply within the specified distances shall be determined by weight, volume or other physical unit of measure, except that dollar value shall be used if different commodities received in the establishment are customarily measured in physical units that are not comparable.
The entire regulation is set forth in the Appendix to this opinion, post, p. 482.
On this phase of the problem the Administrator said in his findings dated December 18, 1946:
“Although it is clear that any line attempting to distinguish between ‘urban-industrial’ and ‘rural-agricultural’ communities on the basis of population can at best be only an approximation, it is equally clear that none of the proposals advanced at the hearing would accomplish the objectives of such a test with as much accuracy as the 2,500 population test. As a class, places of 2,500 population or more are predominantly industrial, while places with populations of less than 2,500 are predominantly agricultural. A population limit of 2,500, moreover, has for over 35 years been the official dividing line between ‘rural’ and ‘urban’ employed by the Bureau of the Census in its studies. This dividing line has also been accepted and used in studies made by the Bureau of Agricultural Economics, the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, the Works Progress Administration and other government agencies. It has furnished the definition of ‘rural’ communities which has been the basis of studies of rural and urban communities by many sociologists. It has been incorporated into statute by the Congress of the United States in special legislation for rural communities To a very great extent the handling and processing of agricultural and horticultural commodities is carried on in the open country or in towns of less than 2,500. For example, only about 10% of grain elevators are located in towns of 2,500 or more. Only about 11% of cotton gins are located in such populated places. About two-thirds of all fresh fruit and vegetable canning and packing, cheese manufacturing and poultry and egg assembling are' carried on in the open country or in towns of 2,500 or less.
“On the basis of all the evidence, it is my conclusion that a population test of 2,500, while not drawing a line between 'urban-industrial’ and ‘rural-agricultural’ conditions with a fine precision, will come as close to accomplishing this objective as it is possible to come in a general rule applicable to many situations.”
The references were to 39 Stat. 356, 40 Stat. 1200.
On this phase of the problem the Administrator said:
“The selection of appropriate distances for the different commodities and groups of commodities has been no easy task, and was accomplished only after carefully weighing and synthesizing a large variety of complicated economic factors. Among the many factors taken into consideration were the following: the kind of crop; the distances from which the establishments in each industry receive the agricultural or horticultural commodities upon which they perform the operations specified in the pertinent sections of the Act; the geography and topography of the various sections of the country in which the different commodities are normally produced; the location of the plants within these areas; the concentration of cultivation of the different commodities in various sections of the country; the pattern of concentration of agricultural production with respect to the location of the establishment; differences in practice as between single crop areas and diversified farming areas; the perishability of the commodities received; the extent to which the plants deal with a single commodity rather than a variety of commodities; the nature of the operations performed on the commodities received, including the degree of industrialization of the various operations; the number of hands or operations through which the particular commodity has moved since leaving the farm, including the possibility of passing increased labor costs back to the farmer; the marketing practices of the particular industries; and the wage rates paid, and overtime practices in the various communities concerned with particular commodities.”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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G
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Souter
delivered the opinion of the Court.
These consolidated cases are about the meaning of vote dilution and the facts required to show it, when §2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 is applied to challenges to single-member legislative districts. See 79 Stat. 437, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 1973. We hold that no violation of § 2 can be found here, where, in spite of continuing discrimination and racial bloc voting, minority voters form effective voting majorities in a number of districts roughly proportional to the minority voters’ respective shares in the voting-age population. While such proportionality is not dispositive in a challenge to single-member districting, it is a relevant fact in the totality of circumstances to be analyzed when determining whether members of a minority group have “less opportunity than other members of the electorate to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of their choice.” Ibid.
I
On the first day of Florida’s 1992 legislative session, a group of Hispanic voters including Miguel De Grandy (De Grandy plaintiffs) complained in the United States District Court against the speaker of Florida’s House of Representatives, the president of its Senate, the Governor, and other state officials (State). The complainants alleged that the districts from which Florida voters had chosen their state senators and representatives since 1982 were malapportioned, failing to reflect changes in the State’s population during the ensuing decade. The State Conference of NAACP Branches and individual black voters (NAACP plaintiffs) filed a similar suit, which the three-judge District Court consolidated with the De Grandy case.
Several months after the first complaint was filed, on April 10, 1992, the state legislature adopted Senate Joint Resolution 2-G (SJR 2-G), providing the reapportionment plan currently at issue. The plan called for dividing Florida into 40 single-member Senate, and 120 single-member House, districts based on population data from the 1990 census. As the Constitution of Florida required, the state attorney general then petitioned the Supreme Court of Florida for a declaratory judgment that the legislature’s apportionment plan was valid under federal and state law. See Fla. Const., Art. Ill, § 16(c). The court so declared, while acknowledging that state constitutional time constraints precluded full review for conformity with §2 of the Voting Rights Act and recognizing the right of any interested party to bring a §2 challenge to the plan in the Supreme Court of Florida. See In re Constitutionality of Senate Joint Resolution 2G, Special Apportionment Session 1992, 597 So. 2d 276, 285-286 (1992).
The De Grandy and NAACP plaintiffs responded to SJR 2-G by amending their federal complaints to charge the new reapportionment plan with violating § 2. They claimed that SJR 2-G “ ‘unlawfully fragments cohesive minority communities and otherwise impermissibly submerges their right to vote and to participate in the electoral process/” and they pointed to areas around the State where black or Hispanic populations could have formed a voting majority in a politically cohesive, reasonably compact district (or in more than one), if SJR 2-G had not fragmented each group among several districts or packed it into just a few. De Grandy v. Wetherell, 815 F. Supp. 1550, 1559-1560 (ND Fla. 1992).
The Department of Justice filed a similar complaint, naming the State of florida and several elected officials as defendants and claiming that SJR 2-G diluted the voting strength of blacks and Hispanics in two parts of the State in violation of § 2. The Government alleged that SJR 2-G diluted the votes of the Hispanic population in an area largely covered by Dade County (including Miami) and the black population in an area covering much of Escambia County (including Pensacola). App. 75. The District Court consolidated this action with the other two and held a 5-day trial, followed immediately by an hours-long hearing on remedy.
At the end of the hearing, on July 1, 1992, the District Court ruled from the bench. It held the plan’s provisions for state House districts to be in violation of §2 because “more than [SJR 2-G’s] nine Hispanic districts may be drawn without having or creating a regressive effect upon black voters,” and it imposed a remedial plan offered by the De Grandy plaintiffs calling for 11 majority-Hispanic House districts. App. to Juris. Statement 2a, 203a. As to the Senate, the court found that a fourth majority-Hispanic district could be drawn in addition to the three provided by SJR 2-G, but only at the expense of black voters in the area. Id., at 202a; 815 F. Supp., at 1560. The court was of two minds about the implication of this finding, once observing that it meant the legislature’s plan for the Senate was a violation of §2 but without a remedy, once saying the plan did not violate §2 at all. In any event, it ordered elections to be held using SJR 2-G’s senatorial districts.
In a later, expanded opinion the court reviewed the totality of circumstances as required by § 2 and Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U. S. 30 (1986). In explaining Dade County’s “tripartite politics,” in which “ethnic factors... predominate over all other[s]...,” 815 F. Supp., at 1572, the court found political cohesion within each of the Hispanic and black populations but none between the two, id., at 1569, and a tendency of non-Hispanic whites to vote as a bloc to bar minority groups from electing their chosen candidates except in a district where a given minority makes up a voting majority, id., at 1572. The court further found that the nearly one million Hispanics in the Dade County area could be combined into 4 Senate and 11 House districts, each one relatively compact and with a functional majority of Hispanic voters, id., at 1568-1569, whereas SJR 2-G created fewer majority-Hispanic districts; and that one more Senate district with a black voting majority could have been drawn, id., at 1576. Noting that Florida’s minorities bore the social, economic, and political effects of past discrimination, the court concluded that SJR 2-G impermissibly diluted the voting strength of Hispanics in its House districts and of both Hispamos and blacks in its Senate districts. Id., at 1574. The findings of vote dilution in the senatorial districts had no practical effect, however, because the court held that remedies for the blacks and the Hispanics were mutually exclusive; it consequently deferred to the state legislature’s work as the “fairest” accommodation of all the ethnic communities in south Florida. Id., at 1580.
We stayed the judgment of the District Court, 505 U. S. 1232 (1992), and noted probable jurisdiction, 507 U. S. 907 (1993).
II
Before going to the issue at the heart of these cases, we need to consider the District Court’s refusal to give preclusive effect to the decision of the State Supreme Court validating SJR 2-G. The State argues that the claims of the De Grandy plaintiffs should have been dismissed as res judicata because they had a full and fair opportunity to litigate vote dilution before the State Supreme Court, see In re Constitutionality of Senate Joint Resolution 2G, Special Apportionment Session 1992, 597 So. 2d, at 285. The premise, however, is false, exaggerating the review afforded the De Grandy plaintiffs in the state court and ignoring that court’s own opinion of its judgment’s limited scope. Given the state constitutional mandate to review apportionment resolutions within 30 days, see Fla. Const., Art. Ill, § 16(c), the Supreme Court of Florida accepted briefs and evidentiary submissions, but held no trial. In that court’s own words, it was “impossible... to conduct the complete factual analysis contemplated by the Voting Rights Act... within the time constraints of article III,” and its holding was accordingly “without prejudice to the right of any protestor to question the validity of the plan by filing a petition in this Court alleging how the plan violates the Voting Rights Act.” 597 So. 2d, at 282, 285-286.
The State balks at recognizing this express reservation by blaming the De Grandy plaintiffs for not returning to the State Supreme Court with the § 2 claims. But the plaintiffs are free to litigate in any court with jurisdiction, and their choice to forgo further, optional state review hardly converted the state constitutional judgment into a decision following “full and fair opportunity to litigate,” Allen v. McCurry, 449 U. S. 90, 104 (1980), as res judicata would require. For that matter, a federal court gives no greater preclusive effect to a state-court judgment than the state court itself would do, Marrese v. American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, 470 U. S. 373, 384-386 (1985), and the Supreme Court of Florida made it plain that its preliminary look at the vote dilution claims would have no preclusive effect under Florida law.
The State does not, of course, argue that res judicata bars the claims of the United States, which was not a party in the Florida Supreme Court action. It contends instead that the Federal Government’s §2 challenge deserved dismissal under this Court’s Rooker!Feldman abstention doctrine, under which a party losing in state court is barred from seeking what in substance would be appellate review of the state judgment in a United States district court, based on the losing party’s claim that the state judgment itself violates the loser’s federal rights. See District of Columbia Court of Appeals v. Feldman, 460 U. S. 462, 482 (1983); Rooker v. Fidelity Trust Co., 263 U. S. 413, 416 (1923). But the invocation of Rooker/Feldman is just as inapt here, for unlike Rooker or Feldman, the United States was not a party in the state court. It was in no position to ask this Court to review the state court’s judgment and has not directly attacked it in this proceeding. Cf. Feldman, supra, at 468, and n. 2, 472, and n. 8 (suing District of Columbia Court of Appeals); Rooker, supra, at 414 (seeking to have state court’s judgment declared null and void). The United States merely seeks to litigate its § 2 case for the first time, and the Government’s claims, like those of the private plaintiffs, are properly before the federal courts.-
Ill
On the merits of the vote dilution claims covering the House districts, the crux of the State’s argument is the power of Hispanics under SJR 2-G to elect candidates of their choice in a number of districts that mirrors their share of the Dade County area’s voting-age population (i. e., 9 out of 20 House districts); this power, according to the State, bars any finding that the plan dilutes Hispanic voting strength. The District Court is said to have missed that conclusion by mistaking our precedents to require the plan to maximize the number of Hispanic-controlled districts.
The State’s argument takes us back to ground covered last Term in two cases challenging single-member districts. See Voinovich v. Quilter, 507 U. S. 146 (1993); Growe v. Emison, 507 U. S. 25 (1993). In Growe, we held that a claim of vote dilution in a single-member district requires proof meeting the same three threshold conditions for a dilution challenge to a multimember district: that a minority group be “ ‘sufficiently large and geographically compact to constitute a majority in a single-member district’”; that it be “‘politically cohesive’ ”; and that “ ‘the white majority vot[e] sufficiently as a bloc to enable it... usually to defeat the minority’s preferred candidate.’ ” Id., at 40 (quoting Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U. S., at 50-51). Of course, as we reflected in Voinovich and amplify later in this opinion, “the Gingles factors cannot be applied mechanically and without regard to the nature of the claim.” 507 U. S., at 158.
In Voinovich we explained how manipulation of district lines can dilute the voting strength of politically cohesive minority group members, whether by fragmenting the minority voters among several districts where a bloc-voting majority can routinely outvote them, or by packing them into one or a small number of districts to minimize their influence in the districts next door. See id., at 153-154. Section 2 prohibits either sort of line-drawing where its result, “ ‘inter-netting] with social and historical conditions,’ impairs the ability of a protected class to elect its candidate of choice on an equal basis with other voters.” Ibid, (quoting Gingles, supra, at 47).
Plaintiffs in Growe and Voinovich failed to show vote dilution because the former did not prove political cohesiveness of the minority group, Growe, supra, at 41-42, and the latter showed no significant white bloc voting, Voinovich, supra, at 158. Here, on the contrary, the District Court found, and the' State does not challenge, the presence of both these Gingles preconditions. The dispute in this litigation centers on two quite different questions: whether Hispanics are sufficiently numerous and geographically compact to be a majority in additional single-member districts, as required by the first Gingles factor; and whether, even with all three Gingles conditions satisfied, the circumstances in totality support a finding of vote dilution when Hispanics can be expected to elect their chosen representatives in substantial proportion to their percentage of the area’s population.
A
When applied to a claim that single-member districts dilute minority votes, the first Gingles condition requires the possibility of creating more than the existing number of reasonably compact districts with a sufficiently large minority population to elect candidates of its choice. The District Court found the condition satisfied by contrasting SJR 2-G with the De Grandy plan for the Dade County area, which provided for 11 reasonably compact districts, each with a voting-age population at least 64 percent Hispanic. 815 F. Supp., at 1580. While the percentage figures are not disputed, the parties disagree about the sufficiency of these supermajorities to allow Hispanics to elect representatives of their choice in all 11 districts. The District Court agreed with plaintiffs that the supermajorities would compensate for the number of voting-age Hispanics who did not vote, most commonly because they were recent immigrants who had not become citizens of the United States. Id., at 1567-1568. The State protests that fully half of the Hispanic voting-age residents of the region are not citizens, with the result that several districts in the De Grandy plan lack enough Hispanic voters to elect candidates of their choice without cross-over votes from other ethnic groups. On these assumptions, the State argues that the condition necessary to justify tinkering with the State’s plan disappears.
We can leave this dispute without a winner. The parties’ ostensibly factual disagreement raises an issue of law about which characteristic of minority populations (e. g., age, citizenship) ought to be the touchstone for proving a dilution claim and devising a sound remedy. These cases may be resolved, however, without reaching this issue or the related question whether the first Gingles condition can be satisfied by proof that a so-called influence district may be created (that is, by proof that plaintiffs can devise an additional district in which members of a minority group are a minority of the voters, but a potentially influential one). As in the past, we will assume without deciding that even if Hispanics are not an absolute majority of the relevant population in the additional districts, the first Gingles condition has been satisfied in these cases. See Voinovich, supra, at 154; see also Growe, supra, at 41-42, n. 5 (declining to reach the issue); Gingles, supra, at 46-47, n. 12 (same).
B
We do, however, part company from the District Court in assessing the totality of circumstances. The District Court found that the three Gingles preconditions were satisfied, and that Hispanics had suffered historically from official discrimination, the social, economic, and political effects of which they generally continued to feel, 815 F. Supp., at 1573-1574. Without more, and on the apparent assumption that what could have been done to create additional Hispanic supermajority districts should have been done, the District Court found a violation of § 2. But the assumption was erroneous, and more is required, as a review of Gingles will show.
1
Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U. S. 30 (1986), prompted this Court’s first reading of §2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 after its 1982 amendment. Section 2(a) of the amended Act prohibits any “standard, practice, or procedure... which results in a denial or abridgement of the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color [or membership in a language minority group]....” Section 2(b) provides that a denial or abridgment occurs where,
“based on the totality of circumstances, it is shown that the political processes leading to nomination or election in the State or political subdivision are not equally open to participation by members of a class of citizens protected by subsection (a) of this section in that its members have less opportunity than other members of the electorate to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of their choice. The extent to which members of a protected class have been elected to office in the State or political subdivision is one circumstance which may be considered: Provided, That nothing in this section establishes a right to have members of a protected class elected in numbers equal to their proportion in the population.” 42 U. S. C. § 1973(b).
Gingles provided some structure to the statute’s “totality of circumstances” test in a case challenging multimember legislative districts. See 478 U. S., at 46-51. The Court listed the factors put forward as relevant in the Senate Report treating the 1982 amendments, and held that
“[w]hile many or all of [them] may be relevant to a claim of vote dilution through submergence in multimember districts, unless there is a conjunction of the following circumstances, the use of multimember districts generally will not impede the ability of minority voters to elect representatives of their choice. Stated succinctly, a bloc voting majority must usually be able to defeat candidates supported by a politically cohesive, geographically insular minority group.” Id., at 48-49 (footnote omitted) (emphasis in original).
The Court thus summarized the three now-familiar Gingles factors (compactness/numerousness, minority cohesion or bloc voting, and majority bloc voting) as “necessary preconditions,” id., at 50, for establishing vote dilution by use of a multimember district.
But if Gingles so clearly identified the three as generally necessary to prove a §2 claim, it just as clearly declined to hold them sufficient in combination, either in the sense that a court’s examination of relevant circumstances was complete once the three factors were found to exist, or in the sense that the three in combination necessarily and in all circumstances demonstrated dilution. This was true not only because bloc voting was a matter of degree, with a variable legal significance depending on other facts, id., at 55-58, but also because the ultimate conclusions about equality or inequality of opportunity were intended by Congress to be judgments resting on comprehensive, not limited, canvassing of relevant facts. Lack of electoral success is evidence of vote dilution, but courts must also examine other evidence in the totality of circumstances, including the extent of the opportunities minority voters enjoy to participate in the political processes. Id., at 46, 79-80; id., at 98-99 (O’Connor, J., concurring in judgment). To be sure, some § 2 plaintiffs may have easy cases, but although lack of equal electoral opportunity may be readily imagined and unsurprising when demonstrated under circumstances that include the three essential Gingles factors, that conclusion must still be addressed explicitly, and without isolating any other arguably relevant facts from the act of judgment.
2
If the three Gingles factors may not be isolated as sufficient, standing alone, to prove dilution in every multimember district challenge, a fortiori they must not be when the challenge goes to a series of single-member districts, where dilution may be more difficult to grasp. Plaintiffs challenging single-member districts may claim, not total submergence, but partial submergence; not the chance for some electoral success in place of none, but the chance for more success in place of some. When the question thus comes down to the reasonableness of drawing a series of district lines in one combination of places rather than another, judgments about inequality may become closer calls. As facts beyond the ambit of the three Gingles factors loom correspondingly larger, factfinders cannot rest uncritically on assumptions about the force of the Gingles factors in pointing to dilution.
The cases now before us, of course, fall on this more complex side of the divide, requiring a court to determine whether provision for somewhat fewer majority-minority districts than the number sought by the plaintiffs was dilution of the minority votes. The District Court was accordingly required to assess the probative significance of the Gingles factors critically after considering the further circumstances with arguable bearing on the issue of equal political opportunity. We think that in finding dilution here the District Court misjudged the relative importance of the Gingles factors and of historical discrimination, measured against evidence tending to show that in spite of these facts, SJR 2-G would provide minority voters with an equal measure of political and electoral opportunity.
The District Court did not, to be sure, commit the error of treating the three Gingles conditions as exhausting the, enquiry required by § 2. Consistently with Gingles, the court received evidence of racial relations outside the immediate confines of voting behavior and found a history of discrimination against Hispanic voters continuing in society generally to the present day. But the District Court was not critical enough in asking whether a history of persistent discrimination reflected in the larger society and its bloc-voting behavior portended any dilutive effect from a newly proposed districting scheme, whose pertinent features were majority-minority districts in substantial proportion to the minority’s share of voting-age population. The court failed to ask whether the totality of facts, including those pointing to proportionality, showed that the new scheme would deny minority voters equal political opportunity.
Treating equal political opportunity as the focus of the enquiry, we do not see how these district lines, apparently providing political effectiveness in proportion to voting-age numbers, deny equal political opportunity. The récord establishes that Hispanics constitute 50 percent of the voting-age population in Dade County and under SJR 2-G would make up supermajorities in 9 of the 18 House districts located primarily within the county. Likewise, if one considers the 20 House districts located at least in part within Dade County, the record indicates that Hispanics would be an effective voting majority in 45 percent of them (i e., nine), and would constitute 47 percent of the voting-age population in the area. 815 F. Supp., at 1580; App. to Juris. Statement 180a-183a. In other words, under SJR 2-G Hispanics in the Dade County area would enjoy substantial proportionality. On this evidence, we think the State’s scheme would thwart the historical tendency to exclude Hispanics, not encourage or perpetuate it. Thus in spite of that history and its legacy, including the racial cleavages that characterize Dade County politics today, we see no grounds for holding in these cases that SJR 2-G’s district lines diluted the votes cast by Hispanic voters.
The De Grandy plaintiffs urge us to put more weight on the District Court’s findings of packing and fragmentation, allegedly accomplished by the way the State drew certain specific lines: “[T]he line of District 116 separates heavily Hispanic neighborhoods in District 112 from the rest of the heavily Hispanic Kendall Lakes area and the Kendall area,” so that the line divides “neighbors making up the... same housing development in Kendall Lakes,” and District 114 “packs” Hispanic voters, while Districts 102 and 109 “fragment” them. 815 F. Supp., at 1569 (internal quotation marks omitted). We would agree that where a State has split (or lumped) minority neighborhoods that would have been grouped into a single district (or spread among several) if the State had employed the same line-drawing standards in minority neighborhoods as it used elsewhere in the jurisdiction, the inconsistent treatment might be significant evidence of a §2 violation, even in the face of proportionality. The District Court, however, made no such finding. Indeed, the propositions the court recites on this point are not even phrased as factual findings, but merely as recitations of testimony offered by plaintiffs’ expert witness. While the District Court may well have credited the testimony, the court was apparently wary of adopting the witness’s conclusions as findings. But even if one imputed a greater significance to the accounts of testimony, they would boil down to findings that several of SJR 2-G’s district lines separate portions of Hispanic neighborhoods, while another district line draws several Hispanic neighborhoods into a single district. This, however, would be to say only that lines could have been drawn elsewhere, nothing more. But some dividing by district lines and combining within them is virtually inevitable and befalls any population group of substantial size. Attaching the labels “packing” and “fragmenting” to these phenomena, without more, does not make the result vote dilution when the minority group enjoys substantial proportionality.
3
It may be that the significance of the facts under § 2 was obscured by the rule of thumb apparently adopted by the District Court, that anything short of the maximum number of majority-minority districts consistent with the Gingles conditions would violate §2, at least where societal discrimination against the minority had occurred and continued to occur. But reading the first Gingles condition in effect to define dilution as a failure to maximize in the face of bloc voting (plus some other incidents of societal bias to be expected where bloc voting occurs) causes its own dangers, and they are not to be courted.
Assume a hypothetical jurisdiction of 1,000 voters divided into 10 districts of 100 each, where members of a minority group make up 40 percent of the voting population and voting is totally polarized along racial lines. With the right geographic dispersion to satisfy the compactness requirement, and with careful manipulation of district lines, the minority voters might be placed in control of as many as 7 of the 10 districts. Each such district could be drawn with at least 51 members of the minority group, and whether the remaining minority voters were added to the groupings of 51 for safety or scattered in the other three districts, minority voters would be able to elect candidates of their choice in all seven districts. The point of the hypothetical is not, of course, that any given district is likely to be open to such extreme manipulation, or that bare majorities are likely to vote in full force and strictly along racial lines, but that reading § 2 to define dilution as any failure to maximize tends to obscure the very object of the statute and to run counter to its textually stated purpose. One may suspect vote dilution from political famine, but one is not entitled to suspect (much less infer) dilution from mere failure to guarantee a political feast. However prejudiced a society might be, it would be absurd to suggest that the failure of a districting scheme to provide a minority group with effective political power 75 percent above its numerical strength indicates a denial of equal participation in the political process. Failure to maximize cannot be the measure of § 2.
4
While, for obvious reasons, the State agrees that a failure to leverage minority political strength to the maximum possible point of power is not definitive of dilution in bloc-voting societies, it seeks to impart a measure of determinacy by applying a definitive rule of its own: that as a matter of law no dilution occurs whenever the percentage of single-member districts in which minority voters form an effective majority mirrors the minority voters’ percentage of the relevant population. Proportionality so defined, see n. 11, supra, would thus be a safe harbor for any districting scheme.
The safety would be in derogation of the statutory text and its considered purpose, however, and of the ideal that the Voting Rights Act of 1965 attempts to foster. An inflexible rule would run counter to the textual command of § 2, that the presence or absence of a violation be assessed “based on the totality of circumstances.” 42 U. S. C. § 1973(b). The need for such “totality” review springs from the demonstrated ingenuity of state and local governments in hobbling minority voting power, McCain v. Lybrand, 465 U. S. 236, 243-246 (1984), a point recognized by Congress when it amended the statute in 1982: “[S]ince the adoption of the Voting Rights Act, [some] jurisdictions have substantially moved from direct, over[t] impediments to the right to vote to more sophisticated devices that dilute minority voting strength,” Senate Report 10 (discussing §5). In modifying §2, Congress thus endorsed our view in White v. Regester, 412 U. S. 755 (1973), that “whether the political processes are ‘equally open’ depends upon a searching practical evaluation of the ‘past and present reality,’” Senate Report 30 (quoting 412 U. S., at 766, 770). In a substantial number of voting jurisdictions, that past reality has included such reprehensible practices as ballot box stuffing, outright violence, discretionary registration, property requirements, the poll tax, and the white primary; and other practices censurable when the object of their use is discriminatory, such as at-large elections, runoff requirements, anti-single-shot devices, gerrymandering, the impeachment of officeholders, the annexation or deannexation of territory, and the creation or elimination of elective offices. Some of those expedients could occur even in a jurisdiction with numerically demonstrable proportionality; the harbor safe for States would thus not be safe for voters. It is, in short, for good reason that we have been, and remain, chary of entertaining a simplification of the sort the State now urges upon us. Cf. Gingles, 478 U. S., at 77 (“[Pjersistent proportional representation... [may] not accurately reflect the minority group’s ability to elect its preferred representatives”).
Even if the State’s safe harbor were open only in cases of alleged dilution by the manipulation of district lines, however, it would rest on an unexplored premise of highly suspect validity: that in any given voting jurisdiction (or portion of that jurisdiction under consideration), the rights of some minority voters under §2 may be traded off against the rights of other members of the same minority class. Under the State’s view, the most blatant racial gerrymandering in half of a county’s single-member districts would be irrelevant under §2 if offset by political gerrymandering in the other half, so long as proportionality was the bottom line. But see Baird v. Consolidated City of Indianapolis, 976 F. 2d 357, 359 (CA7 1992) (“A balanced bottom line does not foreclose proof of discrimination along the way”); Richmond v. United States, 422 U. S. 358, 378-379 (1975) (territorial annexation aimed at diluting black votes forbidden by § 5, regardless of its actual effect).
Finally, we reject the safe harbor rule because of a tendency the State would itself certainly condemn, a tendency to promote and perpetuate efforts to devise majority-minority districts even in circumstances where they may not be necessary to achieve equal political and electoral opportunity. Because in its simplest form the State’s rule would shield from §2 challenge a districting scheme in which the number of majority-minority districts reflected the minority’s share of the relevant population, the conclusiveness of the rule might be an irresistible inducement to create such districts. It bears recalling, however, that for all the virtues of majority-minority districts as remedial devices, they rely on a quintessentially race-conscious calculus aptly described as the “politics of second best,” see B. Grofman, L. Handley, & R. Niemi, Minority Representation and the Quest for Voting Equality 136 (1992). If the lesson of Gingles is that society’s racial and ethnic cleavages sometimes necessitate majority-minority districts to ensure equal political and electoral opportunity, that should not obscure the fact that there are communities in which minority citizens are able to form coalitions with voters from other racial and ethnic groups, having no need to be a majority within a single district in order to elect candidates of their choice. Those candidates may not represent perfection to every minority voter, but minority voters are not immune from the obligation to pull, haul, and trade to find common political ground, the virtue of which is not to be slighted in applying a statute meant to hasten the waning of racism in American politics.
It is enough to say that, while proportionality in the sense used here is obviously an indication that minority voters have an equal opportunity, in spite of racial polarization, “to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of their choice,” 42 U. S. C. § 1973(b), the degree of probative value assigned to proportionality may vary with other facts. No single statistic provides courts with a shortcut to determine whether a set of single-member districts unlawfully dilutes minority voting strength.
5
While the United States concedes the relevance of proportionality to a § 2 claim, it would confine proportionality to an affirmative defense, and one to be made only on a statewide basis in cases that challenge districts for electing a body with statewide jurisdiction. In this litigation, the United States would have us treat any claim that evidence of proportionality supports the State’s plan as having been waived because the State made no argument in the District Court that the proportion of districts statewide in which Hispanics constitute an effective voting majority mirrors the proportion of statewide Hispanic population.
The argument has two flaws. There is, first, no textual reason to segregate some circumstances from the statutory totality, to be rendered insignificant unless the defendant pleads them by way of affirmative defense. Second, and just as importantly, the argument would recast these cases as they come to us, in order to bar consideration of proportionality except on statewide scope, whereas up until now the dilution claims have been litigated on a smaller geographical scale. It is, indeed, the plaintiffs themselves, including the United States, who passed up the opportunity to frame their dilution claim in statewide terms. While the United States points to language in its complaint alleging that the redistricting plans dilute the votes of “Hispanic citizens and black citizens in the State of Florida,” App. 77, the complaint identifies “several areas of the State” where such violations of § 2 are said to occur, and then speaks in terms of Hispanics in the Dade County area (and blacks in the area of Escambia County), id., at 75-76. Nowhere do the allegations indicate that claims of dilution “in the State of Florida” are not to be considered in terms of the areas specifically mentioned. The complaint alleges no facts at all about the contours, demographics, or voting patterns of any districts outside the Dade County or Escambia County areas, and neither the evidence at trial
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The judgment is vacated and the case is remanded to the 19th Judicial District Court of Louisiana for further consideration in light of Washington v. Harper, 494 U. S. 210 (1990).
It is so ordered.
Justice Souter took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
D
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Frankfurter
delivered the opinion of the Court.
These two cases had their origin in suits based on the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, 35 Stat. 65, as amended, 45 U. S. C. § 51 et seq., brought in the Circuit Court of the City of St. Louis, Missouri. It is superfluous to give concrete details regarding the parties, the circumstances of the injuries, and the considerations affecting the choice of forum. It suffices to state that in both cases the plaintiff was not a resident of Missouri, the carrier was a foreign corporation, and the accident which gave rise to the claim of liability for negligence took place outside Missouri. In both, the doctrine of jorum non conveniens was invoked; in both, the trial court denied the motion to dismiss the suit on that ground as beyond the jurisdiction of the court to grant. In both cases original proceedings in mandamus were thereupon begun in the Supreme Court of Missouri to compel the trial court to exercise discretionary jurisdiction in disposing of the motions. After alternative writs of mandamus had issued and the causes had been consolidated for consideration, the writs were quashed by a single judgment. 359 Mo. 827, 224 S. W. 2d 105. We brought the proceedings here for review, 339 U. S. 918, because they involved questions important to the enforcement of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act by the courts of the States.
A decision by the highest court of a State determining that the doctrine of jorum non.conveniens cannot bar an action based on the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, in the circumstances before us, may rest on one of three theories. (1) According to its own notions of procedural policy, a State may reject, as it may accept, the doctrine for all causes of action begun in its courts. If denial of a .motion to dismiss an action under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act is rested on such a general local practice, no federal issue comes into play. (It is assumed of course that the State has acquired jurisdiction over the defendant.) (2) By reason of the Privileges- and-Immunities Clause of the Constitution, a State may not discriminate against citizens of sister States. Art. IV, § 2. Therefore Missouri cannot allow suits by nonresident Missourians for liability under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act arising out of conduct outside that State and discriminatorily deny access to its courts to a non-resident who is a citizen of another State. But if a State chooses to “[prefer] residents in access to often overcrowded Courts” and to deny such access to all nonresidents, whether its own citizens or those of other States, it is a choice within its own control. This is true also of actions for personal injuries under the Employers’ Liability Act. Douglas v. New York, N. H. & H. R. Co., 279 U. S. 377, 387. Whether a State makes such a choice is, like its acceptance or rejection of the doctrine of forum non conveniens, a question of State law not open to review here.
But, (3), a State may reject the doctrine of forum non conveniens in suits under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act because it may deem itself compelled by federal law to reject it. Giving the opinion of the Supreme Court of Missouri in these cases a scope most favorable to reliance on a non-federal ground, doubt still remains whether that Court did not deem itself bound to deny the motions for dismissal on the score of forum non con-veniens by its view of the demands of our decisions in Baltimore & O. R. Co. v. Kepner, 314 U. S. 44, and Miles v. Illinois Central R. Co., 315 U. S. 698.
But neither of these cases limited the power of a State to deny access to its courts to persons seeking recovery under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act if in similar cases the State for reasons of local policy denies resort to its courts and enforces its policy impartially, see McKnett v. St. Louis & S. F. R. Co., 292 U. S. 230, so as not to involve a discrimination against Employers’ Liability Act suits and not to offend against the Privileges-and-Immunities Clause of the Constitution. No such restriction is imposed upon the States merely because the Employers’ Liability Act empowers their courts to entertain suits arising under it. There was nothing in that Act even prior to § 1404 (a) of the 1948 revision of the Judicial Code, Title 28, U. S. C., which purported “to force a duty” upon the State courts to entertain or retain Federal Employers’ Liability litigation “against an otherwise valid excuse.” Douglas v. New York, N. H. & H. R. Co., supra, at 388.
Therefore, if the Supreme Court of Missouri held as it did because it felt under compulsion of federal law as enunciated by this Court so to hold, it should be relieved of that compulsion. It should be freed to decide the availability of the principle of jorum non conveniens in these suits according to its own local law. To that end we vacate the judgment of the Supreme Court of Missouri and remand the cause to that Court for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion. State Tax Comm’n v. Van Cott, 306 U. S. 511; Minnesota v. National Tea Co., 309 U. S. 551; Herb v. Pitcairn, 324 U. S. 117; 325 U.S. 77.
Judgment vacated.
Section 1404 (a) reads, “For the convenience of parties and witnesses, in the interest of justice, a district court may transfer any civil action to any other district or division where it might have been brought.” See Ex parte Collett, 337 U. S. 55.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Rehnquist
delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II, and V, and delivered an opinion with respect to Parts III and IV, in which The Chief Justice, Justice Powell, and Justice O’Connor joined.
Appellees in this case challenge two provisions of the Texas Constitution that limit a public official’s ability to become a candidate for another public office. The primary question in this appeal is whether these provisions violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
h-H
Article III, § 19, of the Texas Constitution provides:
“No judge of any court, Secretary of State, Attorney General, clerk of any court of record, or any person holding a lucrative office under the United States, or this State, or any foreign government shall during the term for which he is elected or appointed, be eligible to the Legislature.”
Section 19 renders an officeholder ineligible for the Texas Legislature if his current term of office will not expire until after the legislative term to which he aspires begins. Lee v. Daniels, 377 S. W. 2d 618, 619 (Tex. 1964). Resignation is ineffective to avoid § 19 if the officeholder’s current term of office overlaps the term of the legislature to which he seeks election. Ibid. In other words, §19 requires an officeholder to complete his current term of office before he may be eligible to serve in the legislature.
Article XVI, § 65, is commonly referred to as a “resign-to-run” or “automatic resignation” provision. Section 65 covers a wide range of state and county offices. It provides in relevant part:
“[IJf any of the officers named herein shall announce their candidacy, or shall in fact become a candidate, in any General, Special or Primary Election, for any office of profit or trust under the laws of this State or the United States other than the office then held, at any time when the unexpired term of the office then held shall exceed one (1) year, such announcement or such candidacy shall constitute an automatic resignation of the office then held.”
Four of the appellees are officeholders subject to the automatic resignation provision of §65. Fashing is a County Judge, Baca and McGhee are Justices of the Peace, and Ybarra is a Constable. Each officeholder-appellee alleged in the complaint that he is qualified under Texas law to be a candidate for higher judicial office, and that the reason he has not and will not announce his candidacy is that such an announcement will constitute an automatic resignation from his current position. Appellee Baca alleged in addition that he could not become a candidate for the legislature because of § 19. The remaining appellees are 20 voters who allege that they would vote for the officeholder-appellees were they to become candidates.
The District Court for the Western District of Texas held that § 19 and § 65 denied appellees equal protection. Fashing v. Moore, 489 F. Supp. 471 (1980). The District Court concluded that §19 created “classifications that are invidiously discriminatory.” Id., at 475. The District Court explained that § 19 draws distinctions between those officials whose terms end concurrently with the beginning of the legislative term and those whose terms overlap the legislative term. The court also found §19 deficient because “[n]o reciprocal prohibition ... is placed upon a legislator seeking to run for mayor or judge.” Ibid. As to §65, the District Court determined that the classifications embodied in §65 “fail[ed] to serve any proper governmental interest” because some state and local officials were covered by §65 while others were not. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed without opinion. Fashing v. Moore, 631 F. 2d 731 (1980). We noted probable jurisdiction, 452 U. S. 904 (1981), and now reverse.
II
Before we may reach the merits of the constitutional issues in this case, we must address appellants’ contention that the allegations in the complaint are insufficient to create a “case or controversy” between the officeholder-appellees and those Texas officials charged with enforcing § 19 and § 65. Appellants contend that the dispute in this case is merely hypothetical and therefore not a justiciable controversy within the meaning of Art. Ill of the United States Constitution. United Public Workers v. Mitchell, 330 U. S. 75, 90-91 (1947).
We find the uncontested allegations in the complaint sufficient to create an actual case or controversy. The officeholder-appellees have alleged that they have not and will not announce their candidacy for higher judicial office because such action will constitute an automatic resignation of their current offices pursuant to §65. Unlike the situation in Mitchell, appellees have alleged in a precise manner that, but for the sanctions of the constitutional provision they seek to challenge, they would engage in the very acts that would trigger the enforcement of the provision. Given that §65 provides for automatic resignation upon an announcement of candidacy, it cannot be said that §65 presents only a speculative or hypothetical obstacle to appellees’ candidacy for higher judicial office. See Regional Rail Reorganization Act Cases, 419 U. S. 102, 143, and n. 29 (1974); Turner v. Fouche, 396 U. S. 346, 361-362, n. 23 (1970).
Baca’s uncontested allegations are sufficient to create a case or controversy with regard to § 19. That provision entirely disables an officeholder from becoming a candidate for the legislature until he completes his present term of office. The gist of Baca’s challenge to § 19 is that it renders him ineligible to become a candidate for the legislature because his term as Justice of the Peace overlaps the legislative term. Baca’s dispute with appellants over the constitutionality of § 19, therefore, cannot be said to be abstract or hypothetical, since he has sufficiently alleged that § 19 has prevented him from becoming a candidate for the legislature.
Ill
The Equal Protection Clause allows the States considerable leeway to enact legislation that may appear to affect similarly situated people differently. Legislatures are ordinarily assumed to have acted constitutionally. Under traditional equal protection principles, distinctions need only be drawn in such a manner as to bear some rational relationship to a legitimate state end. Classifications are set aside only if they are based solely on reasons totally unrelated to the pursuit of the State’s goals and only if no grounds can be conceived to justify them. See, e. g., McDonald v. Board of Election Comm’rs, 394 U. S. 802, 808-809 (1969); McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420, 425-426 (1961). We have departed from traditional equal protection principles only when the challenged statute places burdens upon “suspect classes” of persons or on a constitutional right that is deemed to be “fundamental.” San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 1, 17 (1973).
Thus, we must first determine whether the provisions challenged in this case deserve “scrutiny” more vigorous than that which the traditional principles would require.
Far from recognizing candidacy as a “fundamental right,” we have held that the existence of barriers to a candidate’s access to the ballot “does not of itself compel close scrutiny.” Bullock v. Carter, 405 U. S. 134, 143 (1972). “In approaching candidate restrictions, it is essential to examine in a realistic light the extent and nature of their impact on voters.” Ibid. In assessing challenges to state election laws that restrict access to the ballot, this Court has not formulated a “litmus-paper test for separating those restrictions that are valid from those that are invidious under the Equal Protection Clause.” Storer v. Brown, 415 U. S. 724, 730 (1974). Decision in this area of constitutional adjudication is a matter of degree, and involves a consideration of the facts and circumstances behind the law, the interests the State seeks to protect by placing restrictions on candidacy, and the nature of the interests of those who may be burdened by the restrictions. Ibid.; Williams v. Rhodes, 393 U. S. 23, 30 (1968).
Our ballot access cases, however, do 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.” Lubin v. Panish, 415 U. S. 709, 716 (1974), This Court has departed from traditional equal protection analysis in recent years in two essentiallyseparate, although similar, lines of ballot access cases.
One line of ballot access cases involves classifications based on wealth. In invalidating candidate filing-fee provisions, for example, we have departed from traditional equal protection analysis because such a “system falls with unequal weight on voters, as well as candidates, according to their economic status.” Bullock v. Carter, supra, at 144. “Whatever may be the political mood at any given time, our tradition has been one of hospitality toward all candidates without regard to their economic status.” Lubin v. Panish, supra, at 717-718. Economic status is not a measure of a prospective candidate’s qualifications to hold elective office, and a filing fee alone is an inadequate test of whether a candidacy is serious or spurious. Clearly, the challenged provisions in the instant case involve neither filing fees nor restrictions that invidiously burden those of lower economic status. This line of cases, therefore, does not support a departure from the traditional equal protection principles.
The second line of ballot access cases involves classification schemes that impose burdens on new or small political parties or independent candidates. See, e. g., Illinois State Bd. of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, 440 U. S. 173 (1979); Storer v. Brown, supra; American Party of Texas v. White, 415 U. S. 767 (1974); Jenness v. Fortson, 403 U. S. 431 (1971); Williams v. Rhodes, supra. These cases involve requirements that an independent candidate or minor party demonstrate a certain level of support among the electorate before the minor party or candidate may obtain a place on the ballot. In these cases, the Court has emphasized that the States have important interests in protecting the integrity of their political processes from frivolous or fraudulent candidacies, in ensuring that their election processes are efficient, in avoiding voter confusion caused by an overcrowded ballot, and in avoiding the expense and burden of run-off elections. To this end, the Court has upheld reasonable level-of-support requirements and classifications that turn on the political party’s success in prior elections. See Storer v. Brown, supra; American Party of Texas v. White, supra; Jenness v. Fortson, supra. The Court has recognized, however, that such requirements may burden First Amendment interests in ensuring freedom of association, as these requirements classify on the basis óf a candidate’s association with particular political parties. Consequently, the State may not act to maintain the “status quo” by making it virtually impossible for any but the two major parties to achieve ballot positions for their candidates. See Williams v. Rhodes, supra, at 25.
The provisions of the Texas Constitution challenged in this case do not contain any classification that imposes special burdens on minority political parties or independent candidates. The burdens placed on those candidates subject to § 19 and § 65 in no way depend upon political affiliation or political viewpoint.
It does not automatically follow, of course, that we must apply traditional equal protection principles in examining § 19 and §65 merely because these restrictions on candidacy do not fall into the two patterns just described. But this fact does counsel against discarding traditional principles without first examining the nature of the interests that are affected and the extent of the burden these provisions place on candidacy. See Bullock v. Carter, supra, at 143; Storer v. Brown, supra, at 730. Not all ballot access restrictions require “heightened” equal protection scrutiny. The Court, for example, applied traditional equal protection principles to uphold a classification scheme that denied absentee ballots to inmates in jail awaiting trial. McDonald v. Board of Election Comm’rs, 394 U. S., at 807-811. Thus, it is necessary to examine the provisions in- question in terms of the extent of the burdens that they place on the candidacy of current holders of public office.
IV
A
Section 19 applies only to candidacy for the Texas Legislature. Of the appellees, only Baca, a Justice of the Peace, alleged that he would run for the Texas Legislature. Of the plaintiffs in this case, only appellee Baca’s candidacy for another public office has in any fashion been restricted by § 19. The issue in this case, therefore, is whether § 19 may be applied to a Justice of the Peace in a manner consistent with the Equal Protection Clause.
Section 19 merely prohibits officeholders from cutting short their current term of office in order to serve in the legislature. In Texas, the term of office for a Justice of the Peace is four years, while legislative elections are held every two years. See Tex. Const., Art. V, §18; Art. Ill, §§3, 4. Therefore, § 19 simply requires Baca to complete his 4-year term as Justice of the Peace before he may be eligible for the legislature. At most, therefore, Baca must wait two years— one election cycle — before he may run as a candidate for the legislature.
In making an equal protection challenge, it is the claimant’s burden to “demonstrate in the first instance a discrimination against [him] of some substance.” American Party of Texas v. White, 415 U. S., at 781. Classification is the essence of all legislation, and only those classifications which are invidious, arbitrary, or irrational offend the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution. Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S. 483, 489 (1955).
In establishing a maximum “waiting period” of two years for candidacy by a Justice of the Peace for the legislature, § 19 places a de minimis burden on the political aspirations of a current officeholder. Section 19 discriminates neither on the basis of political affiliation nor on any factor not related to a candidate’s qualifications to hold political office. Unlike filing fees or the level-of-support requirements, § 19 in no way burdens access to the political process by those who are outside the “mainstream” of political life. In this case, § 19 burdens only a candidate who has successfully been elected to one office, but whose political ambitions lead him to pursue a seat in the Texas Legislature.
A “waiting period” is hardly a significant barrier to candidacy. In Storer v. Brown, 415 U. S., at 733-737, we upheld a statute that imposed a flat disqualification upon any candidate seeking to run in a party primary if he had been registered or affiliated with another political party within the 12 months preceding his declaration of candidacy. Similarly, we upheld a 7-year durational residency requirement for candidacy in Chimento v. Stark, 414 U. S. 802 (1973), summarily aff’g 353 F. Supp. 1211 (NH). We conclude that this sort of insignificant interference with access to the ballot need only rest on a rational predicate in order to survive a challenge under the Equal Protection Clause. See Illinois State Bd. of Elections v. Socialist Workers Party, 440 U. S., at 189 (Stevens, J., concurring in part and in judgment).
Section 19 clearly rests on a rational predicate. That provision furthers Texas’ interests in maintaining the integrity of the State’s Justices of the Peace. By prohibiting candidacy for the legislature until completion of one’s term of office, § 19 seeks to ensure that a Justice of the Peace will neither abuse his position nor neglect his duties because of his aspirations for higher office. The demands of a political campaign may tempt a Justice of the Peace to devote less than his full time and energies to the responsibilities of his office. A campaigning Justice of the Peace might be tempted to render decisions and take actions that might serve more to further his political ambitions than the responsibilities of his office. The State’s interests are especially important with regard to judicial officers. It is a serious accusation to charge a judicial officer with making a politically motivated decision. By contrast, it is to be expected that a legislator will vote with due regard to the views of his constituents.
Texas has a legitimate interest in discouraging its Justices of the Peace from vacating their current terms of office. By requiring Justices of the Peace to complete their current terms of office, the State has eliminated one incentive to vacate one’s office prior to the expiration of the term. The State may act to avoid the difficulties that accompany interim elections and appointments. “[T]he Constitution does not require the State to choose ineffectual means to achieve its aims.” Storer v. Brown, supra, at 736. Under traditional equal protection principles, a classification is not deficient simply because the State could have selected another means of achieving the desired ends. Massachusetts Bd. of Retirement v. Murgia, 427 U. S. 307, 316 (1976); Mathews v. Diaz, 426 U. S. 67, 83 (1976); San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S., at 51.
Finally, it is no argument that § 19 is invalid because it burdens only those officeholders who desire to rim for the legislature. In Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U. S. 601, 607, n. 5 (1973), we rejected the contention that Oklahoma’s restrictions on political activity by public employees violated the Equal Protection Clause:
“Appellants also claim that §818 violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment by singling out classified service employees for restrictions on partisan political expression while leaving unclassified personnel free from such restrictions. The contention is somewhat odd in the context of appellants’ principal claim, which is that § 818 reaches too far rather than not far enough. In any event, the legislature must have some leeway in determining which of its employment positions require restrictions on partisan political activities and which may be left unregulated. See McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420 (1961). And a State can hardly be faulted for attempting to limit the positions upon which such restrictions are placed.”
It would indeed be a perversion of the Equal Protection Clause were we to conclude that Texas must restrict a Justice of the Peace’s candidacy for all offices before it can restrict a Justice of the Peace’s candidacy for any office.
The Equal Protection Clause allows the State to regulate “one step at a time, addressing itself to the phase of the problem which seems most acute.” Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S., at 489. The State “need not run the risk of losing an entire remedial scheme simply because it failed, through inadvertence or otherwise, to cover every evil that might conceivably have been attacked.” McDonald v. Board of Election Comm’rs, 394 U. S., at 809 (citation omitted).
B
Article XVI, § 65, of the Texas Constitution provides that the holders of certain offices automatically resign their positions if they become candidates for any other elected office, unless the unexpired portion of the current term is one year or less. The burdens that §65 imposes on candidacy are even less substantial than those imposed by § 19. The two provisions, of course, serve essentially the same state interests. The District Court found § 65 deficient, however, not because of the nature or extent of the provision’s restriction on candidacy, but because of the manner in which the offices are classified. According to the District Court, the classification system cannot survive equal protection scrutiny because Texas has failed to explain sufficiently why some elected public officials are subject to § 65 and why others are not. As with the case of § 19, we conclude that § 65 survives a challenge under the Equal Protection Clause unless appel-lees can show that there is no rational predicate to the classification scheme.
The history behind § 65 shows that it may be upheld consistent with the “one step at a time” approach that this Court has undertaken with regard to state regulation not subject to more vigorous scrutiny than that sanctioned by the traditional principles. Section 65 was enacted in 1954 as a transitional provision applying only to the 1954 election. 2 G. Braden, The Constitution of the State of Texas: An Annotated and Comparative Analysis 812 (1977). Section 65 extended the terms of those offices enumerated in the provision from two to four years. The provision also staggered the terms of other offices so that at least some county and local offices would be contested at each election. Ibid. The automatic resignation proviso to §65 was not added until 1958. In that year, a similar automatic resignation provision was added in Art. XI, § 11, which applies to officeholders in home rule cities who serve terms longer than two years. Section 11 allows home rule cities the option of extending the terms of municipal offices from two to up to four years.
Thus, the automatic resignation provision in Texas is a creature of the State’s electoral reforms of 1958. That the State did not go further in applying the automatic resignation provision to those officeholders whose terms were not extended by §11 or §65, absent an invidious purpose, is not the sort of malfunctioning of the State’s lawmaking process forbidden by the Equal Protection Clause. See McDonald v. Board of Election Comm’rs, supra, at 809. A regulation is not devoid of a rational predicate simply because it happens to be incomplete. See Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., supra, at 489. The Equal Protection Clause does not forbid Texas to restrict one elected officeholder’s candidacy for another elected office unless and until it places similar restrictions on other officeholders. Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U. S., at 607, n. 5. Cf. Minnesota v. Clover Leaf Creamery Co., 449 U. S. 456, 466 (1981). The provision’s language and its history belie any notion that § 65 serves the invidious purpose of denying access to the political process to identifiable classes of potential candidates.
V
As an alternative ground to support the judgments of the courts below, appellees contend that § 19 and § 65 violate the First Amendment. Our analysis of appellees’ challenge under the Equal Protection Clause disposes of this argument. We have concluded that the burden on appellees’ First Amendment interests in candidacy are so insignificant that the classifications of §19 and §65 may be upheld consistent with traditional equal protection principles. The State’s interests in this regard are sufficient to warrant the de minimis interference with appellees’ interests in candidacy.
There is another reason why appellees’ First Amendment challenge must fail. Appellees are elected state officeholders who contest restrictions on partisan political activity. Section 19 and § 65 represent a far more limited restriction on political activity than this Court has upheld with regard to civil servants. See CSC v. Letter Carriers, 413 U. S. 548 (1973); Broadrick v. Oklahoma, supra; United Public Workers v. Mitchell, 330 U. S. 75 (1947). These provisions in no way restrict appellees’ ability to participate in the political campaigns of third parties. They limit neither political contributions nor expenditures. They do not preclude appellees from holding an office in a political party. Consistent with §19 and §65, appellees may distribute campaign literature and may make speeches on behalf of a candidate.
In this case, § 19 operates merely to require appellee Baca to await the conclusion of his 4-year term as Justice of the Peace before he may run for the Texas Legislature. By virtue of §65, appellees in this case will automatically resign their current offices if they announce their candidacy for higher judicial office so long as the unexpired term of their current office exceeds one year. In this sense, § 19 and § 65 are in reality no different than the provisions we upheld in Mitchell, Letter Carriers, and Broadrick, which required dismissal of any civil servant who became a political candidate. See 413 U. S., at 556; 413 U. S., at 617.
Neither the Equal Protection Clause nor the First Amendment authorizes this Court to review in cases such as this the manner in which a State has decided to govern itself. Constitutional limitations arise only if the classification scheme is invidious or if the challenged provision significantly impairs interests protected by the First Amendment. Our view of the wisdom of a state constitutional provision may not color our task of constitutional adjudication.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Reversed.
Section 65 covers District Clerks, County Clerks, County Judges, County Treasurers, Criminal District Attorneys, County Surveyors, Inspectors of Hides and Animals, County Commissioners, Justices of the Peace, Sheriffs, Assessors and Collectors of Taxes, District Attorneys, County Attorneys, Public Weighers, and Constables. Section 65 altered the terms of these offices. See infra, at 970.
Bullock v. Carter, 405 U. S. 134 (1972); Lubin v. Panish, 415 U. S. 709 (1974).
A litigant has standing to challenge the constitutionality of a statute only insofar as it adversely affects his own rights. Ulster County Court v. Allen, 442 U. S. 140, 154-155 (1979). “Embedded in the traditional rules governing constitutional adjudication is the principle that a person to whom a statute may constitutionally be applied will not be heard to challenge that statute on the ground that it may conceivably be applied unconstitutionally to others, in other situations not before the Court.” Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U. S. 601, 610 (1973). Therefore, Baca may not argue that § 19 may not be applied to restrict a Justice of the Peace’s candidacy for the legislature because the State’s interests in restricting candidacy by a different class of officeholders are insufficient to survive constitutional scrutiny. See Stover v. Brown, 415 U. S. 724, 737 (1974). Cf. Cabell v. Chavez-Salido, 454 U. S. 432, 442 (1982).
In the case of local elected officials whose terms of office typically end in nonelection years, the “waiting period” of § 19 is even shorter.
The State’s particular interest in maintaining the integrity of the judicial system could support § 19, even if such a restriction could not survive constitutional scrutiny with regard to any other officeholder. See n. 3, supra.
Baca may not utilize the “overbreadth” doctrine to challenge § 19. Baca may not challenge the provision’s application to him on the grounds that the provision might be unconstitutional as applied to a class of officeholders not before the Court. Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U. S., at 612-616. The First Amendment will not suffer if the constitutionality of § 19 is litigated on a case-by-case basis.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Scalia
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Following a jury trial in the Pennsylvania Court of Common Pleas, respondent Michael Peoples, who had been arrested for robbing a man and then setting him on fire, was convicted of “arson-endangering persons,” aggravated assault, and robbery. The Pennsylvania Superior Court affirmed his conviction on direct appeal. Commonwealth v. Peoples, 319 Pa. Super. 621, 466 A. 2d 720 (1983). Respondent then filed a pro se petition for allocatur and appointment of counsel with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Under Pennsylvania law, such allocatur review “is not a matter of right, but of sound judicial discretion, and an appeal will be allowed only when there are special and important reasons therefor.” Pa. Rule App. Proc. 1114. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court granted the request for counsel without reaching the merits of the claims presented. Shortly thereafter, respondent, represented by appointed counsel, submitted a second petition for allocatur, raising some, but not all, of the claims he had raised pro se. On November 4, 1985, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied the second petition without opinion.
On July 28, 1986, respondent filed a petition for federal ha-beas relief in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, asserting: (1) that the prosecutor violated state law, and thereby due process, by cross-examining him with regard to unrelated crimes; (2) that the Court of Common Pleas arbitrarily deprived him of his state-law right to a bench trial; (3) that the police used unreasonably suggestive identification procedures, which tainted the prosecution’s in-court identifications; and (4) that defense counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to move to suppress various state’s evidence obtained from an illegal arrest and search and seizure, and by failing to contest the introduction of evidence that respondent had acted in contempt of court by drastically altering his hairstyle just prior to a scheduled lineup.
After reviewing the procedural history of each claim, the District Court denied relief and dismissed the petition for failure to exhaust state remedies. Upon respondent’s appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit reversed and remanded for a hearing on the merits. Peoples v. Fulcomer, 838 F. 2d 462 (1987) (judgment order). The court found that claims (2) and (4) had first been raised in one or the other of the unsuccessful petitions for allocatur, but, without considering whether respondent could obtain review of these claims on state collateral review, held that such presentation sufficiently exhausted state remedies. Specifically, the Court of Appeals held that claims raised by respondent in either his pro se petition for allocatur or his later counseled petition for allocatur were exhausted by virtue of their inclusion in such petitions. It believed this result dictated by Chaussard v. Fulcomer, 816 F. 2d 925 (1987), an earlier Third Circuit opinion, which had read our case law to provide that “the exhaustion rule is satisfied when the state courts have had an ‘opportunity to pass upon and correct’ alleged violations of a prisoner’s federal constitutional rights.” Id., at 928, quoting Fay v. Noia, 372 U. S. 391, 438 (1963). The Chaussard panel concluded that the discretionary nature of allocatur review by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court “does not affect the fact that [the] petition for allocatur . . . gave the highest Pennsylvania state court the opportunity to correct each alleged constitutional infirmity in [the] criminal con-victio[n].” 816 F. 2d, at 928. We granted certiorari to consider whether the presentation of claims to a State’s highest court on discretionary review, without more, satisfies the exhaustion requirements of 28 U. S. C. § 2254. 486 U. S. 1004 (1988).
Respondent’s habeas petition should have been dismissed if state remedies had not been exhausted as to any of the federal claims. Rose v. Lundy, 455 U. S. 509 (1982). The exhaustion requirement, first enunciated in Ex parte Royall, 117 U. S. 241 (1886), is grounded in principles of comity and reflects a desire to “protect the state courts’ role in the enforcement of federal law,” Rose v. Lundy, supra, at 518. In addition, the requirement is based upon a pragmatic recognition that “federal claims that have been fully exhausted in state courts will more often be accompanied by a complete factual record to aid the federal courts in their review.” 455 U. S., at 519. Codified since 1948 in 28 U. S. C. §2254, the exhaustion rule, while not a jurisdictional requirement, Granberry v. Greer, 481 U. S. 129 (1987), creates a “strong presumption in favor of requiring the prisoner to pursue his available state remedies.” Id., at 131; see also Rose v. Lundy, supra, at 515 (“[SJtate remedies must be exhausted except in unusual circumstances”).
Today we address again what has become a familiar inquiry: “To what extent must the petitioner who seeks federal habeas exhaust state remedies before resorting to the federal court?” Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 78 (1977) (emphasis added). Title 28 U. S. C. § 2254(c) provides that a claim shall not be deemed exhausted so long as a petitioner “has the right under the law of the State to raise, by any available procedure, the question presented.” Read narrowly, this language appears to preclude a finding of exhaustion if there exists any possibility of further state-court review. We have, however, expressly rejected such a construction, Brown v. Allen, 344 U. S. 443, 448-449, n. 3 (1953), holding instead that once the state courts have ruled upon a claim, it is not necessary for a petitioner “to ask the state for collateral relief, based upon the same evidence and issues already decided by direct review.” Id., at 447. This interpretation reconciles § 2254(c) with § 2254(b), which provides that federal habeas review will lie where state corrective processes are “ineffective to protect the rights of the prisoner.” It would be inconsistent with the latter provision, as well as with underlying principles of comity, to mandate recourse to state collateral review whose results have effectively been predetermined, or permanently to bar from federal habeas prisoners in States whose postconviction procedures are technically inexhaustible.
The Third Circuit’s analysis in the present case derives from the manner in which we applied the holding of Brown in Smith v. Digmon, 434 U. S. 332 (1978) (per curiam), where, on direct review, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals had failed to address explicitly a claim that had been properly presented. Chaussard, supra, at 928-929. Finding for the petitioner, we stated in Digmon that “[i]t is too obvious to merit extended discussion that whether the exhaustion requirement of 28 U. S. C. § 2254(b) has been satisfied cannot turn upon whether a state appellate court chooses to ignore in its opinion a federal constitutional claim squarely raised in petitioner’s brief in the state court, and, indeed, in this case, vigorously opposed in the State’s brief.” Digmon, supra, at 333. The reason that point was “too obvious to merit extended discussion” was that by then it was well settled that “once [a] federal claim has been fairly presented to the state courts, the exhaustion requirement is satisfied.” Picard v. Connor, 404 U. S. 270, 275 (1971) (emphasis added). The Court of Appeals below held, and respondent contends here, that the submission of a new claim to a State’s highest court on discretionary review constitutes a fair presentation. We disagree.
Although we have- rejected a narrow interpretation of § 2254(c), we have not blue-penciled the provision from the text of the statute. It is reasonable to infer an exception where the State has actually passed upon the claim, as in Brown; and where the claim has been presented as of right but ignored (and therefore impliedly rejected), as in Digmon. In both those contexts, it is fair to assume that further state proceedings would be useless. Such an assumption is not appropriate, however — and the inference of an exception to the requirement of § 2254(c) is therefore not justified — where the claim has been presented for the first and only time in a procedural context in which its merits will not be considered unless “there are special and important reasons therefor,” Pa. Rule App. Proc. 1114. Raising the claim in such a fashion does not, for the relevant purpose, constitute “fair presentation.” See Ex parte Hawk, 321 U. S. 114 (1944) (application to Nebraska Supreme Court for original writ of habeas corpus does not exhaust state remedies); Pitchess v. Davis, 421 U. S. 482 (1975) (per curiam) (motions to the California Court of Appeal and the California Supreme Court for a pretrial writ of prohibition do not exhaust state remedies).
It follows from what we have said that it was error for the Court of Appeals to rest a conclusion of exhaustion upon respondent’s presentation of his claims in petitions for allo-catur. The requisite exhaustion may nonetheless exist, of course, if it is clear that respondent’s claims are now procedurally barred under Pennsylvania law. See, e. g., Engle v. Isaac, 456 U. S. 107, 125-126, n. 28 (1982); Teague v. Lane, ante, at 297-298. We leave that question for the Court of Appeals. The judgment of the Third Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Section 2254 in relevant part provides:
“(b) An application for a writ of habeas corpus in behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court shall not be granted unless it appears that the applicant has exhausted the remedies available in the courts of the State, or that there is either an absence of available State corrective process or the existence of circumstances rendering such process ineffective to protect the rights of the prisoner.
“(c) An applicant shall not be deemed to have exhausted the remedies available in the courts of the State, within the meaning of this section, if he has the right under the law of the State to raise, by any available procedure, the question presented.”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Brennan
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Interstate Commerce Act provides that it is unlawful for any person engaged in a business other than transportation to “transport property by motor vehicle in interstate or foreign commerce for business purposes unless such transportation is within the scope, and in furtherance, of a primary business enterprise (other than transportation) of such person.” §203 (c), 49 U. S. C. § 303 (c). Appellees deal in livestock and commodities from a place of business in San Antonio, Texas. They make deliveries in their own trucks to customers in Louisiana, and buy sugar at Supreme, Louisiana, which they backhaul 525 miles for resale to customers in San Antonio. The Interstate Commerce Commission held that this backhaul was not exempt under § 203 (c) as “transportation . . . within the scope, and in furtherance, of a primary business enterprise . . of appellees, but was “conducted with the purpose of profiting from the transportation performed, and, as such, constitutes for-hire carriage for which operating authority from this Commission is required.” 81 M. C. C. 33/, 347. A three-judge court in the District Court for the Western District of Texas set aside the ICC order. 219 F. Supp. 781. We noted probable jurisdiction. 375 U. S. 901. We affirm.
Section 203 (c) was designed explicitly to authorize the ICC to eliminate transportation which, though carried on in the guise of private carriage, was in effect for-hire carriage, and thus might lawfully be carried on only by an authorized common or contract carrier. Before the enactment of § 203 (c) the ICC was able to reach such abuses by interpreting § 203 (a) (17), 49 U. S. C. § 303 (a) (17), so as to exclude such “pseudo-private” carriage from its definition of a “private carrier of property by motor vehicle” as a person, not a “common” or “contract” carrier, who transports property of which he “is the owner, lessee, or bailee, when such transportation is for the purpose of sale, lease, rent, or bailment, or in furtherance of any commercial enterprise.” Many of the cases involved nonauthorized carriers in the transportation business who resorted to transparent “buy-and-sell” devices to evade ICC regulation. A typical buy-and-sell arrangement is one under which the carrier “buys” property at a shipping point, transports it to a delivery point and there “sells” it to the real purchaser, the “profit” to the carrier amounting to the price of the transportation between the two points. Similar evasions through the use of spurious buy-and-sell agreements were found in cases where property was transported in trucks regularly used by noncarrier businesses to make pickups and deliveries. The ICC was faced with the necessity of determining on the facts of each case whether the transportation constituted private carriage beyond the scope of ICC economic regulation, or for-hire transportation subject to all relevant provisions of the Act. In other words, here, as in United States v. Drum, 368 U. S. 370, 374, in which we dealt with another aspect of the “pseudo-private” carriage problem, the ICC has also “had to decide whether a particular arrangement gives rise to that ‘for-hire’ carriage which is subject to economic regulation in the public interest, or whether it is, in fact, private carriage as to which Congress determined that the [noncarrier’s] interest . . . should prevail.”
In the course of discriminating between this pseudo-private carriage and that transportation which was in fact in furtherance of a noncarrier business, the ICC developed the so-called “primary business” test. This test was first enunciated by the full Commission in Lenoir Chair Co., 51 M. C. C. 65, ail’d, sub nom. Brooks Transportation Co. v. United States, 93 F. Supp. 517, aff’d, 340 U. S. 925. A chair manufacturer delivered some of its products in its own trucks. Whenever possible, it also used the vehicles to backhaul manufacturing materials for use and processing in its own plant. The ICC concluded, 51 M. C. C., at 76, that the delivery of goods and the backhaul were lawful private carriage because undertaken “as a bona fide incident to and in furtherance of [its] primary business . . . The governing standard was stated as follows, id., at 75:
“If the facts establish that the primary business of an operator is the supplying of transportation for compensation then the carrier’s status is established though the operator may be the owner, at the time, of the goods transported and may be transporting them for the purpose of sale. ... If, on the other hand, the primary business of an operator is found to be manufacturing or some other noncarrier commercial enterprise, then it must be determined whether the motor operations are in bona fide furtherance of the primary business or whether they are conducted as a related or secondary enterprise with the purpose of profiting from the transportation performed. In our opinion, they cannot be both.”
The ICC believed, however, that § 203 (a) (17) was not sufficiently explicit, particularly since decisions of some lower courts after Brooks raised doubts whether a truck operator could be found to be an unauthorized “for-hire” carrier in the absence of some affirmative showing that his operations brought him within the definitions of common or contract carriage. Consequently the Commission sought additional legislation. The original ICC bill in this area would have amended the definition of “private carrier” in § 203 (a) (17) to prohibit the buy-and-sell device employed by pseudo-private carriers as a subterfuge to avoid regulation. See S. 1677, H. R. 5825, 85th Cong., 1st Sess. This was withdrawn, however, in favor of a more broadly phrased provision, sponsored by the Transportation Association of America, which encompassed not only buy-and-sell devices, but also similar subterfuges which might be employed to engage in unauthorized for-hire transportation. The second clause of § 203 (c) is substantially the TAA proposal.
The 1958 amendment appears on its face to codify the primary business test as the standard for determining whether a particular carrier is engaged in a private or for-hire operation. The appellants argue, however, that the amendment was intended to impose a broader limitation in the case of backhaul operations of the kind engaged in by appellees. The United States urges in its brief that Congress in 1958 was particularly concerned with the diversion of traffic from regulated carriers by backhauling operations, and that one object of the 1958 amendment was “to make plain that the purchase and sale of goods solely to take advantage of available backhaul capacity cannot qualify as a 'primary business enterprise (other than transportation).’ ” We understand this argument to be that Congress in effect enacted a per se test outlawing trucking operations limited to backhaul capacity without inquiry into whether that operation was undertaken pursuant to a bona fide noncarrier business enterprise. We find no support in either the words of the amendment or its legislative history for putting that gloss upon the amendment. On the contrary, we are persuaded that Congress meant only to codify the primary business test which, as applied by the ICC, requires an analysis of the backhaul operation in the factual setting of .each case.
The legislative history fully supports this view. The ICC Chairman, speaking in support of the TAA amendment, expressly stated that, in his view, its effect would be to “incorporate the primary business test into the statute.” Similarly, the President of TAA, speaking directly to the backhaul problem, said that “Our proposal . . . would affect . . . the carrier who delivers his own goods in one direction, as a legal private carrier, but then resorts to the buy-and-sell practice to get a return load.” The Senate and House Reports, while less crystal clear, nevertheless reveal no purpose beyond codification of the Brooks test. Thus the Senate Report states that the amendment “accurately reflects the holding in the Brooks case.” Although the House Report includes a discussion of the backhaul problem in language which tracks the statement in the ICC 1953 Annual Report — where the Commission first directed the attention' of Congress to the problem of buy-and-sell arrangements — the House Report concludes: “There is no intention on the part of this Committee in any way to jeopardize or interfere with bona fide private carriage, as recognized in the Brooks case.” Moreover, the managers of the bills in both Senate and House gave assurances that the object of the amendment was to incorporate the primary business test into positive law. No application of the primary business test by the ICC or the courts gave conclusive effect to backhauling. The critical determination made in each case was between spurious buy-and-sell arrangements, whether or not as part of a backhaul, and a true wholesaling operation utilizing the operator’s own trucks. Backhauls were treated as merely one aspect of the buy-and-sell problem, since the presence of backhaul capacity presents a special temptation to indulge in pseudo-private carriage.
We therefore conclude that § 203 (c) merely codifies the primary business test, and embodies no outright prohibition of backhauling practices. The statutory scheme recognizes that mere availability and use of backhaul capacity may in particular cases be completely consistent with the bona fide conduct of a noncarrier business. Thus the question in this case is a narrow one: whether, applying the standards developed under the primary business test, appellees’ backhauling of sugar was within the scope, and in furtherance, of a primary, noncarrier business.
In developing and applying the primary business standard, the ICC has elaborated criteria characteristic of the spurious buy-and-sell device. Among these are the large investment of assets or payroll in transportation operations; negotiating the sale of goods transported in advance of dispatching a truck to pick them up; direct delivery of the transported goods from the truck to the ultimate buyer, rather than from warehoused stocks; solicitation of the order by the supplier rather than the truck owner; and inclusion in the sales price of an amount to cover transportation costs.
We are not persuaded from our examination of the record that there is sufficient evidence to support the ICC’s conclusion that the appellees’ sugar operation was for-hire transportation and not transportation within the scope, and in furtherance, of appellees’ noncarrier business enterprise. The ICC found that appellees “have long been buying and selling certain commodities and in connection therewith transporting them to purchasers, in bona fide furtherance of their primary business, as a dealer in those commodities.” 81 M. C. C., at 345. The ICC found further that “The more usual arrangement under which [appellees] operate . . . appears to be one in which the [appellees] have no preexisting sugar order, but buy with the intention of selling later either en route or after the transportation is accomplished. This procedure is ordinarily coordinated with a backhaul, and the purpose of their sugar dealings is the generation of sugar shipments which they can transport as return lading for their trucks which are moving in the opposite direction.” 81 M. C. C., at 346. But these findings, on this record, are consistent with an operation “within the scope, and in furtherance, of a primary business enterprise.” Appel-lees began their business in 1934 as dealers in livestock. They gradually added a feed mill and the buying and selling of corn, oats, wheat, bran, molasses, salt and fertilizer. They added sugar in 1954. Moreover, in addition to the absence of the element — usually found in spurious buy-and-sell arrangements — of obtaining orders for a commodity (in this case sugar) before purchasing it, other indicia are absent. Appellees’ assets are not in large part composed of transportation facilities, nor is transportation a major item of expense; appellees bear the full risk of damage in transit and, since they sell at market price, also of loss in value due to price changes; they buy the sugar on credit with a discount for payment in 10 days, and sell on the same terms; their sugar accounts receivable at the date of hearing exceeded $10,000, and amounted to $20,000 or $30,000 during the previous year. It is true that they warehoused only a small stock of sugar and that generally the trucks delivered the sugar directly to buyers upon, or within a day or two after, arrival in San Antonio. Appellees offered an entirely reasonable explanation for this, however: sugar is a perishable commodity, the preservation of which apparently requires air conditioning facilities with which their warehouse is not equipped; the ICC offered nothing to the contrary. And the ICC offered no evidence that other sugar dealers in San Antonio conducted their businesses differently from appellees. It is also true that since the motor carrier rate for transporting sugar from Supreme is 69 cents, and the rail rate $1.09 per hundred pounds, appellees could not have conducted the sugar business but for the availability of the backhaul capacity of their trucks. This shows no more than that appellees were able to make efficient use of their equipment; on these facts it does not prove, as the ICC found, that the “transportation ... is, with respect to their primary business of buying and selling livestock and certain other commodities, a related or secondary enterprise conducted with the purpose of profiting from the transportation performed . . . 81 M. C. C., at 347. We agree with the District Court that, rather, “The record clearly indicates that [appellees] are in a general mercantile business buying and selling many items, including sugar.” 219 F. Supp., at 782. As such, on the facts shown, their purchase of sugar at Supreme to provide a backhaul in connection with outbound movements of livestock and other commodities from San Antonio is within the scope, and in furtherance, of their primary general mercantile business enterprise.
Affirmed.
Section 203 (c), as added in 1957, 71 Stat. 411, provided in pertinent part:
. .no person shall engage in any for-hire transportation business by motor vehicle, in interstate or foreign commerce . . . unless there is in force with.respect to such person a certificate or a permit issued by the Commission authorizing such transportation.”
In 1958, 72 Stat. 574, the section was amended to add the provision here involved providing,
“nor shall any person engaged in any other business enterprise transport property by motor vehicle in interstate or foreign commerce for business purposes unless such transportation is within the scope, and in furtherance, of a primary business enterprise (other than transportation) of such person.”
The 1957 version of § 203 (c) was enacted after the examiner submitted his report but as amended in 1958 was part of the Interstate Commerce Act when Division 1 of the Commission served its report.
Appellees’ action was brought pursuant to 28 U. S. C. §§ 1336, 1398. The statutory three-judge court was convened under 28 U. S. C. § 2325.
See, e. g., Lyle H. Carpenter, 2 M. C. C. 85; B. E. Farnsworth, 4 M. C. C. 164; Thomas Stanley Redding, 7 M. C. C. 608; ICC v. Tank Car Oil Corp., 151 F. 2d 834 (C. A. 5th Cir.).
See, e. g., T. J. McBroom, 1 M. C. C. 425; Triangle Motor Co., 2 M. C. C. 485. Cf. Congoleum-Naim, Inc., 2 M. C. C. 237.
See, e. g., ICC v. Woodall Food Prods. Co., 207 F. 2d 517 (C. A. 5th Cir.); Taylor v. ICC, 209 F. 2d 353 (C. A. 9th Cir.). See the discussion of Taylor in the Commission’s Sixty-eighth Annual Report (1954), p. 82.
The Commission pressed for amendments in its Annual Reports from 1953 through 1957: 1953 Report, p. 55; 1954 Report, p. 5; 1955 Report, p. 99; 1956 Report, p. 2; 1957 Report, pp. 137-138.
In amending §203 (c) rather than the definitional sections, the TAA proposal also met the protests of private carriers who opposed ICC’s proposal on the ground that it might be construed to throw doubt on the Brooks test, and unduly restrict the scope of private carriage. See Remarks of Frazor T. Edmondson, Private Truck Council of America, Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce on S. 1384, 85th Cong., 1st Sess., 163 (1957); Remarks of R. J. Van Liew, Private Carrier Conference, American Trucking Associations, id., at 275.
See Remarks of Chairman Clarke, Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce on S. 1384, 85th Cong., 1st Sess., 13, 19 (1957).
See Statement of Mr. Baker, President, Transportation Association of America, id., at 244, 246.
S. Rep. No. 1647, 85th Cong., 2d Sess., 5 (1958).
In its 1953 Annual Report the Commission said (p. 55):
“Merchandising by motortruck, whether actual or pretended, over long distances is increasing to such an extent that it is becoming a major factor in the transportation of freight between distant points. Manufacturers and mercantile establishments, which deliver in their own trucks articles which they manufacture or sell, are increasingly purchasing merchandise at or near their point of delivery and transporting such articles to their own terminal for sale to others. Such transportation is performed for the purpose of receiving compensation for the otherwise empty return of their trucks. Sometimes the purchase and sale is a bona fide merchandising venture. In other cases, arrangements are made with the consignee of such merchandise for the 'buy-and-sell' arrangement in order that the consignee may receive transportation at a reduced cost.” Compare H. R. Rep. No. 1922, 85th Cong., 2d Sess., 18 (1958).
See id., at 19.
See 104 Cong. Rec. 12535-12536 (1958) (House); 104 Cong. Rec. 10818 (1958) (Senate).
See Virgil P. Stutzman, 81 M. C. C. 223, 226; Joseph V. Hofer, 84 M. C. C. 527, 540.
See Lyle H. Carpenter, 2 M. C. C. 85, 86; Thomas Stanley Redding, 7 M. C. C. 608, 609; Jay Cee Transport Co., 68 M. C. C. 758, 759; Church Point Wholesale Beverage Co., 82 M. C. C. 457, 459, aff'd, sub nom. Church Point Wholesale Beverage Co. v. United States, 200 F. Supp. 508 (D. C. W. D. La.).
See L. A. Woitishek, 42 M. C. C. 193; Jay Cee Transport Co., supra; William Stewart, 89 M. C. C. 281, 286.
See Subler Transfer, Inc., 79 M. C. C. 561, 565; Riggs Dairy Express, Inc., 78 M. C. C. 574, 575-576; Donald L. Wilson, 82 M. C. C. 651, 661.
See Riggs Dairy Express, Inc., supra.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Clark
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a companion case to No. 95, Linkletter v. Walker, ante, p. 618. Petitioner was convicted in a New York State court in 1951 for possession of narcotics with intent to sell. On December 21, 1950, two detectives attached to the Narcotics Squad of the New York City Police Department entered petitioner’s apartment by a door opened by a painter who was just leaving. They ignored the protest of petitioner and proceeded, without a warrant, to search the apartment. Upon entering, one of the officers called an agent of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. After two federal agents arrived the local and federal officers made a thorough search of the apartment. One of the local officers found 54 cellophane envelopes, 106 empty capsules, a box of staples and a scale. A federal agent found four packages under a hat. Analysis revealed that three of the packets contained heroin and the other contained cocaine. These items were introduced in evidence at the state trial without objection of petitioner’s counsel. Nor was objection made to the participation of the federal narcotics agents in the investigation. After conviction petitioner filed a notice of appeal to the Appellate Division but the appeal was dismissed in March of 1952.
In August 1961, after Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U. S. 643, was decided, petitioner resorted to state post-conviction remedies claiming that the evidence found in his apartment and introduced against him had been illegally seized and that his conviction had therefore been obtained in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. Upon seeking habeas corpus in the United States District Court on the same grounds his application was denied. The trial judge refused to apply Mapp retrospectively. The Court of Appeals sitting en banc affirmed by a divided vote. 333 F. 2d 12. We granted certiorari, 379 U. S. 815 (1964), and set this case for argument with Linkletter, supra. That case answers petitioner’s point as to the retrospective application of Mapp.
However, petitioner also contends that the participation of federal narcotics agents in the search and seizure requires reversal here, citing Rea v. United States, 350 U. S. 214 (1956). We cannot agree. That case invoked the supervisory power of a federal court over a federal law enforcement officer and we held that the latter might be enjoined from appearing in a state trial for the purpose of offering evidence previously seized by him illegally as a federal officer and so found by a federal court. But even if an exclusionary rule were fashioned to bar use of the federal agent’s testimony in the absence of a federal court restraint, the petitioner would be entitled to no relief. Such an exclusionary rule would depend upon the reasons given in Mapp and under Linkletter, supra, would not have retrospective application.
Affirmed.
Mr. Justice Black and Mr. Justice Douglas would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the reasons stated in Mr. Justice Black’s dissenting opinion in Linkletter v. Walker, ante, p. 640.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Douglas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case, here on certiorari to the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia, presents important problems under § 30 and § 32 of the Banking Act of 1933, 48 Stat. 162, 193, 194, as amended, 49 Stat. 684, 709, 12 U. S. C. §§ 77, 78.
Section 30 of the Act provides that the Comptroller of the Currency, whenever he is of the opinion that a director or officer of a national bank has violated any law relating to the bank, shall warn him to discontinue the violation and, if the violation continues, may certify the facts to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The Board is granted power to order that the director or officer be removed from office if it finds after notice and a reasonable opportunity to be heard that he has continued to violate the law.
Section 32 of the Act prohibits, inter alia, any partner or employee of any partnership “primarily engaged in the issue, flotation, underwriting, public sale, or distribution, at wholesale or retail, or through syndicate participation, of stocks, bonds, or other similar securities” from serving at the same time as an officer, director, or employee of a member bank.
Pursuant to the procedure outlined in § 30 the Board ordered respondents removed from office as directors of the Paterson National Bank on the ground that they were employees of a firm "primarily engaged” in underwriting within the meaning of § 32. Respondents brought suit in the District Court for the District of Columbia to review the action of the Board or to enjoin its action. The District Court dismissed the complaint. The Court of Appeals reversed by a divided vote, holding that the Board exceeded its authority and that an injunction should issue. 153 F. 2d 785.
First. The Board contends that the removal orders of the Board made under § 30 are not subject to judicial review in the absence of a charge of fraud. It relies on the absence of an express right of review and on the nature of the federal bank supervisory scheme of which § 30 is an integral part. Cf. Adams v. Nagle, 303 U. S. 532; Switchmen’s Union v. Mediation Board, 320 U. S. 297; Estep v. United States, 327 U. S. 114. A majority of the Court, however, is of the opinion that the determination of the extent of the authority granted the Board to issue removal orders under § 30 of the Act is subject to judicial review and that the District Court is authorized to enjoin the removal if the Board transcends its bounds and acts beyond the limits of its statutory grant of authority. See American School of Magnetic Healing v. McAnnulty, 187 U. S. 94; Philadelphia Co. v. Stimson, 223 U. S. 605, 620; Stark v. Wickard, 321 U. S. 288, 309-310. That being decided, it seems plain that the claim to the office of director is such a personal one as warrants judicial consideration of the controversy. Cf. Columbia Broadcasting System v. United States, 316 U. S. 407; Stark v. Wickard, supra, p. 305.
Second. We come then to the merits. Respondents for a number of years have been directors of the Paterson National Bank, a national banking association and a member of the Federal Reserve System. Since 1941 they have been employed by Eastman, Dillon & Co., a partnership, which holds itself out as being “Underwriters, Distributors, Dealers and Brokers in Industrial, Railroad, Public Utility and Municipal Securities.” During the fiscal year ending February 28, 1943, its gross income from the underwriting field was 26 per cent of its gross income from all sources, while its gross income from the brokerage business was 42 per cent of its gross income from all sources. The same percentages for the fiscal year ending February 29, 1944, were 32 per cent and 47 per cent respectively; and for the period from March 1, 1944, to July 31, 1944, 39 per cent and 40 per cent respectively. Of the total number of transactions, as well as the total market value of the securities bought and sold by the firm as broker and as dealer for an indefinite period prior to September 20, 1943, about 15 per cent were in the underwriting field. The firm is active in the underwriting field, getting what business it can. In 1943 it ranked ninth among 94 leading investment bankers in the country with respect to its total participations in underwritings of bonds. For a time during 1943 it ranked first among the underwriters of the country. Apart from municipals and rails, its participation in underwritings during 1943 amounted to $14,657,000. Since October, 1941, respondents have done no business with the bank other than a strictly commission business with its customers. Nor has the firm done business with the bank since the fall of 1941.
These are the essential facts found by the Board.
On the basis of these facts the Board concluded that during the times relevant here Eastman, Dillon & Co. was “primarily engaged” in the underwriting business and that respondents, being employees of the firm, were disqualified from serving as directors of the bank.
The Court of Appeals concluded that when applied to a single subject “primary” means first, chief, or principal; that a firm is not “primarily engaged” in underwriting when underwriting is not by any standard its chief or principal business. Since this firm’s underwriting business did not by any quantitative test exceed 50 per cent of its total business, the court held that it was not “primarily engaged” in the underwriting business within the meaning of § 32 of the Act.
We take a different view. It is true that “primary” when applied to a single subject often means first, chief, or principal. But that is not always the case. For other accepted and common meanings of “primarily” are “essentially” (Oxford English Dictionary) or “fundamentally” (Webster’s New International). An activity or function may be “primary” in that sense if it is substantial. If the underwriting business of a firm is substantial, the firm is engaged in the underwriting business in a primary way, though by any quantitative test underwriting may not be its chief or principal activity. On the facts in this record we would find it hard to say that underwriting was not one primary activity of the firm and brokerage another. If “primarily” is not used in the sense we suggest, then the firm is not “primarily engaged” in any line of‘business though it specializes in at least two and does a substantial amount of each. One might as well say that a professional man is not “primarily engaged” in his profession though he holds himself out to serve all comers and devotes substantial time to the practice but makes the greater share of his income on the stock market.
That is the construction given the Act by the Board. And it is, we think, not only permissible but also more consonant with the legislative purpose than the construction which the Court of Appeals adopted. Firms which do underwriting also engage in numerous other activities. The Board indeed observed that, if one was not “primarily engaged” in underwriting unless by some quantitative test it was his principal activity, then § 32 would apply to no one. Moreover, the evil at which the section was aimed is not one likely to emerge only when the firm with which a bank director is connected has an underwriting business which exceeds 50 per cent of its total business. Section 32 is directed to the probability or likelihood, based on the experience of the 1920’s, that a bank director interested in the underwriting business may use his influence in the bank to involve it or its customers in securities which his underwriting house has in its portfolio or has committed itself to take. That likelihood or probability does not depend on whether the firm’s underwriting business exceeds 50 per cent of its total business. It might, of course, exist whatever the proportion of the underwriting business. But Congress did not go the whole way; it drew the line where the need was thought to be the greatest. And the line between substantial and unsubstantial seems to us to be the one indicated by the words “primarily engaged.”
There is other intrinsic evidence in the Banking Act of 1933 to support our conclusion. Section 20 of the Act outlaws affiliation of a member bank with an organization “engaged principally” in the underwriting business. Section 19 provides control over bank holding companies. In order to vote its stock in controlled banks a bank holding company must show that it does not own, control, or have any interest in, and is not participating in the management or direction of any organization “engaged principally” in the underwriting business. On the other hand, when Congress came to deal with the practice of underwriters taking checking deposits, it used language different from what it used either in §§ 19 and 20 on the one hand or in § 32 on the other. By § 21 it prohibited any organization “engaged” in the underwriting business “to engage at the same time to any extent whatever” in the business of receiving checking deposits. Thus within the same Act we find Congress dealing with several types of underwriting firms — those “engaged” in underwriting, those “primarily engaged” in underwriting, those “engaged principally” in underwriting. The inference seems reasonable to us that Congress by the words it chose marked a distinction which we should not obliterate by reading “primarily” to mean “principally.”
The Court of Appeals laid some stress on the fact that Congress did not abolish'the bank affiliate system but only those underwriter affiliates which were under the control of a member bank or which were under a common control with it. Section 20. Since Congress made majority control critical under § 20, it was thought that under § 32 a firm was not “primarily engaged” in underwriting unless underwriting constituted a majority of its business. But the two situations are not comparable. In § 32 Congress was not dealing with the problem of control of underwriters by banks or vice versa. The prohibited nexus is in no way dependent on the presence or absence of control, nor would it be made so even if “primarily engaged” in underwriting were construed to mean principally engaged in that business. Section 32 was designed, as we have said, to remove tempting opportunities from the management and personnel of member banks. In no realistic sense do those opportunities disappear merely because the underwriting activities of the outside firm with which the officer, director, or employee is connected happens to fall below 51 per cent. Fifty-one per cent, which is relevant in terms of control, is irrelevant here. The fact then that Congress did not abolish underwriter affiliates serves as no guide in determining whether “primarily engaged” in underwriting as used in § 32 means principally engaged or substantially engaged in that business.
Section 32 is not concerned, of course, with any showing that the director in question has in fact been derelict in his'duties or has in any way breached his fiduciary obligation to the bank. It is a preventive or prophylactic measure. The fact that respondents have been scrupulous in their relationships to the bank is therefore immaterial.
There is a suggestion that if “primarily” does not mean principally but merely connotes substantiality, § 32 constitutes an unlawful delegation of authority to the Board. But we think it plain under our decisions that if substantiality is the statutory guide, the limits of administrative action are sufficiently definite or ascertainable so as to survive challenge on the grounds of unconstitutionality. Sunshine Anthracite Coal Co. v. Adkins, 310 U. S. 381, 397-400; Opp Cotton Mills v. Administrator, 312 U. S. 126, 142-146; Yakus v. United States, 321 U. S. 414, 424-428; Bowles v. Willingham, 321 U.S. 503, 512-516.
Reversed.
Section 30 also provides:
“That such order and the findings of fact upon which it is based shall not be made public or disclosed to anyone except the director or officer involved and the directors of the bank involved, otherwise than in connection with proceedings for a violation of this section. Any such director or officer removed from office as herein provided who thereafter participates in any manner in the management of such bank shall be fined not more than $5,000, or imprisoned for not more than five years, or both, in the discretion of the court.”
Not material here is an exception “in limited classes of cases in which the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System may allow such service by general regulations when in the judgment of the said Board it would not unduly influence the investment policies of such member bank or the advice it gives its customers regarding investments.” § 32.
The issue, flotation, underwriting, public sale or distribution, at wholesale or retail or through syndicate participation, of stocks, bonds or other similar securities. The firm does not deal in United States Government bonds.
Defined in § 2 (b) as direct or indirect ownership or control of more than 50 per cent of the voting stock of the organization in question, common ownership or control of 50 per cent or more of such voting stock, or a majority of common directors.
See note 4, supra.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Rutledge
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The primary question is whether the coverage of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act and the Boiler Inspection Act includes injuries in the nature of occupational disease, here silicosis, or is confined exclusively to injuries inflicted by accident. After having béen twice before the, Supreme Court of Missouri, the case is here'on certiorari, 335 U. S. 809, for, review of its final decision on the second appeal that recovery may not be had for other than accidental injuries; A statement/of the course taken by the proceedings in the state courts, hs well as of the facts, becomes necessary for resolving the issues presented.
In 1941 petitioner Tom Urie filed suit under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act against respondent Thompson, trustee of the Missouri Pacific Railroad. According to petitioner’s allegations', h§ had been eimplQyed as a fireman on steam locomotives of the’ interstate Missouri Pacific for roughly thirty years. In lt)40 he had been forced, to cease work by a pulmonary disease diagnosed as silicosis.. This permanently disabling affliction had been caused by continuous inhalation of silica dust blown or sucked into the cabs of the locomotives on which he had worked. The injurious concentration of silica dust in the air breathed by petitioner arose from the railroad’s use in its locomotives’ sanding boxes of sand materials containing 80 to 90 per cent of silica or silicon dioxide and the emission by the locomotives’ faultily adjusted “sanders” of such sand materials in excessive amounts beyond those needed to provide traction for locomotive wheels. Respondent Thompson, trustee of the railroad since 1933, “knew, or by the exercise of due care should have known,” of the danger of silicosis arising from the conditions of petitioner’s employment.
The trial court sustained respondent’s demurrer to the complaint. On appeal the Missouri Supreme Court held that the action could not be maintained by virtue of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act alone, for the reason that respondent could not have “anticipated plaintiff’s injury-, and... therefore... the petition does not stat'e facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action for negligence under the Federal Employers Liability Act.” 352 Mo.- 211, 219. The court felt, however, that the claimed malfunctioning of the locomotives’ sanders was in substance an allegation of breach of § 2 of the Boiler Inspection Act and that, since proof of breach of the latter Act would support a recovery under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act without regard to respondent’s negligence, Lilly v. Grand Trunk R. Co., 317 U. S. 481, 485-486, petitioner had stated a cause of action. Furthermore, the court held that the Federal Employers’ Liability Act’s three-year statute of limitations, 45 U. S. C. § 56, did not bar petitioner’s claim since his “cause of action accrued in May,.1940, when he became incapacitated....” 352 Mo. at 222. Accordingly the court reversed the judgment and remanded the cause for trial.
On remand petitioner amended his complaint to charge specifically violations of the Boiler Inspection Act. Section 2 of that Act, as amended, makes it “unlawful for any carrier to use or permit to be used on its line any locomotive unless said locomotive, its boiler, tender, and all parts and appurtenances thereof are in proper condition and safe to.operate in the service to which the same are put, that the same may be employed in the active •service of such carrier without unnecessary peril to life or limb....” 45 U. S. C. § 23. The violations alleged were (1) that the sanders were broken or faultily adjusted so as to release too much sand and (2) that the locomotive decks and cabs were in a bad state of repair, admitting dust through various cracks and openings in the cab’s iloor and elsewhere which ought to have been sealed off.
.The' case was tried to a jury, under instructions that negligence was not in iss.ue and that petitioner should prevail if he proved that he had contracted silicosis by reason of respondent’s breach of an “absolute and continuing duty to have such locomotive engines and all their parts and appurtenances thereof, in proper condition and safe, to operate... without unnecessary peril to the life of Tom Urie....” The jury found for petitioner in the amount of $30,000.
Upon respondent’s appeal the Missouri Supreme Court reversed the judgment entered.on this verdict. 357 Mo. 738. Noting that on the former review it did not “treat with a contention that'silicosis’ is not an evil at.which the Act is aimed,” id. at 746, the court concluded that the Boiler Inspection Act “is aimed at promoting safety from accidental injury, as distinguished from injury due to.the gradual inhalation of harmful.dusts.” Id. at 749r It was to review the state supreme court’s successive constructions of the Federal Employers’ Liability and Boiler Inspection Acts that our writ was issued.
I.
Two preliminary contentions first engage our attention. We are met at the outset by the question whether, without regard to the legal sufficiency of petitioner’s claim under either Act, that claim is barred, as to both Acts by operation of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act’s statute of limitations.
, Urie filed suit qxi November 25, 1941. • Under the terms of the then prevailing thrq -year statute' of' limitations, the court could not entertain the. claim if Urie’s “jsause of action accrued” before November 25, 1938. Respondent contends that Urie, having been exposed to silica dust since approximately 1910, must unwittingly have contracted silicosis long before 1938, and hence that his “cause of action” must be deemed to have “accrued” longer than' three years before the institution of this action. Alier-C natively it may be argued that each inhalation of silica/ dust was a separate tort giving rise to a fresh “cause of action,” and that Urie is therefore limited to a claim forj inhalations between November 25, 1938, and the spring day in 1940 when he became incapacitated.
In our view, however, neither of the outlined constructions of the statute of limitations can be sustained. For, if we assume that Congress intended to include occupational diseases in thé category of injuries compensable under the Federal Employers’ Liability and Boiler Inspection Acts, süch mechanical analysis of 'the “accrual” of petitioner’s injury — whether- breath by breath, or at one unrecorded moment in the progress of the disease — can only serve to thwart the' congressional purpose.
If Urie were held barréd from prosecuting this action because he must be said, as a matter of law, to have contracted silicosis prior to November 25, 1938, it would be clear that the federal legislation -afforded Urie only a delusive remedy. It would mean that at some past moment, in time, unknown and inherently unknowablé even in retrospect, Urie was charged with knowledge of the slow and tragic disintegration of his lungs; under this view Urie’s failure to; diagnose within the applicable statute of limitations a disease whose symptoms had not yet obtruded on his consciousness would constitute waiver of his right to compensation at the ultimate day of discovery-and disability.
Nor can we accept the theory that each intake of dusty breath is a" fresh “cause of action.” In the present case, for example, application of such a rule would, arguably, limit petitioner’s damages to that aggravation of his progressive injury traceable to the last eighteen months of his employment. Moreóver petitioner would have been wholly barred from suit had he left the railroad, or merely been transferred to work involving no exposure to silica dust, more than three years before discovering the disease with which he was afflicted.
We do not think the humane legislative plan intended such consequences to attach to blameless ignorance. Nor do we think those consequences can be reconciled with the traditional purposes of statutes of limitations, which conventionally require the assertion of claims within a specified period of time after notice of the invasion of legal rights. The record before us is clear that Urie became too ill to work in May of 1940 and that diagnosis of his condition was accomplished in the following weeks. There is no suggestion that. Urie should have known he had silicosis at any earlier date. “It follows that no specific date of contact with the substance can be charged with being the date of injury, inasmuch as the injurious consequences of the exposure are the product of a period of time rather than a point of time; consequéhtly the afflicted employee can be held to be ‘injured’ only when the accumulated effects of the deleterious substance manifest themselves....” Associated Indemnity Corp. v. Industrial Accident Commission, 124 Cal. App. 378, 381. The quoted language, used in a state workmen’s compensation case, seems to us applicable in every relevant particular to the construction of the federal statute of limitations with which we are here, concerned. Accordingly we agree with the view expressed by the Missouri Supreme Court on the first appeal of this case, that Urie’s claim, if otherwise maintainable, is not barred by the statute of limitations.
We may readily dispose of another preliminary question concerning the issues which are now properly before us. Respondent argues, somewhat surprisingly, that the sufficiency of petitioner’s original claim for negligence involved in the first appeal is not properly here, since it. was neither raised nor considered on the second appeal to the Missouri Supreme Court. The short answer is that petitioner has brought the claim to this Court at' his first opportunity; and it was not necessary for him to relitigate that claim a second, time through the state courts in order to preserve it for our consideration on review of the final judgment rendered in the cause.
From the opinions of the state supreme court we know judicially that its judgment negating the general claim for negligence was coupled with its subsequently repudiated conclusion that petitioner had stated a cause of action under the Boiler Inspection Act and that, consequently, the court remanded the cause for trial, not for dismissal. The judgment therefore was not final; it was interlocutory and not reviewable here within the meaning of our jurisdictional statute. 28 U. S. C. § 344 (b) [now § 1257 (3)].
Although the Missouri Supreme Court’s disposition of the first appeal precluded review here at that time of the ruling adverse- to petitioner, Urie did not waive that question by amending his complaint, in conformity with the court’s mandate, to state his claim more specifically in terms of the Boiler Inspection Act or by proceeding with trial on that theory. As the case then stood, this was his only remaining chance for success unless he was to waive it; ask fof final judgment to be entered against him bn the general negligence issue, and.rely solely upon securing review of that judgment and reversal by this Court:
Whatever the effect of the state supreme court’s ruling for further proceedings in the state courts, it could not impose such an alternative upon petitioner. Local rules of practice cannot bar this Court’s-independent consideration of- all- substantial federal questions actually determined in earlier stages of the litigation by the court whose final adjudication is brought here for. review. Zeckendorf v. Steinfeld, 225 U. S. 445, 454; Messenger v. Anderson, 225 U. S. 436, 444. Even so, We think sound practice would see to it that such questions were expressly. preserved in the later stages of review. But, as this -Court has had occasion heretofore to observe; its power to probe issues disposed of on appeals prior to the one under review is", in the last analysis, a “necessary correlative” of the rule which limits it to the examination of final judgments. Louisiana Navigation Co. v. Oyster Commission, 226 U. S. 99, 102.
Accordingly, even if it should be held that petitioner has stated no claim under the Boilér Inspection Act, the judgment now in review cannot starid unless the Missouri ■Supreme 'Court rightly concluded, on the first appeal, that petitioner’s original complaint stated no cause of action for negligence under the Federal Employers’ Lia-, bility Act, considered apart from any effect of the Boiler Inspection Act. That question is properly presented and-to'it we now turn.
II.
Section 1 of the. Federal Employers’ Liability Act provides:'
“Every common carrier by railroad while engaging5 in commerce... shall be liable in damages to any' person suffering injury while he is employed by such carrier in such commerce...' for such injury or death resulting in whole or in part from, the negligence of any of the officers, agents, or employees of such carrier, or by reason of any'defect or insufficiency, due to its negligence, in its cars, engines, appliances, machinery, track, roadbed, works, boats, wharves, or other equipment.” 45 U. S. C. § 51. (Emphasis added.)
The section does not define negligence, leaving that question to be determined, as the Missouri Supreme Court said, “by the common law principles as established and applied in the federal courts.” 352 Mo. at 218. Erie R. Co. v. Tompkins, 304 U. S. 64, has no. application. What constitutes negligence for the statute’s purposes is á federal question, not varying in accordance with the differing conceptions of negligence applicable under state and local laws fór other purposes. Federal decisional- law formuláting and applying the concept governs. Hence the Missouri Supreme Court’s decision on the first appeal, that the complaint did not state a cause of action for negligence, is subject to our independent review and ^s not to be taken as governed conclusively by the state court decisions which alone were cited in support of the determination.
. Of course if silicosis caused by the employment is not an “injury” within the statute’s intended coverage, no cause of action could be stated for that injury under the statute, even though the allegations of fault and causation were wholly sufficient. The Missouri Supreme Court’s firs/ decision, however, assumed that silicosis fell within the statute’s broad term “injury,” and held that it would not “be reasonable to hold, under the facts- admitted by the demurrer, that defendant should have anticipated plaintiff’s injury....” 352 Mo. at 219. Accordingly, the court ruled that no cause of action for negligence under the Act had been stated.
Upon the assumption that silicosis when caused by the employment’is a compensable employee “injury,” the adequacy of petitioner’s claim turns solely on whether his original complaint alleged facts raising a triable issue of negligence. We think that under the standards heretofore set and followed by this Court the facts alleged in the complaint and taken as admitted by the demurrer clearly stated a cause of action for negligence.
Those facts have been briefly, though only partially, summarized above. They charged that respondent used in the locomotives’ sanders a sand material containing a very high percentage of silica or silicon dioxide; that often the material would come to the rails from the sanders in excessive and unnecessary quantities and would there be ground to dust; that the dust containing “such usual and unusual quantity of silican [sic] dioxide would come” into the engine cabs and, “frequently of.unusual quantity,” would be breathed by petitioner; and that, respondent “knew, or by the exercise of due care should have known,” that the sand contained the high percentage of silicon dioxide; that “the dust would form and frequently of excessive quantity because of said sanders,” come into the cab and be breathed by petitioner; and that, over a period of time the breathing was “dangerous to the health and-life and would likely cause to the plaintiff the condition resulting to the plaintiff.” The complaint then stated the further allegations set forth in the margin, together with the following paragraph:
“Plaintiff further alleges that the sanding devices on said engines were all of the usual and customary type and used for the usual and customary purpose’ and if ordinary, care was exercised in keeping them adjusted such large quantities of such sandy silica material would not escape; that plaintiff does not know whether the same kind of sand containing such high quality of silica was used by other-railroads operating over or through such parts of the country of Missouri-; that such sanding devices operated in the same manner by the same means as devices on locomotives of other railroads, and if kept in normal and regular working condition, would not allow such large quantities of silica dust to form as above stated.”
• These and other allegations sufficiently charged.respondent with knowingly having used, in excessive quantitle's due in pait to faulty adjustment of the sanders and' respondent’s failure to use due'¿are in adjusting them, a dangerous sand material likely to cause silicosis ánd. in fact causing petitioner to contract it and become permanently disabled. This would seem to be clearly adequate for stating a cause of action for negligence resulting in injury within the nieaning of the statute and the applicable judicial standards to which we have referred. All the usual elements are comprehended, including want of due or ordinary care, proximate, causation of the injury, and injury within our assumption fqr present purposes of statutory coverage.'•,.
To. sustain the contrary view, however, the Missouri Supreme Court seems to have ruled- as a matter of law that respondent had adhered to the customary standards of the tra,de, stressing the admission-in petitioner’s coin-plaint that the sanding devices alleged to have been faultily adjusted were of the kind ordinarily used throughout the railroad industry. Contrary to the court’s apparent conclusion, this obviously was not ap admission that respondent had complied with the usual standards of the trade. There was neither admission by petitioner nor evidence of anything more, than that respondent’s sanders were “all of the usual and customary type” which, if kept properly adjusted by ordinary care, would not have allowed such large and excessive quantities of silica dust to escape, concentrate in the cab, )and- be breathed by petitioner. There was no admission that other railroads generally or in the region customarily used suo'h high silica content materials for sanding purposes or that, if they did, they did not take steps to minimize potentially harmful effects. Moreover, assuming the premise that maintenance of trade standards negatives negligence, we cannot grasp its significance in this context, absent any indication that faultily adjusted sanding devices are the rule rather than the exception on American steam locomotives.
But wé-also reject’the premise, for-we think that negligence, within - the meaning of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, attached if respondent “knew, or by the exercise of due care should have known,” that prevalent standards of conduct were inadequate to protect. petitioner and similarly situated employees. Cf. Hill v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 336 U. S. 911, reversing 229 N. C. 236. See also Sadowski v. Long Island R. Co., 292 N. Y. 448, 456-457. Respondent’s knowledge, actual or constructive, of the alleged inadequacies of the sanding equipment was a jury question. Whether petitioner was then or now would be able to shoulder the burden of proving respondent’s knowledge we need not surmise, though the evidence adduced by petitioner at trial under the Boiler Inspection Act — indicating that others besides petitioner had observed and reported defects in respondent’s locomotive equipment — underscores our insistence that issues of fact are matters for the jury.
Accordingly we think the state court’s ruling that the facts stated in the original complaint were insufficient to constitute a charge of negligence on respondent’s.part, within the meaning of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act considered apart from the. effect of the Boiler Inspection Act, was wrong and must be overruled. What was said by the New York Court of Appeals in Sadowski v. Long Island R. Co., supra at 455-456, in sustaining a recovery for silicosis under the,Act, fits very closely the facts of this case and represents, in our opinion, the correct view:
“Ordinary care must be in proportion to the danger to be avoided and the consequences that might reasonably be anticipated from the neglect (Railroad Co. v. Jones, 95 U. S. 439; Bailey v. Central Vermont Ry., supra [319 U. S. 350]). It must be commensurate with known dangers. Defendant created the place in which the work was done and supervised the doing of the work by plaintiff and was aware for a period of at least sixteen years of the conditions under which plaintiff was required to work and of the means and methods by which its work was accomplished. It is a matter of common knowledge that it is injurious to the lungs and dangerous to health to work in silica dust, a fact which defendant was bound to know.”
The question remains whether silicosis is an “injury” within the meaning of that term as used in the Federal Employers’ Liability Act. It is a novel one for this Court. But w.e think silicosis is within the statute’s coverage when it results from the employer’s negligence. Considerations arising from the breadth of the statutory language, the Act’s humanitarian purposes, its accepted standard of liberal construction in order to accomplish those objects, the absence of anything in the legislative history indicating a congressional intent to require a restricted interpretation or expressly to exclude such occupational disease, and the trend of existing authorities dealing with the question, combine to support this conclusion.'
We recognize of course that, when the statute was enacted, Congress’ attention was focused primarily upon injuries and death resulting from accidents on interstate railroads. Obviously these were the major causes of-injury and death resulting from railroad operations. But accidental' injuries were not the only ones likely to occur. And nothing in either the language or the legislative history discloses.expressly any intent to exclude from the Act’s coverage any injury resulting.“in whole or in part from the negligence” of the carrier. If such an intent can be found, it must be read into the Act by. sheer inference.
The language is as broad as could be framed: “any person suffering injury while he is employed”; “such injury or death resulting in whole or in part from the negligence of any. of the officers, agents,.or employees of such carrier”; “by reason of any defect or insufficiency, due to its negligence, in its cars, engines, áppliancés,” etc. On its face, every injury suffered by any employee while employed by reason of the carrier’s negligence was made compensable. The wording was not restrictive'as' to the employees covered; the cause of injury, except that it. must constitute negligence attributable to the carrier;, or the particular, kind of injury resulting.
To read into this all-inclusive wording a restriction as to the kinds of employees covered, the degree of negligence required, or the particular sorts of harms inflicted, would be contradictory to the wording, the remedial and humanitarian purpose, and the constant and established course of liberal construction of the Act followed by this Court.
We recognize, with respondent, that the Federal Employers’ Liability Act is founded on common-law concepts of negligence and injury, •• subject to such qualifications as Congress has imported into those terms.' If respondent were right in suggesting that the common law does not recognize occupational disease as a category of compensable injury, he would lend substance to the argument that Congress’ use of the word “injury” was less broad than the word’s surface connotation indicates. However, although the contrary view has been advanced, we are satisfied that the difficulties which have attached to tort recovery for occupational disease inhere not in the nature of the wrong but in the difficulty of proving negligence. For, as the Ohio Supreme Court observed with reference to silicosis, “In the early period of industrial development there was little medical knowledge regarding the origin of diseases peculiar to the various employments....” Triff v. National Bronze & Aluminum Foundry Co., 135 Ohio St. 191, 195. We do not doubt that at “common law the incurring of a disease or harm to health is such a personal wrong as to warrant a recovery if the other elements of liability for tort are present.”
Viewing the Federal Employers’ Liability Act as a negligence statute, we think that arguments drawn from the coverage accorded occupational diseases in state workmen’s compensation statutes cannot control the present, inquiry. And yet we may note in passing that decisions under such statutes, to whatever extent they may be thought relevant, offer little support to respondent’s narrow view of the federal legislation before us. True it is that the British Workmen’s Compensation Act of 1897; 60 & 61 Viet, c; 37, although covering anthrax contracted by claimant from a particular and identifiable processing of wool, Turvey v. Brintons, Ltd., [1904] 1 K. B. 328, affirmed [1905] A. C. 230, was held to exclude gradual lead poisoning. Steel v. Cammell, Laird & Co., [1905] 2 K. B. 232. But-it is equally true that the statute there construed provided for compensation only in cases of “personal injury by accident,” (emphasis added), a limitation much stressed by the opinions in Steel v. Cammell, Laird & Co., supra. And see Walker v. Lilleshall Coal Co., [1900] 1 Q. B. 488. Decisions in this country have uniformly followed the early British rule.in construing such terms as “accident” and “accidental injury,” as well as “personal injury by accident.”
But decisions construing “personal injury” — more nearly akin to the simple “injury” of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act — -are.in conflict. Thus the Supreme Court of Ohio excluded occupational diseases in view of the special legislative and constitutional context of the statute considered/ while recognizing that otherwise it would be “no difficult matter to bring within the purview of the'words 'personal injuries sustained in the course of employment’- occupational diseases incurred in course of employment.” Industrial Commission v. Brown, 92 Ohio St. 309, 312-313; cf. Industrial Commission v. Roth, 98 Ohio St. 34. The Connecticut Supreme Court, relying on its common-law view that “typical” occupational diseases were not compensable, likewise excluded occupational diseases from its “personal -injury” statute; Miller v. American Steel & Wire Co., 90 Conn. 349. But against this line of authority may be set the - view of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, speaking by Chief Justice Rugg, which held that blindness caused by noxious industrial vapors was a “personal injury”- within the meaning- of the Massachusetts statute. Hurle’s Case, 217 Mass. 223.- ’ ■
Consonant with the: Massachusetts statute is the one compensation act the meaning of which may be thought directly to bear on congressional use of the word “injury” in the federal negligence statute with which we are today concerned. The Federal Employees’ Compensation Act of May 30, 1908, 35 Stat. 556, approved less than two months after the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, provided" compensation for certain classes of federal employee^ “injured in the course of... employment.” Under this statute compensation was awarded for, inter alia, inhalation of dust and fine scale, lead poisoning, cardiac hypertrophy caused by inhalation of ether, and throat tuberculosis aggravated by brass poisoning. In short,, the workmen’s compensation cases offer little comfort to respondent’s view of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act.
While no decision of this Court involving the Federal Employers’ Liability Act has dealt specifically with silicosis, the New York Court of Appeals, as we have indicated above, has sustained recovery under the Act for that disease when resulting from the carrier’s negligence. This was done in circumstances not substantially different from those alleged in petitioner’s original complaint, except that the facts involved no possible application of the Boiler Inspection Act. Sadowski v. Long Island R. Co., supra. Moreover, other state and federal decisions have authorized recovery under the Act for injuries not caused by accidental or violent means. These include Shelton v. Thomson, 148 F. 2d 1; 157 F. 2d 709, where recovery was permitted for carbon monoxide poisoning; B. & O. R. Co. v. Branson, 128 Md. 678, reversed on other grounds,- 242 U. S. 623, in which recovery was allowed for paint poisoning. Cf: C. R. I. & P. R. Co. v. Cheek, 105 Okla. 91. Not all of these decisions could be sustained if the statutory term “injury” were held, to require that, the harm suffered from the employer’s negligence must be confined to that inflicted by “external, violent and accidental” mearis or be an “accidental injury,” as respondent’s narrow view of the statute’s coverage • seems to. contemplate.
We would be most hesitant to adopt a construction of “injúry”. as used in this Act which, would overrule the decisions last cited or seriously' impair their authority. We think they were made in the spirit the statute contemplated for its administration and application. That, spirit is one not in conformity with importing nice distinctions in applying the Act’s broad and general terms or cutting down their full scope by inference or implication.
In our view, when the employer’s negligence impairs or destroys an employee’s health by requiring him to work under conditions likely to bring about such harmful consequences, the injury to the employee is just as great when it follows, often inevitably, from a carrier’s negligent course pursued over an extended period of time as when it comes with the suddenness of lightning. Silicosis is as much “injury,” leading in time as certainly to permanent disability, as scalding from a boiler’s explosion. We do not think the mere difference in the time required for different acts of negligence to take effect and disclose their harmful, disabling consequences would justify excluding the one type of injury from the Act’s coverage or that such an exclusion would be consistent, with its language, purposes, or unvarying standards of construction.
, Accordingly it follows, as the Missouri Supreme Court assumed on the first appeal, that petitioner’s original complaint did not fail in stating a cause of action under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act for want of allegation of sufficient injury. Petitioner was entitled to go to trial at that time without restriction requiring him to show violation of the Boiler. Inspection Act.
This conclusion, if it were all that is involved in the case,- would compel- reversal of the state supreme court’s decision and remand for trial upon the original complaint. However, it remains to consider the effect of the Boiler Inspection Act and whether the verdict rendered for petitioner under that Act, in conjunction with the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, should be allowed to stand.
III.
By virtue of the course taken by the case in the state courts, the Missouri Supreme Court did not squarely hold that silicosis was not-an injury within the coverage of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act considered apart from the Boiler Inspection Act. As the case took shape that question did not arise on the first appeal. And by virtue of the ruling on the remand for trial, that the only-cause of action stated was that arising under the Boiler Inspection Act, the court on the second appeal treated the question whether silicosis was a compensable injury "substantially as if the Boiler Inspection Act was a wholly independent statute, unrelated in the scope of its coverage, for purposes of employees’ suits for breach of its provisions, to the Employers’ Liability Act’s terms, i. e., as if the question arose solely tinder the Boiler Inspection Act.
But by its. own terms the' Boiler Inspection Act, like the Safety Appliance Acts, does not purport to confer any right of action upon injured employees. It merely makes violation of its prohibitions “unlawful.” Yet it has been held consistently that the Boiler Inspection Act supplements the Federal Employers’ Liability Act by imposing on interstate railroads “an absolute and continuing duty” to provide safe equipment. Lilly v. Grand Trunk R. Co., supra at 485; Southern R. Co. v. Lunsford, 297 U. S. 398, 401; cf. Baltimore & O. R. Co. v. Groeger, 266 U. S. 521, 528-529.
This conclusion stems, not from any express statutory language, but by implication from §§ 3 and 4 of the Federal Emplqyers’ Liability Act, 45 U. S. C.- §§ 53, 54, which bar pleadings of, respectively, contributory negligence and assumption of risk “in any case where the violation by such common carrier of any statute enacted for the safety of employees contributed to' the injury or death of such employee.” But it is § 1 of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act, and not §§ 3 and 4, which expressly creates a cause of action for negligence; and by the same token it is § 1 which is the basis of an employee’s suit for violation.of the Boiler Inspection or Safety Appliance Acts. For where § 1 “refers to ‘any defect or insufficiency, due to its negligence, in its cars, engines, appliances,’ etc., it clearly is the legislative intent to treat a violation of the Safety Appliance Act as ‘negligence’ — what is sometimes called negligence per se.” San Antonio & A. P. R. Co. v. Wagner, 241 U. S. 476, 484.
In this view-the Safety Appliance Acts, together with the Boiler Inspection Act, are substantively if not in form • amendments to the Federal Employers’ Liability Act. They dispense, for the purposes of employees’ suits, with the necessity of proving that’ violations of-the safety statutes constitute negligence; and making proof of such violations is effective to show negligence as a matter of law. Thus taken, as has been the consistent'practice; the Boiler Inspection and Safety Appliance Acts cannot be regarded as statutes wholly separate from and ^dependent of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act. They are' tatherl supplemental to it, having the purpose and effect of facilitating employee recovery, not of restricting such recovery or making it impossible-.
Regarded in this light, the Boiler Inspection and Safety-Appliance Acts would take on highly incongruous character if, at the very time they were expediting employee recovery under the Employers’ Liability Act by substituting the comparatively light burden of proving violation of their prohibitions for the heavier one of proving negligence, they were also contracting the scope of compensable injuries and to that extent defeating recovery altogether. We do not think that Congress intended to act so inconsistently or that, by dispensing with the employee’s burden of proving negligence in certain classes of Employers’ Liability Act suits, it had any purpose to withdraw from that Act’s coverage any injury caused by the employment which was covered by its terms. In the absence of any specific showing that Congress had in mind such a re-, strictive and inconsistent object, we are not free to create one by inference, more especially when it is derived from approaching the problem as if the Boiler Inspection and Safety Appliance Acts were wholly independent of and separate in design and purpose from the Employers’ Liability Act.
The congressional purpose underlying the Boiler Inspection Act is basically the same as that underlying the Safety Appliance Acts and the Employers’ Liability Act. In requiring that the boiler, and, not long after, that the entire locomotive, be maintained “in proper condition and safe to operate,” Congress by its own statement was attempting to insure that such equipment “be- employed in... active service... without unnecessary peril to life or limb....” 45 U. S. C. § 23. Certain requirements of the
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Ginsburg
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case concerns the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA or Agency) to enforce the provisions of the Clean Air Act’s (CAA or Act) Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) program. Under that program, no major air pollutant emitting facility may be constructed unless the facility is equipped with “the best available control technology” (BACT). As added by § 165, 91 Stat. 735, and amended, 42 U. S. C. § 7475(a)(4). BACT, as defined in the CAA, means, for any major air pollutant emitting facility, “an emission limitation based on the maximum degree of [pollutant] reduction... which the permitting authority, on a case-by-case basis, taking into account energy, environmental, and economic impacts and other costs, determines is achievable for [the] facility....” § 7479(3).
Regarding oversight, the a struction and one geared specifically to the PSD program. The general prescription, § 113(a)(5) of the Act, authorizes EPA, when it finds that a State is not complying with a CAA requirement governing construction of a pollutant source, to issue an order prohibiting construction, to prescribe an administrative penalty, or to commence a civil action for in-junctive relief. 42 U. S. C. § 7413(a). Directed specifically to the PSD program, CAA §167 instructs EPA to “take such measures, including issuance of an order, or seeking ih-junctive relief, as necessary to prevent the construction” of a major pollutant emitting facility that does not conform to the PSD requirements of the Act. 42 U. S. C. § 7477.
In the case before us, “the permitting authority” under §7479(3) is the State of Alaska, acting through Alaska’s Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC). The question presented is what role EPA has with respect to ADEC’s BACT determinations. Specifically, may EPA act to block construction of a new major pollutant emitting facility permitted by ADEC when EPA finds ADEC’s BACT determination unreasonable in light of the guides §7479(3) prescribes? We hold that the Act confers that checking authority on EPA.
I
A
Congress enacted the Clean Air Amendments of 1970, 84 Stat. 1676, 42 U. S. C. § 7401 et seq., in response to “dissatisfaction with the progress of existing air pollution programs.” Union Elec. Co. v. EPA, 427 U. S. 246, 249 (1976). The amendments aimed “to guarantee the prompt attainment and maintenance of specified air quality standards.” Ibid,.; D. Currie, Air Pollution §1.13, p. 1-16 (1981) (summary of 1970 amendments). Added by the 1970 amendments, §§ 108(a) and 109(a) of the Act require EPA to publish lists of emissions that “cause or contribute to air pollution which may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare,” and to promulgate primary and secondary national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) for such pollutants. 42 U. S. C. §§ 7408(a) and 7409(a); Whitman v. American Trucking Assns., Inc., 531 U. S. 457, 462-463 (2001). NAAQS “define [the] levels of air quality that must be achieved to protect public health and welfare.” R. Belden, Clean Air Act 6 (2001). The Agency published initial NAAQS in 1971, Union Elec., 427 U. S., at 251 (citing 40 CFR pt. 50 (1975)), and in 1985, NAAQS for the pollutant at issue in this case, nitrogen dioxide. 40 CFR §50.11 (2002).
Under § 110 of the Act, also added in 1970, each State must submit for EPA approval “a plan which provides for implementation, maintenance, and enforcement of [NAAQS].” 42 U. S. C. § 7410(a)(1); cf. § 7410(c)(1) (EPA shall promulgate an implementation plan if the State’s plan is inadequate). Relevant to this case, EPA has approved Alaska’s implementation plan. 48 Fed. Reg. 30626 (1983), as amended, 56 Fed. Reg. 19288 (1991); 40 CFR § 52.96(a) (2002). To gain EPA approval, a “state implementation plan” (SIP) must “include enforceable emission limitations and other control measures, means, or techniques... as may be necessary or appropriate to meet the applicable [CAA] requirements.” 42 U. S. C. § 7410(a)(2)(A). While States have “wide discretion” in formulating their plans, Union Elec., 427 U. S., at 250, SIPs must include certain measures Congress specified “to assure that national ambient air quality standards are achieved,” 42 U. S. C. § 7410(a)(2)(C). Among those measures are permit provisions, § 7475, basic to the administration of the program involved in this case, CAA’s “Prevention of Significant Deterioration of Air Quality” (PSD) program.
The PSD requirements, as part ments to the Act, Title I, §160 et seq., 91 Stat. 731, “are designed to ensure that the air quality in attainment areas or areas that are already 'clean’ will not degrade,” Belden, supra, at 43. See 42 U. S. C. § 7470(1) (purpose of PSD program is to “protect public health and welfare from any. actual or potential adverse effect which in [EPA’s] judgment may reasonably be anticipate^] to occur from air pollution... notwithstanding attainment and maintenance of all national ambient air quality standards”). Before 1977, no CAA provision specifically addressed potential air quality deterioration in areas where pollutant levels were lower than the NAAQS. Alabama Power Co. v. Costle, 636 F. 2d 323, 346-347 (CADC 1979). Responding to litigation initiated by an environmental group, however, EPA issued regulations in 1974 requiring that SIPs include a PSD program. Id., at 347, and n. 18 (citing 39 Fed. Reg. 42510 (1974)). Three years later, Congress adopted the current PSD program. See S. Rep. No. 95-127, p. 11 (1977) (Congress itself has “a responsibility to delineate a policy for protecting clean air”).
The PSD program imposes on States a regime governing areas “designated pursuant to [42 U. S. C. § 7407] as attainment or unclassifiable.” § 7471. An attainment area is one in which the air “meets the national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard for [a regulated pollutant].” §7407(d)(l)(A)(ii). Air in an unclassifiable area “cannot be classified on the basis of available information as meeting or not meeting the national primary or secondary ambient air quality standard for the pollutant.” §7407(d)(l)(A)(iii). Northwest Alaska, the region this ease concerns, is classified as an attainment or unclassifiable area for nitrogen dioxide, 40 CFR § 81.302 (2002); therefore, the PSD program applies to emissions of that pollutant in the region. In 2002, the Agency reported that “[a]ll areas of the country that once violated the NAAQS for [nitrogen dioxide] now meet that standard.” EPA, Latest Findings on National Air Quality 7 (Aug. 2003).
Section 165 of the Act, 42 U. S. C. §7475, installs a permitting requirement for any “major emitting facility,” defined to include any source emitting more than 250 tons of nitrogen oxides per year, §7479(1). No such facility may be constructed or modified unless a permit prescribing emission limitations has been issued for the facility. § 7475(a)(1); see §7479(2)(C) (defining “construction” to include “modification”). Alaska’s SIP imposes an analogous requirement. 18 Alaska Admin. Code § 50.300(c)(1) (2003). Modifications to major emitting facilities that increase nitrogen oxide emissions in excess of 40 tons per year require a PSD permit. 40 CFR § 51.166(b)(23)(i) (2002); 18 Alaska Admin. Code § 50.300(h)(3)(B)(ii) (2003).
The Act sets out preconditions for the issuance of PSD permits. Inter alia, no PSD permit may issue unless “the proposed facility is subject to the best available control technology for each pollutant subject to [CAA] regulation... emitted from... [the] facility.” 42 U. S. C. § 7475(a)(4). As described in the Act’s definitional provisions, “best available control technology” (BACT) means:
“an emission limitation based on the maximum degree of reduction of each pollutant subject to regulation under this chapter emitted from or which results from any major emitting facility, which the permitting authority, on a case-by-case basis, taking into account energy, environmental, and economic impacts and other costs, determines is achievable for such facility through application of production processes and available methods, systems, and techniques.... In no event shall application of ‘best available control technology’ result in emissions of any pollutants which will exceed the emissions allowed by any applicable standard established pursuant to section 7411 or 7412 of this title [emission standards for new and existing stationary sources].” §7479(3).
40 CFR §51.166(b)(12) (2002) (repeating statutory definition). Alaska’s SIP contains provisions that track the statutory BACT requirement and definition. 18 Alaska Admin. Code §§ 50.310(d)(3) and 50.990(13) (2003). The State, with slightly variant terminology, defines BACT as “the emission limitation that represents the maximum reduction achievable for each regulated air contaminant, taking into account energy, environmental and economic impacts, and other costs.” §50.990(13). Under the federal Act, a limited class of sources must gain advance EPA approval for the BACT prescribed in the permit. 42 U. S. C. § 7475(a)(8).
CAA also provides that a PSD permit may issue only if a source “will not cause, or contribute to, air pollution in excess of any... maximum allowable increase or maximum allowable concentration for any pollutant” or any NAAQS. § 7475(a)(3). Congress left to the Agency the determination of most maximum allowable increases, or “increments,” in pollutants. EPA regulations have defined increments for nitrogen oxides. 40 CFR § 51.166(c) (2002). Typically, to demonstrate that increments will not be exceeded, applicants use mathematical models of pollutant plumes, their behavior, and their dispersion. Westbrook, Air Dispersion Models: Tools to Assess Impacts from Pollution Sources, 13 Natural Resources & Env. 546, 547-548 (1999).
Among measures EPA may take to ensure compliance with the PSD program, two have special relevance here. The first prescription, § 113(a)(5) of the Act, provides that “[w]henever, on the basis of any available information, [EPA] finds that a State is not acting in compliance with any requirement or prohibition of the chapter relating to the construction of new sources or the modification of existing sources,” 42 U. S. C. § 7413(a)(5), EPA may “issue an order prohibiting the construction or modification of any major stationary source in any area to which such requirement applies,” § 7413(a)(5)(A). The second measure, §167 of the Act, trains on enforcement of the PSD program; it requires EPA to “take such measures, including issuance of an order, or seeking injunctive relief, as necessary to prevent the construction or modification of a major emitting facility which does not conform to the [PSD] requirements.” §7477.
B
Teck Comineo Alaska Inc. (Comineo) operates a zinc concentrate mine, the Red Dog Mine, in northwest Alaska approximately 100 miles north of the Arctic Circle and close to the native Alaskan villages of Kivalina and Noatak. App. to Pet. for Cert. 3a; Brief for Petitioner 8; Brief for Respondents 4. The mine is the region’s largest private employer. Brief for Petitioner 9. It supplies a quarter of the area’s wage base. Ibid. Comineo leases the land from the NANA Regional Corporation, an Alaskan corporation formed pursuant to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, 85 Stat. 688, as amended, 43 U. S. C. § 1601 et seq. Brief for NANA Regional Corporation, Inc., as Amicus Curiae 1-2, 4.
In 1988, Comineo obtained authorization to operate the mine, a “major emitting facility” under the Act and Alaska’s SIP. App. 106. The mine’s PSD permit authorized five 5,000 kilowatt Wartsila diesel electric generators, MG-1 through MG-5, subject to operating restrictions; two of the five generators were permitted to operate only in standby status. Ibid. Petitioner Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation (ADEC) issued a second PSD permit in 1994 allowing addition of a sixth full-time generator (MG-6), removing standby status from MG-2, and imposing a new operational cap that allowed all but one generator to run full time. Ibid.
In 1996, Comineo initiated a project, with funding from the State, to expand zinc production by 40%. Brief for Petitioner 10; Reply Brief for Petitioner 11, n. 9. Anticipating that the project would increase nitrogen oxide emissions by more than 40 tons per year, see supra, at 472, Comineo applied to ADEC for a PSD permit to allow, inter alia, increased electricity generation by its standby generator, MG-5. App. 107-108; App. to Pet. for Cert. 33a. On March 3, 1999, ADEC preliminarily proposed as BACT for MG-5 the emission control technology known as selective catalytic reduction (SCR), which reduces nitrogen oxide emissions by 90%. App. 72, 108. In response, Comineo amended its application to add a seventh generator, MG-17, and to propose as BACT an alternative control technology — Low NOx— that achieves a 30% reduction in nitrogen oxide pollutants. Brief for Respondents 5, and n. 1; App. 84.
On May 4,1999, ADEC, in conjunction with Cominco’s representative, issued a first draft PSD permit and preliminary technical analysis report that concluded Low NOx was BACT for MG-5 and MG-17. Id., at 55-95. To determine BACT, ADEC employed EPA’s recommended top-down methodology, id., at 61:
“In briefj the top-down process provides that all available control technologies be ranked in descending order of control effectiveness. The PSD applicant first examines the most stringent — or ‘top’ — alternative. That alternative is established as BACT unless the applicant demonstrates, and the permitting authority in its informed judgment agrees, that technical considerations, or energy, environmental, or economic impacts justify a conclusion that the most stringent technology is not ‘achievable’ in that case. If the most stringent technology is eliminated in this fashion, then the next most stringent alternative is considered, and so on.” EPA, New Source Review Workshop Manual B.2 (Draft Oct. 1990) (hereinafter New Source Review Manual); App. 61-62.
Applying top-down methodology, ADEC first homed in on SCR as BACT for MG-5, and the new generator, MG-17. “[W]ith an estimated reduction of 90%,” ADEC stated, SCR “is the most stringent” technology. Id., at 79. Finding SCR “technically and economically feasible,” id., at 65, ADEC characterized as “overstated” Cominco’s cost estimate of $5,643 per ton of nitrogen oxide removed by SCR, id., at 113. Using Cominco's data, ADEC reached a cost estimate running between $1,586 and $2,279 per ton. Id., at 83. Costs in that range, ADEC observed, “are well within what ADEC and EPA conside[r] economically feasible.” Id., at 84. Responding to Cominco’s comments on the preliminary permit, engineering staff in ADEC’s Air Permits Program pointed out that, according to information Comineo provided to ADEC, “SCR has been installed on similar diesel-fired engines throughout the world.” Id., at 102.
Despite its staff’s clear view “that SCR (the most effective individual technology) [was] technologically, environmentally, and economically feasible for the Red Dog power plant engines,” id., at 103-104, ADEC endorsed the alternative proffered by Comineo. To achieve nitrogen oxide emission reductions commensurate with SCR’s 90% impact, Comineo proposed fitting the new generator MG-17 and the six existing generators with Low NOx. Ibid., Comineo asserted that it could lower net emissions by 396 tons per year if it fitted all seven generators with Low NOx rather than fitting two (MG-5 and MG-17) with SCR and choosing one of them as the standby unit. Id., at 87. Cominco’s proposal hinged on the “assumption... that under typical operating conditions one or more engines will not be running due to maintenance of standby-generation capacity.” Ibid. If all seven generators ran continuously, however, Cominco’s alternative would increase emissions by 79 tons per year. Ibid. Accepting Cominco’s submission, ADEC stated that Cominco’s Low NOx solution “achieve[d] a similar maximum NOx reduction as the most stringent controls; [could] potentially result in a greater NOx reduction; and is logistically and economically less onerous to Comineo.” Id., at 87-88.
On the final day of the public comment period, June 2, 1999, the United States Department of the Interior, National Parks Service (NPS), submitted comments to ADEC. App. to Pet. for Cert. 33a; App. 97, 108. NPS objected to the projected offset of new emissions from MG-5 and MG-17 against emissions from other existing generators that were not subject to BACT. Letter from John Notar, NPS Air Resources Division, to Jim Baumgartner, ADEC (June 2, 1999). Such an offset, NPS commented, “is neither allowed by BACT, nor achieves the degree of reduction that would result if all the generators that are subject to BACT were equipped with SCR.” Id., at 3. NPS further observed that the proposed production-increase project would remove operating restrictions that the 1994 PSD permit had placed on four of the existing generators — MG-1, MG-3, MG-4, and MG-5. App. to Pet. for Cert. 34a. Due to that alteration, NPS urged, those generators, too, became part of the production-expansion project and would be subject to the BACT requirement. Ibid.
Following NPS’ lead, EPA wrote to ADEC on July 29, 1999, commenting: “Although ADEC states in its analysis that [SCR], the most stringent level of control, is economically and technologically feasible, ADEC did not propose to require SCR.... [0]nce it is determined that an emission unit is subject to BACT, the PSD program does not allow the imposition of a limit that is less stringent than BACT.” App. 96-97. A permitting authority, EPA agreed with NPS, could not offset new emissions “by imposing new controls on other emission units” that were not subject to BACT, Id., at 97. New emissions could be offset only against reduced emissions from sources covered by the same BACT authorization. Id., at 285-286. EPA further agreed with NPS that, based on the existing information, BACT would be required for MG-1, MG-3, MG-4, and MG-5. Id., at 97.
After receiving EPA comments, ADEC issued a second draft PSD permit and technical analysis report on September 1,1999, again finding Low NOx to be BACT for MG-17. Id., at 105-117. Abandoning the emissions-offsetting justification advanced in the May 4 draft permit, ADEC agreed with NPS and EPA that “emission reductions from sources that were not part of the permit action,” here MG-1, MG-2, MG-3, MG-4, MG-5, and MG-6, could not be considered in determining BACT for MG-17. Id., at 111; id., at 199 (same).
ADEC conceded that, lacking data from Comineo, it had made “no judgment... as to the impact of... [SCR] on the operation, profitability, and competitiveness of the Red Dog Mine.” Id., at 116. Contradicting its May 1999 conclusion that SCR was “technically and economically feasible,” see supra, at 476, ADEC found in September 1999 that SCR imposed “a disproportionate cost” on the mine. App. 116. ADEC concluded, on a “cursory review,” that requiring SCR for a rural Alaska utility would lead to a 20% price increase, and that in comparison with other BACT technologies, SCR came at a “significantly higher” cost. Ibid. No economic basis for a comparison between the mine and a rural utility appeared in ADEC’s technical analysis.
EPA protested the revised permit. In a September 15, 1999, letter, the Agency stated: “Comineo has not adequately demonstrated any site-specific factors to support their claim that the installation of [SCR] is economically infeasible at the Red Dog Mine. Therefore, elimination of SCR as BACT based on cost-effectiveness grounds is not supported by the record and is clearly erroneous.” Id., at 127; see id., at 138 (ADEC’s record does not support the departure from ADEC’s initial view that the costs for SCR were economically feasible).
To justify the September 1, 1999, permit, EPA suggested, ADEC could “include an analysis of whether requiring Com-ineo to install and operate [SCR] would have any adverse economic impacts upon Comineo specifically.” Id., at 127. Stating that such an inquiry was unnecessary and expressing “concerns related to confidentiality,” Comineo declined to submit financial data. Id., at 134. In this regard, Comineo simply asserted, without detail, that the company’s “overall debt remains quite high” despite continuing profits. Id., at 134-135. Comineo also invoked the need for “[¡Industrial development in rural Alaska.” Id., at 135.
On December 10, 1999, ADEC issued the final permit and technical analysis report. Once again, ADEC approved Low NOx as BACT for MG-17 “[t]o support Cominco’s Red Dog Mine Production Rate Increase Project, and its contributions to the region.” Id., at 208. ADEC did not include the economic analysis EPA had suggested. Id., at 152-246. Indeed, ADEC conceded again that it had made “no judgment... as to the impact of... [SCR’s] cost on the operation, profitability, and competitiveness of the Red Dog Mine.” Id., at 207. Nonetheless, ADEC advanced, as cause for its decision, SCR’s adverse, effect on the mine’s “unique and continuing impact on the economic diversity of th[e] region” and on the venture’s “world competitiveness.” Id., at 208. ADEC did not explain how its inferences of adverse effects on the region’s economy or the mine’s “world competitiveness” could be made without financial information showing SCR’s impact on the “operation, profitability, and competitiveness” of the mine. Id., at 207, 299. Instead, ADEC reiterated its rural Alaska utility analogy, and again compared SCR’s cost to the costs of other, less stringent, control technologies. Id., at 205-207.
The same day, December 10, 1999, EPA issued an order to ADEC, under §§ 113(a)(5) and 167 of the Act, 42 U. S. C. §§ 7413(a)(5) and 7477, prohibiting ADEC from issuing a PSD permit to Comineo “unless ADEC satisfactorily documents why SCR is not BACT for the Wartsila diesel generator [MG-17].” App. to Pet. for Cert. 36a. In the letter accompanying the order, the Agency stated that “ADEC’s own analysis supports the determination that BACT is [SCR], and that ADEC’s decision in the proposed permit therefore is both arbitrary and erroneous.” App. 149.
On February 8, 2000, EPA, again invoking its authority under §§ 113(a)(5) and 167 of the Act, issued a second order, this time prohibiting Comineo from beginning “construction or modification activities at the Red Dog mine.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 49a. A third order, issued on March 7, 2000, superseding and vacating the February 8 order, generally prohibited Comineo from acting on ADEC’s December 10 PSD permit but allowed limited summer construction. Id., at 62a-64a. On April 25, 2000, EPA withdrew its December 10 order. App. 300; App. to Pet. for Cert. 6a. Once ADEC issued the permit, EPA explained, that order lacked utility. On July 16, 2003, ADEC granted Comineo a PSD permit to construct MG-17 with SCR as BACT. Letter from Theodore B. Olson, Solicitor General, to William K. Suter, Clerk of the Court (Aug. 21, 2003). Under the July 16, 2003, permit, SCR ceases to be BACT “if and when the case currently pending before the Supreme Court of the United States of America is decided in favor of the State of Alaska.” ADEC, Air Quality Control Construction Permit, Final Technical Analysis Report, Permit No. 9932-AC005, Revision 2, p. 7.
The day EPA issued its first order against Comineo, February 8, 2000, ADEC and Comineo petitioned the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit for review of EPA’s orders. App. 11. The Agency initially moved to dismiss, urging that the Court of Appeals lacked subject-matter jurisdiction. In an order released March 27, 2001, the Ninth Circuit concluded that it had adjudicatory authority pursuant to 42 U. S. C. § 7607(b)(1), which lodges jurisdiction over challenges to “any... final [EPA] action” in the Courts of Appeals. Alaska v. United States EPA, 244 F. 3d 748, 750-751.
The Court of Appeals resolved the merits in a judgment released July 30, 2002. 298 F. 3d 814 (CA9). It held that EPA had authority under §§ 113(a)(5) and 167 to issue the contested orders, and that the Agency had properly exercised its discretion in doing so. Id., at 820-823. Concerning EPA’s authority under §§ 113(a)(5) and 167, the Court of Appeals observed first that “the question presented is what requirements the state must meet” under the Act to issue a PSD permit, not what the correct BACT might be. Id., at 821 (emphasis in original). Concluding that EPA had “authority to determine the reasonableness or adequacy of the state's justification for its decision,” the Court of Appeals emphasized that the “provision of a reasoned justification” by a permitting authority is undeniably a “requirement” of the Act. Ibid. EPA had properly exercised its discretion in issuing the three orders, the Ninth Circuit ultimately determined, because (1) Comineo failed to “demonstrate] that SCR was economically infeasible,” and (2) “ADEC failed to provide a reasoned justification for its elimination of SCR as a control option.” Id., at 823. We granted certiorari, 537 U. S. 1186 (2003), to resolve an important question of federal. law, i. e., the scope of EPA’s authority under §§ 113(a)(5) and 167, and now affirm the Ninth Circuit's judgment.
II
ADEC contested EPA’s orders under 42 U. S. C. § 7607 (b)(1), which renders reviewable in the appropriate federal court of appeals any EPA “final action." Before the Ninth Circuit, EPA unsuccessfully urged that its orders were “interlocutory,” and therefore unreviewable in court unless and until EPA chose to commence an enforcement action. A preenforcement contest could be maintained in the Court of Appeals under § 7607(b)(1), the Ninth Circuit held, for in the circumstances presented, EPA’s actions had the requisite finality.
It was undisputed, the Court of Appeals observed, that EPA had spoken its “‘last word”’ on whether ADEC had adequately justified its conclusion that Low NOx was the best available control technology for the MG-17 generator. 244 F. 3d, at 750. Further, EPA’s orders effectively halted construction of the MG-17 generator, for Comineo would risk civil and criminal penalties if it defied a valid EPA directive.
In this Court, EPA agrees with the Ninth Circuit’s finality determination. See Brief for Respondents 16-20; Tr. of Oral Arg. 43-44. We are satisfied that the Court of Appeals correctly applied the guides we set out in Bennett v. Spear, 520 U. S. 154, 177-178 (1997) (to be “final,” agency action must “mark the ‘consummation’ of the agency’s decisionmaking process,” and must either determine “rights or obligations” or occasion “legal consequences” (some internal quotation marks omitted)). As the Court of Appeals stated, EPA had “asserted its final position on the factual circumstances” underpinning the Agency’s orders, 244 F. 3d, at 750, and if EPA’s orders survived judicial review, Cominco could not escape the practical and legal consequences (lost costs and vulnerability to penalties) of any ADEC-permitted construction Cominco endeavored, ibid.
No question has been raised here, we note, about the adequacy of EPA’s preorder procedures under the Due Process Clause or the Administrative Procedure Act. Cf. Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 435 U. S. 519, 544 (1978) (agencies have authority to “fashion their own rules of procedure,” even when a statute does not specify what process to use). Furthermore, in response to ADEC’s initial contention that the record was incomplete, the Ninth Circuit gave EPA an opportunity to supplement the record, and thereafter obtained from all parties agreement “that the record as it stood was adequate to resolve [ADEC’s review petition].” 298 F. 3d, at 818.
III
A
Centrally at issue in this case is the question whether EPA’s oversight role, described by Congress in CAA §§ 113(a)(5) and 167, see supra, at 473-474, extends to ensuring that a state permitting authority’s BACT determination is reasonable in light of the statutory guides. Sections 113(a)(5) and 167 lodge in the'Agency encompassing supervisory responsibility over the construction and modification of pollutant emitting facilities in areas covered by the PSD program. 42 U. S. C. §§ 7413(a)(5) and 7477. In notably capacious terms, Congress armed EPA with authority to issue orders stopping construction when “a State is not acting in compliance with any [CAA] requirement or prohibition... relating to the construction of new sources or the modification of existing sources,” § 7413(a)(5), or when “construction or modification of a major emitting facility... does not conform to the requirements of [the PSD program],” § 7477.
The federal Act enumerates several “^reconstruction requirements” for the PSD program. §7475. Absent these, “[n]o major emitting facility... may be constructed.” Ibid. One express preconstruction requirement is inclusion of a BACT determination in a facility’s PSD permit. §§ 7475(a) (1) and (4). As earlier set out, see supra, at 472, the Act defines BACT as “an emission limitation based on the maximum degree of reduction of [a] pollutant... which the permitting authority, on a case-by-case basis, taking into account energy, environmental, and economic impacts and other costs, determines is achievable for [a] facility.” §7479(3). Under this formulation, the permitting authority, ADEC here, exercises primary or initial responsibility for identifying BACT in line with the Act’s definition of that term.
All parties agree that one of the “many requirements in the PSD provisions that the EPA may enforce” is “that a [PSD] permit contain a BACT limitation.” Brief for Petitioner 34; see id., at 22, 25 (same). See also Brief for Respondents 23. It is therefore undisputed that the Agency may issue an order to stop a facility’s construction if a PSD permit contains no BACT designation.
EPA reads the Act’s definition of BACT, together with CAA’s explicit listing of BACT as a “^reconstruction re-quiremen[t],” to mandate not simply a BACT designation, but a determination of BACT faithful to the statute’s definition. In keeping with the broad oversight role §§ 113(a)(5) and 167 vest in EPA, the Agency maintains, it may review permits to ensure that a State’s BACT determination is reasonably moored to the Act’s provisions. See id., at 24. We hold, as elaborated below, that the Agency has rationally construed the Act’s text and that EPA’s construction warrants our respect and approbation.
BACT’s statutory definition requires selection of an emission control technology that results in the “maximum” reduction of a pollutant “achievable for [a] facility” in view of “energy, environmental, and economic impacts and other costs.” 42 U. S. C. § 7479(3). This instruction, EPA submits, cabins state permitting authorities’ discretion by granting only “authority to make reasonable BACT determinations,” Brief for Respondents 27 (emphasis in original), i. e., decisions made with fidelity to the Act’s purpose “to insure that economic growth will occur in a manner consistent with the preservation of existing clean air resources,” 42 U. S. C. § 7470(3). Noting that state permitting authorities’ statutory discretion is constrained by CÁA’s strong, normative terms “maximum” and “achievable,” §7479(3), EPA reads §§ 113(a
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Souter
announced the judgment of the Court and delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, II-A, and III, and an opinion with respect to Parts II-B and II-C, in which The Chief Justice, Justice White, and Justice Stevens join.
The provisions of the Juvenile Delinquency Act require the length of official detention in certain circumstances to be limited to “the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult.” 18 U. S. C. § 5037(c)(1)(B). We.hold that this limitation refers to the maximum sentence that could be imposed if the juvenile were being sentenced after application of the United States Sentencing Guidelines.
1 — 1
Early m the morning of November 5, 1989, after a night of drinking, the then-16-year-old respondent R. L. C. and another juvenile stole a car with which they struck another automobile, fatally injuring one of its passengers, 2-year-old La Tesha Mountain. R. L. C. is a member of the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians, and these events took place on the Red Lake Indian Reservation, which is within Indian country as defined by federal law. These circumstances provide federal jurisdiction in this case. See 18 U. S. C. §§ 1151, 1162, 1153. Upon certifying that a proceeding was authorized in federal court under § 5082 on the ground that no state court had jurisdiction over the offense, the Government charged R. L. C. with an act of juvenile delinquency.
After a bench trial, the District Court found R. L. C. to be a juvenile who had driven a car recklessly while intoxicated and without the owner’s authorization, causing Mountain’s death. R. L. C. was held to have committed an act of juvenile delinquency within the meaning of § 5031, since his acts would have been the crime of involuntary manslaughter in violation of §§ 1112(a) and 1153 if committed by an adult. The maximum sentence for involuntary manslaughter under 18 U. S. C. § 1112(b) is three years. At R. L. C.’s disposi-tional hearing, the District Court granted the Government’s request to impose the maximum penalty for respondent’s delinquency and accordingly committed him to official detention for three years.
Despite the manslaughter statute’s provision for an adult sentence of that length, the United States Court of Appeals for the' Eighth Circuit vacated R. L. C.’s sentence and remanded for resentencing, after concluding that 36 months exceeded the cap imposed by § 5037(c)(1)(B) upon the period of detention to which a juvenile delinquent may be sentenced. 915 F. 2d 320 (1990). Although the statute merely provides that juvenile detention may not extend beyond “the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult,” the Court of Appeals read this language to bar a juvenile term longer than the sentence a court could have imposed on a similarly situated adult after applying the United States Sentencing Guidelines. Under the Guidelines, involuntary manslaughter caused by recklessness has a base offense level of 14. United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual § 2A1.4(a)(2) (Nov. 1991). The court found, and the Government agrees, see Brief for United States 22, n. 5, that because R. L. C. had the lowest possible criminal history level, Category I, the Guidelines would yield a sentencing range of 15-21 months for a similarly situated adult. The Court of Appeals therefore concluded that the maximum period of detention to which R. L. C. could be sentenced was 21 months.
The Government sought no stay of mandate from the Court of Appeals, and on remand the District Court imposed detention for 18 months. Although R. L. C. has now served this time, his failure to complete the 3-year detention originally imposed and the possibility that the remainder of it could be imposed saves the case from mootness. See United States v. Villamonte-Marquez, 462 U. S. 579, 581, n. 2 (1983). We granted the Government’s petition for certiorari, 501 U. S. 1230 (1991), to resolve the conflict between the Eighth Circuit’s holding in this case and the Ninth Circuit’s position, adopted in United States v. Marco L., 868 F. 2d 1121, cert. denied, 493 U. S. 956 (1989), and endorsed by the Government.
II
A
The Government suggests a straightforward enquiry into plain meaning to explain what is “authorized.” It argues that the word “authorized” must mean the maximum term of imprisonment provided for by the statute defining the offense, since only Congress can “authorize” a term of imprisonment in punishment for a crime. As against the position that the Sentencing Guidelines now circumscribe a trial court’s authority, the Government insists that our concern must be with the affirmative authority for imposing a sentence, which necessarily stems from statutory law. It maintains that in any event the Sentencing Commission’s congressional authorization to establish sentencing guidelines does not create affirmative authority to set punishments for crime, and that the Guidelines do not purport to authorize the punishments to which they relate.
But this is too easy. The answer to any suggestion that the statutory character of a specific penalty provision gives it primacy over administrative sentencing guidelines is that the mandate to apply the Guidelines is itself statutory. See 18 U. S. C. § 3553(b). More significantly, the Government’s argument that “authorization” refers only to what is affirmatively provided by penal statutes, without reference to the Sentencing Guidelines to be applied under statutory mandate, seems to us to beg the question. Of course it is true that no penalty would be “authorized” without a statute providing specifically for the penal consequences of defined criminal activity. The question, however, is whether Congress intended the courts to treat the upper limit of such a penalty as “authorized” even when proper application of a statutorily mandated Guideline in an adult case would bar imposition up to the limit, and an unwarranted upward departure from the proper Guideline range would be reversible error. § 3742. Here it suffices to say that the Government’s construction is by no means plain. The text is at least equally consistent with treating “authorized” to refer to the result of applying all statutes with a required bearing on the sentencing decision, including not only those that empower the court to sentence but those that limit the legitimacy of its exercise of that power. This, indeed, is arguably the more natural construction.
Plain-meaning analysis does not, then, provide the Government with a favorable answer. The most that can be said from examining the text in its present form is that the Government may claim its preferred construction to be one possible resolution of statutory ambiguity.
B
On the assumption that ambiguity exists, we turn to examine the textual evolution of the limitation in question and the legislative history that may explain or elucidate it. The predecessor of § 5037(c) as included in the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 provided that a juvenile adjudged delinquent could be committed to the custody of the Attorney General for a period “not [to] extend beyond the juvenile’s twenty-first birthday or the maximum term which could have been imposed on an adult convicted of the same offense, whichever is sooner.” 18 U. S. C. § 5037(b) (1982 ed.) (emphasis added). In its current form, the statute refers to the “maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult.” 18 U. S. C. § 5037(c) (emphasis added). On its face, the current language suggests a change in reference from abstract consideration of the penalty permitted in punishment of the adult offense, to a focused en-quiry into the maximum that would be available in the circumstances of the particular juvenile before the court. The intervening history supports this reading.
With the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 (chapter II of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, Pub. L. 98-473, § 214(a), 98 Stat. 2013), §5037 was rewritten. As § 5037(c)(1)(B), its relevant provision became “the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized by section 3581(b) if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult.” 18 U.S.C. §§ 5037(c)(1)(B), (c)(2)(B)(ii) (1982 ed., Supp. II) (emphasis added). The emphasized language was quickly deleted, however, by the Criminal Law and Procedure Technical Amendments Act of 1986, Pub. L. 99-646, § 21(a)(2), 100 Stat. 3596 (Technical Amendments Act), resulting in the present statutory text, “the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult.” It thus lost the reference to § 3581(b), which would have guided the sentencing court in identifying the “authorized” term of imprisonment.
R. L. C. argues that this loss is highly significant. Section 3581(b) was, and still is, part of a classification system adopted in 1984 for use in setting the incidents of punishment for federal offenses by reference to letter grades reflecting their relative seriousness. One provision, for example, sets the maximum period of supervised release for each letter grade. §3583. Section 3581(b) sets out the maximum term of imprisonment for each letter grade, providing, for instance, that the authorized term of imprisonment for a class C felony is not more than 12 years, for a class D not more than 6, and for a class E not more than 3.
The deletion of the reference to § 3581(b) with its specific catalog of statutory máximums would seem to go against the Government’s position. Since, for example, a juvenile who had committed what would have been an adult class E felony would apparently have been subject to three years of detention, because § 3581(b) “authorized” up to three years of imprisonment for an adult, the deletion of the reference to § 3581(b) would appear to indicate some congressional intent to broaden the range of enquiry when determining what was authorized.
The Government, however, finds a different purpose, disclosed in the section-by-section analysis prepared by the Department of Justice to accompany the bill that became the Technical Amendments Act. The Department’s analysis included this explanation for the proposal to delete the reference to § 3581(b): “Because of the effect of 18 U. S. C. § 3559(b)(2), deleting the reference to 18 U. S. C. § 3581(b) will tie the maximum sentences for juveniles to the maximum for adults, rather than making juvenile sentences more severe than adult sentences.” 131 Cong. Rec. 14177 (1985). Congress had enacted § 3559 to reconcile the new sentencing schedule, providing for the incidents of conviction according to the offense’s assigned letter grade, with the pre-existing body of federal criminal statutes, which of course included no assignments of letter grades to the particular offenses they created. Section 3559(a) provides a formula for assigning the missing letter based on the maximum term of imprisonment set by the statute creating the offense. Thus, as it stood at the time of the Technical Amendments Act, it read:
“(a) Classification
“An offense that is not specifically classified by a letter grade in the section defining it, is classified—
“(1) if the maximum term of imprisonment authorized is—
“(A) life imprisonment, or if the maximum penalty is death, as a Class A felony;
“(B) twenty years or more, as a Class B felony;
“(C) less than twenty years but ten or more years, as a Class C felony;
“(D) less than ten years but five or more years, as a Class D felony;
“(E) less than five years but more than one year, as a Class E felony;
“(F) one year or less but more than six months, as a Class A misdemeanor;
“(G) six months or less but more than thirty days, as a Class B misdemeanor;
“(H) thirty days or less but more than five days, as a Class C misdemeanor; or
“(I) five days or less, or if no imprisonment is authorized, as an infraction.
“(b) Effect of classification
“An offense classified under subsection (a) carries all the incidents assigned to the applicable letter designation except that:
“(1) the maximum fine that may be imposed is the fine authorized by the statute describing the offense, or by this chapter, whichever is the greater; and
“(2) the maximum term of imprisonment is the term authorized by the statute describing the offense.” 18 U. S. C. §3559 (1982 ed., Supp. II).
The Government explains that limiting the length of a juvenile detention to that authorized for an adult under § 3581(b) could in some circumstances have appeared to authorize a longer sentence than an adult could have received, when the offense involved was assigned no letter grade in its defining statute. Thus an offense created without letter grade and carrying a maximum term of two years would be treated under § 3559(a) as a class E felony. Section 3581(b) provides that a class E felony carried a maximum of three years. Regardless of that classification, §3559(b)(2) would certainly preclude sentencing any adult offender to more than two years. Tension would arise, however, where a juvenile had committed the act constituting the offense. Insofar as § 5037(c) capped the juvenile detention by reference to what was authorized for an adult, the maximum would have been two years; but insofar as it capped it by reference to what was authorized by § 3581(b), the limit might have appeared to be three. It was to break this tension, according to the Government, that the reference to § 3581(b) was deleted guaranteeing that no juvenile would be given detention longer than the maximum adult sentence authorized by the statute creating the offense. The amendment also, the Government says, left the law clear in its reference to the statute creating the offense as the measure of an “authorized” sentence. This conclusion is said to be confirmed by a statement in the House Report that the amendment “delet[es an] incorrect cross-referenc[e],” H. R. Rep. No. 99-797, p. 21 (1986), which, the Government argues, “suggests that no substantive change was intended.” Brief for United States 20, n. 4.
We agree with the Government’s argument up to a point. A sentencing court could certainly have been confused by the reference to § 3581(b). A sentencing judge considering a juvenile defendant charged with an offense bearing no letter classification, and told to look for “the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized [according to letter grade] by section 3581(b),” would have turned first to § 3559(a) to obtain a letter classification. The court perhaps would have felt obliged to ignore the provision of § 3559(b) that “the maximum term of imprisonment is the term authorized by the statute describing the offense” in favor of a longer term provided for by the appropriate letter grade in § 3581(b). Indeed, the sentencing judge would have been faced with this puzzle in virtually every case, since the system of classifying by letter grades adopted in 1984 was only to be used in future legislation defining federal criminal offenses. See Brief for United States 16. No federal offense on the books at the time the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 was adopted carried a letter grade in its defining statute, and Congress has used the device only rarely in the ensuing years.
Thus, while it included a reference to § 3581(b), § 5037(c) was ambiguous. This ambiguity was resolved by an amendment that, absent promulgation of the Guidelines, might have left the question of the “authorized” maximum term of imprisonment to be determined only by reference to the penalty provided by the statute creating the offense, whether expressed as a term of years or simply by reference to letter grade. The legislative history does not prove, however, that Congress intended “authorized” to refer solely to the statute defining the offense despite the enactment of a statute requiring application of the Sentencing Guidelines, a provision that will generally provide a ceiling more favorable to the juvenile than that contained in the offense-defining statute.
Indeed, the contrary intent would seem the better inference. The Justice Department analysis of the Criminal Law and Procedure Technical Amendments Act of 1986, upon which the Government relies, went on to say that “deleting the reference to 18 U. S. C. § 3581(b) will tie the maximum sentences for juveniles to the maximum for adults, rather than making juvenile sentences more severe than adult sentences.” 131 Cong. Rec. 14177 (1985). This is an expression of purpose that today can be achieved only by reading “authorized” to refer to the maximum period of imprisonment that may be imposed consistently with 18 U. S. C. § 3553(b). That statute provides that “[t]he court shall impose a sentence . . . within the range” established for the category of offense as set forth in the Guidelines, “unless the court finds that there exists an aggravating or mitigating circumstance of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines that should result in a sentence different from that described.” § 3553(b).
The point is reinforced by other elements of the legislative history. The Senate Report accompanying the 1986 Technical Amendments Act states that the amendment “makes clear that juvenile sentences are to be of equal length as those for adult offenders committing the same crime.” S. Rep. No. 99-278, p. 3 (1986). This, in turn, reflects the statement in the Senate Report accompanying the Sentencing Reform Act, that the changes in juvenile sentencing law were included “in order to conform it to the changes made in adult sentencing laws.” S. Rep. No. 98-225, p. 155 (1983). The most fundamental of the Sentencing Reform Act’s changes was, of course, the creation of the Sentencing Commission, authorized to promulgate the guidelines required for use by sentencing courts. It hardly seems likely that Congress adopted the current § 5037(c) with a purpose to conform juvenile and adult maximum sentences without intending the recently authorized Guidelines scheme to be considered for that purpose. The legislative history thus reinforces our initial conclusion that § 5037 is better understood to refer to the maximum sentence permitted under the statute requiring application of the Guidelines.
C
We do not think any ambiguity survives. If any did, however, we would choose the construction yielding the shorter sentence by resting on the venerable rule of lenity, see, e. g., United States v. Bass, 404 U. S. 336, 347-348 (1971), rooted in “ ‘the instinctive distaste against men languishing in prison unless the lawmaker has clearly said they should,’ ” id., at 348 (quoting H. Friendly, Benchmarks 209 (1967)). While the rule has been applied not only to resolve issues about the substantive scope of criminal statutes, but to answer questions about the severity of sentencing, see Bifulco v. United States, 447 U. S. 381, 387 (1980), its application is unnecessary in this case, since “we have always reserved lenity for those situations in which a reasonable doubt persists about a statute’s intended scope even after resort to ‘the language and structure, legislative history, and motivating policies’ of the statute.” Moskal v. United States, 498 U. S. 103, 108 (1990) (citation omitted).
Ill
We hold, therefore, that application of the language in § 5037(c)(1)(B) permitting detention for a period not to exceed “the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult” refers to the maximum length of sentence to which a similarly situated adult would be subject if convicted of the adult counterpart of the offense and sentenced under the statute requiring application of the Guidelines, § 3553(b). Although determining the maximum permissible sentence under § 5037(c)(1)(B) will therefore require sentencing and reviewing courts to determine an appropriate Guideline range in juvenile-delinquency proceedings, we emphasize that it does not require plenary application of the Guidelines to juvenile delinquents. Where that statutory provision applies, a sentencing court’s concern with the Guidelines goes solely to the upper limit of the proper Guideline range as setting the maximum term for which a juvenile may be committed to official detention, absent circumstances that would warrant departure under § 3553(b).
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Affirmed.
Title 18 U. S. C. §5037(c) provides:.
“(c) The term for which official detention may be ordered for a juvenile found to be a juvenile delinquent may not extend'—
“(1) in the case of a juvenile who is less than eighteen years old, beyond the lesser of—
“(A) the date when the juvenile becomes twenty-one years old; or
“(B) the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult; or
“(2) in the case of a juvenile who is between eighteen and twenty-one years old—
“(A) who if convicted as an adult would be convicted of a Class A, B, or C felony, beyond five years; or
“(B) in any other case beyond the lesser of—
“(i) three years; or
“(ii) the maximum term of imprisonment that would be authorized if the juvenile had been tried and convicted as an adult.”
R. L. C. argues that the broader statutory purpose supports his position. He contends that longer juvenile sentences are only justified by a rehabilitative purpose. See, e. g., Carter v. United States, 113 U. S. App. D. C. 123, 125, 306 F. 2d 283, 285 (1962) (imposing a longer juvenile sentence under the now-repealed Youth Corrections Act) (“[Rjehabilitation may be regarded as comprising the quid pro quo for a longer confinement but under different conditions and terms than a defendant would undergo in an ordinary prison”). He then suggests that the Sentencing Reform Act rejected the rehabilitative model not merely for adult imprisonment, see Mistretta v. United States, 488 U. S. 361, 366-367 (1989), but for juveniles as well. See Brief for Respondent 19. While it is true that some rehabilitative tools were removed from the juvenile penalty scheme in 1984, see Pub. L. 98-473, § 214(b), 98 Stat. 2014 (abolishing parole for juvenile delinquents), the Juvenile Delinquency Act does not completely reject rehabilitative objectives. See, e. g., 18 U. S. C. §§5035, 5039. We do not think a broader congressional purpose points clearly in either party’s direction.
“(b) Authorized terms. — The authorized terms of imprisonment are—
“(1) for a Class A felony, the duration of the defendant’s life or any period of time;
“(2) for a Class B felony, not more than twenty-five years;
“(3) for a Class C felony, not more than twelve years;
“(4) for a Class D felony, not more than six years;
“(5) for a Class E felony, not more than three years;
“(6) for a Class A misdemeanor, not more than one year;
“(7) for a Class B misdemeanor, not more than six months;
“(8) for a Class C misdemeanor, not more than thirty days; and
“(9) for an infraction, not more than five days.” 18 U. S. C. § 3581.
We speak here of an indication appearing solely from the face of the text. In fact, so far as we can tell, at the time of the amendment no federal statute defining an offense referred to it by letter grade.
The dissent takes us to task for reliance upon a “technical amendment.” But a statute is a statute, whatever its label. Although the critical congressional enactment, the deletion of the reference to § 3681(b), came in the Technical Amendments Act, we have applied the usual tools of statutory construction: the language left in the statute after its amendment in 1986 is most naturally read to refer to the term of imprisonment authorized after application of the statute mandating use of the Guidelines. The legislative history of the Technical Amendments Act reinforces this conclusion.
Justice Scalia questions the soundness of Moskal’s statement that we have reserved lenity for those cases (unlike this one) in which after examining “the ... structure, legislative history, and motivating policies,” in addition to the text of an ambiguous criminal statute, we are still left with a reasonable doubt about the intended scope of the statute’s application. But the Court has not in the past approached the use of lenity in the way Justice Scalia would have it.
It is true that the need for fair warning will make it “rare that legislative history or statutory policies will support a construction of a statute broader than that clearly warranted by the text,” Crandon v. United States, 494 U. S. 162, 160 (1990), and that “general declarations of policy,” whether in the text or the legislative history, will not support construction of an ambiguous criminal statute against the defendant, Hughey v. United States, 496 U. S. 411, 422 (1990). But lenity does not always require the “narrowest” construction, and our cases have recognized that a broader construction may be permissible on the basis of nontextual factors that make clear the legislative intent where it is within the fair meaning of the statutory language. See Dixson v. United States, 465 U. S. 482, 500-501, n. 19 (1984). Cf. McBoyle v. United States, 283 U. S. 25, 27 (1931) (a criminal statute should be construed in such a way that its language gives “fair warning” to the “common mind”). Whether lenity should be given the more immediate and dispositive role Justice Scalia espouses is an issue that is not raised and need not be reached in this case.
The Sentencing Guidelines, of course, do not directly apply to juvenile-delinquency proceedings. We observe that 28 U. S. C. § 995(a)(19), also enacted as part of the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, gives the Sentencing Commission power to “study the feasibility of developing guidelines for the disposition of juvenile delinquents.” The Government reports that the Sentencing Commission has recently begun such a study. See Brief for United States 11, n. 1.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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B
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Douglas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Section 530 of the California Public Utilities Code, Cal. Stat. 1955, c. 1966, provides in part:
“Every common carrier subject to the provisions of this part may transport, free or at reduced rates:
“(a) Persons for the United States, ....
“The commission may permit common carriers to transport property at reduced rates for the United States, state, county, or municipal governments, to such extent and subject to such conditions as it may consider just and reasonable. Nothing herein shall prevent any common carrier subject to the provisions of this part from transporting property for the United States, state, county, or municipal governments, at reduced rates no lower than rates which lawfully may be assessed and charged by any other such common carrier or by highway permit carriers as defined in the Highway Carriers’ Act.” (Italics added.)
There is a large volume of military traffic between points in California. For many years the United States has negotiated special agreements with carriers as to the rates governing the transportation of government property. Property for the armed services has usually been transported at negotiated rates substantially equal to or lower than those applicable to regular commercial shipments.
The United States filed this suit for declaratory relief, 28 U. S. C. § 2201, in a three-judge District Court, asking that § 530 be declared unconstitutional insofar as it prohibits carriers from transporting government property at rates other than those approved by the Commission and requesting relief by injunction.
The District Court rendered judgment for the United States, 141 F. Supp. 168. The case is here by appeal, 28 U. S. C. §§ 1253, 2101 (b). We noted probable jurisdiction. 352 U. S. 924.
We are met at the outset with a contention that there is no “actual controversy” between the United States and the Commission within the meaning of 28 U. S. C. § 2201. If so, there is a fatal constitutional, as well as statutory, defect because of the manner in which the judicial power is defined by Art. III, § 2, cl. 1, of the Constitution. See Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Haworth, 300 U. S. 227. The argument is that there is no allegation that the Commission had done or had threatened to do anything adverse to the United States or its agent.
Prior to 1955, § 530 provided that every common carrier “may transport, free or at reduced rates: . . . property for the United States . ...” In 1955, § 530 was amended to eliminate that provision and substitute the provision already noted that the Commission “may permit” common carriers to transport property of the United States at reduced rates “to such extent and subject to such conditions as it may consider just and reasonable.” As also noted above, this amendment further provided that no common carrier shall be prevented from trans- . porting property of the United States “at reduced rates no lower than rates which lawfully may be assessed and charged by any other such common carrier or by highway permit carriers . . . .” Prior to this amendment the Commission had authorized highway permit carriers to deviate from the prescribed minimum rates in connection with the transportation of property for the armed forces of the United States. To prevent the continuation of this exemption the Commission on August 16, 1955, canceled the deviation authorization for permit carriers as of September 7, 1955, the effective date of the amendment to § 530. On request of the Department of Defense the Commission postponed the effectiveness of that cancellation until December 5, 1955. On November 29, 1955, the Commission denied a further extension, stating:
“The provision of Item No. 20 of Minimum Rate Tariff No. 2 which permits carriers to deviate from the minimum rates in connection with the transportation of property for the Armed Forces of the United States constitutes an exception which was established prior to the amendment of Section 530. So long as this provision remains in effect, not only the permitted carriers but also the common carriers are without the rate regulation which clearly was contemplated under the recent legislative enactment. . . .
“The intent of the legislature should be carried out without further delay. Accordingly, the petition for further postponement will be denied. This action will in no way preclude carriers from filing applications for such rate exceptions as they may consider to be just and reasonable.”
As a result of this denial, common carriers could no longer transport any United States property at lower negotiated rates without Commission approval. For § 486 requires common carriers to file their rates with the Commission. Section 493 provides that no common carrier shall engage in transportation until its schedules of rates have been filed. Section 494 provides that no common carrier “shall, charge, demand, collect, or receive a different compensation for the transportation of persons or property . . . than the applicable rates . . . specified in its schedules filed . . . .” (A like provision is contained in Art. XII, § 22 of the California Constitution.) Moreover the Public Utilities Code provides penalties for violations of its provisions and orders issued thereunder. §§ 2107, 2112. These penalties are applicable not only to the carrier but to shippers as well. California Public Utilities Code, § 2112. As stated by the District Court, “If a United States officer were to negotiate with a carrier for 'reduced rates’ without permitting the defendant to determine whether it 'considered’ the conditions of the contract 'just and reasonable’, he could be thrown into the county jail.” 141 F. Supp., at 186.
The Commission has plainly indicated an intent to enforce the Act; and prohibition of the statute is so broad as to deny the United States the right to ship at reduced rates, unless the Commission first gives its approval. The case is, therefore, quite different from Public Service Comm’n v. Wycoff. Co., 344 U. S. 237, where a carrier sought relief in a federal court against a state commission in order “to guard against the possibility,” id., at 244, that the Commission would assume jurisdiction. Here the statute limits transportation at reduced rates unless the Commission first gives approval. The controversy is present and concrete — whether the United States has the right to obtain transportation service at such rates as it may negotiate or whether it can do so only with state approval.
There is a large group of cases involving the doctrine of primary jurisdiction which requires the complainant first to seek relief in the administrative proceeding before a remedy will be supplied by the courts. See Far East Conference v. United States, 342 U. S. 570; United States v. Western Pacific R. Co., 352 U. S. 59. In related situations we have insisted that an aggrieved party pursue his administrative remedy before the state agency and the state court prior to bringing his complaint to the federal court, so that the true interpretation of the state law may be known and its actual, as opposed to its theoretical, impact on the litigant authoritatively determined before the federal court undertakes to sit in judgment. See Alabama Federation of Labor v. McAdory, 325 U. S. 450; Leiter Minerals, Inc., v. United States, 352 U. S. 220.
These cases are inapposite. We know the statute applies to shipments of the United States. We know that it is unlawful to ship at reduced rates unless the Commission approves those rates. The question is whether the United States can be subjected to the discretionary authority of a state agency for the terms on which, by grace, it can make arrangements for services to be rendered it. That issue is a constitutional one that the Commission can hardly be expected to entertain. If, as in Aircraft Diesel Equipment Corp. v. Hirsch, 331 U. S. 752, and Allen v. Grand Central Aircraft Co., 347 U. S. 535, an administrative proceeding might leave no remnant of the constitutional question, the administrative remedy plainly should be pursued. But where the only question is whether it is constitutional to fasten the administrative procedure onto the litigant, the administrative agency may be defied and judicial relief sought as the only effective way of protecting the asserted constitutional right. In that posture the case is kin to those that hold that “failure to apply for a license under an ordinance which on its face violates the Constitution does not preclude review in this Court of a judgment of conviction under such an ordinance.” Staub v. City of Baxley, 355 U. S. 313, 319, and cases cited; Thomas v. Collins, 323 U. S. 516.
It is argued that 28 TJ. S. C. § 1342, bars the grant of relief in this case. It provides that the federal courts “shall not enjoin, suspend or restrain the operation of, or compliance with, any order affecting rates chargeable by a public utility and made by a State administrative agency or a rate-making body of a State political subdivision, where:
“(1) Jurisdiction is based solely on diversity of citizenship or repugnance of the order to the Federal Constitution . . . .”
Assuming, arguendo, that the Act applies to the sovereign who made it, there is no violation of its mandate in the relief granted here. In the present case, the challenge is not to a rate “order” but to a statute which requires the United States to submit its negotiated rates to the California Commission for approval. The United States wants to be rid of the system that subjects its procurement services to that form of state supervision.
We come to the merits. Congress has provided a comprehensive policy governing procurement. 10 U. S. C. (Supp. V) §§ 2301-2314. While competitive bidding is the general policy, § 2304 provides that “the head of an agency may negotiate such a purchase or contract, if—
“(2) the public exigency will not permit the delay incident to advertising;
“(10) the purchase or contract is for property or services for which it is impracticable to obtain competition;
“(12) the purchase or contract is for property or services whose procurement he determines should not be publicly disclosed because of their character, ingredients, or components; . . . .”
The regulations, promulgated to carry out these statutory provisions, are numerous and extensive. One provides that “volume shipments” shall be referred “at the earliest practicable time to the appropriate military traffic management office for a determination of the reasonableness of applicable current rates and, when appropriate, for negotiation of adjusted or modified rates.”
The Army regulations provide that the “least costly means of transportation will be selected which will meet military requirements and still be consistent with governing procurement regulations and transportation policies as expressed by Congress, contingent upon carrier ability to provide safe, adequate, and efficient transportation.” Navy regulations provide that when applicable freight rates “appear excessive” they “may be negotiated for more equitable rates.” The Air Force regulations provide for negotiations for adjustments or modifications of “commercial carriers' rates . . . only after a determination has been made as to the unreasonableness, unjustness or otherwise apparent unlawfulness of effective rates . ...”
It seems clear that these regulations — which have the force of law, Leslie Miller, Inc., v. Arkansas, 352 U. S. 187; Standard Oil Co. v. Johnson, 316 U. S. 481 — sanction the policy of negotiating rates for shipment of federal property and entrust the procurement officers with the discretion to determine when existing rates will be accepted and when negotiation for lower rates will be undertaken. It also seems clear that under § 530 of the California Public Utilities Code this discretion of the federal officers may be exercised and reduced rates used only if the Commission approves. The question is whether California may impose this restraint or control on federal transportation procurement.
We lay to one side these cases which sustain nondiscriminatory state taxes on activities of contractors and others who do business for the United States, as their impact at most is to increase the costs of the operation. See, e. g., Esso Standard Oil Co. v. Evans, 345 U. S. 495; Smith v. Davis, 323 U. S. 111; Alabama v. King & Boozer, 314 U. S. 1; James v. Dravo Contracting Co., 302 U. S. 134. We also need do no more than mention cases where, absent a conflicting federal regulation, a State seeks to impose safety or other requirements on a contractor who does business for the United States. See, e. g., Baltimore & Annapolis R. Co. v. Lichtenberg, 176 Md. 383, 4 A. 2d 734, appeal dismissed, 308 U. S. 525; James Stewart & Co. v. Sadrakula, 309 U. S. 94. Penn Dairies v. Milk Control Comm’n, 318 U. S. 261, can likewise be put to one side. There the question, much mooted, was whether the federal policy conflicted with the state policy fixing the price of milk which the United States purchased. The Court concluded that the state regulation “imposes no prohibition on the national government or its officers.” Id., at 270. Here, however, the State places a prohibition on the Federal Government. Here the conflict between the federal policy of negotiated rates and the state policy of regulation of negotiated rates seems to us to be clear. The conflict is as plain as it was in Arizona v. California, 283 U. S. 423, 451, where a State sought authority over plans and specifications for a federal dam, in Leslie Miller, Inc., v. Arkansas, supra, where state standards regulating contractors conflicted with federal standards for those contractors, and in Johnson v. Maryland, 254 U. S. 51, where a State sought to exact a license requirement from a federal employee driving a mail truck. The conflict seems to us to be as clear as any that the Supremacy Clause, Art. VI, cl. 2, of the Constitution was designed to resolve. As Chief Justice Marshall said in M’Culloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 427,
“It is of the very essence of supremacy to remove all obstacles to its action within its own sphere, and so to modify every power vested in subordinate governments, as to exempt its own operations from their own influence.”
The seriousness of the impact of California’s regulation on the action, of federal procurement officials is dramatically shown by this record.
It is the practice of the Government not only to negotiate separate rates which vary from the class or “paper rate” but also to negotiate a “freight all kinds” rate which will cover hundreds of diverse items for the supply of a division of the Army or for a vessel that are needed at one place at one particular time. There is no provision in the California Code or the regulations for the making of such shipments. The findings are that if the Code is applied here, this type of arrangement would be abolished:
“This would make it necessary for the shipping officers to classify the hundreds and thousands of different items used in military operations, to segregate such items in accordance with published tariffs and classifications, to rearrange the boxing and crating of such items in order to meet the classifications and requirements of commercial traffic and fill out voluminous documents. This additional process could cause delays as high as thirteen hours in the shipment of one truckload or carload. In many situations a delay of this sort would seriously hamper or disrupt the military mission for which the shipment was made.”
Moreover, no rates exist for much of the military traffic, which means that, unless the United States can negotiate rates for each shipment, the shipments will be delayed for Commission action unless shipped under the established rates which are higher than negotiated rates.
General Edmond C. R. Lasher of the United States Army, who was Assistant Chief of Transportation, testified at the trial:
“for us to make these arrangements at the Washington level with the various states, let us say 48 states, with 48 varieties of methods to follow, we would find ourselves in an administrative morass out of which we would never fight our way, we would never win the war.”
Affirmed.
Cal. Stat. 1951, c. 764, p. 2045.
California Public Utilities Code § 3515 defines a “highway permit carrier” as “every highway carrier other than a highway common carrier or a petroleum irregular route carrier.”
The purpose of this subsection is “to place the maximum responsibility for decisions as to when it is impracticable to secure competition in the hands of the agency concerned.” S. Rep. No. 571, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 8. The Senate Report goes on to state: “The experiences of the war and contracts negotiated since the war in the fields of stevedoring, ship repairs, chartering of vessels, where prices are set by law or regulation, or where there is a single source of supply, have shown clearly that the competitive-bid-advertising method is not only frequently impracticable but does not always operate to the best interests of the Government. It is, therefore, intended that this section should be construed liberally and that the review of these contracts should be confined to the validity and legality of the action taken and should not extend to reversal of bona fide determinations of impracticability where any reasonable ground for, such determination exists.”
It would seem, therefore, that negotiation was contemplated where rates, fixed by a government agency, are involved. And see H. R. Rep. No. 109, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., pp. 8-9. As stated by W. John Kenney, Acting Secretary of the Navy, who submitted the draft of this bill:
“The primary purpose of the bill is to permit the War and Navy Departments to award contracts by negotiation when the national defense or sound business judgment dictates the use of negotiation rather than the rigid limitations of formal advertising, bid, and award procedures.” Hearings before House Committee on Armed Services on H. R. 1366, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., Vol. 1, p. 425.
10 U. S. C. § 3012 (g) provides, “The Secretary [of the Army] may prescribe regulations to carry out his functions, powers, and duties under this title.” For comparable provisions applicable to the Navy and Air Force see 10 U. S. C. § 6011 and 10 U. S. C. § 8012 (f) respectively.
Armed Services Procurement Regulations, 32 CFR, 1957 Cum. Pocket Supp., § 1.108 et seq.
Id., § 1.306-10.
Army Regulation 55-142, ¶ 2, dated April 19, 1956.
Navy Shipping Guide, Part I, Art. 1800 (d) (3) (20).
Air Force Manual 75-1, ¶ 80501 (b), dated July 10,1956.
Section 22 of the Interstate Commerce Act, 24 Stat. 379, as amended, 49 U. S. C. §22, exempts transportation for the United States from the rate provisions of that Act. The provision in the law, respecting land-grant rates, which imposes on the United States the obligation to pay “the full applicable commercial rates,” 49 U. S. C. § 65, applies only to rates fixed by the Interstate Commerce Commission and is made expressly subject to § 22 of the Interstate Commerce Act.
The findings of the District Court state:
“Under the theory of rate regulation in California and elsewhere, every common carrier is required to have in existence at all times a published rate to cover the shipment of every known item between every conceivable point. This rate structure is known as the class or ‘paper rate.,’ Since the channels of commercial traffic are regular and well defined in accordance with the stability of trade, large commercial shippers seldom use the class rate but negotiate rates with the carriers known as ‘commercial rates,’ which are peculiarly suited and adapted to the requirements of the commerce involved. These commercial rates are usually considerably lower than the class rates. Very little commercial traffic moves at the class rate.”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
J
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This litigation presents for review the denial of a motion, filed in the District Court on behalf of the President of the United States, in the case of United States v. Mitchell (D. C. Crim. No. 74-110), to quash a third-party-subpoena duces tecum issued by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, pursuant to Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 17 (c). The subpoena directed the President to produce certain tape recordings and documents relating to his conversations with aides and advisers. The court rejected the President’s claims of absolute executive privilege, of lack of jurisdiction, and of failure to satisfy the requirements of Rule 17 (c). The President appealed to the Court of Appeals. We granted both the United States’ petition for certiorari before judgment (No. 73-1766), and also the President’s cross-petition for certiorari before judgment (No. 73-1834), because of the public importance of the issues presented and the need for their prompt resolution. 417 U. S. 927 and 960 (1974).
On March 1, 1974, a grand jury of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia returned an indictment charging seven named individuals with various offenses, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and to obstruct justice. Although he was not designated as such in the indictment, the grand jury named the President, among others, as an unindicted co-conspirator. On April 18, 1974, upon motion of the Special Prosecutor, see n. 8, infra, a subpoena duces tecum was issued pursuant to Rule 17 (c) to the President by the United States District Court and made returnable on May 2, 1974. This subpoena required the production, in advance of the September 9 trial date, of certain tapes, memoranda, papers, transcripts, or other writings relating to certain precisely identified meetings between the President and others. The Special Prosecutor was able to fix the time, place, and persons present at these discussions because the White House daily logs and appointment records had been delivered to him. On April 30, the President publicly released edited transcripts of 43 conversations; portions of 20 conversations subject to subpoena in the present case were included. On May 1, 1974, the President’s counsel filed a “special appearance” and a motion to quash the subpoena under Rule 17 (c). This motion was accompanied by a formal claim of privilege. At a subsequent hearing, further motions to expunge the grand jury’s action naming the President as an unindicted coconspirator and for protective orders against the disclosure of that information were filed or raised orally by counsel for the President.
On May 20, 1974, the District Court denied the motion to quash and the motions to expunge and for protective orders. 377 F. Supp. 1326. It further ordered “the President or any subordinate officer, official, or employee with custody or control of the documents or objects subpoenaed,” id., at 1331, to deliver to the District Court, on or before May 31, 1974, the originals of all subpoenaed items, as well as an index and analysis of those items, together with tape copies of those portions of the subpoenaed recordings for which transcripts had been released to the public by the President on April 30. The District Court rejected jurisdictional challenges based on a contention that the dispute was non justiciable because it was between the Special Prosecutor and the Chief Executive and hence “intra-executive” in character; it also rejected the contention that the Judiciary was without authority to review an assertion of executive privilege by the President. The court’s rejection of the first challenge was based on the authority and powers vested in the Special Prosecutor by the regulation promulgated by the Attorney General; the court concluded that a justiciable controversy was presented. The second challenge was held to be foreclosed by the decision in Nixon v. Sirica, 159 U. S. App. D. C. 58, 487 P. 2d 700 (1973).
The District Court held that the judiciary, not the President, was the final arbiter of a claim of executive privilege. The court concluded that, under the circumstances of this case, the presumptive privilege was overcome by the Special Prosecutor’s prima facie “demonstration of need sufficiently compelling to warrant judicial examination in chambers....” 377 F. Supp., at 1330. The court held, finally, that the Special Prosecutor had satisfied the requirements of Rule 17 (c). The District Court stayed its order pending appellate review on condition that review was sought before 4 p. m., May 24. The court further provided that matters filed under seal remain under seal when transmitted as part of the record.
On May 24, 1974, the President filed a timely notice of appeal from the District Court order, and the certified record from the District Court was docketed in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. On the same day, the President also filed a petition for writ of mandamus in the Court of Appeals seeking review of the District Court order.
Later on May 24, the Special Prosecutor also filed, in this Court, a petition for a writ of certiorari before judgment. On May 31, the petition was granted with an expedited briefing schedule. 417 U. S. 927. On June 6, the President filed, under seal, a cross-petition for writ of certiorari before judgment. This cross-petition was granted June 15, 1974, 417 U. S. 960, and the case was set for argument on July 8, 1974.
I
JURISDICTION
The threshold question presented is whether the May 20, 1974, order of the District Court was an appeal-able order and whether this case was properly “in” the Court of Appeals when the petition for certiorari was filed in this Court. 28 U. S. C. § 1254. The Court of Appeals’ jurisdiction under 28 U. S. C. § 1291 encompasses only “final decisions of the district courts.” Since the appeal was timely filed and all other procedural requirements were met, the petition is properly before this Court for consideration if the District Court order was final. 28 U. S. C. §§ 1254 (1), 2101 (e).
The finality requirement of 28 U. S. C. § 1291 embodies a strong congressional policy against piecemeal reviews, and against obstructing or impeding an ongoing judicial proceeding by interlocutory appeals. See, e. g., Cobbledick v. United States, 309 U. S. 323, 324-326 (1940). This requirement ordinarily promotes judicial efficiency and hastens the ultimate termination of litigation. In applying this principle to an order denying a motion to quash and requiring the production of evidence pursuant to a subpoena duces tecum, it has been repeatedly held that the order is not final and hence not appealable. United States v. Ryan, 402 U. S. 530, 532 (1971); Cobbledick v. United States, supra; Alexander v. United States, 201 U. S. 117 (1906). This Court has
“consistently held that the necessity for expedition in the administration of the criminal law justifies putting one who seeks to resist the production of desired information to a choice between compliance with a trial court’s order to produce prior to any review of that order, and resistance to that order with the concomitant possibility of an adjudication of contempt if his claims are rejected on appeal.” United States v. Ryan, supra, at 533.
The requirement of submitting to contempt, however, is not without exception and in some instances the purposes underlying the finality rule require a different result. For example, in Perlman v. United States, 247 U. S. 7 (1918), a subpoena had been directed to a third party requesting certain exhibits; the appellant, who owned the exhibits, sought to raise a claim of privilege. The Court held an order compelling production was appeal-able because it was unlikely that the third party would risk a contempt citation in order to allow immediate review of the appellant’s claim of privilege. Id., at 12-13. That case fell within the “limited class of cases where denial of immediate review would render impossible any review whatsoever of an individual’s claims.” United States v. Ryan, supra, at 533.
Here too, the traditional contempt avenue to immediate appeal is peculiarly inappropriate due to the unique setting in which the question arises. To require a President of the United States to place himself in the posture of disobeying an order of a court merely to trigger the procedural mechanism for review of the ruling would be unseemly, and would present an unnecessary occasion for constitutional confrontation between two branches of the Government. Similarly, a federal judge should not be placed in the posture of issuing a citation to a President simply in order to invoke review. The issue whether a President can be cited for contempt could itself engender protracted litigation, and would further delay both review on the merits of his claim of privilege and the ultimate termination of the underlying criminal action for which his evidence is sought. These considerations lead us to conclude that the order of the District Court was an appealable order. The appeal from that order was therefore properly “in” the Court of Appeals, and the case is now properly before this Court on the writ of certiorari before judgment. 28 U. S. C. § 1254; 28 U. S. C. § 2101 (e). Gay v. Buff, 292 U. S. 25, 30 (1934).
II
JUSTICIABILITY
In the District Court, the President’s counsel argued that the court lacked jurisdiction to issue the subpoena because the matter was an intra-branch dispute between a subordinate and superior officer of the Executive Branch and hence not subject to judicial resolution. That argument has been renewed in this Court with emphasis on the contention that the dispute does not present a “case” or “controversy” which can be adjudicated in the federal courts. The President’s counsel argues that the federal courts should not intrude into areas committed to the other branches of Government. He views the present dispute as essentially a “jurisdictional” dispute within the Executive Branch which he analogizes to a dispute between two congressional committees. Since the Executive Branch has exclusive authority and absolute discretion to decide whether to prosecute a case, Confiscation Cases, 7 Wall. 454 (1869) ; United States v. Cox, 342 F. 2d 167, 171 (CA5), cert. denied sub nom. Cox v. Hauberg, 381 U. S. 935 (1965), it is contended that a President’s decision is final in determining what evidence is to be used in a given criminal case. Although his counsel concedes that the President has delegated certain specific powers to the Special Prosecutor, he has not “waived nor delegated to the Special Prosecutor the President’s duty to claim privilege as to all materials... which fall within the President’s inherent authority to refuse to disclose to any executive officer.” Brief for the President 42. The Special Prosecutor’s demand for the items therefore presents, in the view of the President’s counsel, a political question under Baker v. Carr, 369 U. S. 186 (1962), since it involves a “textually demonstrable” grant of power under Art. II.
The mere assertion of a claim of an “intra-branch dispute,” without more, has never operated to defeat federal jurisdiction; justiciability does not depend on such a surface inquiry. In United States v. ICC, 337 U. S. 426 (1949), the Court observed, “courts must look behind names that symbolize the parties to determine whether a justiciable case or controversy is presented.” Id., at 430. See also Powell v. McCormack, 395 U. S. 486 (1969); ICC v. Jersey City, 322 U. S. 503 (1944); United States ex rel. Chapman v. FPC, 345 U. S. 153 (1953); Secretary of Agriculture v. United States, 347 U. S. 645 (1954); PMB v. Isbrandtsen Co., 356 U. S. 481, 483 n. 2 (1958); United States v. Marine Bancorporation ante, p. 602; and United States v. Connecticut National Bank, ante, p. 656.
Our starting point is the nature of the proceeding for which the evidence is sought — here a pending criminal prosecution. It is a judicial proceeding in a federal court alleging violation of federal laws and is brought in the name of the United States as sovereign. Berger v. United States, 295 U. S. 78, 88 (1935). Under the authority of Art. II, § 2, Congress has vested in the Attorney General the power to conduct the criminal litigation of the United States Government. 28 U. S. C. § 516. It has also vested in him the power to appoint subordinate officers to assist him in the discharge of his duties. 28 U. S. C. §§ 509, 510, 515, 533. Acting pursuant to those statutes, the Attorney General has delegated the authority to represent the United States in these particular matters to a Special Prosecutor with unique authority and tenure. The regulation gives the Special Prosecutor explicit power to contest the invocation of executive privilege in the process of seeking evidence deemed relevant to the performance of these specially delegated duties. 38 Fed. Reg. 30739, as amended by 38 Fed. Reg. 32805.
So long as this regulation is extant it has the force of law. In United States ex rel. Accardi v. Shaughnessy, 347 U. S. 260 (1954), regulations of the Attorney General delegated certain of his discretionary powers to the Board of Immigration Appeals and required that Board to exercise its own discretion on appeals in deportation cases. The Court held that so long as the Attorney General’s regulations remained operative, he denied himself the authority to exercise the discretion delegated to the Board even though the original authority was his and he could reassert it by amending the regulations. Service v. Dulles, 354 U. S. 363, 388 (1957), and Vitarelli v. Seaton, 359 U. S. 535 (1959), reaffirmed the basic holding of Accardi.
Here, as in Accardi, it is theoretically possible for the Attorney General to amend or revoke the regulation defining the Special Prosecutor’s authority. But he has not done so. So long as this regulation remains in force the Executive Branch is bound by it, and indeed the United States as the sovereign composed of the three branches is bound to respect and to enforce it. Moreover, the delegation of authority to the Special Prosecutor in this case is not an ordinary delegation by the Attorney General to a subordinate officer: with the authorization of the President, the Acting Attorney General provided in the regulation that the Special Prosecutor was not to be removed without the “consensus” of eight designated leaders of Congress. N. 8, supra.
The demands of and the resistance to the subpoena present an obvious controversy in the ordinary sense, but that alone is not sufficient to meet constitutional standards. In the constitutional sense, controversy means more than disagreement and conflict; rather it means the kind of controversy courts traditionally resolve. Here at issue is the production or nonproduction of specified evidence deemed by the Special Prosecutor to be relevant and admissible in a pending criminal case. It is sought by one official of the Executive Branch within the scope of his express authority; it is resisted by the Chief Executive on the ground of his duty to preserve the confidentiality of the communications of the President. Whatever the correct answer on the merits, these issues are “of a type which are traditionally justiciable.” United States v. ICC, 337 U. S., at 430. The independent Special Prosecutor with his asserted need for the subpoenaed material in the underlying criminal prosecution is opposed by the President with his steadfast assertion of privilege against disclosure of the material. This setting assures there is “that concrete adverseness which sharpens the presentation of issues upon which the court so largely depends for illumination of difficult constitutional questions.” Baker v. Carr, 369 U. S., at 204. Moreover, since the matter is one arising in the regular course of a federal criminal prosecution, it is within the traditional scope of Art. Ill power. Id., at 198.
In light of the uniqueness of the setting in which the conflict arises, the fact that both parties are officers of the Executive Branch cannot be viewed as a barrier to justiciability. It would be inconsistent with the applicable law and regulation, and the unique facts of this case to conclude other than that the Special Prosecutor has standing to bring this action and that a justiciable controversy is presented for decision.
Ill
RULE 17 (c)
The subpoena duces tecum is challenged on the ground that the Special Prosecutor failed to satisfy the requirements of Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 17 (c), which governs the issuance of subpoenas duces tecum in federal criminal proceedings. If we sustained this challenge, there would be no occasion to reach the claim of privilege asserted with respect to the subpoenaed material. Thus we turn to the question whether the requirements of Rule 17 (c) have been satisfied. See Arkansas Louisiana Gas Co. v. Dept. of Public Utilities, 304 U. S. 61, 64 (1938); Ashwander v. TV A, 297 U. S. 288, 346-347 (1936)
(Brandeis, J., concurring).
Rule 17 (c) provides:
“A subpoena may also command the person to whom it is directed to produce the books, papers, documents or other objects designated therein. The court on motion made promptly may quash or modify the subpoena if compliance would be unreasonable or oppressive. The court may direct that books, papers, documents or objects designated in the subpoena be produced before the court at a time prior to the trial or prior to the time when they are to be offered in evidence and may upon their production permit the books, papers, documents or objects or portions thereof to be inspected by the parties and their attorneys.”
A subpoena for documents may be quashed if their production would be “unreasonable or oppressive,” but not otherwise. The leading case in this Court interpreting this standard is Bowman Dairy Co. v. United States, 341 U. S. 214 (1951). This case recognized certain fundamental characteristics of the subpoena duces tecum in criminal cases: (1) it was not intended to provide a means of discovery for criminal cases, id., at 220; (2) its chief innovation was to expedite the trial by providing a time and place before trial for the inspection of subpoenaed materials, ibid. As both parties agree, cases decided in the wake of Bowman have generally-followed Judge Weinfeld’s formulation in United States v. Iozia, 13 F. R. D. 335, 338 (SDNY 1952), as to the required showing. Under this test, in order to require production prior to trial, the moving party must show: (1) that the documents are evidentiary and relevant; (2) that they are not otherwise procurable reasonably in advance of trial by exercise of due diligence; (3) that the party cannot properly prepare for trial without such production and inspection in advance of trial and that the failure to obtain such inspection may tend unreasonably to delay the trial; and (4) that the application is made in good faith and is not intended as a general “fishing expedition.”
Against this background, the Special Prosecutor, in order to carry his burden, must clear three hurdles: (1) relevancy; (2) admissibility; (3) specificity. Our own review of the record necessarily affords a less comprehensive view of the total situation than was available to the trial judge and we are unwilling to conclude that the District Court erred in the evaluation of the Special Prosecutor’s showing under Rule 17 (c). Our conclusion is based on the record before us, much of which is under seal. Of course, the contents of the subpoenaed tapes could not at that stage be described fully by the Special Prosecutor, but there was a sufficient likelihood that each of the tapes contains conversations relevant to the offenses charged in the indictment. United States v. Gross, 24 F. R. D. 138 (SDNY 1959). With respect to many of the tapes, the Special Prosecutor offered the sworn testimony or statements of one or more of the participants in the conversations as to what was said at the time. As for the remainder of the tapes, the identity of the participants and the time and place of the conversations, taken in their total context, permit a rational inference that at least part of the conversations relate to the offenses charged in the indictment.
We also conclude there was a sufficient preliminary showing that each of the subpoenaed tapes contains evidence admissible with respect to the offenses charged in the indictment. The most cogent objection to the admissibility of the taped conversations here at issue is that they are a collection of out-of-court statements by declarants who will not be subject to cross-examination and that the statements are therefore inadmissible hearsay. Here, however, most of the tapes apparently contain conversations to which one or more of the defendants named in the indictment were party. The hearsay rule does not automatically bar all out-of-court statements by a defendant in a criminal case. Declarations by one defendant may also be admissible against other defendants upon a sufficient showing, by independent evidence, of a conspiracy among one or more other defendants and the declarant and if the declarations at issue were in furtherance of that conspiracy. The same is true of declarations of coconspirators who are not defendants in the case on trial. Dutton v. Evans, 400 U. S. 74, 81 (1970). Recorded conversations may also be admissible for the limited purpose of impeaching the credibility of any defendant who testifies or any other coconspirator who testifies. Generally, the need for evidence to impeach witnesses is insufficient to require its production in advance of trial. See, e. g., United States v. Carter, 15 F. R. D. 367, 371 (DC 1954). Here, however, there are other valid potential evidentiary uses for the same material, and the analysis and possible transcription of the tapes may take a significant period of time. Accordingly, we cannot conclude that the District Court erred in authorizing the issuance of the subpoena duces tecum.
Enforcement of a pretrial subpoena duces tecum must necessarily be committed to the sound discretion of the trial court since the necessity for the subpoena most often turns upon a determination of factual issues. Without a determination of arbitrariness or that the trial court finding was without record support, an appellate court will not ordinarily disturb a finding that the applicant for a subpoena complied with Rule 17 (c). See, e. g., Sue v. Chicago Transit Authority, 279 F. 2d 416, 419 (CA7 1960); Shotkin v. Nelson, 146 F. 2d 402 (CA10 1944).
In a case such as this, however, where a subpoena is directed to a President of the United States, appellate review, in deference to a coordinate branch of Government, should be particularly meticulous to ensure that the standards of Rule 17 (c) have been correctly applied. United States v. Burr, 25 F. Cas. 30, 34 (No. 14,692d) (CC Va. 1807). From our examination of the materials submitted by the Special Prosecutor to the District Court in support of his motion for the subpoena, we are persuaded that the District Court's denial of the President's motion to quash the subpoena was consistent with Rule 17 (c). We also conclude that the Special Prosecutor has made a sufficient showing to justify a subpoena for production before trial. The subpoenaed materials are not available from any other source, and their examination and processing should not await trial in the circumstances shown. Bowman Dairy Co. v. United States, 341 U. S. 214 (1951); United States v. Iozia, 13 F. R. D. 335 (SDNY 1952).
IV
THE CLAIM OF PRIVILEGE A
Having determined that the requirements of Rule 17 (c) were satisfied, we turn to the claim that the subpoena should be quashed because it demands “confidential conversations between a President and his close advisors that it would be inconsistent with the public interest to produce.” App. 48a. The first contention is a broad claim that the separation of powers doctrine precludes judicial review of a President’s claim of privilege. The second contention is that if he does not prevail on the claim of absolute privilege, the court should hold as a matter of constitutional law that the privilege prevails over the subpoena duces tecum.
In the performance of assigned constitutional duties each branch of the Government must initially interpret the Constitution, and the interpretation of its powers by any branch is due great respect from the others. The President’s counsel, as we have noted, reads the Constitution as providing an absolute privilege of confidentiality for all Presidential communications. Many decisions of this Court, however, have unequivocally reaffirmed the holding of Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137 (1803), that “[i]t is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is.” Id., at 177.
No holding of the Court has defined the scope of judicial power specifically relating to the enforcement of a subpoena for confidential Presidential communications for use in a criminal prosecution, but other exercises of power by the Executive Branch and the Legislative Branch have been found invalid as in conflict with the Constitution. Powell v. McCormack, 395 U. S. 486 (1969); Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S. 579 (1952). In a series of cases, the Court interpreted the explicit immunity conferred by express provisions of the Constitution on Members of the House and Senate by the Speech or Debate Clause, U. S. Const. Art. I, § 6. Doe v. McMillan, 412 U. S. 306 (1973); Gravel v. United States, 408 U. S. 606 (1972); United States v. Brewster, 408 U. S. 501 (1972); United States v. Johnson, 383 U. S. 169 (1966). Since this Court has consistently exercised the power to construe and delineate claims arising under express powers, it must follow that the Court has authority to interpret claims with respect to powers alleged to derive from enumerated powers.
Our system of government “requires that federal courts on occasion interpret the Constitution in a manner at variance with the construction given the document by another branch.” Powell v. McCormack, supra, at 549. And in Baker v. Carr, 369 U. S., at 211, the Court stated:
“Deciding whether a matter has in any measure been committed by the Constitution to another branch of government, or whether the action of that branch exceeds whatever authority has been committed, is itself a delicate exercise in constitutional interpretation, and is a responsibility of this Court as ultimate interpreter of the Constitution.”
Notwithstanding the deference each branch must accord the others, the “judicial Power of the United States” vested in the federal courts by Art. Ill, § 1, of the Constitution can no more be shared with the Executive Branch than the Chief Executive, for example, can share with the Judiciary the veto power, or the Congress share with the Judiciary the power to override a Presidential veto. Any other conclusion would be contrary to the basic concept of separation of powers and the checks and balances that flow from the scheme of a tripartite government. The Federalist, No. 47, p. 313 (S. Mittell ed. 1938). We therefore reaffirm that it is the province and duty of this Court "to say what the law is” with respect to the claim of privilege presented in this case. Marbury v. Madison, supra, at 177.
B
In support of his claim of absolute privilege, the President’s counsel urges two grounds, one of which is common to all governments and one of which is peculiar to our system of separation of powers. The first ground is the valid need for protection of communications between high Government officials and those who advise and assist them in the performance of their manifold duties; the importance of this confidentiality is too plain to require further discussion. Human experience teaches that those who expect public dissemination of their remarks may well temper candor with a concern for appearances and for their own interests to the detriment of the decisionmaking process. Whatever the nature of the privilege of confidentiality of Presidential communications in the exercise of Art. II powers, the privilege can be said to derive from the supremacy of each branch within its own assigned area of constitutional duties. Certain powers and privileges flow from the nature of enumerated powers; the protection of the confidentiality of Presidential communications has similar constitutional underpinnings.
The second ground asserted by the President's counsel in support of the claim of absolute privilege rests on the doctrine of separation of powers. Here it is argued that the independence of the Executive Branch within its own sphere, Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, 295 U. S. 602, 629-630 (1935); Kilbourn v. Thompson, 103 U. S. 168, 190-191 (1881), insulates a President from a judicial subpoena in an ongoing criminal prosecution, and thereby protects confidential Presidential communications.
However, neither the doctrine of separation of powers, nor the need for confidentiality of high-level communications, without more, can sustain an absolute, unqualified Presidential privilege of immunity from judicial process under all circumstances. The President’s need for complete candor and objectivity from advisers calls for great deference from the courts. However, when the privilege depends solely on the broad, undifferentiated claim of public interest in the confidentiality of such conversations, a confrontation with other values arises. Absent a claim of need to protect military, diplomatic, or sensitive national security secrets, we find it difficult to accept the argument that even the very important interest in confidentiality of Presidential communications is significantly diminished by production of such material for in camera inspection with all the protection that a district court will be obliged to provide.
The impediment that an absolute, unqualified privilege would place in the way of the primary constitutional duty of the Judicial Branch to do justice in criminal prosecutions would plainly conflict with the function of the courts under Art. III. In designing the structure of our Government and dividing and allocating the sovereign power among three co-equal branches, the Framers of the Constitution sought to provide a comprehensive system, but the separate powers were not intended to operate with absolute independence.
“While the Constitution diffuses power the better to secure liberty, it also contemplates that practice will integrate the dispersed powers into a workable government. It enjoins upon its branches separateness but interdependence, autonomy but reciprocity.” Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U. S., at 635 (Jackson, J., concurring).
To read the Art. II powers of the President as providing an absolute privilege as against a subpoena essential to enforcement of criminal statutes on no more than a generalized claim of the public interest in confidentiality of nonmilitary and nondiplomatic discussions would upset the constitutional balance of “a workable government” and gravely impair the role of the courts under Art. III.
C
Since we conclude that the legitimate needs of the judicial process may outweigh Presidential privilege, it is necessary to resolve those competing interests in a manner that preserves the essential functions of each branch. The right and indeed the duty to resolve that question does not free the Judiciary from according high respect to the representations made on behalf of the President. United States v. Burr, 25 F. Cas. 187, 190, 191-192 (No. 14,694) (CCVa. 1807).
The expectation of a President to the confidentiality of his conversations and correspondence, like the claim of confidentiality of judicial deliberations, for example, has all the values to which we accord deference for the privacy of all citizens and, added to those values, is the necessity for protection of the public interest in candid, objective, and even blunt or harsh opinions in Presidential decision-making. A President and those who assist him must be free to explore alternatives in the process of shaping policies and making decisions and to do so in a way many would be unwilling to express except privately. These are the considerations justifying a presumptive privilege for Presidential communications. The privilege is fundamental to the operation of Government and inextricably rooted in the separation of powers under the Constitution. In Nixon v. Sirica, 159 U. S. App. D. C. 58, 487 F. 2d 700 (1973), the Court of Appeals held that such Presidential communications are “presumptively privileged,” id., at 75, 487 F. 2d, at 717, and this position is accepted by both parties in the present litigation. We agree with Mr. Chief Justice Marshall’s observation, therefore, that “[i]n no case of this kind would a court be required to proceed against the president as against an ordinary individual.” United States v. Burr, 25 F. Cas., at 192.
But this presumptive privilege must be considered in light of our historic commitment to the rule of law. This is nowhere more profoundly manifest than in our view that “the twofold aim [of criminal justice] is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer.” Berger v. United States, 295 U. S., at 88. We have elected to employ an adversary system of criminal justice in which the parties contest all issues before a court of law. The need to develop all relevant facts in the adversary system is both fundamental and comprehensive. The ends of criminal justice would be defeated if judgments were to be founded on a partial or speculative presentation of the facts. The very integrity of the judicial system and public confidence in the system depend on full disclosure of all the facts, within the framework of the rules of evidence. To ensure that justice is done, it is imperative to the function of courts that compulsory process be available for the production of evidence needed either by the prosecution or by the defense.
Only recently the Court restated the ancient proposition of law, albeit in the context of a grand jury inquiry rather than a trial,
“that ‘the public... has a right to every man’s evidence,’ except for those persons protected by a constitutional, common-law, or statutory privilege, United States v. Bryan, 339 U. S. [323, 331 (1950)] ; Blackmer v. United States, 284 U. S. 421, 438 (1932)....” Branzburg v. Hayes, 408 U. S. 665, 688 (1972).
The privileges referred to by the Court are designed to protect weighty and legitimate competing interests. Thus, the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution provides that no man “shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.” And, generally, an attorney or a priest may not be required to disclose what has been revealed in professional confidence. These and other interests are recognized in law by privileges against forced disclosure, established in the Constitution, by statute, or at common law. Whatever their origins, these exceptions to the demand for every man's evidence are not lightly created nor expansively construed, for they are in derogation of the search for truth.
In this case the President challenges a subpoena served on him as a third party requiring the production of materials for use in a criminal prosecution; he does so on the claim that he has a privilege against disclosure of confidential communications. He does not place his claim of privilege on the ground they are military or diplomatic secrets. As to these areas of
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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A
|
sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice SCALIA delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case requires us to decide whether respondent, Static Control Components, Inc., may sue petitioner, Lexmark International, Inc., for false advertising under the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1125(a).
I. Background
Lexmark manufactures and sells laser printers. It also sells toner cartridges for those printers (toner being the powdery ink that laser printers use to create images on paper). Lexmark designs its printers to work only with its own style of cartridges, and it therefore dominates the market for cartridges compatible with its printers. That market, however, is not devoid of competitors. Other businesses, called "remanufacturers," acquire used Lexmark toner cartridges, refurbish them, and sell them in competition with new and refurbished cartridges sold by Lexmark.
Lexmark would prefer that its customers return their empty cartridges to it for refurbishment and resale, rather than sell those cartridges to a remanufacturer. So Lexmark introduced what it called a "Prebate" program, which enabled customers to purchase new toner cartridges at a 20-percent discount if they would agree to return the cartridge to Lexmark once it was empty. Those terms were communicated to consumers through notices printed on the toner-cartridge boxes, which advised the consumer that opening the box would indicate assent to the terms-a practice commonly known as "shrinkwrap licensing," see, e.g.,ProCD, Inc. v. Zeidenberg, 86 F.3d 1447, 1449 (C.A.7 1996). To enforce the Prebate terms, Lexmark included a microchip in each Prebate cartridge that would disable the cartridge after it ran out of toner; for the cartridge to be used again, the microchip would have to be replaced by Lexmark.
Static Control is not itself a manufacturer or remanufacturer of toner cartridges. It is, rather, "the market leader [in] making and selling the components necessary to remanufacture Lexmark cartridges." 697 F.3d 387, 396 (C.A.6 2012) (case below). In addition to supplying remanufacturers with toner and various replacement parts, Static Control developed a microchip that could mimic the microchip in Lexmark's Prebate cartridges. By purchasing Static Control's microchips and using them to replace the Lexmark microchip, remanufacturers were able to refurbish and resell used Prebate cartridges.
Lexmark did not take kindly to that development. In 2002, it sued Static Control, alleging that Static Control's microchips violated both the Copyright Act of 1976, 17 U.S.C. § 101 et seq., and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 1201 et seq. Static Control counterclaimed, alleging, among other things, violations of § 43(a) of the Lanham Act, 60 Stat. 441, codified at 15 U.S.C. § 1125(a). Section 1125(a) provides:
"(1) Any person who, on or in connection with any goods or services, or any container for goods, uses in commerce any word, term, name, symbol, or device, or any combination thereof, or any false designation of origin, false or misleading description of fact, or false or misleading representation of fact, which-
"(A) is likely to cause confusion, or to cause mistake, or to deceive as to the affiliation, connection, or association of such person with another person, or as to the origin, sponsorship, or approval of his or her goods, services, or commercial activities by another person, or
"(B) in commercial advertising or promotion, misrepresents the nature, characteristics, qualities, or geographic origin of his or her or another person's goods, services, or commercial activities,
"shall be liable in a civil action by any person who believes that he or she is or is likely to be damaged by such act."
Section 1125(a) thus creates two distinct bases of liability: false association, § 1125(a)(1)(A), and false advertising, § 1125(a)(1)(B). See Waits v. Frito-Lay, Inc., 978 F.2d 1093, 1108 (C.A.9 1992). Static Control alleged only false advertising.
As relevant to its Lanham Act claim, Static Control alleged two types of false or misleading conduct by Lexmark. First, it alleged that through its Prebate program Lexmark "purposefully misleads end-users" to believe that they are legally bound by the Prebate terms and are thus required to return the Prebate-labeled cartridge to Lexmark after a single use. App. 31, ¶ 39. Second, it alleged that upon introducing the Prebate program, Lexmark "sent letters to most of the companies in the toner cartridge remanufacturing business" falsely advising those companies that it was illegal to sell refurbished Prebate cartridges and, in particular, that it was illegal to use Static Control's products to refurbish those cartridges. Id., at 29, ¶ 35. Static Control asserted that by those statements, Lexmark had materially misrepresented "the nature, characteristics, and qualities" of both its own products and Static Control's products. Id., at 43-44, ¶ 85. It further maintained that Lexmark's misrepresentations had "proximately caused and [we]re likely to cause injury to [Static Control] by diverting sales from [Static Control] to Lexmark," and had "substantially injured [its] business reputation" by "leading consumers and others in the trade to believe that [Static Control] is engaged in illegal conduct." Id., at 44, ¶ 88. Static Control sought treble damages, attorney's fees and costs, and injunctive relief.1
The District Court granted Lexmark's motion to dismiss Static Control's Lanham Act claim. It held that Static Control lacked "prudential standing" to bring that claim, App. to Pet. for Cert. 83, relying on a multifactor balancing test it attributed to Associated Gen. Contractors of Cal., Inc. v. Carpenters, 459 U.S. 519, 103 S.Ct. 897, 74 L.Ed.2d 723 (1983). The court emphasized that there were "more direct plaintiffs in the form of remanufacturers of Lexmark's cartridges"; that Static Control's injury was "remot[e]" because it was a mere "byproduct of the supposed manipulation of consumers' relationships with remanufacturers"; and that Lexmark's "alleged intent [was] to dry up spent cartridge supplies at the remanufacturing level, rather than at [Static Control]'s supply level, making remanufacturers Lexmark's alleged intended target." App. to Pet. for Cert. 83.
The Sixth Circuit reversed the dismissal of Static Control's Lanham Act claim. 697 F.3d, at 423. Taking the lay of the land, it identified three competing approaches to determining whether a plaintiff has standing to sue under the Lanham Act. It observed that the Third, Fifth, Eighth, and Eleventh Circuits all refer to "antitrust standing or the [Associated General Contractors ] factors in deciding Lanham Act standing," as the District Court had done. Id., at 410 (citing Conte Bros. Automotive, Inc. v. Quaker State-Slick 50, Inc., 165 F.3d 221, 233-234 (C.A.3 1998); Procter & Gamble Co. v. Amway Corp., 242 F.3d 539, 562-563 (C.A.5 2001); Gilbert/Robinson, Inc. v. Carrie Beverage-Missouri, Inc., 989 F.2d 985, 990-991 (C.A.8 1993); Phoenix of Broward, Inc. v. McDonald's Corp., 489 F.3d 1156, 1162-1164 (C.A.11 2007)). By contrast, "[t]he Seventh, Ninth, and Tenth [Circuits] use a categorical test, permitting Lanham Act suits only by an actual competitor." 697 F.3d, at 410 (citing L.S. Heath & Son, Inc. v. AT & T Information Systems, Inc., 9 F.3d 561, 575 (C.A.7 1993); Waits, supra, at 1108-1109;Stanfield v. Osborne Industries, Inc., 52 F.3d 867, 873 (C.A.10 1995)). And the Second Circuit applies a "'reasonable interest' approach," under which a Lanham Act plaintiff "has standing if the claimant can demonstrate '(1) a reasonable interest to be protected against the alleged false advertising and (2) a reasonable basis for believing that the interest is likely to be damaged by the alleged false advertising.' " 697 F.3d, at 410 (quoting Famous Horse, Inc. v. 5th Avenue Photo Inc., 624 F.3d 106, 113 (C.A.2 2010)). The Sixth Circuit applied the Second Circuit's reasonable-interest test and concluded that Static Control had standing because it "alleged a cognizable interest in its business reputation and sales to remanufacturers and sufficiently alleged that th[o]se interests were harmed by Lexmark's statements to the remanufacturers that Static Control was engaging in illegal conduct." 697 F.3d, at 411.
We granted certiorari to decide "the appropriate analytical framework for determining a party's standing to maintain an action for false advertising under the Lanham Act." Pet. for Cert. i; 569 U.S. ----, 133 S.Ct. 2766, 186 L.Ed.2d 217 (2013).2
II. "Prudential Standing"
The parties' briefs treat the question on which we granted certiorari as one of "prudential standing." Because we think that label misleading, we begin by clarifying the nature of the question at issue in this case.
From Article III's limitation of the judicial power to resolving "Cases" and "Controversies," and the separation-of-powers principles underlying that limitation, we have deduced a set of requirements that together make up the "irreducible constitutional minimum of standing." Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130, 119 L.Ed.2d 351 (1992). The plaintiff must have suffered or be imminently threatened with a concrete and particularized "injury in fact" that is fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defendant and likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision. Ibid. Lexmark does not deny that Static Control's allegations of lost sales and damage to its business reputation give it standing under Article III to press its false-advertising claim, and we are satisfied that they do.
Although Static Control's claim thus presents a case or controversy that is properly within federal courts' Article III jurisdiction, Lexmark urges that we should decline to adjudicate Static Control's claim on grounds that are "prudential," rather than constitutional. That request is in some tension with our recent reaffirmation of the principle that "a federal court's 'obligation' to hear and decide" cases within its jurisdiction "is 'virtually unflagging.' " Sprint Communications, Inc. v. Jacobs, 571 U.S. ----, ----, 134 S.Ct. 584, 591, 187 L.Ed.2d 505 (2013) (quoting Colorado River Water Conservation Dist. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800, 817, 96 S.Ct. 1236, 47 L.Ed.2d 483 (1976)). In recent decades, however, we have adverted to a "prudential" branch of standing, a doctrine not derived from Article III and "not exhaustively defined" but encompassing (we have said) at least three broad principles: " 'the general prohibition on a litigant's raising another person's legal rights, the rule barring adjudication of generalized grievances more appropriately addressed in the representative branches, and the requirement that a plaintiff's complaint fall within the zone of interests protected by the law invoked.' " Elk Grove Unified School Dist. v. Newdow, 542 U.S. 1, 12, 124 S.Ct. 2301, 159 L.Ed.2d 98 (2004) (quoting Allen v. Wright, 468 U.S. 737, 751, 104 S.Ct. 3315, 82 L.Ed.2d 556 (1984)).
Lexmark bases its "prudential standing" arguments chiefly on Associated General Contractors, but we did not describe our analysis in that case in those terms. Rather, we sought to "ascertain," as a matter of statutory interpretation, the "scope of the private remedy created by" Congress in § 4 of the Clayton Act, and the "class of persons who [could] maintain a private damages action under" that legislatively conferred cause of action. 459 U.S., at 529, 532, 103 S.Ct. 897. We held that the statute limited the class to plaintiffs whose injuries were proximately caused by a defendant's antitrust violations. Id., at 532-533, 103 S.Ct. 897. Later decisions confirm that Associated General Contractors rested on statutory, not "prudential," considerations. See, e.g.,Holmes v. Securities Investor Protection Corporation, 503 U.S. 258, 265-268, 112 S.Ct. 1311, 117 L.Ed.2d 532 (1992) (relying on Associated General Contractors in finding a proximate-cause requirement in the cause of action created by the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), 18 U.S.C. § 1964(c)); Anza v. Ideal Steel Supply Corp., 547 U.S. 451, 456, 126 S.Ct. 1991, 164 L.Ed.2d 720 (2006) (affirming that Holmes "relied on a careful interpretation of § 1964(c)"). Lexmark's arguments thus do not deserve the "prudential" label.
Static Control, on the other hand, argues that we should measure its "prudential standing" by using the zone-of-interests test. Although we admittedly have placed that test under the "prudential" rubric in the past, see, e.g.,Elk Grove, supra, at 12, 124 S.Ct. 2301, it does not belong there any more than Associated General Contractors does. Whether a plaintiff comes within "the 'zone of interests' " is an issue that requires us to determine, using traditional tools of statutory interpretation, whether a legislatively conferred cause of action encompasses a particular plaintiff's claim. See Steel Co. v. Citizens for Better Environment, 523 U.S. 83, 97, and n. 2, 118 S.Ct. 1003, 140 L.Ed.2d 210 (1998); Clarke v. Securities Industry Assn., 479 U.S. 388, 394-395, 107 S.Ct. 750, 93 L.Ed.2d 757 (1987); Holmes, supra, at 288, 112 S.Ct. 1311 (SCALIA, J., concurring in judgment). As Judge Silberman of the D.C. Circuit recently observed, " 'prudential standing' is a misnomer" as applied to the zone-of-interests analysis, which asks whether "this particular class of persons ha[s] a right to sue under this substantive statute." Association of Battery Recyclers, Inc. v. EPA, 716 F.3d 667, 675-676 (2013) (concurring opinion).3
In sum, the question this case presents is whether Static Control falls within the class of plaintiffs whom Congress has authorized to sue under § 1125(a). In other words, we ask whether Static Control has a cause of action under the statute.4
That question requires us to determine the meaning of the congressionally enacted provision creating a cause of action. In doing so, we apply traditional principles of statutory interpretation. We do not ask whether in our judgment Congress should have authorized Static Control's suit, but whether Congress in fact did so. Just as a court cannot apply its independent policy judgment to recognize a cause of action that Congress has denied, see Alexander v. Sandoval, 532 U.S. 275, 286-287, 121 S.Ct. 1511, 149 L.Ed.2d 517 (2001), it cannot limit a cause of action that Congress has created merely because "prudence" dictates.
III. Static Control's Right To Sue Under § 1125(a)
Thus, this case presents a straightforward question of statutory interpretation: Does the cause of action in § 1125(a) extend to plaintiffs like Static Control? The statute authorizes suit by "any person who believes that he or she is likely to be damaged" by a defendant's false advertising. § 1125(a)(1). Read literally, that broad language might suggest that an action is available to anyone who can satisfy the minimum requirements of Article III. No party makes that argument, however, and the "unlikelihood that Congress meant to allow all factually injured plaintiffs to recover persuades us that [§ 1125(a) ] should not get such an expansive reading." Holmes, 503 U.S., at 266, 112 S.Ct. 1311 (footnote omitted). We reach that conclusion in light of two relevant background principles already mentioned: zone of interests and proximate causality.
A. Zone of Interests
First, we presume that a statutory cause of action extends only to plaintiffs whose interests "fall within the zone of interests protected by the law invoked." Allen, 468 U.S., at 751, 104 S.Ct. 3315. The modern "zone of interests" formulation originated in Association of Data Processing Service Organizations, Inc. v. Camp, 397 U.S. 150, 90 S.Ct. 827, 25 L.Ed.2d 184 (1970), as a limitation on the cause of action for judicial review conferred by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). We have since made clear, however, that it applies to all statutorily created causes of action; that it is a "requirement of general application"; and that Congress is presumed to "legislat[e] against the background of" the zone-of-interests limitation, "which applies unless it is expressly negated." Bennett v. Spear, 520 U.S. 154, 163, 117 S.Ct. 1154, 137 L.Ed.2d 281 (1997); see also Holmes, supra, at 287-288, 112 S.Ct. 1311 (SCALIA, J., concurring in judgment). It is "perhaps more accurat[e]," though not very different as a practical matter, to say that the limitation always applies and is never negated, but that our analysis of certain statutes will show that they protect a more-than-usually "expan[sive]" range of interests. Bennett, supra, at 164, 117 S.Ct. 1154. The zone-of-interests test is therefore an appropriate tool for determining who may invoke the cause of action in § 1125(a). 5
We have said, in the APA context, that the test is not " 'especially demanding,' " Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians v. Patchak, 567 U.S. ----, ----, 132 S.Ct. 2199, 2210, 183 L.Ed.2d 211 (2012). In that context we have often "conspicuously included the word 'arguably' in the test to indicate that the benefit of any doubt goes to the plaintiff," and have said that the test "forecloses suit only when a plaintiff's 'interests are so marginally related to or inconsistent with the purposes implicit in the statute that it cannot reasonably be assumed that' " Congress authorized that plaintiff to sue. Id., at ----, 132 S.Ct., at 2210. That lenient approach is an appropriate means of preserving the flexibility of the APA's omnibus judicial-review provision, which permits suit for violations of numerous statutes of varying character that do not themselves include causes of action for judicial review. "We have made clear, however, that the breadth of the zone of interests varies according to the provisions of law at issue, so that what comes within the zone of interests of a statute for purposes of obtaining judicial review of administrative action under the'"generous review provisions"'of the APA may not do so for other purposes." Bennett, supra, at 163, 117 S.Ct. 1154 (quoting Clarke, 479 U.S., at 400, n. 16, 107 S.Ct. 750, in turn quoting Data Processing, supra, at 156, 90 S.Ct. 827).
Identifying the interests protected by the Lanham Act, however, requires no guesswork, since the Act includes an "unusual, and extraordinarily helpful," detailed statement of the statute's purposes. H.B. Halicki Productions v. United Artists Communications, Inc., 812 F.2d 1213, 1214 (C.A.9 1987). Section 45 of the Act, codified at 15 U.S.C. § 1127, provides:
"The intent of this chapter is to regulate commerce within the control of Congress by making actionable the deceptive and misleading use of marks in such commerce; to protect registered marks used in such commerce from interference by State, or territorial legislation; to protect persons engaged in such commerce against unfair competition; to prevent fraud and deception in such commerce by the use of reproductions, copies, counterfeits, or colorable imitations of registered marks; and to provide rights and remedies stipulated by treaties and conventions respecting trademarks, trade names, and unfair competition entered into between the United States and foreign nations."
Most of the enumerated purposes are relevant to false-association cases; a typical false-advertising case will implicate only the Act's goal of "protect [ing] persons engaged in [commerce within the control of Congress] against unfair competition." Although "unfair competition" was a "plastic" concept at common law, Ely-Norris Safe Co. v. Mosler Safe Co., 7 F.2d 603, 604 (C.A.2 1925) (L. Hand, J.), it was understood to be concerned with injuries to business reputation and present and future sales. See Rogers, Book Review, 39 Yale L.J. 297, 299 (1929); see generally 3 Restatement of Torts, ch. 35, Introductory Note, pp. 536-537 (1938).
We thus hold that to come within the zone of interests in a suit for false advertising under § 1125(a), a plaintiff must allege an injury to a commercial interest in reputation or sales. A consumer who is hoodwinked into purchasing a disappointing product may well have an injury-in-fact cognizable under Article III, but he cannot invoke the protection of the Lanham Act-a conclusion reached by every Circuit to consider the question. See Colligan v. Activities Club of N. Y., Ltd., 442 F.2d 686, 691-692 (C.A.2 1971); Serbin v. Ziebart Int'l Corp., 11 F.3d 1163, 1177 (C.A.3 1993); Made in the USA Foundation v. Phillips Foods, Inc., 365 F.3d 278, 281 (C.A.4 2004); Procter & Gamble Co., 242 F.3d, at 563-564;Barrus v. Sylvania, 55 F.3d 468, 470 (C.A.9 1995); Phoenix of Broward, 489 F.3d, at 1170. Even a business misled by a supplier into purchasing an inferior product is, like consumers generally, not under the Act's aegis.
B. Proximate Cause
Second, we generally presume that a statutory cause of action is limited to plaintiffs whose injuries are proximately caused by violations of the statute. For centuries, it has been "a well established principle of [the common] law, that in all cases of loss, we are to attribute it to the proximate cause, and not to any remote cause." Waters v. Merchants' Louisville Ins. Co., 11 Pet. 213, 223, 9 L.Ed. 691 (1837); see Holmes, 503 U.S., at 287, 112 S.Ct. 1311 (SCALIA, J., concurring in judgment). That venerable principle reflects the reality that "the judicial remedy cannot encompass every conceivable harm that can be traced to alleged wrongdoing." Associated Gen. Contractors, 459 U.S., at 536, 103 S.Ct. 897. Congress, we assume, is familiar with the common-law rule and does not mean to displace it sub silentio. We have thus construed federal causes of action in a variety of contexts to incorporate a requirement of proximate causation. See, e.g.,Dura Pharmaceuticals, Inc. v. Broudo, 544 U.S. 336, 346, 125 S.Ct. 1627, 161 L.Ed.2d 577 (2005) (securities fraud); Holmes, supra, at 268-270, 112 S.Ct. 1311 (RICO); Associated Gen. Contractors, supra, at 529-535, 103 S.Ct. 897 (Clayton Act). No party disputes that it is proper to read § 1125(a) as containing such a requirement, its broad language notwithstanding.
The proximate-cause inquiry is not easy to define, and over the years it has taken various forms; but courts have a great deal of experience applying it, and there is a wealth of precedent for them to draw upon in doing so. See Exxon Co., U.S.A. v. Sofec, Inc., 517 U.S. 830, 838-839, 116 S.Ct. 1813, 135 L.Ed.2d 113 (1996); Pacific Operators Offshore, LLP v. Valladolid, 565 U.S. ----, ----, 132 S.Ct. 680, 692-693, 181 L.Ed.2d 675 (2012) (SCALIA, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment). Proximate-cause analysis is controlled by the nature of the statutory cause of action. The question it presents is whether the harm alleged has a sufficiently close connection to the conduct the statute prohibits.
Put differently, the proximate-cause requirement generally bars suits for alleged harm that is "too remote" from the defendant's unlawful conduct. That is ordinarily the case if the harm is purely derivative of "misfortunes visited upon a third person by the defendant's acts." Holmes, supra, at 268-269, 112 S.Ct. 1311; see, e.g., Hemi Group, LLC v. City of New York, 559 U.S. 1, 10-11, 130 S.Ct. 983, 175 L.Ed.2d 943 (2010). In a sense, of course, all commercial injuries from false advertising are derivative of those suffered by consumers who are deceived by the advertising; but since the Lanham Act authorizes suit only for commercial injuries, the intervening step of consumer deception is not fatal to the showing of proximate causation required by the statute. See Harold H. Huggins Realty, Inc. v. FNC, Inc., 634 F.3d 787, 800-801 (C.A.5 2011). That is consistent with our recognition that under common-law principles, a plaintiff can be directly injured by a misrepresentation even where "a third party, and not the plaintiff,... relied on" it. Bridge v. Phoenix Bond & Indemnity Co., 553 U.S. 639, 656, 128 S.Ct. 2131, 170 L.Ed.2d 1012 (2008).
We thus hold that a plaintiff suing under § 1125(a) ordinarily must show economic or reputational injury flowing directly from the deception wrought by the defendant's advertising; and that that occurs when deception of consumers causes them to withhold trade from the plaintiff. That showing is generally not made when the deception produces injuries to a fellow commercial actor that in turn affect the plaintiff. For example, while a competitor who is forced out of business by a defendant's false advertising generally will be able to sue for its losses, the same is not true of the competitor's landlord, its electric company, and other commercial parties who suffer merely as a result of the competitor's "inability to meet [its] financial obligations." Anza, 547 U.S., at 458, 126 S.Ct. 1991.6
C. Proposed Tests
At oral argument, Lexmark agreed that the zone of interests and proximate causation supply the relevant background limitations on suit under § 1125(a). See Tr. of Oral Arg. 4-5, 11-12, 17-18. But it urges us to adopt, as the optimal formulation of those principles, a multifactor balancing test derived from Associated General Contractors. In the alternative, it asks that we adopt a categorical test permitting only direct competitors to sue for false advertising. And although neither party urges adoption of the "reasonable interest" test applied below, several amici do so. While none of those tests is wholly without merit, we decline to adopt any of them. We hold instead that a direct application of the zone-of-interests test and the proximate-cause requirement supplies the relevant limits on who may sue.
The balancing test Lexmark advocates was first articulated by the Third Circuit in Conte Bros. and later adopted by several other Circuits. Conte Bros. identified five relevant considerations:
"(1) The nature of the plaintiff's alleged injury: Is the injury of a type that Congress sought to redress in providing a private remedy for violations of the [Lanham Act]?
"(2) The directness or indirectness of the asserted injury.
"(3) The proximity or remoteness of the party to the alleged injurious conduct.
"(4) The speculativeness of the damages claim.
"(5) The risk of duplicative damages or complexity in apportioning damages." 165 F.3d, at 233 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).
This approach reflects a commendable effort to give content to an otherwise nebulous inquiry, but we think it slightly off the mark. The first factor can be read as requiring that the plaintiff's injury be within the relevant zone of interests and the second and third as requiring (somewhat redundantly) proximate causation; but it is not correct to treat those requirements, which must be met in every case, as mere factors to be weighed in a balance. And the fourth and fifth factors are themselves problematic. "[T]he difficulty that can arise when a court attempts to ascertain the damages caused by some remote action" is a "motivating principle" behind the proximate-cause requirement, Anza, supra, at 457-458, 126 S.Ct. 1991; but potential difficulty in ascertaining and apportioning damages is not, as Conte Bros. might suggest, an independent basis for denying standing where it is adequately alleged that a defendant's conduct has proximately injured an interest of the plaintiff's that the statute protects. Even when a plaintiff cannot quantify its losses with sufficient certainty to recover damages, it may still be entitled to injunctive relief under § 1116(a) (assuming it can prove a likelihood of future injury) or disgorgement of the defendant's ill-gotten profits under § 1117(a). See TrafficSchool.com, Inc. v. Edriver Inc., 653 F.3d 820, 831 (C.A.9 2011); Johnson & Johnson v. Carter-Wallace, Inc., 631 F.2d 186, 190 (C.A.2 1980). Finally, experience has shown that the Conte Bros. approach, like other open-ended balancing tests, can yield unpredictable and at times arbitrary results. See, e.g., Tushnet, Running the Gamut from A to B: Federal Trademark and False Advertising Law, 159 U. Pa. L.Rev. 1305, 1376-1379 (2011).
In contrast to the multifactor balancing approach, the direct-competitor test provides a bright-line rule; but it does so at the expense of distorting the statutory language. To be sure, a plaintiff who does not compete with the defendant will often have a harder time establishing proximate causation. But a rule categorically prohibiting all suits by noncompetitors would read too much into the Act's reference to "unfair competition" in § 1127. By the time the Lanham Act was adopted, the common-law tort of unfair competition was understood not to be limited to actions between competitors. One leading authority in the field wrote that "there need be no competition in unfair competition," just as "[t]here is no soda in soda water, no grapes in grape fruit, no bread in bread fruit, and a clothes horse is not a horse but is good enough to hang things on." Rogers, 39 Yale L. J., at 299; accord, Vogue Co. v. Thompson-Hudson Co., 300 F. 509, 512 (C.A.6 1924); 1 H. Nims, The Law of Unfair Competition and Trade-Marks, p. vi (4th ed. 1947); 2 id., at 1194-1205. It is thus a mistake to infer that because the Lanham Act treats false advertising as a form of unfair competition, it can protect only the false-advertiser's direct competitors.
Finally, there is the "reasonable interest" test applied by the Sixth Circuit in this case. As typically formulated, it requires a commercial plaintiff to "demonstrate '(1) a reasonable interest to be protected against the alleged false advertising and (2) a reasonable basis for believing that the interest is likely to be damaged by the alleged false advertising.' " 697 F.3d, at 410 (quoting Famous Horse, 624 F.3d, at 113). A purely practical objection to the test is that it lends itself to widely divergent application. Indeed, its vague language can be understood as requiring only the bare minimum of Article III standing. The popularity of the multifactor balancing test reflects its appeal to courts tired of "grappl[ing] with defining" the "'reasonable interest' " test "with greater precision." Conte Bros., 165 F.3d, at 231. The theoretical difficulties with the test are even more substantial: The relevant question is not whether the plaintiff's interest is "reasonable," but whether it is one the Lanham Act protects; and not whether there is a "reasonable basis" for the plaintiff's claim of harm, but whether the harm alleged is proximately tied to the defendant's conduct. In short, we think the principles set forth above will provide clearer and more accurate guidance than the "reasonable interest" test.
IV. Application
Applying those principles to Static Control's false-advertising claim, we conclude that Static Control comes within the class of plaintiffs whom Congress authorized to sue under § 1125(a).
To begin, Static Control's alleged injuries-lost sales and damage to its business reputation-
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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I
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Harlan
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case, which was brought here from the Supreme Court of Iowa, 374 U. S. 826, presents a problem concerning the relationship between an arbitration clause and a no-strike clause in a collective bargaining agreement.
Although this case comes to us on the pleadings and some disputed questions of fact are still to be resolved, we accept as true the following facts for the purposes of our decision. The petitioner, Local Union No. 721, United Packinghouse, Food and Allied Workers, AFL-CIO, and the respondent, Needham Packing Co., had an agreement which included provisions of both kinds, set out hereafter. On May 11, 1961, Needham discharged Anton Stamoulis, an employee represented by the union. In response, on the same day about 190 other employees left work. During the next few days Needham advised the employees to return to work, stating that if they did not their employment would be regarded as terminated and that the discharge of Stamoulis would be treated under the grievance procedures of the collective bargaining agreement. The employees did not return to work.
On July 5, 1961, the union presented to Needham written grievances on behalf of Stamoulis and the other employees, asserting that they had been “improperly discharged” and requesting their reinstatement with full seniority rights and pay for lost time. By letter dated July 11, 1961, Needham refused to process the grievances. The letter stated that the union and its members had by their conduct “repudiated and terminated the labor agreement” with the company. In addition, Needham stated that it would not have further dealings with the union and did not recognize the union as majority representative of Needham employees.
This suit by the union under § 301 (a) of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U. S. C. § 185 (a), to compel arbitration of the two grievances followed. Need-ham alleged as a defense that the union and its members had struck on May 11, 1961, and that this breach of the no-strike clause of the collective bargaining agreement had been and was treated by Needham as having terminated its obligations under the agreement. In addition, Need-ham filed a counterclaim, alleging that it had been damaged in the amount of $150,000 by the union’s breach of the no-strike clause. The union denied such breach. At the close of the pleadings, in accordance with Iowa procedure, Needham moved for a ruling on points of law and a final order denying the union’s petition to compel arbitration. Deciding solely on the basis of matters raised in the pleadings as to which there was no dispute, the trial court ruled in Needham’s favor and issued an order against the union. The union obtained an appeal. The Supreme Court of Iowa affirmed the holding below that “the Union had waived its right to arbitrate the grievances filed by its walkout.” 254 Iowa 882, 887, 119 N. W. 2d 141, 143.
In the present posture of this case, we must answer the question whether acts of the union relieved Needham of its contractual obligation to arbitrate almost entirely on the basis of the agreement itself. We think it plain that, seen from that perspective, the judgment below must be reversed.
The two controlling provisions of the collective bargaining agreement are written in comprehensive terms. The no-strike clause provides:
“It is agreed that during the period of this agreement the employees shall not engage in and the Union shall not call or sanction any slow down, work stoppage or strike . . . .”
The grievance provisions include typical procedures for the resolution of a dispute preliminary to arbitration. They then provide:
“In the event a dispute shall arise between the Company and the Union with reference to the proper interpretation or application of the provisions of this contract and such dispute cannot be settled by mutual agreement of the parties, such dispute shall be referred to a board of arbitration upon the request of the Union.”
It is evident from the above as well as other provisions of the agreement that the grievance procedures were intended largely, if not wholly, for the benefit of the union.
A state court exercising its concurrent jurisdiction over suits under § 301 (a) applies federal substantive law. Charles Dowd Box Co., Inc., v. Courtney, 368 U. S. 502. The law which controls the disposition of this case is stated in Drake Bakeries Inc. v. Local 50, American Bakery & Confectionery Workers International, AFL- CIO, 370 U. S. 254. In that case, the employer had filed an action for damages under § 301 (a), alleging that the union had “instigated and encouraged its members to strike or not to report for work,” in violation of a no-strike clause. Id., at 256. The collective bargaining agreement contained a broad arbitration clause covering “all complaints, disputes or grievances arising between . . . [the parties] involving questions of interpretation or application of any clause or matter covered by this contract or any act or conduct or relation between the parties hereto, directly or indirectly.” Id., at 257.
The employer argued that the promise not to strike was so basic to the collective bargain and breach of the no-strike clause so completely inconsistent with the provision for arbitration that the employer’s duty to arbitrate was excused by the union’s breach. This argument, which is essentially that of Needham here, was rejected on grounds fully applicable to this case. Although the Court relied in part on the employer’s apparent intention not to terminate the contract altogether, more central to its conclusion was the view that there was no “inflexible rule rigidly linking no-strike and arbitration clauses of every collective bargaining contract in every situation.” Id., at 261. (Footnote omitted.) We said:
“. . . [U]nder this contract, by agreeing to arbitrate all claims without excluding the case where the union struck over an arbitrable matter, the parties have negatived any intention to condition the duty to arbitrate upon the absence of strikes. They have thus cut the ground from under the argument that an alleged strike, automatically and regardless of the circumstances, is such a breach or repudiation of the arbitration clause by the union that the company is excused from arbitrating, upon theories of waiver, estoppel, or otherwise. Arbitration provisions, which themselves have not been repudiated, are meant to survive breaches of contract, in many contexts, even total breach; and in determining whether one party has so repudiated his promise to arbitrate that the other party is excused the circumstances of the claimed repudiation are critically important. In this case the union denies having repudiated in any respect its promise to arbitrate, denies that there was a strike, denies that the employees were bound to work on January 2 and asserts that it was the company itself which ignored the adjustment and arbitration provisions by scheduling holiday work.” Id., at 262-263. (Footnotes omitted.)
Continuance of the duty to arbitrate is, if anything, clearer here than it was in Drake Bakeries, where one of the issues was whether an alleged strike was within the intended scope of the arbitration clause. There is no question in this case that the union’s claim of wrongful discharge is one which Needham agreed to arbitrate. Nothing in the agreement indicates an intention to except from Needham’s agreement to arbitrate disputes concerning the “interpretation or application” of the agreement any dispute which involves or follows an alleged breach of the no-strike clause. That the no-strike clause does not itself carry such an implication is the holding of Drake Bakeries.
The fact that the collective bargaining agreement does not require Needham to submit its claim to arbitration, as the employer was required to do in Drake Bakeries, and indeed appears to confine the grievance procedures to grievances of the union, does not indicate a different result. Needham’s claim is the subject of a counterclaim in the Iowa courts; nothing we have said here precludes it from prosecuting that claim and recovering damages. That Needham asserts by way of defense to the union’s action to compel arbitration the same alleged breach of the no-strike clause which is the subject of the counterclaim does not convert the union’s grievance into Need-ham’s different one.
Nor do we believe that this case can be distinguished from Drake Bakeries on the ground that that case involved only a “one-day strike,” id., at 265. Whether a fundamental and long-lasting change in the relationship of the parties prior to the demand for arbitration would be a circumstance which, alone or among others, would release an employer from his promise to arbitrate we need not decide, since the undeveloped record before us reveals no such circumstance. Compare Drake Bakeries, supra, at 265. The passage of time resulting from Needham’s refusal to arbitrate cannot, of course, be a basis for releasing it from its duty to arbitrate.
Needham’s allegations by way of defense and counterclaim that the union breached the no-strike clause, supported by such facts as were undisputed on the pleadings, did not release Needham from its duty to arbitrate the union’s claim that employees had been wrongfully discharged. On that basis, we reverse and remand to the Iowa Supreme Court for further proceedings.
It is so ordered.
Rule 105 of the Iowa Rules of Civil Procedure provides:
“The court may in its discretion, and must on application of either party, made after issues joined and before trial, separately hear and determine any point of law raised in any pleading which goes to the whole or any material part of the case. It shall enter an appropriate final order before trial of the remaining issues, adjudicating the point so determined, which shall not be questioned on the trial of any part of the case of which it does not dispose. If such ruling does not dispose of the whole case, it shall be deemed interlocutory for purposes of appeal.”
Although Rule 105 provides that a final order entered under it shall be “deemed interlocutory for purposes of appeal,” the order which is entered is a “final order . . . adjudicating the point so determined, which shall not be questioned on the trial of any part of the case of which it does not dispose.” See supra, note 1. Accordingly, our jurisdiction was properly invoked.
For example, the agreement provides that grievances must be presented within 14 days “of the occurrence giving rise to such grievance” or within 14 days “of the time the Union has knowledge, or should have had knowledge of such grievance . . . .”
In effect, the union’s grievance involved the “interpretation or application” of § 8 (a) of the collective bargaining agreement, which provided that Needham could discharge employees “for just cause.”
Here, as in Atkinson v. Sinclair Refining Co., 370 U. S. 238, we find it unnecessary to decide what effect, if any, factual or legal determinations of an arbitrator would have on a related action in the courts. See id., at 245, note 5.
Atkinson v. Sinclair Refining Co., 370 U. S. 238, in which the provision for arbitration was similarly limited to employee grievances, is of no relevance here, since the question in that case was whether the employer’s action for breach of the no-strike clause should be submitted to arbitration.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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G
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice White
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The principal issue in this case is the validity of the Illinois obscenity statute, considered in light of Miller v. California, 413 U. S. 15 (1973). There we reaffirmed numerous prior decisions declaring that “obscene material is unprotected by the First Amendment,” id., at 23; but acknowledging “the inherent dangers of undertaking to regulate any form of expression,” ibid., we recognized that official regulation must be limited to “works which depict or describe sexual conduct” and that such conduct “must be specifically defined by the applicable state law, as written or authoritatively construed.” Id., at 24. Basic guidelines for the trier of fact, along with more specific suggestions, were then offered:
“The basic guidelines for the trier of fact must be: (a) whether 'the average person, applying contemporary community standards’ would find that the work, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest, Kois v. Wisconsin, [408 U. S. 229,] 230 [(1972)], quoting Roth v. United States, [354 U. S. 476,] 489 [(1957)]; (b) whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and (c) whether the work, taken as a whole, lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value. We do not adopt as a constitutional standard the ‘utterly without redeeming social value’ test of Memoirs v. Massachusetts, 383 U. S., at 419; that concept has never commanded the adherence of more than three Justices at one time. See supra, at 21. If a state law that regulates obscene material is thus limited, as written or construed, the First Amendment values applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment are adequately protected by the ultimate power of appellate courts to conduct an independent review of constitutional claims when necessary. See Kois v. Wisconsin, supra, at 232; Memoirs v. Massachusetts, supra, at 459-460 (Harlan, J., dissenting); Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U. S., at 204 (Harlan, J., dissenting); New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 284-285 (1964); Roth v. United States, supra, at 497-498 (Harlan, J., concurring and dissenting).
“We emphasize that it is not our function to propose regulatory schemes for the States. That must await their concrete legislative efforts. It is possible, however, to give a few plain examples of what a state statute could define for regulation under part (b) of the standard announced in this opinion, supra:
“(a) Patently offensive representations or descriptions of ultimate sexual acts, normal or perverted, actual or simulated.
“(b) Patently offensive representations or descriptions of masturbation, excretory functions, and lewd exhibition of the genitals.” Id., at 24-25. (Footnotes omitted.)
Illinois Rev. Stat., c. 38, § 11-20 (a)(1) (1975), forbids the sale of obscene matter. Section 11-20 (b) defines “obscene” as follows:
“A thing is obscene if, considered as a whole, its predominant appeal is to prurient interest, that is, a shameful or morbid interest in nudity, sex or excretion, and if it goes substantially beyond customary limits of candor in description or representation of such matters. A thing is obscene even though the obscenity is latent, as in the case of undeveloped photographs.”
In October 1971 appellant Ward was charged in the State of Illinois with having sold two obscene publications in violation of § 11-20 (a)(1). A jury was waived. At the bench trial the State’s evidence consisted solely of the two publications — “Bizarre World” and “Illustrated Case Histories, a Study of Sado-Masochism” — and the testimony of the police officer who purchased them in Ward’s store. Ward was found guilty, and in April 1972, he was sentenced to one day in jail and fined $200. His conviction was affirmed in the state appellate courts after this Court’s decision in Miller. The Illinois Supreme Court expressly rejected his challenge to the constitutionality of the Illinois obscenity statute for failure to conform to the standards of Miller, as well as a claim that the two publications were not obscene. 63 Ill. 2d 437, 349 N. E. 2d 47 (1976). Ward appealed, and we noted probable jurisdiction, 429 U. S. 1037 (1977), to resolve a conflict with a decision of a three-judge District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Eagle Books, Inc. v. Reinhard, 418 F. Supp. 345 (1976), appeal docketed, No. 76-366. We affirm.
As we read the questions presented by Ward, they fairly subsume four issues. First, is the claim that Illinois has failed to comply with Miller’s requirement that the sexual conduct that may not be depicted in a patently offensive way must be “specifically defined by the applicable state law as written or authoritatively construed,” see supra, at 768, and that absent such compliance the Illinois law is unconstitutionally vague because it failed to give him notice that materials dealing with the kind of sexual conduct involved here could not legally be sold in the State. This claim is wholly without merit. As we shall see below, the State has complied with Miller, but even if this were not the case, appellant had ample guidance from the Illinois Supreme Court that his conduct did not conform to the Illinois law. Materials such as these, which by title or content may fairly be described as sado-masochistic, had been expressly held to violate the Illinois statute long before Miller and prior to the sales for which Ward was prosecuted.
In People v. Sikora, 32 Ill. 2d 260, 267-268, 204 N. E. 2d 768, 772-773 (1965), there are detailed recitations of the kind of sexual conduct depicted in the materials found to be obscene under the Illinois statute. These recitations included “sadism and masochism.” See also People v. DeVilbiss, 41 Ill. 2d 135, 142, 242 N. E. 2d 761, 765 (1968); cf. Chicago v. Geraci, 46 Ill. 2d 576, 582-583, 264 N. E. 2d 153, 157 (1970). The construction of the statute in Sikora gives detailed meaning to the Illinois law, is binding on us, and makes plain that § 11-20 reaches the kind of sexual materials which we now have before us. If Ward cannot be convicted for selling these materials, it is for other reasons and not because the Illinois statute is vague and gave him no notice that the statute purports to ban the kind of materials he sold. The statute is not vague as applied to Ward’s conduct.
Second, Ward appears to assert that sado-masochistic materials may not be constitutionally proscribed because they are not expressly included within the examples of the kinds of sexually explicit representations that Miller used to explicate the aspect of its obscenity definition dealing with patently offensive depictions of specifically defined sexual conduct. But those specifics were offered merely as “examples,” 413 U. S., at 25; and, as later pointed out in Hamling v. United States, 418 U. S. 87, 114 (1974), they “were not intended to be exhaustive.” Furthermore, there was no suggestion in Miller that we intended to extend constitutional protection to the kind of flagellatory materials that were among those held obscene in Mishkin v. New York, 383 U. S. 502, 505-510 (1966). If the Mishkin publications remain unprotected, surely those before us today deal with a category of sexual conduct which, if obscenely described, may be proscribed by state law.
The third claim is simply that these materials are not obscene when examined under the three-part test of Miller. This argument is also foreclosed by Mishkin v. New York, supra, which came down the same day as Memoirs v. Massachusetts, 383 U. S. 413 (1966), and which employed the obscenity criteria announced by the latter case. See Marks v. United States, 430 U. S. 188, 194 (1977). The courts below examined the materials and found them obscene under the Illinois statute, which, as we shall see, infra, at 774-776, conforms to the standards set out in Miller, except that it retains the stricter Memoirs formulation of the “redeeming social value” factor. We have found no reason to differ with the Illinois courts.
Fourth, even assuming that the Illinois statute had been construed to overcome the vagueness challenge in this case and even assuming that the materials at issue here are not protected under Miller, there remains the claim that Illinois has failed to conform to the Miller requirement that a state obscenity law, as written or authoritatively construed, must state specifically the kinds of sexual conduct the description or representation of which the State intends to proscribe by its obscenity law. If Illinois has not complied with this requirement, its statute is arguably overbroad, unconstitutional on its face, and an invalid predicate for Ward’s conviction.
As we see it, Illinois has not failed to comply with Miller, and its statute is not overbroad. People v. Ridens, 51 Ill. 2d 410, 282 N. E. 2d 691 (1972), vacated and remanded, 413 U. S. 912 (1973), involved a conviction under this same Illinois obscenity law. It was pending on our docket when our judgment and opinion in Miller issued. We vacated the Ridens judgment and remanded the case for further consideration in the light of Miller. On remand, the Illinois Supreme Court explained that originally § 11-20 had provided the tests for obscenity found in Roth v. United States, 354 U. S. 476 (1957), and that it subsequently had been construed to incorporate the tripartite standard found in Memoirs v. Massachusetts, supra, including the requirement that the materials prohibited be “utterly without redeeming social value.” People v. Ridens, 59 Ill. 2d 362, 321 N. E. 2d 264 (1974). The Illinois court then proceeded to “construe section 11-20 of the Criminal Code ... to incorporate parts (a) and (b) of the Miller standards,” id., at 373, 321 N. E. 2d, at 270, but to retain the “utterly without redeeming social value” standard of Memoirs in preference to the more relaxed criterion contained in part (c) of the Miller guidelines. Ridens’ conviction was affirmed, and we denied certiorari. 421 U. S. 993 (1975).
Because the Illinois court did not go further and expressly describe the kinds of sexual conduct intended to be referred to under part (b) of the Miller guidelines, the issue is whether the Illinois obscenity law is open-ended and overbroad. As we understand the Illinois Supreme Court, however, the statute is not vulnerable in this respect. That court expressly incorporated into the statute part (b) of the guidelines, which requires inquiry “whether the work depicts or describes, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law.” 413 U. S., at 24. The Illinois court thus must have been aware of the need for specificity and of the Miller Court's examples explaining the reach of part (b). See id., at 25. The Illinois court plainly intended to conform the Illinois law to part (b) of Miller, and there is no reason to doubt that, in incorporating the guideline as part of the law, the Illinois court intended as well to adopt the Miller examples, which gave substantive meaning to part (b) by indicating the kinds of materials within its reach. The alternative reading of the decision would lead us to the untenable conclusion that the Illinois Supreme Court chose to create a fatal flaw in its statute by refusing to take cognizance of the specificity requirement set down in Miller.
Furthermore, in a later case, People v. Gould, 60 Ill. 2d 159, 324 N. E. 2d 412 (1975), the Illinois Supreme Court quoted at length from Miller v. California, including the entire passage set out at the beginning of this opinion, supra, at 768-770 — a passage that contains the explanatory examples as well as the guidelines. It then stated that Ridens had construed the Illinois statute to include parts (a) and (b) of the Miller guidelines, and it expressly referred to the standards set out in the immediately preceding quotation from Miller. 60 Ill. 2d, at 164-165, 324 N. E. 2d, at 415. Because the quotation contained not only part (b) but the examples given to explain that part, it would be a needlessly technical and wholly unwarranted reading of the Illinois opinions to conclude that the state court did not adopt these explanatory examples as well as the guidelines themselves.
It might be argued that, whether or not the Illinois court adopted the Miller examples as part of its law, § 11-20 nevertheless remains overbroad because the State has not provided an exhaustive list of the sexual conduct the patently offensive description of which may be held obscene under the statute. We agree with the Illinois Supreme Court, however, that “in order that a statute be held overbroad the overbreadth 'must not only be real, but substantial as well, judged in relation to the statute’s plainly legitimate sweep.’ (Broadrick v. Oklahoma, 413 U. S. 601, 615 . . . .)” People v. Ridens, supra, at 372, 321 N. E. 2d, at 269. Since it is plain enough from its prior cases and from its response to Miller that the Illinois court recognizes the limitations on the kinds of sexual conduct which may not be represented or depicted under the obscenity laws, we cannot hold the Illinois statute to be unconstitutionally overbroad.
Given that Illinois has adopted Miller’s explanatory examples, what the State has done in attempting to bring its statute in conformity with Miller is surely as much as this Court did in its post-Miller construction of federal obscenity statutes. In Hamling v. United States, 418 U. S., at 114, we construed 18 U. S. C. § 1461, which prohibits the mailing of obscene matter, to be limited to “the sort of” patently offensive representations or descriptions of that specific hardcore sexual conduct given as examples in Miller. We have also indicated our approval of an identical approach with respect to the companion provisions of 18 U. S. C. § 1462, which prohibits importation or transportation of obscene matter. See United States v. 12 200-Ft. Reels of Film, 413 U. S. 123, 130 n. 7 (1973).
Finding ail four of Ward’s claims to be without merit, we affirm the judgment of the Illinois Supreme Court.
So ordered.
Section 11-20 (c) provides:
“(c) Interpretation of Evidence.
“Obscenity shall be judged with reference to ordinary adults, except that it shall be judged with reference to children or other specially susceptible audiences if it appears from the character of the material or the circumstances of its dissemination to be specially designed for or directed to such an audience,”
The questions presented in Ward’s Jurisdictional Statement 3 are (1) whether the provisions of § 11-20, “on its face and as construed by the Illinois Supreme Court, are vague, indefinite, overbroad and uncertain, in violation of the free speech and press and due process provisions of the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States”; and (2) whether “the publications, ‘Bizarre World’ and ‘Illustrated Case Histories, a Study of Sado-Masochism’ are constitutionally protected, as a matter of law.”
The Illinois Supreme Court described the materials as follows, 32 Ill. 2d, at 267-268, 204 N. E. 2d, at 772-773:
“ ‘Lust Campus’ by Andrew Shaw is a story of sexual adventures on a college campus 'where even members of the faculty taught sin and evil.’ The book describes homosexuals 'necking’ on a public beach; mutual masturbation; self-fondling; a circle of persons engaged in oral-genital contact; rape; intercourse; lesbian intercourse; cunnilingus and flagellation; flagellation with barbed wire; an abortion with red-hot barbed wire; masturbation with a mirror reflection, and a transvestite episode.
“ 'Passion Bride’ by John Dexter described curricular and extracurricular sexual episodes that take place during a honeymoon on the French Riviera. The book describes masturbation; intercourse; a party between an old man and three prostitutes; attempted intercourse in a bath; lesbian foreplay; flagellation; rape ending in the death of the female from a broken back and intercourse ending in the broken back of the male participant.
“ 'Crossroads of Lust’ by Andrew Shaw describes the sexual adventures of various persons in a small town. There are numerous descriptions of intercourse; lesbian intercourse; oral-genital contact; and rape. A woman stabs a man in the course of intercourse, completing the act after he is dead. There are also three voyeurism scenes, two of which involve watching lesbian love play. The third is characterized by sadism and masochism.”
This case involved a local ordinance that the Illinois Supreme Court described as identical to the state statute. The court described the materials at issue:
“The books are replete with accounts of homosexual acts, masturbation, flagellation, oral-genital acts, rape, voyeurism, masochism and sadism. These accounts can only appeal to the prurient interest, and clearly go beyond customary limits of candor in the kinds of conduct described and in the detail of description.” 41 Ill. 2d, at 142, 242 N. E. 2d, at 765.
The materials under scrutiny — also under a local ordinance — were described by the court:
“The author’s accounts of normal and abnormal sexual conduct, including sodomy, flagellation, masturbation, oral-genital contact, anal intercourse, lesbianism, and sadism and masochism, are vivid, intimately detailed, and explicit. (Cf. One, Inc. v. Olesen (1958), 355 U. S. 371 . . .)” 46 Ill. 2d, at 582-583, 264 N. E. 2d, at 157.
Four Justices dissented, but waived the Rule of Four — that, if at least four Justices so request, the Court will give plenary consideration to a particular case. 421 U. S., at 994 n.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice O’Connor
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Last Term, in Flanagan v. United States, 465 U. S. 259 (1984), the Court unanimously held that pretrial orders disqualifying counsel in criminal cases are not subject to immediate appeal under 28 U. S. C. § 1291. In this case, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held that § 1291 confers jurisdiction over interlocutory appeals of orders disqualifying counsel in a civil case. 237 U. S. App. D. C. 333, 737 F. 2d 1038 (1984). Because we conclude that orders disqualifying counsel in a civil case are not collateral orders subject to immediate appeal, we reverse.
I
Respondent Anne Roller (hereafter respondent) was born without normal arms or legs in a District of Columbia hospital in 1979. She filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, alleging that petitioner Richardson-Merrell, Inc., is liable for her birth defects. The complaint alleged that respondent’s mother, Cynthia Roller, had taken the antinausea drug Bendectin during the early stages of her pregnancy, and that the drug had caused Anne Roller’s injuries. Petitioner is the manufacturer of Bendectin.
Respondent was initially represented by Cohen & Rokus, a Miami law firm, and by local counsel in Washington. As discovery progressed into 1981, however, a Los Angeles law firm, Butler, Jefferson, Dan & Allis, took the lead in trial preparation. James G. Butler entered an appearance pro hac vice for respondent on January 26, 1981; his partner Nicholas Allis was admitted pro hac vice on October 19,1982. As the case neared trial in early 1983, respondent’s counsel of record included at least eight lawyers from the Cohen firm, the Butler firm, and two Washington firms.
On December 22,1982, Nicholas Allis’ secretary, Rrystyna Janowski, twice called the offices of Davis, Polk & Wardwell, Richardson-Merrell’s attorneys. Janowski left messages indicating that Roller’s suit was fraudulent and that Cynthia Roller had not taken Bendectin during the crucial early weeks of her pregnancy. App. 19-20. Janowski subsequently regretted her actions, and on December 26 she told a paralegal at her firm that investigators for Richardson-Merrell had been attempting to persuade her to sign a statement indicating that Roller’s case was fraudulent.
The next day, Allis twice went to see Janowski, first at a hospital where the secretary was visiting her child, and later at the secretary’s apartment. During the second visit, Allis was accompanied by a private investigator who surreptitiously taped the conversation on a concealed tape recorder. Allis presented Janowski a typed statement indicating that “[a]t no time did I ever hear Cynthia Roller or anyone else say that Cynthia Roller did not take Bendectin.” Id., at 26-27. Janowski signed the statement. The following day, December 28, 1982, Allis received a copy of a letter that Davis, Polk & Wardwell had sent to the District Court. The letter recounted Janowski’s telephone calls, informed the court that petitioner had engaged independent counsel for Janowski, and requested a hearing. Id., at 21-22. Allis’ firm responded with its own letter to the court. The letter recounted the story Janowski had told Allis. A copy of the statement obtained from Janowski was attached. Id., at 23-25. During subsequent discovery into the matter, Janowski recanted the signed statement.
While the District Court and counsel were struggling with these unusual revelations, they were also preparing for an imminent trial. A pretrial hearing was scheduled to commence on January 31,1983, and trial was to commence immediately upon the conclusion of the hearing. On January 17, 1983, the trial judge issued a pretrial ruling excluding collateral evidence related to two children who had birth defects like those of the respondent. The court ruled that it would not “grant plaintiffs a license to submit the birth defects of children whose only demonstrable relationship to Anne Roller is that they have suffered birth defects that are superficially similar.” Id., at 60-61. On January 28, 1983, James Butler submitted to the Food and Drug Administration a set of “Drug Experience Reports” prepared by his firm. The reports described the birth defects of a number of children whose mothers had taken Bendectin, including the two children covered by the District Court’s order of January 17. In an accompanying letter, Butler urged the FDA to take Ben-dectin off the market. Butler sent copies of the reports and his letter to a reporter for the Washington Post.
On January 31, 1983, the District Court ruled that it would not admit any “Drug Experience Reports” that were submitted to the FDA more than one year after the birth of the children involved. Id., at 84-91. The 14 reports Butler had submitted to the FDA fell within this category. The following day, a Washington Post reporter interviewed Butler at the attorney’s invitation. Id., at 341. Butler discussed the Roller case and the materials he had sent to the FDA. On February 7, 1983, after the court had already called the February jury pool from which the Roller jury panel would likely be drawn, the Washington Post published a lengthy article discussing the Roller case and the Drug Experience Reports which the trial court had excluded from evidence.
In the wake of these events, the District Court postponed the trial and allowed further discovery concerning Janowski’s allegations. In February 1983, petitioner moved to disqualify Butler, Allis, and their firm from the Roller case on the ground of their alleged misconduct. After a 4-day eviden-tiary hearing on the issue of whether respondent’s law firm had improperly obtained Janowski’s statement, the District Judge issued an order requiring Butler and Allis to show cause why they and their firm should not be disqualified. The show cause order identified two “alleged incidents of misconduct” as possible grounds for disqualification: Butler’s release of information to the Washington Post in an effort to “prejudice the jury” and to “bring inadmissible evidence before the jury pool,” and Allis’ preparing and obtaining a statement from Janowski “without regard for the truth” of the statement in an effort to protect his firm’s financial interest and to thwart an investigation. Id., at 246-248.
Butler and Allis opposed disqualification and defended their conduct in testimony at a lengthy hearing. Nevertheless, on January 6, 1984, the District Judge found that Allis had attempted “to thwart a true investigation of a crucial witness” and that Butler’s release of information to the media “was calculated to prejudice the defendant’s case and circumvent the Court’s prior rulings.” App. to Pet. for Cert. 77a-78a. Noting that respondent’s other counsel of record could provide competent representation, the court revoked the pro hac vice admissions of Butler and Allis and the appearance of their law firm. Id., at 80a.
Respondent appealed the disqualification to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which stayed all proceedings in the trial court pending the outcome of the appeal. App. 339. The Court of Appeals subsequently held that it had jurisdiction to entertain the appeal pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1291. On the merits, the panel held that the District Court’s disqualification order was invalid and that the appearances of Allis, Butler, and their firm should be reinstated. 237 U. S. App. D. C. 333, 737 F. 2d 1038 (1984). We granted certiorari to review the Court of Appeals’ jurisdictional ruling as well as its decision on the merits of the disqualification. 469 U. S. 915 (1984).
HH HH
Title 28 U. S. C. § 1291 grants the courts of appeals jurisdiction of appeals from all “final decisions of the district courts,” except where a direct appeal lies to this Court. The statutory requirement of a “final decision” means that “a party must ordinarily raise all claims of error in a single appeal following final judgment on the merits.” Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. v. Risjord, 449 U. S. 368, 374 (1981). As the Court noted in Firestone, the final judgment rule promotes efficient judicial adminstration while at the same time emphasizing the deference appellate courts owe to the district judge’s decisions on the many questions of law and fact that arise before judgment. Ibid.; Flanagan v. United States, 465 U. S., at 263-264. Immediate review of every trial court ruling, while permitting more prompt correction of erroneous decisions, would impose unreasonable disruption, delay, and expense. It would also undermine the ability of district judges to supervise litigation. In § 1291 Congress has expressed a preference that some erroneous trial court rulings go uncorrected until the appeal of a final judgment, rather than having litigation punctuated by “piecemeal appellate review of trial court decisions which do not terminate the litigation.” United States v. Hollywood Motor Car Co., 458 U. S. 263, 265 (1982).
An order disqualifying counsel in a civil case is not a final judgment on the merits of the litigation. There has been no trial or final judgment in this case, and indeed the stay imposed by the Court of Appeals assures that there can be none pending the outcome of these interlocutory proceedings. Section 1291 accordingly provides jurisdiction for this appeal only if orders disqualifying counsel in civil cases fall within the “collateral order” exception to the final judgment rule. In Cohen v. Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp., 337 U. S. 541, 546 (1949), the Court recognized an exception to the final judgment rule for a “small class” of prejudgment orders which “finally determine claims of right separable from, and collateral to, rights asserted in the action, [and are] too important to be denied review and too independent of the cause itself to require that appellate consideration be deferred until the whole case is adjudicated.”
The collateral order doctrine is a “narrow exception,” Firestone, supra, at 374, whose reach is limited to trial court orders affecting rights that will be irretrievably lost in the absence of an immediate appeal. See Helstoski v. Meanor, 442 U. S. 500, 506-508 (1979); Abney v. United States, 431 U. S. 651, 660-662 (1977). To fall within the exception, an order must at a minimum satisfy three conditions: It must “conclusively determine the disputed question,” “resolve an important issue completely separate from the merits of the action,” and “be effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment.” Coopers & Lybrand v. Livesay, 437 U. S. 463, 468 (1978). Our recent decisions have strictly applied this test when parties pursued immediate appeal of trial court rulings on motions to disqualify counsel.
In Firestone, supra, the Court held that a trial court order denying a motion to disqualify counsel in a civil case was not subject to immediate appeal. The Court assumed without deciding that such a ruling resolves an important issue completely separate from the merits, and thus meets the second part of the Coopers & Lybrand test. 449 U. S., at 376. Nevertheless, the Court refused to permit an interlocutory appeal because it found an order denying disqualification to be reviewable on appeal after a final judgment. Justice Marshall’s opinion for the Court observed:
“An order refusing to disqualify counsel plainly falls within the large class of orders that are indeed reviewable on appeal after final judgment, and not within the much smaller class of those that are not. The propriety of the district court’s denial of a disqualification motion will often be difficult to assess until its impact on the underlying litigation may be evaluated, which is normally only after final judgment. The decision whether to disqualify an attorney ordinarily turns on the particular factual situation of the case then at hand, and the order embodying such a decision will rarely, if ever, represent a final rejection of a claim of fundamental right that cannot effectively be reviewed following judgment on the merits.” Id., at 377 (emphasis added).
Firestone expressly left open the issue of whether orders granting disqualification are subject to immediate appeal, as well as the issue of whether orders denying disqualification in a criminal case fall within the collateral order exception. Id,., at 372, n. 8.
Flanagan v. United States, supra, decided one of the issues left open in Firestone. There the Court held that a district court’s pretrial order granting disqualification of defense counsel in a criminal case was not immediately appealable under § 1291. The unanimous opinion in Flanagan emphasized the strong interest of both the parties and society as a whole in speedy resolution of criminal cases. This important interest counsels application of the final judgment rule with “utmost strictness.” 465 U. S., at 265. The Court then applied the standards enunciated in Coopers & Lybrand and concluded that criminal disqualification orders do not qualify for immediate appeal.
Since Flanagan was decided, the Courts of Appeals have divided on the appealability of orders disqualifying counsel in a civil case. Compare Gibbs v. Paluk, 742 F. 2d 181, 184 (CA5 1984) (rejecting appeal pursuant to § 1291 in reliance on Flanagan), and Kahle v. Oppenheimer & Co., 748 F. 2d 337 (CA6 1984) (rejecting appeal of order disqualifying counsel who was needed as witness), with Banque de Rive, S.A. v. Highland Beach Development Corp., 758 F. 2d 559 (CA11 1985) (distinguishing Flanagan and accepting appeal pursuant to § 1291); Interco Systems, Inc. v. Omni Corporate Services, Inc., 733 F. 2d 253, 255 (CA2 1984) (same); and Panduit Corp. v. All States Plastics Manufacturing Co., 744 F. 2d 1564 (CA Fed. 1984) (same). We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict.
Ill
The decision below allowing immediate appeal of the disqualification order rests primarily on two lines of reasoning. First, the Court of Appeals identifies policy considerations that suggest civil disqualification orders should fall within the collateral order doctrine even though criminal disqualification orders do not. Second, the court attempts to distinguish Flanagan’s application of the Coopers & Lybrand test.
A
At least four policy considerations are articulated in the course of the appellate opinion. First, the panel suggests that the societal interest in prompt adjudication of disputes is weaker in civil cases than in criminal cases, and that the “extraordinary limits on the collateral order doctrine” in the criminal context have not been carried over to civil cases. 237 U. S. App. D. C., at 345-346, 737 F. 2d, at 1050-1051. The appellate court further reasons that “disruption and delay of proceedings on the merits are unhappily foreseeable byproducts of the injudicious use of disqualification motions,” and that this disruption “would be exacerbated were orders disqualifying counsel not immediately appealable.” Id., at 359, 737 F. 2d, at 1064. Third, the panel concludes that immediate appeal should be available not only to vindicate the client’s choice of counsel, but also to vindicate “the interest of the attorneys, who are parties to this appeal, in correcting what they claim is an erroneous finding of misconduct.” Id., at 348-349, 737 F. 2d, at 1053-1054. The panel notes that “[i]n the event that plaintiffs were satisfied with the final verdict obtained by substitute counsel, the disqualified attorneys could be left with no means whatsoever of vindicating their own important interests on appeal from a final judgment.” Ibid. Finally, the Court of Appeals expresses concern that the use of motions to disqualify counsel in order to delay civil proceedings and to harass opponents has become prevalent in recent years. “To insulate from prompt review an erroneous order granting a motion to disqualify counsel,” the Court of Appeals concluded, “would only raise the stakes in this dangerous game.” Id., at 346, 737 F. 2d, at 1051.
We do not find these policy arguments persuasive. Although delay is anathema in criminal cases, it is also undesirable in civil disputes, as the Court of Appeals itself recognized. One purpose of the final judgment rule embodied in § 1291 is to avoid the delay that inherently accompanies time-consuming interlocutory appeals. Flanagan, 465 U. S., at 264. When an appellate court accepts jurisdiction of an order disqualifying counsel, the practical effect is to delay proceedings on the merits until the appeal is decided. As in this case, the appellate court may stay all proceedings during appellate review. Even where the appellate court fails to impose a stay, it would take an intrepid District Judge to proceed to trial with alternate counsel while her decision disqualifying an attorney is being examined in the Court of Appeals.
The delay accompanying an appeal results not only when counsel appeals “injudicious use of disqualification motions,” but also when counsel appeals an entirely proper disqualification order. Most pretrial orders of district judges are ultimately affirmed by appellate courts. 15 C. Wright, A. Miller, & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure §3907, p. 433 (1976). Given an attorney’s personal and financial interest in the disqualification decision, orders disqualifying counsel may be more likely to lead to an interlocutory appeal than other pretrial rulings, whether those rulings are correct or otherwise. To be sure, an order granting disqualification itself leads to delay. Alternate counsel must often be retained. Even in cases like this one where competent alternate counsel had already entered appearances and participated in the litigation, such counsel will need time to gain the knowledge of the disqualified attorneys. But where the disqualification decision of the trial court is correct, this delay is unavoidable. We do not think that the delay resulting from the occasionally erroneous disqualification outweighs the delay that would result from allowing piecemeal appeal of every order disqualifying counsel.
We also decline to view the disqualified attorney’s personal desire for vindication as an independent ground for interlocutory appeal. An attorney who is disqualified for misconduct may well have a personal interest in pursuing an immediate appeal, an interest which need not coincide with the interests of the client. As a matter of professional ethics, however, the decision to appeal should turn entirely on the client’s interest. See ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct 1.7(b), 2.1 (1985). In neither Firestone nor Flanagan did the Court regard the attorney’s personal interest in a disqualification ruling as relevant or dispositive. Moreover, a rule precluding appeal pursuant to § 1291 would not necessarily leave the client or the disqualified attorney without a remedy. As we noted in Firestone, “a party may seek to have the question certified for interlocutory appellate review pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1292(b), . . . and, in the exceptional circumstances for which it was designed, a writ of mandamus from the court of appeals might be available.” 449 U. S., at 378-379, n. 13. Alternatively, if the client obtains an unsatisfactory judgment with substitute counsel, the disqualification ruling may be challenged on appeal of a final judgment. Even when the client is satisfied with the judgment obtained by substitute counsel, an attorney whose reputation has been egregiously injured by the trial court’s disqualification decision might be able to obtain relief from the Circuit Judicial Council pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 332(d)(1).
Finally, we share the Court of Appeals’ concern about “tactical use of disqualification motions” to harass opposing counsel. Nevertheless, we do not believe that this “dangerous game” constitutes an independent justification for immediate appeal of an order disqualifying an attorney. Implicit in § 1291 is Congress’ judgment that the district judge has primary responsibility to police the prejudgment tactics of litigants, and that the district judge can better exercise that responsibility if the appellate courts do not repeatedly intervene to second-guess prejudgment rulings. Cf. Cohen v. Beneficial Loan Corp., 337 U. S., at 546 (“Appeal gives the upper court a power of review, not one of intervention”). Like any referee, the district judge will occasionally make mistakes. A mistaken ruling disqualifying counsel imposes financial hardship on both the disqualified lawyer and the client. But the possibility that a ruling may be erroneous and may impose additional litigation expense is not sufficient to set aside the finality requirement imposed by Congress. Coopers & Lybrand, 437 U. S., at 476, and n. 28; Will v. United States, 389 U. S. 90, 98, n. 6 (1967). “If the expense of litigation were a sufficient reason for granting an exception to the final judgment rule, the exception might well swallow the rule.” Lusardi v. Xerox Corp., 747 F. 2d 174, 178 (CA3 1984). The Coopers & Lybrand test looks not to the litigation expense imposed by a possibly erroneous ruling, but rather to whether the right affected by the ruling can and should be protected by appeal prior to judgment. To that inquiry we now turn.
B
In Flanagan, the Court held that orders disqualifying counsel in criminal cases cannot satisfy either the second or the third parts of the Coopers & Lybrand test: If a showing of prejudice is a prerequisite to reversal, then the ruling is not “completely separate” from the merits because it cannot be assessed until a final judgment has been entered; on the other hand, if a showing of prejudice is not required, then the ruling can be effectively reviewed on appeal of the final judgment. 465 U. S., at 267-269. Apart from its policy discussion, the Court of Appeals held that Flanagan’s analysis is inapplicable in the civil context.
First, the appellate panel asserted that a showing of prejudice would be required in civil cases: “Only an erroneous disqualification combined with prejudice at trial could conceivably result in outright reversal of a civil judgment.” 237 U. S. App. D. C., at 347, 737 F. 2d, at 1052. Nevertheless, the panel concluded that the ruling is both incapable of review on appeal of a final judgment and completely separate from the merits. The panel concluded that a disqualification order is unreviewable on appeal of a final judgment because:
“[I]t would appear virtually impossible to show prejudice resulting from the absence of one counsel and the substitution of another. In a criminal case, a reviewing court could at least draw from the extensive body of law concerning effective assistance of counsel as a first step in determining whether substitute counsel’s performance prejudiced the defense so as to require reversal. In the civil context, however, the court would be without a starting point; because there is no sixth amendment right involved, there is no body of law to help a court evaluate whether a civil judgment should be overturned because of the quality of counsel’s representation.” Ibid, (footnote omitted).
The panel finally concluded that the disqualification ruling was completely separate from the merits, even though prejudice is a prerequisite to reversal of a judgment, because (1) it would be difficult to show that prejudice resulted from an erroneous disqualification; (2) the extensive record in this particular case “presents an entirely adequate basis for determining whether the district court’s order was proper”; and (3) the “validity” of a disqualification order in a civil case does not depend on either prejudice or the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. Id., at 347-348, 737 F. 2d, at 1052-1053.
We find these efforts to distinguish Flanagan unavailing. To a large extent, the Court of Appeals’ analysis rests on a conundrum of its own making. This Court has never held that prejudice is a prerequisite to reversal of a judgment following erroneous disqualification of counsel in either criminal or civil cases. As in Flanagan, we need not today decide this question. But we note that the difficulties in proving prejudice identified by the Court of Appeals go more to the issue of the showing required to reverse a final judgment than to whether a disqualification order should be subject to immediate appeal.
The Court of Appeals relies on a requirement of prejudice to overcome the third Coopers & Lybrand requirement that the ruling “be effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment.” 437 U. S., at 468. Yet by reversing the decision of the District Court on the interlocutory appeal, the Court of Appeals implicitly held that a showing of prejudice is not required on interlocutory appeal. We are unpersuaded by this analysis. As in Flanagan, we conclude that, if establishing a violation of one’s right to counsel of choice in civil cases requires no showing of prejudice, then “a pretrial order violating the right does not meet the third condition for coverage by the collateral-order exception: it is not ‘effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment.’ ” 465 U. S., at 268. Absent a requirement of prejudice, the propriety of the trial court’s disqualification order can be reviewed as effectively on appeal of a final judgment as on an interlocutory appeal.
We must likewise reject the Court of Appeals’ suggestion that civil orders disqualifying counsel satisfy the second condition of the collateral order exception. To do so it is enough to rely on Flanagan. If the nature of the right to representation by counsel of one’s choice is that “[it] is not violated absent some specifically demonstrated prejudice,” ibid., then a disqualification order, though “final,” is not independent of the issues to be tried. Only after assessing the effect of the ruling on the final judgment could an appellate court decide whether the client’s rights had been prejudiced. If respondent were to proceed to trial and there receive as effective or better assistance from substitute counsel than the disqualified attorney could provide, any subsequent appeal of the disqualification ruling would fail. For the same reasons as in Flanagan, the disqualification ruling would be inextricably tied up in the merits.
Even apart from Flanagan’s analysis, we would conclude that orders disqualifying counsel in civil cases are not “completely separate from the merits of the action.” Coopers & Lybrand, 437 U. S., at 468. The Court of Appeals asserts that, in this particular case, the extensive record “presents an entirely adequate basis for determining whether the district court’s order was proper.” 237 U. S. App. D. C., at 348, 737 F. 2d, at 1053. This Court, however, has expressly rejected efforts to reduce the finality requirement of § 1291 to a case-by-case determination of whether a particular ruling should be subject to appeal. Coopers & Lybrand, supra, at 473-475. Even if some orders disqualifying counsel are separable from the merits of the litigation, many are not. Orders disqualifying attorneys on the ground that they should testify at trial, for example, are inextricable from the merits because they involve an assessment of the likely course of the trial and the effect of the attorney’s testimony on the judgment. Kahle v. Oppenheimer & Co., 748 F. 2d, at 339. Appellate review of orders disqualifying counsel for misconduct may be entwined with the merits of the litigation as well. If reversal hinges on whether the alleged misconduct is “likely to infect future proceedings,” 237 U. S. App. D. C., at 351, 737 F. 2d, at 1056, courts of appeals will often have to review the nature and content of those proceedings to determine whether the standard is met. In this case, for example, the Court of Appeals opinion exhaustively discusses respondent’s claim on the merits, the relevance of the alleged instances of misconduct to the attorney’s zealous pursuit of that claim, the pretrial proceedings in the trial court, and the danger that it will be difficult for the trial judge “to act with complete impartiality in future proceedings.” Id., at 359, 737 F. 2d, at 1064. In light of these factors, we conclude that orders disqualifying counsel in civil cases, as a class, are not sufficiently separable from the merits to qualify for interlocutory appeal.
IV
We acknowledge that an order disqualifying counsel may impose significant hardship on litigants. Particularly where the grounds for disqualification are troubling, this hardship may tempt courts of appeals to assert jurisdiction pursuant to § 1291. But in the words of Judge Adams:
“[I]t would seem to us to be a disservice to the Court, to litigants in general and to the idea of speedy justice if we were to succumb to enticing suggestions to abandon th 3 deeply-held distaste for piecemeal litigation in every instance of temptation. Moreover, to find appealability in those close cases where the merits of the dispute may attract the deep interest of the court would lead, eventually, to a lack of principled adjudication or perhaps the ultimate devitalization of the finality rule as enacted by Congress.” Bachowski v. Usery, 545 F. 2d 363, 373-374 (CA3 1976).
As in Firestone, we decline to “transform the limited exception carved out in Cohen into a license for broad disregard of the finality rule imposed by Congress in § 1291.” 449 U. S., at 378.
We hold that orders disqualifying counsel in civil cases, like orders disqualifying counsel in criminal cases and orders denying a motion to disqualify in civil cases, are not collateral orders subject to appeal as “final judgments” within the meaning of 28 U. S. C. § 1291. The Court of Appeals lacked jurisdiction to entertain respondent’s appeal and should not have reached the merits. Firestone, 449 U. S., at 379. We accordingly do not address the additional issues on which we granted certiorari, and we do not intimate any view on the merits of the District Court’s disqualification decision.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated, and the case is remanded with instructions to dismiss the appeal for want of jurisdiction.
It is so ordered.
Justice Powell took no part in the decision of this case.
In their response to the District Court’s order to show cause, Butler and Allis suggested that the court should certify any ruling disqualifying them for appeal pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1292(b). App. 253. Respondent apparently never moved for certification after the disqualification order of January 4, 1984. The sole basis for appellate jurisdiction asserted by respondent and by the Court of Appeals is 28 U. S. C. § 1291.
Although it is well established that Judicial Councils do not exist to review claims that a particular trial judge’s rulings were erroneous, In re Charge of Judicial Misconduct, 613 F. 2d 768 (CA9 1980), they do exist “to provide an administrative remedy for misconduct of a judge for which no judicial remedy is available.” In re Charge of Judicial Misconduct, 595 F. 2d 517 (CA9 1979). Cf. In re Complaint of A. H. Robins Co., JCP 84-001 (CA8 Judicial Council, Dec. 26, 1984) (noting that Judicial Council conducted hearings, received briefs, and heard oral arguments on complaint that Federal District Judge improperly accused counsel of misconduct, and then dismissed complaint as moot only because a Circuit panel found separate grounds to permit an appeal in Gardiner v. A. H. Robins Co., 747 F. 2d 1180 (CA8 1984)).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
Texas by statute authorizes counties to appoint election judges, one for each precinct, who supervise voting at the polls on election days. In 1988 and several times thereafter, Dallas County changed its procedures for selecting these officials. Each of the new methods used party-affiliation formulas of one sort or another. After the most recent change in 1996, appellants sued the county and others in the United States District Court, claiming that § 6 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 79 Stat. 439, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 1973c, required that the changes be precleared.
A three-judge court held that preclearance was not required because the county was simply exercising, under the state statute, its “discretion to adjust [the procedure for appointing election judges] according to party power.” App. to Juris. Statement 4a. The court apparently concluded that this “discretionary” use of political power meant that the various methods for selecting election judges were not covered changes under § 5. The court also concluded that the Justice Department’s preclearance of a 1985 submission from the State — the recodification of its entire election code — operated to preclear the county’s use of partisan considerations in selecting election judges. The court denied injunctive relief, and later dismissed appellants’ complaint pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). Appellants have brought both of these rulings here.
We believe that the decision of the District Court is inconsistent with our precedents. First, in NAACP v. Hampton County Election Comm’n, 470 U. S. 166, 178 (1985), we held that even “an administrative effort to comply with a statute that had already received clearance” may require separate preclearance, because § 5 “reaches informal as well as formal changes.” Thus, the fact that the county here was exercising its “discretion” pursuant to a state statute does not shield its actions from § 5. The question is simply whether the county, by its actions, whether taken pursuant to a statute or not, “enact[ed] or [sought] to administer any ... standard, practice, or procedure with respect to voting different from” the one in place on November 1, 1972. § 5. The fact that the county’s new procedures used political party affiliation as the selection criterion does not mean that the methods were exempt from preclearance.
Second, the State’s 1985 submission (the recodification and a 30-page summary of changes to the old law) indicated that the only change being made to the statute concerning election judges was a change to “the beginning date and duration of [their] appointment.” Thus, neither the recodified statute nor the State’s explanations said anything about the use of specific, partisan-affiliation methods for selecting election judges. This submission was clearly insufficient under our precedents to put the Justice Department on notice that the State was seeking preclearance of the use of partisan affiliations in selecting election judges. See, e.g., Young v. Fordice, 520 U. S. 273, 286-287 (1997); Lopez v. Monterey County, 519 U. S. 9, 15 (1996); Clark v. Roemer, 500 U. S. 646, 658-659 (1991).
Because the parties agree that the record is silent as to the procedure used by Dallas County for appointing election judges as of November 1,1972, the date on which Texas became a covered jurisdiction under the Voting Rights Act, we cannot make a final determination here as to whether pre-clearance is in fact required. We therefore vacate the judgment of the District Court in No. 96-1389, dismiss the appeal from the District Court’s interlocutory judgment in No. 96-987, see Shaffer v. Carter, 252 U. S. 37, 44 (1920), and remand the cases for further proceedings.
It is so ordered.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Ginsburg
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This ease concerns the legitimacy under Rule 23 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure of a class-action certification sought to achieve global settlement of current and future asbestos-related claims. The class proposed for certification potentially encompasses hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of individuals tied together by this commonality: Each was, or some day may be, adversely affected by past exposure to asbestos products manufactured by one or more of 20 companies. Those companies, defendants in the lower courts, are petitioners here.
The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania certified the class for settlement only, finding that the proposed settlement was fair and that representation and notice had been adequate. That court enjoined class members from separately pursuing asbestos-related personal-injury suits in any court, federal or state, pending the issuance of a final order. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated the District Court’s orders, holding that the class certification failed to satisfy Rule 23’s requirements in several critical respects. We affirm the Court of Appeals’ judgment.
I
A
The settlement-class certification we confront evolved in response to an asbestos-litigation crisis. See Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc., 83 F. 3d 610, 618, and n. 2 (CA3 1996) (citing commentary). A United States Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation, appointed by The Chief Justice in September 1990, described facets of the problem in a 1991 report:
“[This] is a tale of danger known in the 1930s, exposure inflicted upon millions of Americans in the 1940s and 1950s, injuries that began to take their toll in the 1960s, and a flood of lawsuits beginning in the 1970s. On the basis of past and current filing data, and because of a latency period that may last as long as 40 years for some asbestos related diseases, a continuing stream of claims can be expected. The final toll of asbestos related injuries is unknown. Predictions have been made of 200,000 asbestos disease deaths before the year 2000 and as many as 265,000 by the year 2015.
. “The most objectionable aspects of asbestos litigation can be briefly summarized: dockets in both federal and state courts continue to grow; long delays are routine; trials are too long; the same issues are litigated over and over; transaction costs exceed the victims’ recovery by nearly two to one; exhaustion of assets threatens and distorts the process; and future claimants may lose altogether.” Report of The Judicial Conference Ad Hoc Committee on Asbestos Litigation 2-3 (Mar. 1991).
Real reform, the report concluded, required federal legislation creating a national asbestos dispute-resolution scheme. See id., at 3, 27-35; see also id., at 42 (dissenting statement of Hogan, J.) (agreeing that “a national solution is the only answer” and suggesting “passage by Congress of an administrative claims procedure similar to the Black Lung legislation”). As recommended by the Ad Hoc Committee, the Judicial Conference of the United States urged Congress to act. See Report of the Proceedings of the Judicial Conference of the United States 33 (Mar. 12, 1991). To this date, no congressional response has emerged.
In the face of legislative inaction, the federal courts — lacking authority to replace state tort systems with a national toxic tort compensation regime — endeavored to work with the procedural tools available to improve management of federal asbestos litigation. Eight federal judges, experienced in the superintendence of asbestos cases, urged the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (MDL Panel), to consolidate in a single district all asbestos complaints then pending in federal courts. Accepting the recommendation, the MDL Panel transferred all asbestos cases then filed, but not yet on trial in federal courts to a single district, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania; pursuant to the transfer order, the collected cases were consolidated for pretrial proceedings before Judge Weiner. See In re Asbestos Products Liability Litigation (No. VI), 771 F. Supp. 415, 422-424 (JPML 1991). The order aggregated pending cases only; no authority resides in the MDL Panel to license for consolidated proceedings claims not yet filed.
B
After the consolidation, attorneys for plaintiffs and defendants formed separate steering committees and began settlement negotiations. Ronald L. Motley and Gene Locks — later appointed, along with Motley’s law partner Joseph F. Rice, to represent the plaintiff class in this action— cochaired the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee. Counsel for the.Center for Claims Resolution (CCR), the consortium of 20 former asbestos manufacturers now before us as petitioners, participated in the Defendants’ Steering Committee. Although the MDL Panel order collected, transferred, and consolidated only cases already commenced in federal courts, settlement negotiations included efforts to find a “means of resolving... future cases.” Record, Doc. 3, p. 2 (Memorandum in Support of Joint Motion for Conditional Class Certification); see also Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc., 157 F. R. D. 246, 266 (ED Pa. 1994) (“primary purpose of the settlement talks in the consolidated MDL litigatidn was to craft a national settlement that would provide an alternative resolution mechanism for asbestos claims,” including claims that might be filed in the future).
In November 1991, the Defendants’ Steering Committee made an offer designed to settle all pending and future asbestos cases by providing a fund for distribution by plaintiffs’ counsel among asbestos-exposed individuals. The Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee rejected this offer, and negotiations fell apart. CCR, however, continued to pursue “a workable administrative system for the handling of future claims.” Id., at 270.,
To that end, CCR counsel approached the lawyers who had headed the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in the unsuccessful negotiations, and a new round of negotiations began; that round yielded the mass settlement agreement now in controversy. At the time, the former heads of the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee represented thousands of plaintiffs with then-pending asbestos-related claims — claimants the parties to this suit call “inventory” plaintiffs. CCR indicated in these discussions that it would resist settlement of inventory cases absent “some kind of protection for the future.” Id., at 294; see also id., at 295 (CCR communicated to the inventory plaintiffs’ attorneys that once the CCR defendants saw a rational way to deal with claims expected to be filed in the future, those defendants would be prepared to address the settlement of pending cases).
Settlement talks thus concentrated on devising an administrative scheme for disposition of asbestos claims not yet in litigation. In these negotiations, counsel for masses of inventory plaintiffs endeavored to represent the interests of the anticipated future claimants, although those lawyers then had no attorney-client relationship with such claimants.
Once negotiations seemed likely to produce an agreement purporting to bind potential plaintiffs, CCR agreed to settle, through separate agreements, the claims of plaintiffs who had already filed asbestos-related lawsuits. In one such agreement, CCR defendants promised to pay more than $200 million to gain release of the claims of numerous inventory plaintiffs. After settling the inventory claims, CCR, together with the plaintiffs’ lawyers CCR had approached, launched this case, exclusively involving persons outside the MDL Panel’s province — plaintiffs without already pending lawsuits.
C
The class action thus instituted was not intended to be litigated. Rather, within the space of a single day, January 15, 1993, the settling parties — CCR defendants and the representatives of the plaintiff class described below — presented to the District Court a complaint, an answer, a proposed settlement agreement, and a joint motion for conditional class certification.
The complaint identified nine lead plaintiffs, designating them and members of their families as representatives of a class comprising all persons who had not filed an asbestos-related lawsuit against a CCR defendant as of the date the class action commenced, but who (1) had been exposed— occupationally or through the occupational exposure of a spouse or household member — to asbestos or products containing asbestos attributable to a CCR defendant, or (2) whose spouse or family member had been so exposed. Untold numbers of individuals may fall within this description. All named plaintiffs alleged that they or a member of their family had been exposed to asbestos-containing products of CCR defendants. More than half of the named plaintiffs alleged that they or their family members had already suffered various physical injuries as a result of the exposure. The others alleged that they had not yet manifested any asbestos-related condition. The complaint delineated no subclasses; all named plaintiffs were designated as representatives of the class as a whole.
The complaint invoked the District Court’s diversity jurisdiction and asserted various state-law claims for relief, including (1) negligent failure to warn, (2) strict liability, (3) breach of express and implied warranty, (4) negligent infliction of emotional distress, (5) enhanced risk of disease, (6) medical monitoring, and (7) civil conspiracy. Each plaintiff requested unspecified damages in excess of $100,000. CCR defendants’ answer denied the principal allegations of the complaint and asserted 11 affirmative defenses.
A stipulation of settlement accompanied the pleadings; it proposed to settle, and to preclude nearly all class members from litigating against CCR companies, all claims not filed before January 15, 1993, involving compensation for present and future asbestos-related personal injury or death. An exhaustive document exceeding 100 pages, the stipulation presents in detail an administrative mechanism and a schedule of payments to compensate class members who meet defined asbestos-exposure and medical requirements. The stipulation describes four categories of compensable disease: mesothelioma; lung cancer; certain “other cancers” (colon-rectal, laryngeal, esophageal, and stomach cancer); and “non-malignant conditions” (asbestosis and bilateral pleural thickening). Persons with “exceptional” medical claims— claims that do not fall within the four described diagnostic categories — may in some instances qualify for compensation, but the settlement caps the number of “exceptional” claims CCR must cover.
For each qualifying disease category, the stipulation specifies the range of damages CCR will pay to qualifying claimants. Payments under the settlement are not adjustable for inflation. Mesothelioma claimants — the most highly compensated category — are scheduled to receive between $20,000 and $200,000. The stipulation provides that CCR is to propose the level of compensation within the prescribed ranges; it also establishes procedures to resolve disputes over medical diagnoses and levels of compensation.
Compensation above the fixed ranges may be obtained for “extraordinary” claims. But the settlement places both numerical caps and dollar limits on such claims. The settlement also imposes “case flow máximums,” which cap the number of claims payable for each disease in a given year.
Class members are to receive no compensation for certain kinds of claims, even if otherwise applicable state law recognizes such claims. Claims that garner no compensation under the settlement include claims by family members of asbestos-exposed individuals for loss of consortium, and claims by so-called “exposure-only” plaintiffs for increased risk of cancer, fear of future asbestos-related injury, and medical monitoring. “Pleural” claims, which might be asserted by persons with asbestos-related plaques on their lungs but no accompanying physical impairment, are also excluded. Although not entitled to present compensation, exposure-only claimants and pleural claimants may qualify for benefits when and if they develop a compensable disease and meet the relevant exposure and medical criteria. Defendants forgo defenses to liability, including statute of limitations pleas.
Class members, in the main, are bound by the settlement in perpetuity, while CCR defendants may choose to withdraw from the settlement after ten years. A small number of class members — only a few per year — may reject the settlement and pursue their claims in court. Those permitted to exercise this option, however, may not assert any punitive damages claim or any claim for increased risk of cancer. Aspects of the administration of the settlement are to be monitored by the AFL-CIO and class counsel. Class counsel are to receive attorneys’ fees in an amount to be approved by the District Court.
D
On January 29,1993, as requested by the settling parties, the District Court conditionally certified, under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(b)(3), an encompassing opt-out class. The certified class included persons occupationally exposed to defendants’ asbestos products, and members of their families, who had not filed suit as of January 15. Judge Weiner appointed Locks, Motley, and Rice as class counsel, noting that “[t]he Court may in the future appoint additional counsel if it is deemed necessary and advisable.” Record, Doc. 11, p. 3 (Class Certification Order). At no stage of the proceedings, however, were additional counsel in fact appointed. Nor was the class ever divided into subclasses. In a separate order, Judge Weiner assigned to Judge Reed, also of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, “the task of conducting fairness proceedings and of determining whether the proposed settlement is fair to the class.” See 157 F. R. D., at 258. Various class members raised objections to the settlement stipulation, and Judge Weiner granted the objectors full rights to participate in the subsequent proceedings. Ibid.
In preliminary rulings, Judge Reed held that the District Court had subject-matter jurisdiction, see Carlough v. Amchem Products, Inc., 834 F. Supp. 1437, 1467-1468 (ED Pa. 1993), and he approved the settling parties’ elaborate plan for giving notice to the class, see Carlough v. Amchem Products, Inc., 158 F. R. D. 314, 336 (ED Pa. 1993). The court-approved notice informed recipients that they could exclude themselves from the class, if they so chose, within a three-month opt-out period.
Objectors raised numerous challenges to the settlement. They urged that the settlement unfairly disadvantaged those without currently compensable conditions in that it failed to adjust for inflation or to account for changes, over time, in medical understanding. They maintained that compensation levels were intolerably low in comparison to awards available in tort litigation or payments received by the inventory plaintiffs. And they objected to the absence of any compensation for certain claims, for example, medical monitoring, compensable under the tort law of several States. Rejecting these and all other objections, Judge Reed concluded that the settlement terms were fair and had been negotiated without collusion. See 157 F. R. D., at 325, 331-332. He also found that adequate notice had been given to class members, see id., at 332-334, and that final class certification under Rule 23(b)(3) was appropriate, see id., at 315.
As to the specific prerequisites to certification, the District Court observed that the class satisfied Rule 23(a)(1)’s numer-osity requirement, see ibid., a matter no one debates. The Rule 23(a)(2) and (b)(3) requirements of commonality and preponderance were also satisfied, the District Court held, in that
“[t]he members of the class have all been exposed to asbestos products supplied by the defendants and all share an interest in receiving prompt and fair compensation for their claims, while minimizing the risks and transaction costs inherent in the asbestos litigation process as it occurs presently in the tort system. Whether the proposed settlement satisfies this interest and is otherwise a fair, reasonable and adequate compromise of the claims of the class is a predominant issue for purposes of Rule 23(b)(3).” Id., at 316.
The District Court held next that the claims of the class representatives were “typical” of the class as a whole, a requirement of Rule 23(a)(3), and that, as Rule 23(b)(3) demands, the class settlement was “superior” to other methods of adjudication. See ibid.
Strenuous objections had been asserted regarding the adequacy of representation, a Rule 23(a)(4) requirement. Objectors maintained that class counsel and class representatives had disqualifying conflicts of interests. In particular, objectors urged, claimants whose injuries had become manifest and claimants without manifest injuries should not have common counsel and should not be aggregated in a single class. Furthermore, objectors argued, lawyers representing inventory plaintiffs should not represent the newly formed class.
Satisfied that class counsel had ably negotiated the settlement in the best interests of all concerned, and that the named parties served as adequate representatives, the District Court rejected these objections. See id., at 317-319, 326-332. Subclasses were unnecessary, the District Court held, bearing in mind the added cost and confusion they would entail and the ability of class members to exclude themselves from the class during the three-month opt-out period. See id., at 318-319. Reasoning that the representative plaintiffs “have a strong interest that recovery for. all of the medical categories be maximized because they may have claims in any, or several categories,” the District Court found “no antagonism of interest between class members with various medical conditions, or between persons with and without currently manifest asbestos impairment.” Id., at 318. Declaring class certification appropriate and the settlement fair, the District Court preliminarily enjoined all class members from commencing any asbestos-related suit against the CCR defendants in any state or federal court. See Georgine v. Amchem Products, Inc., 878 F. Supp. 716, 726-727 (ED Pa. 1994).
The objectors appealed. The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit vacated the certification, holding that the requirements of Rule 23 had not been satisfied. See 83 F. 3d 610 (1996).
E
The Court of Appeals, in a long, heavily detailed opinion by Judge Becker, first noted several challenges by objectors to justiciability, subject-matter jurisdiction, and adequacy of notice. These challenges, the court said, raised “serious concerns.” Id., at 623. However, the court observed, “the jurisdictional issues in this case would not exist but for the [class-action] certification.” Ibid. Turning to the class-certification issues and finding them dispositive, the Third Circuit declined to decide other questions.
On class-action prerequisites, the Court of Appeals referred to an earlier Third Circuit decision, In re General Motors Corp. Pick-Up Truck Fuel Tank Products Liability Litigation, 55 F. 3d 768, cert. denied, 516 U. S. 824 (1995) (hereinafter GM Trucks), which held that although a class action may be certified for settlement purposes only, Rule 23(a)’s requirements must be satisfied as if the case were going to be litigated. 55 F. 3d, at 799-800. The same rule should apply, the Third Circuit said, to class certification under Rule 23(b)(3). See 83 F. 3d, at 625. But cf. In re Asbestos Litigation, 90 F. 3d 963, 975-976, and n. 8 (CA5 1996), cert. pending, Nos. 96-1379, 96-1394. While stating that the requirements of Rule 23(a) and (b)(3) must be met “without taking into account the settlement,” 83 F. 3d, at 626, the Court of Appeals in fact closely considered the terms of the settlement as it examined aspects of the case under Rule 23 criteria. See id., at 630-634.
The Third Circuit recognized that Rule 23(a)(2)’s “commonality” requirement is subsumed under, or superseded by, the more stringent Rule 23(b)(3) requirement that questions common to the class “predominate over” other questions. The court therefore trained its attention on the “predominance” inquiry. See id., at 627. The harmfulness of asbestos exposure was indeed a prime factor common to the class, the Third Circuit observed. See id., at 626, 630. But uncommon questions abounded.
In contrast to mass torts involving a single accident, class members in this case were exposed to different asbestos-containing products, in different ways, over different periods, and for different amounts of time; some suffered no physical injury, others suffered disabling or deadly diseases. See id., at 626, 628. “These factual differences,” the Third Circuit explained, “translated] into significant legal differences.” Id., at 627. State law governed and varied widely on such critical issues as “viability of [exposure-only] claims [and] availability of causes of action for medical monitoring, increased risk of cancer, and fear of future injury.” Ibid. “[T]he number of uncommon issues in this humongous class action,” the Third Circuit concluded, ibid., barred a determination, under existing tort law, that common questions predominated, see id., at 630.
The Court of Appeals next found that “serious intra-class conflicts preclude[d] th[e] class from meeting the adequacy of representation requirement” of Rule 23(a)(4). Ibid. Adverting to, but not resolving charges of attorney conflict of interests, the Third Circuit addressed the question whether the named plaintiffs could adequately advance the interests of all class members. The Court of Appeals acknowledged that the District Court was certainly correct to this extent: “ ‘[T]he members of the class are united in seeking the maximum possible recovery for their asbestos-related claims.’” Ibid, (quoting 157 F. R. D., at 317). “But the settlement does more than simply provide a general recovery fund,” the Court of Appeals immediately added; “[rjather, it makes important judgments on how recovery is to be allocated among different kinds of plaintiffs, decisions that necessarily favor some claimants over others.” 83 F. 3d, at 630.
In the Third Circuit’s view, the "most salient” divergence of interests separated plaintiffs already afflicted with an asbestos-related disease from plaintiffs without manifest injury (exposure-only plaintiffs). The latter would rationally want protection against inflation for distant recoveries. See ibid. They would also seek sturdy back-end opt-out rights and “causation provisions that can keep pace with changing science and medicine, rather than freezing in place the science of 1993.” Id., at 630-631. Already injured parties, in contrast, would care little about such provisions and would rationally trade them for higher current payouts. See id., at 631. These and other adverse interests, the Court of Appeals carefully explained, strongly suggested that an undivided set of representatives could not adequately protect the discrete interests of both currently afflicted and exposure-only claimants.
The Third Circuit next rejected the District Court’s determination that the named plaintiffs were “typical” of the class, noting that this Rule 23(a)(3) inquiry overlaps the adequacy of representation question: “both look to the potential for conflicts in the class.” Id., at 632. Evident conflict problems, the court said, led it to hold that “no set of representatives can be ‘typical’ of this class.” Ibid.
The Court of Appeals similarly rejected the District Court’s assessment of the superiority of the class action. The Third Circuit initially noted that a class action so large and complex “could not be tried.” Ibid. The court elaborated most particularly, however, on the unfairness of binding exposure-only plaintiffs who might be unaware of the class action or lack sufficient information about their exposure to make a reasoned decision whether to stay in or opt out. See id., at 633. “A series of statewide or more narrowly defined adjudications, either through consolidation under Rule 42(a) or as class actions under Rule 23, would seem preferable,” the Court of Appeals said. Id., at 634.
The Third Circuit, after intensive review, ultimately ordered decertification of the class and vacation of the District Court’s antisuit injunction. Id., at 635. Judge Wellford concurred, “fully subscribing] to the decision of Judge Becker that the plaintiffs in this case ha[d] not met the requirements of Rule 23.” Ibid. He added that in his view, named exposure-only plaintiffs had no standing to pursue the suit in federal court, for their depositions showed that “[t]hey claimed no damages and no present injury.” Id., at 638.
We granted certiorari, 519 U. S. 957 (1996), and now affirm.
II
Objectors assert in this Court, as they did in the District Court and Court of Appeals, an array of jurisdictional barriers. Most fundamentally, they maintain that the settlement proceeding instituted by class counsel and CCR is not a justi-ciable case or controversy within the confines of Article III of the Federal Constitution. In the main, they say, the proceeding is a nonadversarial endeavor to impose on countless individuals without currently ripe claims an administrative compensation regime binding on those individuals if and when they manifest injuries.
Furthermore, objectors urge that exposure-only claimants lack standing to sue: Either they have not yet sustained any cognizable injury or, to the extent the complaint states claims and demands relief for emotional distress, enhanced risk of disease, and medical monitoring, the settlement provides no redress. Objectors also argue that exposure-only claimants did not meet the then-current amount-in-controversy requirement (in excess of $50,000) specified for federal-court jurisdiction based upon diversity of citizenship. See 28 U. S. C. § 1332(a).
As earlier recounted, see supra, at 608, the Third Circuit declined to reach these issues because they “would not exist but for the [class-action] certification.” 83 F. 3d, at 623. We agree that “[t]he class certification issues are dispositive,” ibid.; because their resolution here is logically antecedent to the existence of any Article III issues, it is appropriate to reach them first, cf. Arizonans for Official English v. Arizona, 520 U. S. 43, 66-67 (1997) (declining to resolve definitively question whether petitioners had standing because mootness issue was dispositive of the case). We therefore follow the path taken by the Court of Appeals, mindful that Rule 23’s requirements must be interpreted in keeping with Article III constraints, and with the Rules Enabling Act, which instructs that rules of procedure “shall not abridge, enlarge or modify any substantive right,” 28 U. S. C. § 2072(b). See also Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 82 (“rules shall not be construed to extend... the [subject-matter] jurisdiction of the United States district courts”).
III
To place this controversy in context, we briefly describe the characteristics of class actions for which the Federal Rules provide. Rule 23, governing federal-court class actions, stems from equity practice and gained its current shape in an innovative 1966 revision. See generally Kaplan, Continuing Work of the Civil Committee: 1966 Amendments of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (I), 81 Harv. L. Rev. 356, 375-400 (1967) (hereinafter Kaplan, Continuing Work). Rule 23(a) states four threshold requirements applicable to all class actions: (1) numerosity (a “class [so large] that join-der of all members is impracticable”); (2) commonality (“questions of law or fact common to the class”); (3) typicality (named parties’ claims or defenses “are typical... of the class”); and (4) adequacy of representation (representatives “will fairly and adequately protect the interests of the class”).
In addition to satisfying Rule 23(a)’s prerequisites, parties seeking class certification must show that the action is maintainable under Rule 23(b)(1), (2), or (3). Rule 23(b)(1) covers cases in which separate actions by or against individual class members would risk establishing “incompatible standards of conduct for the party opposing the class,” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(b)(1)(A), or would “as a practical matter be disposi-tive of the interests” of nonparty class members “or substantially impair or impede their ability to protect their interests,” Rule 23(b)(1)(B). Rule 23(b)(1)(A) “takes in cases where the party is obliged by law to treat the members of the class alike (a utility acting toward customers; a government imposing a tax), or where the party must treat all alike as a matter of practical necessity (a riparian owner using water as against downriver owners).” Kaplan, Continuing Work 388 (footnotes omitted). Rule 23(b)(1)(B) includes, for example, “limited fund” cases, instances in which numerous persons make claims against a fund insufficient to satisfy all claims. See Advisory Committee’s Notes on Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23, 28 U. S. C. App., pp. 696-697 (hereinafter Adv. Comm. Notes).
Rule 23(b)(2) permits class actions for declaratory or in-junctive relief where “the party opposing the class has acted or refused to act on grounds generally applicable to the class.” Civil rights cases against parties charged with unlawful, class-based discrimination are prime examples. Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 697; see Kaplan, Continuing Work 389 (subdivision (b)(2) “build[s] on experience mainly, but not exclusively, in the civil rights field”).
In the 1966 class-action amendments, Rule 23(b)(3), the category at issue here, was “the most adventuresome” innovation. See Kaplan, A Prefatory Note, 10 B. C. Ind. & Com. L. Rev. 497, 497 (1969) (hereinafter Kaplan, Prefatory Note). Rule 23(b)(3) added to the complex-litigation arsenal class actions for damages designed to secure judgments binding all class members save those who affirmatively elected to be excluded. See 7A C. Wright, A. Miller, & M. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1777, p. 517 (2d ed. 1986) (hereinafter Wright, Miller, & Kane); see generally Kaplan, Continuing Work 379-400. Rule 23(b)(3) “opt-out” class actions superseded the former “spurious” class action, so characterized because it generally functioned as a permissive joinder (“opt-in”) device. See 7A Wright, Miller, & Kane § 1753, at 28-31, 42-44; see also Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 695.
Framed for situations in which “class-action treatment is not as clearly called for” as it is in Rule 23(b)(1) and (b)(2) situations, Rule 23(b)(3) permits certification where class suit “may nevertheless be convenient and desirable.” Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 697. To qualify for certification under Rule 23(b)(3), a class must meet two requirements beyond the Rule 23(a) prerequisites: Common questions must “predominate over any questions affecting only individual members”; and class resolution must be “superior to other available methods for the fair and efficient adjudication of the controversy.” In adding “predominance” and “superiority” to the qualification-for-certification list, the Advisory Committee sought to cover cases “in which a class action would achieve economies of time, effort, and expense, and promote... uniformity of decision as to persons similarly situated, without sacrificing procedural fairness or bringing about other undesirable results.” Ibid. Sensitive to the competing tugs of individual autonomy for those who might prefer to go it alone or in a smaller unit, on the one hand, and systemic efficiency on the other, the Reporter for the 1966 amendments cautioned: “The new provision invites a close look at the case before it is accepted as a class action....” Kaplan, Continuing Work 390.
Rule 23(b)(3) includes a nonexhaustive list of factors pertinent to a court’s “close look” at the predominance and superiority criteria:
“(A) the interest of members of the class in individually controlling the prosecution or defense of separate actions; (B) the extent and nature of any litigation concerning the controversy already commenced by or against members of the class; (C) the desirability or undesirability of concentrating the litigation of the claims in the particular forum; (D) the difficulties likely to be encountered in the management of a class action.”
In setting out these factors, the Advisory Committee for the 1966 reform anticipated that in each case, courts would “consider the interests of individual members of the class in controlling their own litigations and carrying them on as they see fit.” Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 698. They elaborated:
“The interests of individuals in conducting separate lawsuits may be so strong as to call for denial of a class action. On the other hand, these interests may be theoretic rather than practical; the class may have a high degree of cohesion and prosecution of the action through representatives would be quite únobjectionable, or the amounts at stake for individuals may be so small that separate suits would be impracticable.” Ibid.
See also Kaplan, Continuing Work 391 (“Th[e] interest [in individual control] can be high where the stake of each member bulks large and his will and ability to take care of himself are strong; the interest may be no more than theoretic where the individual stake is so small as to make a separate action impracticable.” (footnote omitted)). As the Third Circuit observed in the instant case: “Each plaintiff [in an action involving claims for personal injury and death] has a significant interest in individually controlling the prosecution of [his case]”; each “ha[s] a substantial stake in making individual decisions on whether and when to settle.” 83 F. 3d, at 633.
While the text of Rule 23(b)(3) does not exclude from certification cases in which individual damages run high, the Advisory Committee had dominantly in mind vindication of “the rights of groups of people who individually would be without effective strength to bring their opponents into court at all.” Kaplan, Prefatory Note 497. As concisely recalled in a recent Seventh Circuit opinion:
“The policy at the very core of the class action mechanism is to overcome the problem that small recoveries do not provide the incentive for any individual to bring a solo action prosecuting his or her rights. A class action solves this problem by aggregating the relatively paltry potential recoveries into something worth someone’s (usually an attorney’s) labor.” Mace v. Van Ru Credit Corp., 109 F. 3d 338, 344 (1997).
To alert class members to their right to “opt out” of a (b)(3) class, Rule 23 instructs the court to “direct to the members of the class the best notice practicable under the circumstances, including individual notice to all members who can be identified through reasonable effort.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(c)(2); see Eisen v. Carlisle & Jacquelin, 417 U. S. 156, 173-177 (1974) (individual notice to class members identifiable through reasonable effort is mandatory in (b)(3) actions; requirement may not be relaxed based on high cost).
No class action may be “dismissed or compromised without [court] approval,” preceded by notice to class members. Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 23(e). The Advisory Committee’s sole comment on this terse final provision of Rule 23 restates the Rule’s instruction without elaboration: “Subdivision (e) requires approval of the court, after notice, for the dismissal or compromise of any class action.” Adv. Comm. Notes, 28 U. S. C. App., p. 699.
In the decades since the 1966 revision of Rule 23, class
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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I
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Black
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1958 Pabst Brewing Company, the Nation’s tenth largest brewer, acquired the Blatz Brewing Company, the eighteenth largest. In 1959 the Government brought this action charging that the acquisition violated § 7 of the Clayton Act as amended by the Celler-Kefauver Anti-Merger amendment. That section makes it unlawful for one corporation engaged in commerce to acquire the stock or assets of another “where in any line of commerce in any section of the country, the effect of such acquisition may be substantially to lessen competition, or to tend to create a monopoly.” (Emphasis supplied.) The Government’s complaint charged that “The effect of this acquisition may be substantially to lessen competition or to tend to create a monopoly in the production and sale of beer in the United States and in various sections thereof, including the State of Wisconsin and the three state area encompassing Wisconsin, Illinois and Michigan . ...” At the close of the Government’s case, the District Court dismissed the case under Rule 41 (b) of the Fed. Rules Civ. Proc., holding that the Government’s proof had not shown that either Wisconsin or the three-state area of Wisconsin, Michigan and Illinois was a “relevant geographic market within which the probable effect of the acquisition of Blatz by Pabst should be tested.” The District Court also ruled that the Government had not shown that “the effect of the acquisition . . . may be substantially to lessen competition or to tend to create a monopoly in the beer industry in the continental United States, the only relevant geographic market.” 233 F. Supp. 475, 481, 488.
I.
We first take up the court’s dismissal based on its conclusion that the Government failed to prove either Wisconsin or the three-state area constituted “a relevant section of the country within the meaning of Section 7.” Apparently the District Court thought that in order to show a violation of § 7 it was essential for the Government to show a “relevant geographic market” in the same way the corpus delicti must be proved to establish a crime. But when the Government brings an action under § 7 it must, according to the language of the statute, prove no more than that there has been a merger between two corporations engaged in commerce and that the effect of the merger may be substantially to lessen competition or tend to create a monopoly in any line of commerce “in any section of the country.” (Emphasis supplied.) The language of this section requires merely that the Government prove the merger may have a substantial anticompetitive effect somewhere in the United States — -“in any section” of the United States. This phrase does not call for the delineation of a “section of the country” by metes and bounds as a surveyor would lay off a plot of ground. The Government may introduce evidence which shows that as a result of a merger competition may be substantially lessened throughout the country, or on the other hand it may prove that competition may be substantially lessened only in one or more sections of the country. In either event a violation of § 7 would be proved. Certainly the failure of the Government to prove by an army of expert witnesses what constitutes a relevant “economic” or “geographic” market is not an adequate ground on which to dismiss a § 7 case. Compare United States v. Continental Can Co., 378 U. S. 441, 458. Congress did not seem to be troubled about the exact spot where competition might be lessened; it simply intended to outlaw mergers which threatened competition in any or all parts of the country. Proof of the section of the country where the anticompetitive effect exists is entirely subsidiary to the crucial question in this and every § 7 case which is whether a merger may substantially lessen competition anywhere in the United States.
II.
The Government’s evidence, consisting of documents, statistics, official records, depositions, and affidavits by witnesses, related principally to the competitive position of Pabst and Blatz in the beer industry throughout the Nation, in the three-state area of Wisconsin, Illinois, and Michigan, and in the State of Wisconsin. The record in this case, including admissions by Pabst in its formal answer to the Government’s complaint, the evidence introduced by the Government, the findings of fact and opinion of the District Judge, shows among others the following facts. In 1958, the year of the merger, Pabst was the tenth largest brewer in the Nation and Blatz ranked eighteenth. The merger made Pabst the Nation’s fifth largest brewer with 4.49% of the industry’s total sales. By 1961, three years after the merger, Pabst had increased its share of the beer market to 5.83% and had become the third largest brewer in the country. In the State of Wisconsin, before the merger, Blatz was the leading seller of beer and Pabst ranked fourth. The merger made Pabst the largest seller in the State with 23.95% of all the sales made there. By 1961 Pabst’s share of the market had increased to 27.41%.. This merger took place in an industry marked by a steady trend toward economic concentration. According to theg, District Court the number of breweries operating in the United States declined from 714 in 1934 to 229 in 1961, and the total number of different competitors selling beer has fallen from 206 in 1957 to 162 in 1961. In Wisconsin the number of companies selling beer has declined from 77 in 1955 to 54 in 1961. At the same time the number of competitors in the industry were becoming fewer and fewer, the leading brewers were increasing their shares of sales. Between 1957 and 1961 the Nation’s 10 leading brewers increased their combined shares of sales from 45.06% to 52.60%. In Wisconsin the four leading sellers accounted for 47.74% of the State’s sales in 1957 and by 1961 this share had increased to 58.62%. In the three-state area the evidence showed that in 1957 Blatz was the sixth largest seller with 5.84% of the total sales there and Pabst ranked seventh with 5.48%. As was true in the beer industry throughout the Nation, there was a trend toward concentration in the three-state area. From 1957 to 1961 the number of major brewers selling there dropped from 104 to 86 and during the same period the eight leading sellers increased their combined shares of beer sales from 58.93% to 67.65%.
These facts show a very marked thirty-year decline in the number of brewers and a sharp rise in recent years in the percentage share of the market controlled by the leading brewers. If not stopped, this decline in the number of separate competitors and this rise in the share of the market controlled by the larger beer manufacturers are bound to lead to greater and greater concentration of the beer industry into fewer and fewer hands. The merger of Pabst and Blatz brought together two very large brewers competing against each other in 40 States. In 1957 these two companies had combined sales which accounted for 23.95% of the beer sales in Wisconsin, 11.32% of the sales in the three-state area of Wisconsin, Illinois, and Michigan, and 4.49% of the sales throughout the country. In accord with our prior cases, we hold that the evidence as to the probable effect of the merger on competition in Wisconsin, in the three-state area, a.nd in the entire country was sufficient to show a violation of § 7 in each and all of these three areas.
We have not overlooked Pabst’s contention that we should not consider the steady trend toward concentration in the beer industry because the Government has not shown that the trend is due to mergers. There is no duty on the Government to make such proof. It would seem fantastic to assume that part of the concentration in the beer industry has not been due to mergers but even if the Government made no such proof, it would not aid Pabst. Congress, in passing § 7 and in amending it with the Celler-Kefauver Anti-Merger amendment, was concerned with arresting concentration in the American economy, whatever its cause, in its incipiency. To put a halt to what it considered to be a “rising tide” of concentration in American business, Congress, with full power to do so, decided “to clamp down with vigor on mergers.” United States v. Von’s Grocery Co., ante, at 276. It passed and amended § 7 on the premise that mergers do tend to accelerate concentration in an industry. Many believe that this assumption of Congress is wrong, and that the disappearance of small businesses with a correlative concentration of business in the hands of a few is bound to occur whether mergers are prohibited or not. But it is not for the courts to review the policy decision of Congress that mergers which may substantially lessen competition are forbidden, which in effect the courts would be doing should they now require proof of the congressional premise that mergers are a major cause of concentration. We hold that a trend toward concentration in an industry, whatever its causes, is a highly relevant factor in deciding how substantial the anticompetitive effect of a merger may be.
Reversed and remanded.
38 Stat. 731, as amended, 64 Stat. 1125, 15 U. S. C. §18 (1964 ed.).
The complaint charged that the merger violated § 7 of the Clayton Act in the following ways among others:
“(a) Actual and potential competition between Pabst and Blatz in the sale of beer has been eliminated;
“(b) Actual and potential competition generally in the sale of beer may be substantially lessened;
“(c) Blatz has been eliminated as an independent competitive factor in the production and sale of beer;
“(d) The acquisition alleged herein may enhance Pabst’s competitive advantage in the production and sale of beer to the detriment of actual and potential competition;
“(e) Industry-wide concentration in the sale of beer will be increased.”
Times-Picayune v. United States, 345 U. S. 594, 611; United States v. du Pont & Co., 351 U. S. 377, 395; United States v. Philadelphia Nat. Bank, 374 U. S. 321, 360, n. 37.
See, e. g., United States v. Von’s Grocery Co., ante, p. 270; Brown Shoe Co. v. United States, 370 U. S. 294; United States v. Philadelphia Nat. Bank, 374 U. S. 321; United States v. El Paso Gas Co., 376 U. S. 651; United States v. Alcoa, 377 U. S. 271; United States v. Continental Can Co., 378 U. S. 441; FTC v. Consolidated Foods, 380 U. S. 592.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Chief Justice Roberts
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In an effort to address the large number of prisoner complaints filed in federal court, Congress enacted the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PLRA), 110 Stat. 1321-71, as amended, 42 U. S. C. § 1997e et seq. Among other reforms, the PLRA mandates early judicial screening of prisoner complaints and requires prisoners to exhaust prison grievance procedures before filing suit. 28 U. S. C. § 1915A; 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(a). The Sixth Circuit, along with some other lower courts, adopted several procedural rules designed to implement this exhaustion requirement and facilitate early judicial screening. These rules require a prisoner to allege and demonstrate exhaustion in his complaint, permit suit only against defendants who were identified by the prisoner in his grievance, and require courts to dismiss the entire action if the prisoner fails to satisfy the exhaustion requirement as to any single claim in his complaint. Other lower courts declined to adopt such rules. We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict and now conclude that these rules are not required by the PLRA, and that crafting and imposing them exceeds the proper limits on the judicial role.
I
Prisoner litigation continues to “account for an outsized share of filings” in federal district courts. Woodford v. Ngo, 548 U. S. 81, 94, n. 4 (2006). In 2005, nearly 10 percent of all civil cases filed in federal courts nationwide were prisoner complaints challenging prison conditions or claiming civil rights violations. Most of these cases have no merit; many are frivolous. Our legal system, however, remains committed to guaranteeing that prisoner claims of illegal conduct by their custodians are fairly handled according to law. The challenge lies in ensuring that the flood of nonmeritorious claims does not submerge and effectively preclude consideration of the allegations with merit. See Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U. S. 319, 327 (1989).
Congress addressed that challenge in the PLRA. What this country needs, Congress decided, is fewer and better prisoner suits. See Porter v. Nussle, 534 U. S. 516, 524 (2002) (PLRA intended to “reduce the quantity and improve the quality of prisoner suits”). To that end, Congress enacted a variety of reforms designed to filter out the bad claims and facilitate consideration of the good. Key among these was the requirement that inmates complaining about prison conditions exhaust prison grievance remedies before initiating a lawsuit.
The exhaustion provision of the PLRA states:
“No action shall be brought with respect to prison conditions under [42 U. S. C. § 1983], or any other Federal law, by a prisoner confined in any jail, prison, or other correctional facility until such administrative remedies as are available are exhausted.” 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(a).
Requiring exhaustion allows prison officials an opportunity to resolve disputes concerning the exercise of their responsibilities before being haled into court. This has the potential to reduce the number of inmate suits, and also to improve the quality of suits that are filed by producing a useful administrative record. Woodford, supra, at 94-95. In an attempt to implement the exhaustion requirement, some lower courts have imposed procedural rules that have become the subject of varying levels of disagreement among the federal courts of appeals.
The first question presented centers on a conflict over whether exhaustion under the PLRA is a pleading requirement the prisoner must satisfy in his complaint or an affirmative defense the defendant must plead and prove. The Sixth Circuit, adopting the former view, requires prisoners to attach proof of exhaustion — typically copies of the grievances — to their complaints to avoid dismissal. If no written record of the grievance is available, the inmate must plead with specificity how and when he exhausted the grievance procedures. Knuckles El v. Toombs, 215 F. 3d 640, 642 (2000).
The next issue concerns how courts determine whether a prisoner has properly exhausted administrative remedies— specifically, the level of detail required in a grievance to put the prison and individual officials on notice of the claim. The Sixth Circuit requires that a prisoner have identified, in the first step of the grievance process, each individual later named in the lawsuit to properly exhaust administrative remedies. Burton v. Jones, 321 F. 3d 569, 575 (2003). Other Circuits have taken varying approaches to this question, see, e. g., Butler v. Adams, 397 F. 3d 1181, 1183 (CA9 2005) (proper exhaustion requires use of the administrative process provided by the State; if that process does not require identification of specific persons, neither does the PLRA); Johnson v. Johnson, 385 F. 3d 503, 522 (CA5 2004) (“[T]he grievance must provide administrators with a fair opportunity under the circumstances to address the problem that will later form the basis of the suit”); Riccardo v. Rausch, 375 F. 3d 521, 524 (CA7 2004) (exhaustion satisfied if grievance “served its function of alerting the state and inviting corrective action”), none going as far as the Sixth Circuit in requiring in every case that the defendants have been named from the beginning of the grievance process.
Finally, the Circuits are divided over what the PLRA requires when both exhausted and unexhausted claims are in-eluded in a complaint. Some Circuits, including the Sixth Circuit, apply a “total exhaustion” rule, under which no part of the suit may proceed if any single claim in the action is not properly exhausted. See, e. g., Jones Bey v. Johnson, 407 F. 3d 801, 805 (CA6 2005). Among Circuits requiring total exhaustion there is further disagreement over what to do if the requirement is not met. Most courts allow the prisoner to amend his complaint to include only exhausted claims, e. g., Kozohorsky v. Harmon, 332 F. 3d 1141, 1144 (CA8 2003), but the Sixth Circuit denies leave to amend, dismisses the action, and requires that it be filed anew with only exhausted claims, Baxter v. Rose, 305 F. 3d 486, 488 (2002); Jones Bey, supra, at 807. See also McGore v. Wrigglesworth, 114 F. 3d 601, 612 (1997). Other Circuits reject total exhaustion altogether, instead dismissing only unexhausted claims and considering the rest on the merits. See, e. g., Ortiz v. McBride, 380 F. 3d 649, 663 (CA2 2004).
A
Petitioners are inmates in the custody of the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC). At the time petitioners filed their grievances, MDOC Policy Directive 03.02.130 (Nov. 1, 2000) set forth the applicable grievance procedures. 1 App. 138-157. The policy directive describes what issues are grievable and contains instructions for filing and processing grievances.
Inmates must first attempt to resolve a problem orally within two business days of becoming aware of the grievable issue. Id., at 147. If oral resolution is unsuccessful, the inmate may proceed to Step I of the grievance process, and submit a completed grievance form within five business days of the attempted oral resolution. Id., at 147,149-150. The Step I grievance form provided by MDOC (a one-page form on which the inmate fills out identifying information and is given space to describe the complaint) advises inmates to be “brief and concise in describing your grievance issue.” 2 id., at 1. The inmate submits the grievance to a designated grievance coordinator, who assigns it to a respondent — generally the supervisor of the person being grieved. 1 id., at 150.
If the inmate is dissatisfied with the Step I response, he may appeal to Step II by obtaining an appeal form within five business days of the response, and submitting the appeal within five business days of obtaining the form. Id., at 152. The respondent at Step II is designated by the policy, id., at 152-153 (e. g., the regional health administrator for medical care grievances). If still dissatisfied after Step II, the inmate may further appeal to Step III using the same appeal form; the MDOC director is designated as respondent for all Step III appeals. Id., at 154.
Lorenzo Jones
Petitioner Lorenzo Jones is incarcerated at MDOC’s Saginaw Correctional Facility. In November 2000, while in MDOC’s custody, Jones was involved in a vehicle accident and suffered significant injuries to his neck and back. Several months later Jones was given a work assignment he allegedly could not perform in light of his injuries. According to Jones, respondent Paul Morrison — in charge of work assignments at the prison — made the inappropriate assignment, even though he knew of Jones’s injuries. When Jones reported to the assignment, he informed the staff member in charge — respondent Michael Opanasenko — that he could not perform the work; Opanasenko allegedly told him to do the work or “‘suffer the consequences.’” Id., at 20. Jones performed the required tasks and allegedly aggravated his injuries. After unsuccessfully seeking redress through MDOC’s grievance process, Jones filed a complaint in the Eastern District of Michigan under 42 U. S. C. § 1983 for deliberate indifference to medical needs, retaliation, and harassment. Jones named as defendants, in addition to Morrison and Opanasenko, respondents Barbara Bock (the warden), Valerie Chaplin (a deputy warden), Janet Konkle (a registered nurse), and Ahmad Aldabaugh (a physician).
A Magistrate Judge recommended dismissal for failure to state a claim with respect to Bock, Chaplin, Konkle, and Aldabaugh, and the District Court agreed. 1 App. 41. With respect to Morrison and Opanasenko, however, the Magistrate Judge recommended that the suit proceed, finding that Jones had exhausted his administrative remedies as to those two. Id., at 18-29. The District Court Judge disagreed. In his complaint, Jones provided the dates on which his claims were filed at various steps of the MDOC grievance procedures. Id., at 41. He did not, however, attach copies of the grievance forms or describe the proceedings with specificity. Respondents attached copies of all of Jones’s grievances to their own motion to dismiss, but the District Judge ruled that Jones’s failure to meet his burden to plead exhaustion in his complaint could not be cured by respondents. Id., at 42. The Sixth Circuit agreed, holding both that Jones failed to comply with the specific pleading requirements applied to PLRA suits, 135 Fed. Appx. 837,839 (2005) (per curiam) (citing Knuckles El, 215 F. 3d, at 642), and that, even if Jones had shown that he exhausted the claims against Morrison and Opanasenko, dismissal was still required under the total exhaustion rule, 135 Fed. Appx., at 839 (citing Jones Bey, 407 F. 3d, at 806).
Timothy Williams
Petitioner Timothy Williams is incarcerated at MDOC’s Adrian Correctional Facility. He suffers from noninvoluting cavernous hemangiomas in his right arm, a medical condition that causes pain, immobility, and disfigurement of the limb, and for which he has undergone several surgeries. An MDOC physician recommended further surgery to provide pain relief, but MDOC’s Correctional Medical Services denied the recommendation (and subsequent appeals by the doctor) on the ground that the danger of surgery outweighed the benefits, which it viewed as cosmetic. The MDOC Medical Services Advisory Committee upheld this decision. After Correctional Medical Services indicated that it would take the request under advisement, Williams filed a grievance objecting to the quality of his medical care and seeking authorization for the surgery. He later filed another grievance complaining that he was denied a single-occupancy handicapped cell, allegedly necessary to accommodate his medical condition. After both grievances were denied at all stages, Williams filed a complaint in the Eastern District of Michigan under §1983, naming as respondents William Overton (former director of MDOC), David Jamrog (the warden), Mary Jo Pass and Paul Klee (assistant deputy wardens), Chad Markwell (corrections officer), Bonnie Peterson (health unit manager), and Dr. George Pramstaller (chief medical officer for MDOC).
The District Judge found that Williams had failed to exhaust his administrative remedies with regard to his medical care claim because he had not identified any of the respondents named in his lawsuit during the grievance process. Although Williams’s claim concerning the handicapped cell had been properly exhausted, the District Judge — applying the total exhaustion rule — dismissed the entire suit. The Sixth Circuit affirmed. 136 Fed. Appx. 859, 861-863 (2005) (citing Burton, 321 F. 3d, at 574, Curry v. Scott, 249 F. 3d 493, 504-505 (CA6 2001), and Jones Bey, supra, at 805).
John Walton
Petitioner John Walton is incarcerated at MDOC’s Alger Maximum Correctional Facility. After assaulting a guard, he was sanctioned with an indefinite “upper slot” restriction. Several months later, upon learning that other prisoners had been given upper slot restrictions of only three months for the same infraction, he filed a grievance claiming that this disparity was the result of racial discrimination (Walton is black, the two other prisoners he identified in his grievances are white). After the grievance was denied, Walton filed a complaint in the Western District of Michigan under § 1983, claiming race discrimination. He named as respondents Barbara Bouchard (former warden), Ken Gearin, David Bergh, and Ron Bobo (assistant deputy wardens), Catherine Bauman (resident unit manager), and Denise Gerth (assistant resident unit supervisor).
The District Judge dismissed the lawsuit because Walton had not named any respondent other than Bobo in his grievanee. His claims against the other respondents were thus not properly exhausted, and the court dismissed the entire action under the total exhaustion rule. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, reiterating its requirement that a prisoner must “file a grievance against the person he ultimately seeks to sue,” Curry, supra, at 505, and that this requirement can only be satisfied by naming each defendant at Step I of the MDOC grievance process. Because Walton had exhausted prison remedies only as to respondent Bobo, the Sixth Circuit affirmed the District Court’s dismissal of the entire action. 136 Fed. Appx. 846, 848-849 (2005).
B
Jones sought review in a petition for certiorari, arguing that the Sixth Circuit’s heightened pleading requirement and total exhaustion rule contravene the clear language of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the PLRA. Williams and Walton filed a joint petition under this Court’s Rule 12.4, contending that the rule requiring every defendant to be named during the grievance process is not required by the PLRA, and also challenging the total exhaustion rule. We granted both petitions for certiorari, 547 U. S. 1002 (2006), and consolidated the cases for our review.
II
There is no question that exhaustion is mandatory under the PLRA and that unexhausted claims cannot be brought in court. Porter, 534 U. S., at 524. What is less clear is whether it falls to the prisoner to plead and demonstrate exhaustion in the complaint, or to the defendant to raise lack of exhaustion as an affirmative defense. The minority rule, adopted by the Sixth Circuit, places the burden of pleading exhaustion in a ease covered by the PLRA on the prisoner; most courts view failure to exhaust as an affirmative defense. See n. 2, supra.
We think petitioners, and the majority of courts to consider the question, have the better of the argument. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a) requires simply a “short and plain statement of the claim” in a complaint, while Rule 8(c) identifies a nonexhaustive list of affirmative defenses that must be pleaded in response. The PLRA itself is not a source of a prisoner’s claim; claims covered by the PLRA are typically brought under 42 U. S. C. § 1983, which does not require exhaustion at all, see Patsy v. Board of Regents of Fla., 457 U. S. 496, 516 (1982). Petitioners assert that courts typically regard exhaustion as an affirmative defense in other contexts, see Brief for Petitioners 34-36, and nn. 12-13 (citing cases), and respondents do not seriously dispute the general proposition. We have referred to exhaustion in these terms, see, e. g., Wright v. Universal Maritime Service Corp., 525 U. S. 70, 75 (1998) (referring to “failure to exhaust” as an “affirmative defens[e]”), including in the similar statutory scheme governing habeas corpus, Day v. McDonough, 547 U. S. 198, 208 (2006) (referring to exhaustion as a “defense”). The PLRA dealt extensively with the subject of exhaustion, see 42 U. S. C. §§ 1997e(a), (c)(2), but is silent on the issue whether exhaustion must be pleaded by the plaintiff or is an affirmative defense. This is strong evidence that the usual practice should be followed, and the usual practice under the Federal Rules is to regard exhaustion as an affirmative defense.
In a series of recent cases, we have explained that courts should generally not depart from the usual practice under the Federal Rules on the basis of perceived policy concerns. Thus, in Leatherman v. Tarrant County Narcotics Intelligence and Coordination Unit, 507 U. S. 163 (1993), we unanimously reversed the Court of Appeals for imposing a heightened pleading standard in § 1983 suits against municipalities. We explained that “[p]erhaps if [the] Rules... were rewritten today, claims against municipalities under § 1983 might be subjected to the added specificity requirement.... But that is a result which must be obtained by the process of amending the Federal Rules, and not by judicial interpretation.” Id., at 168.
In Swierkiewicz v. Sorema N. A., 534 U. S. 506 (2002), we unanimously reversed the Court of Appeals for requiring employment discrimination plaintiffs to specifically allege the elements of a prima facie ease of discrimination. We explained that “the Federal Rules do not contain a heightened pleading standard for employment discrimination suits,” and a “requirement of greater specificity for particular claims” must be obtained by amending the Federal Rules. Id., at 515 (citing Leatherman). And just last Term, in Hill v. McDonough, 547 U. S. 573 (2006), we unanimously rejected a proposal that § 1983 suits challenging a method of execution must identify an acceptable alternative: “Specific pleading requirements are mandated by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and not, as a general rule, through case-by-case determinations of the federal courts.” Id., at 582 (citing Swierkiewicz).
The Sixth Circuit and other courts requiring prisoners to plead and demonstrate exhaustion in their complaints contend that if the “new regime” mandated by the PLRA for prisoner complaints is to function effectively, prisoner complaints must be treated outside of this typical framework. See Baxter, 305 F. 3d, at 489. These courts explain that the PLRA not only imposed a new mandatory exhaustion requirement, but also departed in a fundamental way from the usual procedural ground rules by requiring judicial screening to filter out nonmeritorious claims: Courts are to screen inmate complaints “before docketing, if feasible or,... as soon as practicable after docketing,” and dismiss the complaint if it is “frivolous, malicious,... fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted[,] or... seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief.” 28 U. S. C. §§ 1915A(a), (b). All this may take place before any responsive pleading is filed — unlike in the typical civil case, defendants do not have to respond to a complaint covered by the PLRA until required to do so by the court, and waiving the right to reply does not constitute an admission of the allegations in the complaint. See 42 U. S. C. §§ 1997e(g)(l), (2). According to respondents, these departures from the normal litigation framework of complaint and response mandate a different pleading requirement for prisoner complaints, if the screening is to serve its intended purpose. See, e. g., Baxter, supra, at 489 (“This court’s heightened pleading standards for complaints covered by the PLRA are designed to facilitate the Act’s screening requirements... ”); Knuckles El, 215 F. 3d, at 642. See also Brief for Respondents 17.
We think that the PLRA’s screening requirement does not — explicitly or implicitly — justify deviating from the usual procedural practice beyond the departures specified by the PLRA itself. Before the PLRA, the informa pauperis provision of §1915, applicable to most prisoner litigation, permitted sua sponte dismissal only if an action was frivolous or malicious. 28 U. S. C. § 1915(d) (1994 ed.); see also Neitzke, 490 U. S., at 320 (concluding that a complaint that fails to state a claim was not frivolous under § 1915(d) and thus could not be dismissed sua sponte). In the PLRA, Congress added failure to state a claim and seeking monetary relief from a defendant immune from such relief as grounds for sua sponte dismissal of informa pauperis cases, § 1915(e)(2)(B) (2000 ed.), and provided for judicial screening and sua sponte dismissal of prisoner suits on the same four grounds, § 1915A(b); 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(c)(l). Although exhaustion was a “centerpiece” of the PLRA, Woodford, 548 U. S., at 84, failure to exhaust was notably not added in terms to this enumeration. There is thus no reason to suppose that the normal pleading rules have to be altered to facilitate judicial screening of complaints specifically for failure to exhaust.
Some courts have found that exhaustion is subsumed under the PLRA’s enumerated ground authorizing early dismissal for “failfure] to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.” 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915A(b)(l), 1915(e)(2)(B); 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(c)(l). See Baxter, supra, at 489; Steele v. Federal Bureau of Prisons, 355 F. 3d 1204,1210 (CA10 2003); Rivera v. Allin, 144 F. 3d 719, 731 (CA11 1998). The point is a bit of a red herring. A complaint is subject to dismissal for failure to state a claim if the allegations, taken as true, show the plaintiff is not entitled to relief. If the allegations, for example, show that relief is barred by the applicable statute of limitations, the complaint is subject to dismissal for failure to state a claim; that does not make the statute of limitations any less an affirmative defense, see Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 8(c). Whether a particular ground for opposing a claim may be the basis for dismissal for failure to state a claim depends on whether the allegations in the complaint suffice to establish that ground, not on the nature of the ground in the abstract. See Leveto v. Lapina, 258 F. 3d 156, 161 (CA3 2001) (“[A] complaint may be subject to dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) when an affirmative defense... appears on its face” (internal quotation marks omitted)). See also Lopez-Gonzalez v. Comerio, 404 F. 3d 548, 551 (CA1 2005) (dismissing a complaint barred by the statute of limitations under Rule 12(b)(6)); Pani v. Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield, 152 F. 3d 67, 74-75 (CA2 1998) (dismissing a complaint barred by official immunity under Rule 12(b)(6)). See also 5B C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1357, pp. 708-710, 721-729 (3d ed. 2004). Determining that Congress meant to include failure to exhaust under the rubric of “failure to state a claim” in the screening provisions of the PLRA would thus not support treating exhaustion as a pleading requirement rather than an affirmative defense.
The argument that screening would be more effective if exhaustion had to be shown in the complaint proves too much; the same could be said with respect to any affirmative defense. The rejoinder that the PLRA focused on exhaustion rather than other defenses simply highlights the failure of Congress to include exhaustion in terms among the enumerated grounds justifying dismissal upon early screening. As noted, that is not to say that failure to exhaust cannot be a basis for dismissal for failure to state a claim. It is to say that there is no basis for concluding that Congress implicitly meant to transform exhaustion from an affirmative defense to a pleading requirement by the curiously indirect route of specifying that courts should screen PLRA complaints and dismiss those that fail to state a claim.
Respondents point to 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(g) as confirming that the usual pleading rules should not apply to PLRA suits, but we think that provision supports petitioners. It specifies that defendants can waive their right to reply to a prisoner complaint without the usual consequence of being deemed to have admitted the allegations in the complaint. See §1997e(g)(l) (allowing defendants to waive their response without admitting the allegations “[njotwithstanding any other law or rule of procedure”)- This shows that when Congress meant to depart from the usual procedural requirements, it did so expressly.
We conclude that failure to exhaust is an affirmative defense under the PLRA, and that inmates are not required to specially plead or demonstrate exhaustion in their complaints. We understand the reasons behind the decisions of some lower courts to impose a pleading requirement on plaintiffs in this context, but that effort cannot fairly be viewed as an interpretation of the PLRA. “Whatever temptations the statesmanship of policy-making might wisely suggest,” the judge’s job is to construe the statute— not to make it better. Frankfurter, Some Reflections on the Reading of Statutes, 47 Colum. L. Rev. 527, 533 (1947). The judge “must not read in by way of creation,” but instead abide by the “duty of restraint, th[e] humility of function as merely the translator of another’s command.” Id., at 533-534. See United States v. Goldenberg, 168 U. S. 95, 103 (1897) (“No mere omission... which it may seem wise to have specifically provided for, justifies] any judicial addition to the language of the statute”). Given that the PLRA does not itself require plaintiffs to plead exhaustion, such a result “must be obtained by the process of amending the Federal Rules, and not by judicial interpretation. ” Leatherman, 507 U. S., at 168.
Ill
The Sixth Circuit threw out the Williams and Walton suits because those prisoners had not identified in their initial grievances each defendant they later sued. 136 Fed. Appx., at 862-863; id., at 848-849. See Burton, 321 F. 3d, at 575. Here again the lower court’s procedural rule lacks a textual basis in the PLRA. The PLRA requires exhaustion of “such administrative remedies as are available,” 42 U. S. C. § 1997e(a), but nothing in the statute imposes a “name all defendants” requirement along the lines of the Sixth Circuit’s judicially created rule. Respondents argue that without such a rule the exhaustion requirement would become a “ ‘useless appendage,’ ” Brief for Respondents 44 (quoting Woodford, 548 U. S., at 93), but the assertion is hyperbole, and the citation of Woodford misplaced.
Woodford held that “proper exhaustion” was required under the PLRA, and that this requirement was not satisfied when grievances were dismissed because prisoners had missed deadlines set by the grievance policy. Id., at 98-95. At the time each of the grievances at issue here was filed, in contrast, the MDOC policy did not contain any provision specifying who must be named in a grievance. MDOC’s policy required only that prisoners “be as specific as possible” in their grievances, 1 App. 148, while at the same time the required forms advised them to “[b]e brief and concise,” 2 id., at 1. The MDOC grievance form does not require a prisoner to identify a particular responsible party, and the respondent is not necessarily the allegedly culpable prison official, but rather an administrative official designated in the policy to respond to particular types of grievances at different levels. Supra, at 207. The grievance policy specifically provides that the grievant at Step I “shall have the opportunity to explain the grievance more completely at [an] interview, enabling the Step I respondent to gather any additional information needed to respond to the grievance.” 1 App. 151. Nothing in the MDOC policy itself supports the conclusion that the grievance process was improperly invoked simply because an individual later named as a defendant was not named at the first step of the grievance process.
Nor does the PLRA impose such a requirement. In Woodford, we held that to properly exhaust administrative remedies prisoners must “complete the administrative review process in accordance with the applicable procedural rules,” 548 U. S., at 88 — rules that are defined not by the PLRA, but by the prison grievance process itself. Compliance with prison grievance procedures, therefore, is all that is required by the PLRA to “properly exhaust.” The level of detail necessary in a grievance to comply with the grievance procedures will vary from system to system and claim to claim, but it is the prison’s requirements, and not the PLRA, that define the boundaries of proper exhaustion. As MDOC’s procedures make no mention of naming particular officials, the Sixth Circuit’s rule imposing such a prerequisite to proper exhaustion is unwarranted.
We have identified the benefits of exhaustion to include allowing a prison to address complaints about the program it administers before being subjected to suit, reducing litigation to the extent complaints are satisfactorily resolved, and improving litigation that does occur by leading to the preparation of a useful record. See id., at 88-91; Porter, 534 U. S., at 524-525. The Sixth Circuit rule may promote early notice to those who might later be sued, but that has not been thought to be one of the leading purposes of the exhaustion requirement. See Johnson, 385 F. 3d, at 522 (“We are mindful that the primary purpose of a grievance is to alert prison officials to a problem, not to provide personal notice to a particular official that he may be sued; the grievance is not a summons and complaint that initiates adversarial litigation”); see also Brief for American Civil Liberties Union et al. as Amici Curiae 8-9, and n. 6 (collecting grievance procedures and noting that the majority do not require prisoners to identify specific individuals).
We do not determine whether the grievances filed by petitioners satisfied the requirement of “proper exhaustion,” Woodford, supra, at 93, but simply conclude that exhaustion is not per se inadequate simply because an individual later sued was not named in the grievances. We leave it to the court below in the first instance to determine the sufficiency of the exhaustion in these cases.
IV
The final issue concerns how courts should address complaints in which the prisoner has failed to exhaust some, but not all, of the claims asserted in the complaint. All agree that no unexhausted claim may be considered. The issue is whether the court should proceed with the exhausted claims, or instead — as the Sixth Circuit has held — dismiss the entire action if any one claim is not properly exhausted. See Jones Bey, 407 F. 3d, at 807.
Here the Sixth Circuit can point to language in the PLRA in support of its rule. Section 1997e(a) provides that “[n]o action shall be brought” unless administrative procedures are exhausted. Respondents argue that if Congress intended courts to dismiss only unexhausted claims while retaining the balance of the lawsuit, the word “claim” rather than “action” would have been used in this provision.
This statutory phrasing — “no action shall be brought” — is boilerplate language. There are many instances in the Federal Code where similar language is used, but such language has not been thought to lead to the dismissal of an entire action if a single claim fails to meet the pertinent standards. Statutes of limitations, for example, are often introduced by a variant of the phrase “no action shall be brought,” see, e. g., Beach v. Ocwen Fed. Bank, 523 U. S. 410, 416 (1998); 18 U. S. C. § 1030(g) (2000 ed., Supp. IV), but we have never heard of an entire complaint being thrown out simply because one of several discrete claims was barred by the statute of limitations, and it is hard to imagine what purpose such a rule would serve. The same is true with respect to other uses of the “no action shall be brought” phrasing. See, e. g., Hawksbill Sea Turtle v. Federal Emergency Management Agency, 126 F. 3d 461, 471 (CA3 1997) (dismissing only claims that fail to comply with the citizen suit notification requirement of 16 U. S. C. § 1540(g)(2), which states that “[n]o action may be commenced” until an agency has declined to act after being given written notice).
More generally, statutory references to an “action” have not typically been read to mean that every claim included in the action must meet the pertinent requirement before the “action” may proceed. See, e. g., Exxon Mobil Corp. v. Allapattah Services, Inc., 545 U. S. 546, 560-563 (2005) (District Court had jurisdiction over a “civil action” under 28 U. S. C. § 1367(a), even if it might not have jurisdiction over each separate claim pressed in the action); Chicago v. International College of Surgeons, 522 U. S. 156, 166 (1997) (District Court had jurisdiction over removed “civil action” even if every claim did not satisfy jurisdictional prerequisites).
As a general matter, if a complaint contains both good and bad claims, the court proceeds with the good and leaves the bad. “[Ojnly the bad claims are dismissed; the complaint as a whole is not. If Congress meant to depart from this norm, we would expect some indication of that, and we find none.” Robinson v. Page, 170 F. 3d 747, 748-749 (CA7 1999) (considering § 1997e(e)).
Respondents note an exception to this general rule, the total exhaustion rule in habeas corpus. In Rose v. Lundy, 455 U. S. 509, 522 (1982), we held that “mixed” habeas petitions — containing both exhausted and unex
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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A
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We granted certiorari to decide whether the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was violated when the defendant in a state court received a greater sentence on retrial where the earlier sentence was imposed by the jury, the trial judge granted the defendant’s motion for a new trial, the defendant requested that in the second trial the judge fix the sentence, and the judge entered findings of fact justifying the longer sentence.
I
In 1980, Sanford James McCullough was tried before a jury in the Randall County, Texas, District Court and convicted of murder. McCullough elected to be sentenced by the jury, as was his right under Texas law. Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann., Art. 37.07 (Vernon 1981). The jury imposed a 20-year sentence. Judge Naomi Harney, the trial judge, then granted McCullough’s motion for a new trial on the basis of prosecutorial misconduct.
Three months later, McCullough was retried before a jury, with Judge Harney again presiding. At this trial, the State presented testimony from two witnesses who had not testified at the first trial that McCullough rather than his accomplices had slashed the throat of the victim. McCullough was again found guilty by a jury. This time, he elected to have his sentence fixed by the trial judge. Judge Harney sentenced McCullough to 50 years in prison and, upon his motion, made findings of fact as to why the sentence was longer than that fixed by the jury in the first trial. She found that in fixing the sentence she relied on new evidence about the murder that was not presented at the first trial and hence never made known to the sentencing jury. The findings focused specifically on the testimony of two new witnesses, Carolyn Hollison McCullough and Willie Lee Brown, which “had a direct effect upon the strength of the State’s case at both the guilt and punishment phases of the trial.” App. to Pet. for Cert. A-23. In addition, Judge Harney explained that she learned for the first time on retrial McCullough had been released from prison only four months before the later crime had been committed. Ibid. Finally, the judge candidly stated that, had she fixed the first sentence, she would have imposed more than 20 years. Id., at A-24.
On appeal, the Texas Court of Appeals reversed and resen-tenced McCullough to 20 years’ imprisonment. 680 S. W. 2d 493 (1983). That court considered itself bound by this Court’s decision in North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U. S. 711 (1969), and held that a longer sentence upon retrial could be imposed only if it was based upon conduct of the defendant occurring after the original trial. Petitioner sought review in the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, and that court limited its review to whether the Texas Court of Appeals had authority to limit respondent’s sentence to 20 years. 720 S. W. 2d 89 (1983). The court concluded that, as a matter of procedure, the case should have been remanded to the trial judge for resentencing. On petitioner’s motion for rehearing, the court concluded that under Pearce vindictiveness must be presumed even though a jury had fixed punishment at the first trial and a judge had fixed it at the second trial. We granted certiorari. 472 U. S. 1007 (1985). We reverse.
H h-1
In North Carolina v. Pearce, supra, the Court placed a limitation on the power of a sentencing authority to increase a sentence after reconviction following a new trial. It held that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prevented increased sentences when that increase was motivated by vindictiveness on the part of the sentencing judge. The Court stated:
“Due process of law, then, requires that vindictiveness against a defendant for having successfully attacked his first conviction must play no part in the sentence he receives after a new trial. And since the fear of such vindictiveness may unconstitutionally deter a defendant’s exercise of the right to appeal or collaterally attack his first conviction, due process also requires that a defendant be freed of apprehension of such a retaliatory motivation on the part of the sentencing judge.
“In order to assure the absence of such a motivation, we have concluded that whenever a judge imposes a more severe sentence upon a defendant after a new trial, the reasons for his doing so must affirmatively appear” Id., at 725-726 (emphasis added).
Beyond doubt, vindictiveness of a sentencing judge is the evil the Court sought to prevent rather than simply enlarged sentences after a new trial. The Pearce requirements thus do not apply in every case where a convicted defendant receives a higher sentence on retrial. Like other “judicially created means of effectuating the rights secured by the [Constitution],” Stone v. Powell, 428 U. S. 465, 482 (1976), we have restricted application of Pearce to areas where its “objectives are thought most efficaciously served,” 428 U. S., at 487. Accordingly, in each case, we look to the need, under the circumstances, to “guard against vindictiveness in the resentencing process.” Chaffin v. Stynchcombe, 412 U. S. 17, 25 (1973) (emphasis omitted). For example, in Moon v. Maryland, 398 U. S. 319 (1970), we held that Pearce did not apply when the defendant conceded and it was clear that vindictiveness had played no part in the enlarged sentence. In Colten v. Kentucky, 407 U. S. 104 (1972), we saw no need for applying the presumption when the second court in a two-tier trial system imposed a longer sentence. In Chaffin, supra, we held Pearce not applicable where a jury imposed the increased sentence on retrial. Where the prophylactic rule of Pearce does not apply, the defendant may still obtain relief if he can show actual vindictiveness upon resentencing. Wasman v. United States, 468 U. S. 559, 569 (1984).
The facts of this case provide no basis for a presumption of vindictiveness. In contrast to Pearce, McCullough’s second trial came about because the trial judge herself concluded that the prosecutor’s misconduct required it. Granting McCullough’s motion for a new trial hardly suggests any vindictiveness on the part of the judge towards him. “[U]n-like the judge who has been reversed,” the trial judge here had “no motivation to engage in self-vindication.” Chaffin, 412 U. S., at 27. In such circumstances, there is also no justifiable concern about “institutional interests that might occasion higher sentences by a judge desirous of discouraging what he regards as meritless appeals.” Ibid. In granting McCullough’s new trial motion, Judge Harney went on record as agreeing that his “claims” had merit. Presuming vindictiveness on this basis alone would be tantamount to presuming that a judge will be vindictive towards a defendant merely because he seeks an acquittal. Thus, in support of its position, the dissent conjures up visions of judges who view defendants as temerarious for filing motions for new trials, post, at 151, and who are “annoyed” at being forced “to sit through . . . trial[s] whose result[s] [are] foregone conclu-siones],” post, at 150. We decline to adopt the view that the judicial temperament of our Nation’s trial judges will suddenly change upon the filing of a successful post-trial motion. The presumption of Pearce does not apply in situations where the possibility of vindictiveness is this speculative, particularly since the presumption may often “operate in the absence of any proof of an improper motive and thus . . . block a legitimate response to criminal conduct,” United States v. Goodwin, 457 U. S. 368, 373 (1982). Indeed, not even “apprehension of such a retaliatory motivation on the part of the sentencing judge,” Pearce, 395 U. S., at 725, could be present in this case. McCullough was entitled by law to choose to be sentenced by either a judge or a jury. Faced with that choice, on retrial McCullough chose to be sentenced by Judge Harney. There can hardly be more emphatic affirmation of his appraisal of Judge Harney’s fairness than this choice. Because there was no realistic motive for vindictive sentencing, the Pearce presumption was inappropriate.
The presumption is also inapplicable because different sentencers assessed the varying sentences that McCullough received. In such circumstances, a sentence “increase” cannot truly be said to have taken place. In Colten v. Kentucky, supra, which bears directly on this case, we recognized that when different sentencers are involved,
“[i]t may often be that the [second sentencer] will impose a punishment more severe than that received from the [first]. But it no more follows that such a sentence is a vindictive penalty for seeking a [new] trial than that the [first sentencer] imposed a lenient penalty.” Id., at 117.
Here, the second sentencer provides an on-the-record, wholly logical, nonvindictive reason for the sentence. We read Pearce to require no more, particularly since trial judges must be accorded broad discretion in sentencing, see Wasman, supra, at 563-564.
In this case, the trial judge stated candidly her belief that the 20-year sentence respondent received initially was unduly lenient in light of significant evidence not before the sentencing jury in the first trial. On this record, that appraisal cannot be faulted. In any event, nothing in the Constitution prohibits a state from permitting such discretion to play a role in sentencing.
III
Even if the Pearce presumption were to apply here, we hold that the findings of the trial judge overcome that presumption. Nothing in Pearce is to be read as precluding a rebuttal of intimations of vindictiveness. As we have explained, Pearce permits “a sentencing authority [to] justify an increased sentence by affirmatively identifying relevant conduct or events that occurred subsequent to the original sentencing proceedings.” Wasman, 468 U. S., at 572; see also id., at 573 (Powell, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment). This language, however, was never intended to describe exhaustively all of the possible circumstances in which a sentence increase could be justified. Restricting justifications for a sentence increase to only “events that occurred subsequent to the original sentencing proceedings” could in some circumstances lead to absurd results. The Solicitor General provides the following hypothetical example:
“Suppose . . . that a defendant is convicted of burglary, a non-violent, and apparently first, offense. He is sentenced to a short prison term or perhaps placed on probation. Following a successful appeal and a conviction on retrial, it is learned that the defendant has been using an alias and in fact has a long criminal record that includes other burglaries, several armed robbery convictions, and a conviction for murder committed in the course of a burglary. None of the reasons underlying Pearce in any way justifies the perverse result that the defendant receive no greater sentence in light of this information than he originally received when he was thought to be a first offender.” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 26.
We agree with the Solicitor General and find nothing in Pearce that would require such a bizarre conclusion. Perhaps then the reach of Pearce is best captured in our statement in United States v. Goodwin, 457 U. S., at 374:
“In sum, the Court [in Pearce] applied a presumption of vindictiveness, which may be overcome only by objective information . . . justifying the increased sentence.”
Nothing in the Constitution requires a judge to ignore “objective information . . . justifying the increased sentence.” In refusing to apply Pearce retroactively we observed that “the Pearce prophylactic rules assist in guaranteeing the propriety of the sentencing phase of the criminal process.” Michigan v. Payne, 412 U. S. 47, 52-53 (1973). Realistically, if anything this focus would require rather than forbid the consideration of the relevant evidence bearing on sentence since “‘[h]ighly relevant — if not essential — to [the] selection of an appropriate sentence is the possession of the fullest information possible concerning the defendant’s life and characteristics.’” Wasman, supra, at 564 (quoting Williams v. New York, 337 U. S. 241, 247 (1949)).
To be sure, a defendant may be more reluctant to appeal if there is a risk that new, probative evidence supporting a longer sentence may be revealed on retrial. But this Court has never recognized this “chilling effect” as sufficient reason to create a constitutional prohibition ¿gainst considering relevant information in assessing sentences. We explained in Chaffin v. Stynchcombe, 412 U. S., at 29, that “the Court [in Pearce] intimated no doubt about the constitutional validity of higher sentences in the absence of vindictiveness despite whatever incidental deterrent effect they might have on the right to appeal.” We see no reason to depart from this conclusion.
It is clear that the careful explanation by the trial judge for the sentence imposed here fits well within our prior holdings. Judge Harney relied on the testimony of two new witnesses which she concluded “had a direct effect upon the strength of the State’s case at both the guilt and punishment phases of the trial.” App. to Pet. for Cert. A-23. The judge supported this conclusion with specific findings, noting that “[t]he testimony [of the two new witnesses] added to the credibility of the State’s key witness . . . and detracted from the credibility of Dennis McCullough and [respondent] who both testified for the defense.” Ibid. The judge also found that “[t]he testimony of these two witnesses directly implicated the defendant in the commission of the murder in question and showed what part he played in committing the offense.” Id., at A-22. Finally, the judge concluded that their testimony “shed new light upon [McCullough’s] life, conduct, and his mental and moral propensities.” Id., at A-23. These findings clearly constitute “objective information . . . justifying the increased sentence.”
Judge Harney also found that McCullough had been released from confinement only four months before the murder, ibid., another obviously relevant fact not before the sentencing jury in the first trial. We have recognized the state’s legitimate interest “in dealing in a harsher manner with those who by repeated criminal acts have shown that they are simply incapable of conforming to the norms of society as established by its criminal law.” Rummel v. Estelle, 445 U. S. 263, 276 (1980). A defendant who commits new crimes within four months of his release from prison clearly poses a greater danger to society than one who commits crimes less often. To foreclose reliance on the kind of pertinent new information developed in the second trial would be wholly incompatible with modern sentencing standards. This new objective information also amply justified McCullough’s increased sentence.
In setting aside the second sentence, the Texas Court of Appeals recognized that the new information bore legitimately on the appropriate sentence to impose, but concluded, reluctantly, that Pearce precluded reliance, on this information. It is appropriate that we clarify the scope and thrust of Pearce, and we do so here.
The case is remanded to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
Reversed and remanded.
Later Judge Harney sentenced two other defendants for their role in the same murder. She gave both defendants 50-year sentences identical to McCullough’s.
The Texas Court of Appeals in applying Pearce observed:
“This case demonstrates the excessive scope of Pearce. The trial judge filed detailed and valid reasons for the heavier punishment and there is nothing in the record to indicate that the increased punishment resulted from vindictiveness. However, the reasons affirmatively supported by evidence are based on events occurring during or after the crime but before the first trial. Although those matters were not brought out at the first trial, they cannot be used [under Pearce] to increase punishment because none occurred after the first trial.” 680 S. W. 2d, at 496, n. 2.
Pearce itself apparently involved different judges presiding over the two trials, a fact that has led some courts to conclude by implication that the presumption of vindictiveness applies even where different sentencing judges are involved. See, e. g., United States v. Hawthorne, 532 P. 2d 318, 323 (CA3), cert. denied, 429 U. S. 894 (1976). That fact, however, may not have been drawn to the Court’s attention and does not appear anywhere in the Court’s opinion in Pearce. Clearly the Court did not focus on it as a consideration for its holding. See Hardwick v. Doolittle, 558 F. 2d 292, 299 (CA5 1977), cert. denied, 434 U. S. 1049 (1978). Subsequent opinions have also elucidated the basis for the Pearce presumption. We held in Chaffin v. Stynchcombe, 412 U. S. 17 (1973), for instance, that the presumption derives from the judge’s “personal stake in the prior conviction,” id., at 27, a statement clearly at odds with reading Pearce to answer the two-sentencer issue. We therefore decline to read Pearce as governing this issue. See also n. 4, infra.
The dissent contends that this objection “was considered in Pearce and rejected there.” Post, at 155. In fact, the issue, like the two-sentencer issue just discussed, was not before the Court because in neither Pearce nor its companion case did the State offer “any reason or justification” for the increased sentence. 395 U. S., at 726. Moreover, Pearce was argued on the assumption that the Constitution either absolutely forbade or permitted increased sentences on retrial. None of the briefs advanced the intermediate position ultimately relied upon by the Court that the Constitution permits increased sentences only in certain circumstances. Cf. Brief for American Civil Liberties Union et al. as Amici Curiae in North Carolina v. Pearce, O. T. 1968, No. 413, pp. 8-10 (quoted post, at 155-156) (arguing that “[t]o subject an accused to the risk of harsher punishment... as a condition of appeal... is an unconstitutional condition which violates the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments”). Thus, as the Solicitor General points out, “in formulating the standard set forth in Pearce, the Court was completely without the ‘sharpening of] the presentation of issues’ provided by the adversary process, ‘upon which the court so largely depends for illumination of difficult constitutional issues.’ ” Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 22-23 (quoting Baker v. Carr, 369 U. S. 186, 204 (1962)). But even if Pearce could be read to speak definitively to this situation, we are not reluctant to tailor judicially created rules to implement constitutional guarantees, like the Pearce rule, see Michigan v. Payne, 412 U. S. 47, 51 (1973), when the need to do so becomes apparent. Cf. United States v. Leon, 468 U. S. 897 (1984).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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A
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Rutledge
deliveréd the opinion of the Court.
Most broadly stated, the important question presented by this case is the extent to which due process of law, as guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment, Requires federal administrative tribunals to accord the right of oral argument to one claiming to be adversely affected by their action, more particularly upon questions of law. Lest this spacious form of statement bé taken as too sweeping and abstract to pose a justiciable issue, we think the specific context of fact and decisión out of which the question has arisen must be set forth. But before this is done we should say that, as we understand the Court of Appeals’, decision', it has ruled that Fifth Amendment procedural due process requires an opportunity for oral argument, to be given “on every question of law raised before a judicial or quasi-judicial tribunal, including questions raised by demurrer or as if on demurrer, except such questions of law as may be involved in interlocutory orders such as orders for the stay of proceedings pendente lite, for temporary injunctions and the like,” 174 F. 2d 226, 233, and on this basis has remanded this cause to the Federal Communications Commission for oral argument.
Involved in the controversy are two radio stations and the Commission, which is the petitioner here. One of the stations is the respondent WJR. It is licensed by the Commission as a “Class I-A Station,” to broadcast day and night from‘Detroit, Michigan, on a frequency of 760 kilocycles and with a strength of 50 kilowatts. The other station is the intervenor, Coastal Plains (formerly Tarboro) Broadcasting Company.
Prior to August 22, 1946, Tarboro filed written application with the Commission for a permit to construct a “Class II Station” to broadcast from Tarboro, North Carolina.'On ’that date the Commission granted the application. The permit specified that the new station was to broadcast during the day from Tarboro at a strength of one kilowatt on the frequency of 760 kilocycles, which previously had been used exclusively by WJR. The construction permit was granted without notice to WJR and without oral hearing or other participation by-it in the proceedings before the Commission.
On'September 10 following, WJR filed with the Commission a written “Petition for reconsideration and hearing.” This'alleged that the proposed broadcasting range of the Coastal Plains station would cause “objectionable interference” with respondent’s broadcast signal. Interference was said to be anticipated principally in certain areas;, of Michigan where “the field intensity of WJR averagés 32 microvolts per meter or less during the daytime hours,” but where “WJR provides the best signal available”; limited interference “during the winter season” was also expected within “contours” of field intensity “much higher” than 32 microvolts; interference of unspecified extent was also thought likely in neighboring states, though as to such areas it was conceded that “a better signal is provided by other stations.”
On the basis of these allegations WJR asked that the Commission hold a hearing on the Coastal Plains application to which WJR might be made a party or, in the. alternative, postpone final action on the Coastal Plains application until the conclusion of the then peh^ing.“Clear Channel” proceeding. In that proceeding, essentially legislative, in character, the Commission was considering the desirability of changing its rules so as to allow WJR and other stations to increase their broadcast strengths to 500 kilowatts. The basis for the alternative request was WJR’s fear that a grant of the Coastal Plains construction permit might prejudice a possible future WJR application for increased signal strength in the event the decision in the clear channel proceeding should so modify the Commission’s rules as to facilitate such an application.
Coastal Plains filed an opposition to WJR’s petition for reconsideration, asserting among other grounds for denial' that WJR had not alleged that the proposed new opera*tion “would cause any interference within the normally protected service area of station. WJR” and had neither alleged nor proved “any interference within its normally protected contours.” The opposition was based on the theory that under the Commission’s regulations WJR’s license conferred no right, to protection against interference outside its normally protected contours as specified in the regulations, that the interference alleged was outside those contours, and hence WJR’s petition was legally insufficient on its face to state any basis for WJR to be made a party to or to be heard in the Coastal Plains proceeding.
No response to the opposition was filed by WJR and some three months later, on December 17,1946, the Commission denied WJR’s application in a written opinion, rendered without prior oral argument. The opinion first disposed of the allegations of interference:
“Station WJR is a Class I-A station. Under the Commission’s Rules and Standards, Class I-A stations are normally protected daytime to the 100 microvolt-per-meter contour. The area sought by petitioner to be protected is, according to the engineering affidavit accompanying the petition, served by Station WJR during the daytime with a signal intensity of 32 microvolts-per-meter or less, and is therefore outside the normally protected contour.”
As the Court of Appeals later treated this ruling, it was the equivalent of holding as a matter of law, in judicial parlance essentially as though raised upon demurrer, that WJR’s petition did not state facts sufficient to raise any legal issue concerning (indirect) modification of lyJR’s license or fights under the license. The Commission also denied WJR’s alternate request to stay the Coastal Plains application, concluding that, postponement of the newly authorized service, out of deference to any possible “future assignment of facilities” to WJR “would not serve the public interest.”
WJR then appealed to the Court of Appeals. The. court agreed that the Commission had not abused its discretion in refusing to stay the Coastal Plains permit until completion of the clear channel proceeding. It held, however, that WJR’s claim of objectionable interference with its broadcast signal presented a question of law and, by a closely divided vote, in the broad language quoted ■;above, that, concerning the merits of that question, the Fifth Amendment assured to WJR the right of oral argument before the Commission. Accordingly, it refused to consider whether the Commission was right in its legal conclusion that areas of signal intensity lower than 100 microvolts per meter were not within the “normally protected contour” of a Class I-A station, reversed the Commission’s denial of WJR’s petition, and remanded the case for oral argument before the Commission. 174 F. 2d 226. To consider the questions of importance to the administrative process thus determined, we issued our writ of certiorari./ 336 U. S. 917.
At the outset we note our complete agreement with the Court of Appeals that the Commission was under no duty1" to WJR to postpone final action on the Coastal Plains permit until it had disposed of the clear channel proceeding. As the court pointed out, WJR had no vested right in the “supposititious eventualities” that the Commission at some indeterminate time might modify its rules governing clear channel stations. Furthermore, the judicial regulation of an administrative docket sought by WJR “would require [the Court of Appeals] to direct the order in which the Commission shall consider its cases.” And this, as the court said, it “cannot do.” 174 F. 2d at 231. “Only Congress could confer such a priority.” Federal Communications Commission v. Pottsville Broadcasting Co., 309 U. S. 134, 145.
Obviously the most important question is the Court of Appeals’ ruling that Fifth Amendment due process required the Commission to afford respondent an opportunity for oral argument upon its petition for reconsideration of Coastal' Plains’ application; together with its grounding of that ruling in the even broader one that such an opportunity is an inherent element of procedural due process in all judicial or quasi-judicial, i. e., administrative, determinations ■ of questions of law, outside of such questions as may arise upon interlocutory matters involving stays pendente lite, temporary injunctions and the like.
That the scope of its decision might not be.misunderstood, the court expressly stated: “A ruling upon a demurrer is obviously not interlocutory for if the demurrer is sustained the pleader’s cause (or defense) is dismissed upon the merits....” Moreover; except as to the indicated interlocutory matters, the right of oral argument on questions of law- (“as well as-... those of fact” when raised) was said to be “not conditional upon the ex parte view of the tribunal as to whether there is a substantial question as to the sufficiency of the allegations of a complainant.” 174 F. 2d at 240.
Accordingly, although it was urged both by the Commission and by WJR to consider and determine thej “threshold” question of law upon. its merits, namely, whether the Commission’s decision in denying WJR’s petition was wrong, the court refused to consider or decide that question. In its view the question of the Commission’s duty to accord a hearing, “i. e., to hear argument before deciding whether the allegations of WJR’s petition were sufficient” in law, was “a procedural question quite separate from the question on the merits whether or not the allegations of the petition, assuming their truth, were sufficient.” 174 F. 2d at 240. The statutory scheme of the Communications Act, the court thought, “contemplates, before review in this court, proper éxercise of the Commission’s primary jurisdiction, i. e., valid first instance hearings' properly conducted from the procedural — due process — standpoint.” Ibid. Accordingly, the majority felt that the court, “must therefore remand the case with directions to the Commission to allow a hearing to WJR. Then if after hearing the Commission decides that the allegations were insufficient and dismisses the petition... an appeal to this court will bring properly before us the question of the correctness of the Commission’s decision on the merits....” Ibid.
I.
Taken at its literal and explicit import, the Court’s broad constitutional ruling cannot be sustained. So taken, it would require oral argument upon every question of law, apart from the excluded interlocutory matters, arising in administrative proceedings of every sort. This would be regardless of whether the legal question were substantial or insubstantial; of the substantive nature of the asserted right or interest involved; of whether Congress had provided a procedure, relating to the particular interest, requiring oral argument or allowing it to be dispensed with; and regardless of the fact that full opportunity for judicial review may be available.
We do not stop to consider the.effects of such a ruling, if accepted, upon the work of the vast and varied administrative as well as judicial tribunals of the federal system and the equally numerous and diversified interests affected by their functioning; or indeed upon the many and different types of administrative and judicial procedures which Congress has provided for dealing adjudicatively with such interests. It is enough to say that due process of law, as conceived by the Fifth Amendment, has never been cast in so rigid and all-inclusive confinement.
On the contrary, due process of law has never been a term of fixed and invariable content. This is as true with reference to oral argument as with respect to other elements of procedural due process. For this Court has held in some situations that such argument is essential to a fair hearing, Londoner v. Denver, 210 U. S. 373, in others that argument submitted in writing is sufficient. Morgan v. United States, 298 U. S. 468, 481. See also Johnson & Wimsatt v. Hazen, 69 App. D. C. 151; Mitchell v. Reichelderfer, 61 App. D. C. 50.
. The decisions cited are sufficient to show that, the broad generalization made by the Court of Appeals is not the law. Rather it is in conflict with this Court’s rulings, in effect, that the right of oral argument.as a matter of procedural due process varies from case to case in accordance with differing circumstances, as do other procedural regulations. Certainly the Constitution does not require oral argument in all cases where only insubstantial or frivolous questions of law, or indeed even substantial ones, are raised. Equally certainly it has left wide discretion to Congress in creating the procedures to be followed in both administrative and judicial proceedings, as well as in their conjunction.
Without in any sense discounting the value of oral argument wherever it may be appropriate or, by virtue of the particular circumstances, constitutionally required, we cannot accept the broad formula upon which the Court of Appeals rested its ruling. To do so would do violence not only to our own former decisions but also, we think, to the constitutional power of Congress to devise differing administrative and legal procedures appropriate for the disposition of issues affecting interests widely varying in kind.
It follows also that we should not undertaké in this case to generalize more broadly than the particular circumstances require upon when and under what circumstances procedural due process may require oral argument. That is not a matter, under our decisions, for broadside generalization and indiscriminate application. It is rather one for case-to-case determination, through which alone account may be taken of differences in the particular interests affected, circumstances involved, and procedures prescribed by Congress for dealing with them. Only thus may the judgment of Congress, expressed pursuant to its power under the Constitution to devise both judicial and administrative procedures, be taken into account. Any other approach would be; in these respects, highly abstract, indeed largely in a vacuum.
II.
Descending to the concrete setting of this case in the provisions of the Communications Act, we are unable to conclude that the procedure Congress has provided for determination of the questions respondent raises affords any semblance of due process deficiency.
The statute itself provides in terms for oral argument before the Commission in a single situation only, namely, in proceedings heard initially before an examiner under §409 (a). That provision however has no pertinence to this case, since it tvas not heard or assigned for hearing in the first instance before an examiner and respondent’s claimed right of participation arises under § 312 (b). 47 U. S. C. § 312 (b). That section authorizes the Commission to modify station licenses “if in the judgment of the Commission such action will, promote the public interest, convenience, and necessity,” but provides “That no such order of modification shall become final until the holder of such outstanding license... shall have been notified in writing of the proposed action and the grounds or reasons therefor and shall have been given reasonable opportunity to show cause why such an order of modification should not issue.”
As bearing on the meaning of § 312 (b), account must be taken also of two other factors. One is § 4 (j) of the Act [47 U. S. C.. § 154 (j)], which provides: “The Commission may. conduct its proceedings in such manner as will best conduce to the proper dispatch of business and to the ends óf justice.... Any party may appear before the Commission and be heard in person or by attorney....” The other factor consists in this Court’s decision in Federal Communications Commission v. National Broadcasting Co., 319 U. S. 239, the so-called KOA case.
That case held that the granting of. a license to broadcast on a frequency and at a strength which would interfere with.the broadcast signal of a prior licensee within the protection of the latter’s license as afforded by the Commission’s existing rules constitutes an indirect modification of the prior outstanding license. From this it was held to follow that § 312 (b) gave the prior licensee the right to be made a party to the proceeding and hence to “have notice in writing of the proposed action and the grounds therefor and... a reasonable opportunity to show cause why an order of modification should not issue.” 319 U. S. at 245-246. Then followed the Court’s conclusion that by virtue of KOA’s right to'be a party, it had also the right under § 402 (b) (2), as a “person aggrieved or whose interests are adversely affected,” to appeal to the Court of Appeals from the Commission’s denial of its petition, to intervene and participate as a party in the proceedings before it.
It is in this context of statutory provisions and judicial decision that, WJR’s claim of right to participate in the Commission’s proceedings, including the right óf oral argument, and. of denial of due process through the denial of its petition for reconsideration arises and must be considered.
WJR’s petition presents the question whether upon its face it states facts sufficient to show (indirect) modification of its license by the granting of Coastal Plains’ application. This in turn depends on whether allegations not asserting interference within the 100 microvoltper-meter contour or, as the Commission held, allegations asserting interference only “outside the normally protected contour” of WJR’s license, set forth any legally sufficient basis for a claim of right to be made a party and participate in the proceedings. And, again, according to respondent, the answer to.that question turns on whether the Commission’s Standards of Good Engineering Practice Concerning Standard Broadcast Stations constitute a part of and a limitation upon WJR’s license.
Respondent insists that those Standards, as a matter of law, do not limit its license or measure the protection it affords against “objectionable interference”; it necessarily argues in addition that the degree -of interference its petition alleges brings about an-(indirect) modification of its license (conversely stated, that^the license protected it against the alleged degree of interference) and hence, as in the KOA case, the proposed grant of a new license entitles it under § 312 (b) to be made a party to the Coastal Plains proceeding and to participate in it as § 312 (b) provides.
This is the claim which the Court of Appeals purported expressly to refuse to consider or decide, prior to oral argument upon it before the Commission. But two things may be noted. One is that, contrary to the situation here, in the KOA case the Commission’s proposed grant of a new license to Station WHDH concededly created interference against which the existing rules of the Commission protected the prior license of KOA.
In the second place, the majority’s disclaimer here of decision upon the merits seems hardly consistent with its opinion’s flat ruling, as we understand it, that WJR’s allegations qualified it as a party to the proceeding and not, as the dissenting judges thought, merely as a stranger seeking to come in as an intervenor. For that question here, viz., whether WJR’s allegations entitle it to standing as a party, is but another way of phrasing the issue whether its petition states a legally sufficient claim of (indirect) modification, since under § 312 (b) only a prior licensee who States such a claim is entitled to be made a party and to participate in the proceedings. To decide that one has the status of a party is therefore to decide the question of modification vel non.
In view of the court’s mandate, however, we think we must accept its disclaimer. But we also think that, in the light of the disclaimer, its ruling, if it was such, that WJR is entitled to be made a party must be rejected and that question must be regarded as inherently involved in, indeed as identical with, the undetermined issue of modification vel non, if. any effect is to be given to the provisions of § 312 (b).
We think the limitations of that section must be given effect. Indeed it is our view that the Act’s procedural scheme and its application in this case have not deprived the respondent of any procedural right guaranteed by the due-process requirement of the Fifth Amendment. That is true notwithstanding the Commission’s failure to afford respondent an opportunity for oral argument upon its allegations in this case.
Congress, we think, has committed to the Commission’s discretion, by the terms of § 312 (b) and § 4 (j) of - the Communications Act, the questions whether and under what circumstances it will allow or require oral argument, except where the Act itself expressly requires it. As we have noted, Congress has required oral argument expressly in proceedings heard initially before an examiner under § 409 (a). But no such requirement was made by § 312 (b). While that section requires notice and statement of grounds for any proposed order of modification before such order “shall become final,” it does not specify that further proceedings shall include the right to oral argument; it requires only that the holder of the outstanding license to be modified “shall have been given reasonable opportunity to show cause why such an order of modification should not issue” before the order becomes final.
In view of the contrast between this language and that of § 409 (a), it is hardly to be taken that Congress intended the “reasonable opportunity to show cause” always to. include opportunity for oral argument. Indeed, in the absence of any such explicit requirement as that of § 409 (a), the terms of § 312 (b) must be read in the light of the Act’s general procedural authorization in § 4 (j), which empowers the Commission to “conduct its proceedings in such manner as will best conduce to the proper dispatch of business and to the ends of justice.”
In this wording Congress was mindful not only of the ends of justice but also of the proper dispatch of the Commission’s business, a matter not unrelated to achieving the ends of justice, and left largely to its judgment the determination of the manner of conducting its business which would most fairly and reasonably accommodate those ends. Moreover it was dealing with substantive interests involving the use, pursuant To federal license, of channels of radio communication “but not the ownership thereof,” § 301, as to which moreover the Act expressly provides that “no such license shall be construed to create any right, beyond the terms, conditions, and periods of the license.” Ibid.
In this connection it cannot be recalled too often that “ ‘public convenience, interest, or necessity’ was the touchstone for the exercise of the Commission’s authority” in matters relating to construction permits and licensing, and that this criterion “serves as a supple instrument for the exercise of discretion by the expert body which Congress has charged to carry out its legislative policy.” Federal Communications Commission v. Pottsville Broadcasting Co., 309 U. S. 134, 137-188. “Necessarily, therefore, the subordinate questions of procedure in ascertaining the public interest, when the Commission’s licensing authority is. invoked — the scope of the inquiry, whether applications should be heard contemporaneously or successively, whether parties should be allowed to intervene in one another’s proceedings, and similar questions — were explicitly and by implication left to the Commission’s own devising, so long, of course, as it observes the basic requirements designed for the protection of private as well as public interest.” Id. at 138.
We need not go again over the ground which was covered by this decision and others. Suffice it to say that the Commission has not seen fit to provide for oral argument in all such cases as this arising under § 312 (b); nor is there any basis in the section or the Act for believing-that Congress intended to require it to do- so. “Reasonable opportunity to show cause,” as used in § 3Í2 (b), comprehends, in the light of § 4 (j) and this Court’s prior decisions, that the Commission'shall have broad discretion in determining whether and when oral argument shall be required or permitted, as it does with respect to other procedural mátters.
Respondent does not contend that it was denied any opportunity to present for the Commission’s consideration any matter of fact or law in connection with its application or that the Commission has not given all matters submitted by it due and full consideration. We cannot say, in view of the statute and of the subject matter involved, that the Commission abused its discretion in hearing respondent’s application on the written submission.
Accordingly we think it was error for the court to decline to decide the merits of the question whether respondent’s application stated a legally sufficient case of (indirect) modification of its license within the terms of § 312 (b) as well as to decide, without determining that question, that respondent was entitled to be made a party to and participate as such in the Coastal Plains proceeding. As we have said, in the situation here presented, the two forms of statement pose the same question in substance, together with the further question, under the KOA decision, whether respondent has standing to appeal as a party aggrieved. The statutory sequence identifies- (1) a legally sufficient claim of modification with (2) right to'standing as a party and (3) right to appeal.
This threefold issue presents a question of law respondent is entitled to have determined. The dissenting judges in the Court of Appeals considered the question insubstantial, because they thought, contrary to respondent’s position, that the Commission’s Standards of Good Engineering Practice applied as a limitation upon respondent’s license and therefore excluded it from protection against interference such as respondent alleged, i. e., outside the contours prescribed by the Standards.
That question, being one of law, might now be decided here. But since the statute, if it affords respondent a right of appeal, provides that it shall be to the Court of Appeals, and since that court has not decided the basic issue on the merits, we think the cause should be remanded to the Court of Appeals for decision of that question, uncomplicated by questions of constitutionality relating to the Commission’s procedure. Accordingly the court’s decision is reversed apd the cause is remanded to it for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
Reversed and remanded.
Mr. Justice Murpht took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Federal Communications Commission Rules Governing Standard Broadcast Stations § 3.22 (a): “A 'Class I Station’ is a dominant station operating on a clear channel and designed to render primary and secondary service over, an extended area and at relatively long distances. Its primary service area is free from objectionable interference from other stations on the same and adjacent channels, and its secondary service area free from interference, except from stations on the adjacent channel, and from stations on the same channel, in accordance. With the channel designation in Sec. 3.25 or in accordance with,the ’‘Engineering Standards of Allocation’. The operating power shall" :be not less than 10 kw nor more than 50 kw (also see Sec. 3.25"(a).for’further power limitation).” 4 Fed. Reg. 2715.
Federal Communications Commission Rules Governing Standard Broadcast Stations-§ 3.22 (b): “A ‘Class II Station’ is a secondary statiijn which. operates on a clear channel (see Sec. 3.25) and is designed to render service over a primary service area which is limited by and. subject to such interference as may be received from Class -T.stations. A station of this class shall operate with power not dess than 0.25 kilowatts nor more than 50 kilowatts. Whenever necessary a Class II station shall use a directional antenna or other means to avoid interference with Class I stations and with other Class II stations, in accordance with the ‘Engineering Standards of Allocation.’ ’’ 4 Fed. Reg. 2715.
For the meaning of the term “field intensity,” and for the relation óf a broadcast signal’s “field intensity” to the legal concept of a licensed radio station’s “normally protected contour,” see note 5..
Federal Communications Commission Rules Governing Standard Broadcast Stations § 3.21 (a): “A ‘clear channel’ is one-on which the, dominant station or stations render service over wide areas and which are cleared of objectionable interference, within their primary service areas and over all or a substantial portion of their secondary service areas.” 4 Fed. Reg. 2715.
The dissenting opinion in the- Court of Appeals decision here under review offers a succinct exposition of these technical terms:
"This concept of normal protection in the daytime is clear. The circumference of -the. protected area is a contour line, which is fixed by measurement of the strength of the radio waves from the par-. ticúlar station. That strength, or intensity, is measured in terms of microvolts (millionths of a volt) or millivolts (thousandths of a volt) per meter, abbreviated as uv/m and mv/m respectively. The wave which is measured is the groundwave, which follows the surface of the earth and extends greater or less distances depending upon the nature of the earth, its topography, and such obstacles as noise and steel structures. Generally speaking, the greater the distance from the station, the less the strength of the station signal. The ‘100 uv/m ground wave contour’ named in the Commission’s Standards, is the imaginary line which connects all points at which the ground wave of the station is of 100 microvolts per meter strength.” 174 F. 2d 226,244.
The “Commission’s Standards” to which the opinion refers are the Standards of Good Engineering Practice Concerning Broadcast Stations. Under the subheading “Engineering Standards of Allocation,” paragraph (2) (a) provides as follows: “The Class I stations in Group 1 are those assigned to the channels allocated by Section 3.25, paragraph (a) [including, inter alia, the 760 kilocycle frequency assigned to WJR, 4 Fed. Reg. 2716], on which duplicate nighttime operation is not permitted, that is, no other station is.permitted to operate on a channel with a Class I station of this group within the limits of the United' States- (the Class II stations assigned the ■ channels operate limited time or daytime only) and during daytime the Class I station is protected to the 100 uv/m ground wave contour-.” 4 Fed. Reg. 2862-.-
The case was first argued before three justices; Chief Justice Groner and Justices Clark and Prettyman. By direction of the court it was reargued before Justices Stephens, Edgerton, Clark, •Wilbur K. Miller and Prettyman. The decision was rendered pursiiant to an opinion of Justice Stephens, in which Justices Clark and Miller concurred.^ Justice Prettyman filed a dissenting opinion in which Justice Edgerton joined.
The statement, taken in its context and the. pervading sense of the opinion, related not merely to judicial rulings technically “raised by demurrer” but also to judicial and administrative rulings “as if on demurrer,” i. e., as expressly stated later in the opinion, to rulings “raised by demurrer or motion to dismiss or, in an administrative proceeding, by some less formally named instrument of'like purpose,, or by the tribunal’s sua sponte treatment of a petition as if under demurrer....” 174 F. 2d at 236.
Both from the wording of the immediate reference, quoted above, and from other language-in context, it is clear that the court’s reference to “the statutory scheme set up in the Communications Act” was not designed as a ruling that the statutory scheme itself, considered wholly as such and apart from any requirement of due process, affords the right of’ oral argument upon all questions of law, other than the interlocutory exceptions, before the Commission. Rather, the reference was intended to construe the Act as incorporating the court’s reiterated conception of due-process "requirements in this respect, in effect as a construction required by the Fifth Amendment. It is clear also that in this ruling the court identified “hearing” with “oral argument” insofar as determination of questions of law are concerned. We are thus confronted, so far as the court’s decision went, with no question purely of statutory construction but solely, at bottom, with one of constitutional import and effect.
“The Fifth Amendment guarantees no particular form of procedure; it protects substantial rights.” Labor Board v. Mackay Co., 304 U. S. 333, 351. “The requirements imposed by that guaranty [Fifth Amendment due process] are not technical, nor is any particular form of procedure necessary.” Inland Empire Council v. Milis, 325 U. S. 697, 710. See also Bowles v. Willingham, 321 U. S. 503, 519-521; Opp Cotton Mills v. Administrator, 312 U. S. 126, 152-153; Buttfield v. Stranahan, 192 U. S. 470, 496-497; Anniston Mfg. Co. v. Davis, 301 U. S. 337, 342, 343; United States v. Ju Toy, 198 U. S. 253, 263; Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Chicago, 166 U. S. 226, 235; Phillips v. Commissioner, 283 U. S. 589, 596-597.
For example, what may be appropriate or constitutionally required by way of procedure, including opportunity for oral argument, in protection of an alien’s claims of right to enter the country, cf. Johnson v. Shaughnessy, 336 U. S. 806, may be very different from what is required to determine an alleged citizen’s right of entry or reentry, cf. Ng Fung Ho v. White, 259 U. S. 276, 282; Carmichael v. Delaney, 170 F. 2d 239, 243-244; a claimed right of naturalization, Tutun v. United States, 270 U. S. 568, 576-578; a claim1 of just compensation for land condemned, cf. Roberts v. New York City, 295 U. S. 264, 277-278; or the right to defend against an indictment for crime.
Act of June 19, 1934, c. 652, 48 Stat. 1064, 1081, 47 U. S. C. § 301 ff.
The section, reads in part: “In all cases heard by an examiner the Commission shall hear oral arguments....” 47 U. S. C. §409 (a).
The Standards, 4 Fed. Reg. 2862, expressly state that “during daytime the Class I station is protected to the 100 uv/m ground wave contour.” § 1 (2) (a). The Commission’s Standards of Good Engineering Practice Concerning Standard Broadcast Stations' were adopted in 1939 after formal and informal hearings. Fifth Annual Report of the Federal Communications Commission (1940) 37.
In other words, the interference alleged was within the conceded “normal contours” of KOA’s protection, not without them. There was therefore no question such as is presented here whether the existing station’s license protected it against the interference alleged. The KOA decision therefore cannot be taken as ruling that one asserting interference outside the scope' of its license protection, afforded by the Commission’s rules and regulations, is entitled to be made a party and to participate in proceedings involving the issuance of a new license creating only such interference.
The court’s opinion stated: “WJR as an outstanding licensee is not a mere permissive intervener or, as the minority puts it, an ‘outsider’.” 174 F. 2d at 240. The statement of the minority to which this rejoinder was made was: “The ruling [of the majority] is that a petitioner for intervention in an administrative proceeding is entitled to an oral hearing as a matter of constitutional right, no matter what or how little he says in his petition.... [WJR’s petition] was basically a petition to intervene, as it asked that WJR be made a party to the Coastal Plains proceeding.” Id. at 243.
The Court of Appeals was not simply construing the statute, but was influenced throughout its opinion by its broad constitutional generalization concerning oral argument. In that view necessarily the Act’s specific terms, including, those of §312 (b), sank into the generalization’s constitutional coloring. In that light, perhaps, the majority’s disclaimer and its ruling that WJR was entitled to come in as a party bore semblance of consistency. But without the coloration, § 312 (b) identifies showing of modification with standing as a party; and, unless this limitation is invalid for constitutional reasons, it must be
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
D
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Stewart
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In this case we are called upon to determine whether Oregon may constitutionally require a person convicted of a criminal offense to repay to the State the costs of providing him with effective representation of counsel, when he is indigent at the time of the criminal proceedings but subsequently acquires the means to bear the costs of his legal defense.
The petitioner Fuller pleaded guilty, on July 20, 1972, to an information charging him with sodomy in the third degree. At the hearing on the plea and in other court proceedings he was represented by a local member of the bar appointed by the court upon the petitioner’s representation that he was indigent and unable to hire a lawyer. Fuller’s counsel in turn hired an investigator to aid in gathering facts for his defense, and the investigator’s fees were also assumed by the State. Fuller was subsequently sentenced to five years of probation, conditioned upon his satisfactorily complying with the requirements of a work-release program at the county jail that would permit him to attend college, and also upon his reimbursement to the county of the fees and expenses of the attorney and investigator whose services had been provided him because of his indigent status. On appeal to the Oregon Court of Appeals, his principal contention was that the State could not constitutionally condition his probation on the repayment of these expenses. With one judge dissenting, the imposition of his sentence was affirmed, 12 Ore. App. 152, 504 P. 2d 1393, and the Supreme Court of Oregon subsequently denied Fuller's petition for review. Because of the importance of the question presented and the conflict of opinion on the constitutional issue involved, we granted certiorari, 414 U. S. 1111.
I
We begin with consideration of the plan and operation of the challenged statute. By force of interpretation of the State’s Constitution and comprehensive legislation, Oregon mandates that every defendant in a criminal case must be assigned a lawyer at state expense if “[i]t appears to the court that the defendant is without means and is unable to obtain counsel.” Ore. Rev. Stat. § 135.-050 (l)(d) (1973). As part of a recoupment statute passed in 1971, Oregon requires that in some cases all or part of the “expenses specially incurred by the state in prosecuting the defendant,” § 161.665 (2), be repaid to the State, and that when a convicted person is placed on probation repayment of such expenses may be made a condition of probation. These expenses include the costs of the convicted person’s legal defense.
As the Oregon appellate court noted in its opinion in this case, however, the requirement of repayment “is never mandatory.” 12 Ore. App., at 156, 504 P. 2d, at 1395. Rather, several conditions must be satisfied before a person may be required to repay the costs of his legal defense. First, a requirement of repayment may be imposed only upon a convicted defendant; those who are acquitted, whose trials end in mistrial or dismissal, and those whose convictions are overturned upon appeal face no possibility of being required to pay. Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.665 (1). Second, a court may not order a convicted person to pay these expenses unless he “is or will be able to pay them.” § 161.665 (3). The sentencing court must “take account of the financial resources of the defendant and the nature of the burden that payment of costs will impose.” Ibid. As the Oregon court put the matter in this case, no requirement to repay may be imposed if it appears at the time of sentencing that “there is no likelihood that a defendant’s indigency will end ....” 12 Ore. App., at 159, 504 P. 2d, at 1397. Third, a convicted person under an obligation to repay “may at any time petition the court which sentenced him for remission of the payment of costs or of any unpaid portion thereof.” Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.665 (4). The court is empowered to remit if payment “will impose manifest hardship on the defendant or his immediate family ...” Ibid. Finally, no convicted person may be held in contempt for failure to repay if he shows that “his default was not attributable to an intentional refusal to obey the order of the court or to a failure on his part to make a good faith effort to make the payment § 161.685 (2).
Thus, the recoupment statute is quite clearly directed only at those convicted defendants who are indigent at the time of the criminal proceedings against them but who subsequently gain the ability to pay the expenses of legal representation. Defendants with no likelihood of having the means to repay are not put under even a conditional obligation to do so, and those upon whom a conditional obligation is imposed are not subjected to collection procedures until their indigency has ended and no “manifest hardship” will result. The contrast with appointment-of-counsel procedures in States without recoupment requirements is thus relatively small: a lawyer is provided at the expense of the State to all defendants who are unable, even momentarily, to hire one, and the obligation to repay the State accrues only to those who later acquire the means to do so without hardship.
II
The petitioner’s first contention is that Oregon’s recoupment system violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because of various classifications explicitly or implicitly drawn by the legislative provisions. He calls attention to our decision in James v. Strange, 407 U. S. 128, which held invalid under the Equal Protection Clause a law enacted by Kansas that was somewhat similar to the legislation now before us. But the offending aspect of the Kansas statute was its provision that in an action to compel repayment of counsel fees “[n]one of the exemptions provided for in the code of civil procedure [for collection of other judgment debts] shall apply to any such judgment...," Kan. Stat. Ann. § 22-4513 (a) (Supp. 1971), a provision which “strip [ped] from indigent defendants the array of protective exemptions Kansas has erected for other civil judgment debtors . . . .” 407 U. S., at 135. . The Court found that the elimination of the exemptions normally available to judgment debtors “embodie[d] elements of punitiveness and discrimination which violate the rights of citizens to equal treatment under the law.” Id., at 142.
The Oregon statute under consideration here suffers from no such infirmity. As the Oregon Court of Appeals observed, “[n]o denial of the exemptions from execution afforded to other judgment debtors is included in the Oregon statutes.” 12 Ore. App., at 159, 504 P. 2d, at 1397. Indeed, a separate provision directs that “[a] judgment that the defendant pay money, either as a fine or as costs and disbursements of the action, or both, shall be docketed as a judgment in a civil action and with like effect . . . .” Ore. Rev. Stat. § 137.180. The convicted person from whom recoupment is sought thus retains all the exemptions accorded other judgment debtors, in addition to the opportunity to show at any time that recovery of the costs of his legal defense will impose “manifest hardship,” § 161.665 (4). The legislation before us, therefore, is wholly free of the kind of discrimination that was held in James v. Strange to violate the Equal Protection Clause.
The petitioner contends further, however, that the Oregon statute denies equal protection of the laws in another way — by discriminating between defendants who are convicted, on the one hand, and those who are not convicted or whose convictions are reversed, on the other. Our review of this distinction, of course, is a limited one. As the Court stated in James v. Strange: “We do not inquire whether this statute is wise or desirable .... Misguided laws may nonetheless be constitutional.” 407 U. S., at 133. Our task is merely to determine whether there is “some rationality in the nature of the class singled out.” Rinaldi v. Yeager, 384 U. S. 305, 308-309. See also McGinnis v. Royster, 410 U. S. 263; McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420. In Rinaldi the Court found impermissible New Jersey’s decision to single out prisoners confined to state institutions for imposition of an obligation to repay to the State costs incurred in providing free transcripts of trial court proceedings required by this Court’s decision in Griffin v. Illinois, 351 U. S. 12. The legislative decision to tax those confined to prison but not those also convicted but given a suspended sentence, probation, or a fine without imprisonment was found to be invidiously discriminatory and thus violative of the requirements of the Equal Protection Clause. In the case before us, however, the sole distinction is between those who are ultimately convicted and those who are not.
We conclude that this classification is wholly non-invidious. A defendant whose trial ends without conviction or whose conviction is overturned on appeal has been seriously imposed upon by society without any conclusive demonstration that he is criminally culpable. His life has been interrupted and subjected to great stress, and he may have incurred financial hardship through loss of job or potential working hours. His reputation may have been greatly damaged. The imposition of such dislocations and hardships without an ultimate conviction is, of course, unavoidable in a legal system that requires proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and guarantees important procedural protections to every defendant in a criminal trial. But Oregon could surely decide with objective rationality that when a defendant has been forced to submit to a criminal prosecution that does not end in conviction, he will be freed of any potential liability to reimburse the State for the costs of his defense. This legislative decision reflects no more than an effort to achieve elemental fairness and is a far cry from the kind of invidious discrimination that the Equal Protection Clause condemns.
III
The petitioner’s second basic contention is that Oregon’s recoupment statute infringes upon his constitutional right to have counsel provided by the State when he is unable because of indigency to hire a lawyer. Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335; Argersinger v. Hamlin, 407 U. S. 25. The argument is not that the legal representation actually provided in this case was ineffective or insufficient. Nor does the petitioner claim that the fees and expenses he may have to repay constitute unreasonable compensation for the defense provided him. Rather, he asserts that a defendant’s knowledge that he may remain under an obligation to repay the expenses incurred in providing him legal representation might impel him to decline the services of an appointed attorney and thus “chill” his constitutional right to counsel.
This view was articulated by the Supreme Court of California, in a case invalidating California’s recoupment legislation, in the following terms:
“[W]e believe that as knowledge of [the recoupment] practice has grown and continues to grow many indigent defendants will come to realize that the judge’s offer to supply counsel is not the gratuitous offer of assistance that it might appear to be; that, in the event the case results in a grant of probation, one of the conditions might well be the reimbursement of the county for the expense involved. This knowledge is quite likely to deter or discourage many defendants from accepting the offer of counsel despite the gravity of the need for such representation as emphasized by the [Supreme] [C]ourt in Gideon . . . .” In re Allen, 71 Cal. 2d 388, 391, 455 P. 2d 143, 144.
We have concluded that this reasoning is wide of the constitutional mark.
The focal point of this Court’s decisions securing the right to state-appointed counsel for indigents was the “noble ideal” that every criminal defendant be guaranteed not only “procedural and substantive safeguards designed to assure fair trials before impartial tribunals in which every defendant stands equal before the law,” but also the expert advice necessary to recognize and take advantage of those safeguards. Gideon v. Wainwright, supra, at 344. In the now familiar words of the Court’s seminal opinion in Powell v. Alabama, 287 U. S. 45, 68-69, quoted in Gideon, at 344-345:
“The right to be heard would be, in many cases, of little avail if it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel. Even the intelligent and educated layman has small and sometimes no skill in the science of law. If charged with crime, he is incapable, generally, of determining for himself whether the indictment is good or bad. He is unfamiliar with the rules of evidence. Left without the aid of counsel he may be put on trial without a proper charge, and convicted upon incompetent evidence, or evidence irrelevant to the issue or otherwise inadmissible. He lacks both the skill and knowledge adequately to prepare his defense, even though he have a perfect one. He requires the guiding hand of counsel at every step in the proceedings against him. Without it, though he be not guilty, he faces the danger of conviction because he does not know how to establish his innocence.”
Oregon’s system for providing counsel quite clearly does not deprive any defendant of the legal assistance necessary to meet these needs. As the State Court of Appeals observed in this case, an indigent is entitled to free counsel “when he needs it” — that is, during every stage of the criminal proceedings against him. 12 Ore. App., at 158-159, 504 P. 2d, at 1396. The fact that an indigent who accepts state-appointed legal representation knows that he might someday be required to repay the costs of these services in no way affects his eligibility to obtain counsel. The Oregon statute is carefully designed to insure that only those who actually become capable of repaying the State will ever be obliged to do so. Those who remain indigent or for whom repayment would work “manifest hardship” are forever exempt from any obligation to repay.
We live in a society where the distribution of legal assistance, like the distribution of all goods and services, is generally regulated by the dynamics of private enterprise. A defendant in a criminal case who is just above the line separating the indigent from the nonindigent must borrow money, sell off his meager assets, or call upon his family or friends in order to hire a lawyer. We cannot say that the Constitution requires that those only slightly poorer must remain forever immune from any obligation to shoulder the expenses of their legal defense, even when they are able to pay without hardship.
This case is fundamentally different from our decisions relied on by the petitioner which have invalidated state and federal laws that placed a penalty on the exercise of a constitutional right. See Uniformed Sanitation Men v. Sanitation Comm’r, 392 U. S. 280; Gardner v. Broderick, 392 U. S. 273; United States v. Jackson, 390 U. S. 570. Unlike the statutes found invalid in those cases, where the provisions “had no other purpose or effect than to chill the assertion of constitutional rights by penalizing those who choose to exercise them,” id., at 581, Oregon's recoupment statute merely provides that a convicted person who later becomes able to pay for his counsel may be required to do so. Oregon's legislation is tailored to impose an obligation only upon those with a foreseeable ability to meet it, and to enforce that obligation only against those who actually become able to meet it without hardship.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals of Oregon is affirmed.
It is so ordered.
Other charges contained in the information against Fuller were dismissed when his guilty plea was accepted.
In addition, Fuller argued that the section of the Oregon recoupment statute authorizing an obligation to repay “expenses specially incurred by the state in prosecuting the defendant," Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.665 (2), see n. 5, infra, was not intended by the state legislature to include counsel fees. This issue of state law was resolved against the petitioner in the state court, and properly is not raised here. Murdock v. City of Memphis, 20 Wall. 590.
Courts of some other States, in reviewing legislation similar to that in question here, have expressed views on the constitutionality of the recoupment of defense costs inconsistent with the decision of the Oregon Court of Appeals in this case. In re Allen, 71 Cal. 2d 388, 455 P. 2d 143; Opinion of the Justices, 109 N. H. 508, 256 A. 2d 500; State ex rel. Brundage v. Eide, 83 Wash. 2d 676, 521 P. 2d 706. Cf. Strange v. James, 323 F. Supp. 1230 (Kan.), aff’d on other grounds, 407 U. S. 128. See generally American Bar Association Project on Standards for Criminal Justice, Providing Defense Services § 6.4, pp. 58-59 (Approved Draft 1968); Comment, Reimbursement of Defense Costs as a Condition of Probation for Indigents, 67 Mich. L. Rev. 1404 (1969); Comment, Charging Costs of Prosecution to the Defendant, 59 Geo. L. J. 991 (1971).
Ore. Rev. Stat. § 135.050 (3) (a) (1973) directs that counsel be appointed for an indigent defendant when he is “[c]harged with a crime.”
Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.665 provides:
“(1) The court may require a convicted defendant to pay costs.
“(2) Costs shall be limited to expenses specially incurred by the state in prosecuting the defendant. They cannot include expenses inherent in providing a constitutionally guaranteed jury trial or expenditures in connection with the maintenance and operation of government agencies that must be made by the public irrespective of specific violations of law.
“(3) The court shall not sentence a defendant to pay costs unless the defendant is or will be able to pay them. In determining the amount and method of payment of costs, the court shall take account of the financial resources of the defendant and the nature of the burden that payment of costs will impose.
“ (4) A defendant who has been sentenced to pay costs and who is not in contumacious default in the payment thereof may at any time petition the court which sentenced him for remission of the payment of costs or of any unpaid portion thereof. If it appears to the satisfaction of the court that payment of the amount due will impose manifest hardship on the defendant or his immediate family, the court may remit all or part of the amount due in costs, or modify the method of payment under ORS 161.675.”
Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.675 provides:
“(1) When a defendant is sentenced to pay a fine or costs, the court may grant permission for payment to be made within a specified period of time or in specified instalments. If no such permission is included in the sentence the fine shall be payable forthwith.
“(2) When a defendant sentenced to pay a fine or costs is also placed on probation or imposition or execution of sentence is suspended, the court may make payment of the fine or costs a condition of probation or suspension of sentence.”
Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.685 provides:
“(1) When a defendant sentenced to pay a fine defaults in the payment thereof or of any instalment, the court on motion of the district attorney or upon its own motion may require him to show cause why his default should not be treated as contempt of court, and may issue a show cause citation or a warrant of arrest for his appearance.
“ (2) Unless the defendant shows that his default was not attributable to an intentional refusal to obey the order of the court or to a failure on his part to make a good faith effort to make the payment, the court may find that his default constitutes contempt and may order him committed until the fine, or a specified part thereof, is paid.
“(3) When a fine is imposed on a corporation or unincorporated association, it is the duty of the person authorized to make disbursement from the assets of the corporation or association to pay the fine from those assets, and his failure to do so may be held to be contempt unless he makes the showing required in subsection (2) of this section.
“(4) The term of imprisonment for contempt for nonpayment of fines shall be set forth in the commitment order,, and shall not exceed one day for each $25 of the fine, 30 days if the fine was imposed upon conviction of a violation or misdemeanor, or one year in any other case, whichever is the shorter period. A person committed for nonpayment of a fine shall be given credit toward payment for each day of imprisonment at the rate specified in the commitment order.
“(5) If it appears to the satisfaction of the court that the default in the payment of a fine is not contempt, the court may enter an order allowing the defendant additional time for payment, reducing the amount thereof or of each instalment or revoking the fine or the unpaid portion thereof in whole or in part.
“ (6) A default in the payment of a fine or costs or any instalment thereof may be collected by any means authorized by law for the enforcement of a judgment. The levy of execution for the collection of a fine shall not discharge a defendant committed to imprisonment for contempt until the amount of the fine has actually been collected.”
See n. 2, supra.
The recoupment provisions of other States are set out in the Court’s opinion in James v. Strange, 407 U. S. 128, 132-133, and n. 8. The federal reimbursement provision is found in 18 U. S. C. § 3006A (f).
The Kansas statute allowed only one exception from the blanket denial of exemptions usually available to judgment debtors, permitting debtors upon whom judgments for costs of legal defense were executed to maintain their homesteads intact. 407 U. S., at 135.
The dissenting opinion today argues that Fuller’s conditional obligation to repay constitutes an impermissible discrimination based on wealth in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. More precisely, the argument is made that, unlike a nonindigent defendant, an indigent defendant’s “failure to pay his debt can result in his being sent to prison.” Post, at 60. This contention was not made in the petitioner’s brief or oral argument before this Court, and appears not to have been raised in the Oregon courts. It is, therefore, not properly before us. See n. 11, infra. Furthermore, insofar as the dissent deals with Art. 1, § 19, of the Oregon Constitution which forbids “imprisonment for debt,” the dissent purports to resolve questions of state law that this Court does not have power to decide. Murdock v. City of Memphis, 20 Wall. 590.
More fundamentally, the imposition of a repayment requirement upon those for whom counsel was appointed but not upon those who hired their own counsel simply does not constitute invidious discrimination against the poor. Indeed, the entire thrust of Oregon’s appointment-of-counsel plan is to insure an indigent effective representation of counsel at all significant steps of the criminal process. Those who are indigent may be conditionally required to repay because only they, in contrast to nonindigents, were provided counsel by the State in the first place. Moreover, the fact that a conditional requirement to repay may be made a condition of probation does not mean that the State "imposefs] unduly harsh or discriminatory terms merely because the obligation is to the public treasury rather than to a private creditor.” James v. Strange, 407 U. S., at 138. Under Oregon’s recoupment statute revocation of probation is not a collection device used by the State to enforce debts to it, but is a sanction imposed for “an intentional refusal to obey the order of the court,” Ore. Rev. Stat. § 161.685 (2). Since an order to repay can be entered only when a convicted person is financially able but unwilling to reimburse the State, the constitutional invalidity found in James v. Strange simply does not exist.
The petitioner also claims in his brief that a requirement to repay legal defense expenses has been imposed only on convicted defendants placed on probation, and “has not been applied to those convicted indigents who were sentenced to terms of imprisonment.” While this distinction might well be justified on the ground that those released on probation are more likely than those incarcerated to have the ability to earn money to repay, we need not reach this issue since the statute itself makes no such distinction, and the petitioner has not demonstrated on this record that the State has engaged in any pattern or practice embracing it.
The petitioner’s brief also raises, without extended discussion, various due process claims that imposition of the conditional obligation to repay was made without sufficient notice or hearing. Since these contentions appear not to have been raised in the state courts, and were not discussed by the Oregon Court of Appeals, we need not reach them here. “[T]his Court has stated that when . . . the highest state court has failed to pass upon a federal question, it will be assumed that the omission was due to want of proper presentation in the state courts, unless the aggrieved party in this Court can affirmatively show the contrary.” Street v. New York, 394 U. S. 576, 582. We note in passing, however, that the recoupment statutes, including a schedule of fees, were published in the Oregon Revised Statutes at the time of the petitioner’s plea, and further that both Oregon’s judgment execution statute and its parole revocation procedures provide for a hearing before execution can be levied or probation revoked.
The limitation of the obligation to repay to those who are found able to do so also disposes of the argument, presented by an amicus curiae, that revocation of probation for failure to pay constitutes an impermissible discrimination based on wealth. See Tate v. Short, 401 U. S. 395; Williams v. Illinois, 399 U. S. 235. As the Court stated in Tate v. Short: “We emphasize that our holding today does not suggest any constitutional infirmity in imprisonment of a defendant with the means to pay a fine who refuses or neglects to do so.” 401 U. S., at 400.
Similarly, the wording of Oregon’s statute makes it clear that a determination that an indigent “will be able” to make subsequent repayment is a condition necessary for the initial imposition of the obligation to make repayment, but is not itself a condition for granting probation, or even a factor to be considered in determining whether probation should be granted.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Goldberg
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioners, attorneys engaged in the general practice of law, instituted this declaratory judgment action, 28 U. S. C. § 2201, against respondent, the Attorney General of the United States, in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. The complaint alleged that petitioners had been:
“retained by the Government of the Republic of Cuba to represent in the United States the Republic of Cuba and its governmental agencies in legal matters, including litigation, involving the mercantile and financial interests of the Republic of Cuba. . . . The retainer does not cover advice or representation involving public relations, propaganda, lobbying, or political or other non-legal matters, nor have the plaintiffs advised, represented, or acted on behalf of the Republic of Cuba in any such matters.”
The complaint alleged further that respondent had “demanded that [petitioners] . . . register with the Attorney General under the provisions of the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, as amended.” The relief sought by petitioners included a “judgment declaring that their activities as legal representatives for the Republic of Cuba do not subject them to the requirements of registration under the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, as amended . . . .” 52 Stat. 631, as amended, 22 U. S. C. § 611.
That Act requires the registration of “any person who acts or agrees to act ... as ... a public-relations counsel, publicity agent, information-service employee, servant, agent, representative, or attorney for a foreign principal . . . .” “Foreign principal” includes “a government of a foreign country and a foreign political party,” as well as “a partnership, association, corporation, organization, or other combination of individuals organized under the laws of, or having its principal place of business in, a foreign country . . . .” The Act exempts from registration any “person engaging or agreeing to engage only in private and nonpolitical financial or mercantile activities in furtherance of the bona fide trade or commerce of such foreign principal . . .
Respondent moved for judgment on the pleadings. The District Court denied the motion, but at the request of respondent and with the consent of petitioner, the court certified to the Court of Appeals the “controlling question of law, as to whether individuals requested to register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, as amended, may have their rights adjudicated by a declaratory judgment suit . . .
The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, noting that petitioners did not challenge the constitutionality of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, held, with one judge dissenting, that the doctrine of sovereign immunity required that the case be dismissed “as an unconsented suit against the United States.” 115 U. S. App. D. C. 210, 212, 318 F. 2d 181, 183. We granted certiorari, 375 U. S. 811.
We hold, for the reasons stated below, that the Foreign Agents Registration Act plainly and unquestionably requires petitioners to register. Since we conclude that the Court of Appeals was correct in ordering the case dismissed, but for reasons other than those relied upon in its opinion, we do not pass upon the reasoning by which that court arrived at its decision, nor do we have occasion to consider the scope of the declaratory judgment remedy or the sovereign immunity doctrine.
The Foreign Agents Registration Act was first enacted by Congress on June 8, 1938. It required agents of foreign principals to register with the Secretary of State. “[A]gent of a foreign principal” was defined as "any person who acts or engages or agrees to act as a public-relations counsel, publicity agent, or as agent, servant, representative, or attorney for a foreign principal . . . .” 52 Stat. 631, 632. (Emphasis added.) "Foreign principal” was defined as “the government of a foreign country, a political party of a foreign country, a person domiciled abroad, or any foreign business, partnership, association, corporation, or political organization . . . .” Exempted from the definition of “agent of a foreign principal” was “a person, other than a public-relations counsel, or publicity agent, performing only private, non-political, financial, mercantile, or other activities in furtherance of the bona fide trade or commerce of such foreign principal.” 52 Stat. 631, 632. (Emphasis added.) In 1961, the exemption section was amended to apply to persons “engaging or agreeing to engage only in private and nonpolitical financial or mercantile activities in furtherance of the bona fide trade or commerce of such foreign principal . ...” (Emphasis added.) 75 Stat. 784. The Senate and House Reports accompanying this amendment state its purpose as follows:
“The so-called commercial exemption has proved to be ambiguous. During hearings held on H. R. 6817 in the 86th Congress, a bill identical to H. R. 470, a representative of the Department of Justice testified that the language contained in the exemption has led to confusion and unnecessarily difficult problems in the administration of the law. Argument has been made that if an agent of a foreign principal meets any one of the above-quoted conditions, as distinguished from meeting several or all of the requirements, it need not register. As rewritten, the section with its proposed changes and sentence structure makes it clear that for an agent to qualify for exemption from the obligation of registering, it must be engaged in activities which meet either of two sets of three requirements. They must be private and nonpolitical and financial, or private and nonpolitical and mercantile. If any one of these characteristics is lacking, the agent cannot qualify for exemption and therefore must register under the act.” (Emphasis added.) S. Rep. No. 1061, 87th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 2.
See also H. R. Rep. No. 246, 87th Cong., 1st Sess.
Petitioners here are attorneys who have been retained “to represent in the United States the Republic of Cuba and its governmental agencies in legal matters, including litigation . . . .” As an example of their “activities” pursuant to this retainer, petitioners cite their appearance before this Court in the recently decided case of Banco Nacional de Cuba v. Sabbatino, ante, at 398.
Although the work of a lawyer in litigating for a foreign government might be regarded as “private and nonpolitical” activity, it cannot properly be characterized as only “financial or mercantile” activity. It is clear from the statute and its history that “financial or mercantile” activity was intended to describe conduct of the ordinary private commercial character usually associated with those terms. See, e. g., S. Rep. No. 1783, 75th Cong., 3d Sess. Furthermore, although the interest of a government in litigation might be labeled “financial or mercantile,” it cannot be deemed only “private and nonpolitical,” Since an attorney may not qualify for exemption “[i]f any one of these characteristics is lacking,” it would be impossible to conclude, under any construction of the statute, that petitioners are engaging “only in private and nonpolitical financial or mercantile activities.”
We conclude, therefore, that petitioners, attorneys representing a foreign government in legal matters including litigation, are not exempt from registering under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
In support of their case, petitioners also claim that if they register they would be required in completing the registration forms to “make public disclosure not only of their relation with their foreign principal, but of numerous private, personal and business affairs unconnected with their representation of the Republic of Cuba.” In concluding that petitioners must register, we do not suggest that they may be required to answer all the questions in the registration forms. The Government says that some of the questions are “clearly inapplicable” to petitioners, that others may satisfactorily be answered in conclusory language, and that others, while “framed in general terms,” may satisfactorily be answered by disclosing only those facts which “bear a reasonable relationship to the representation of the foreign principal.” Under the rules established by the Department of Justice and printed on the forms themselves:
“If compliance with any requirement of the form appears in any particular case to be inappropriate or unduly burdensome, the Registrant may apply for a complete or partial waiver -of the requirement.”
Compare, 28 CFR § 5.201. Since petitioners have made no attempt to determine which questions must be answered and how much information disclosed, this issue is not ripe for adjudication. See, e. g., Eccles v. Peoples Bank, 333 U. S. 426. See generally, Davis, Ripeness of Governmental Action for Judicial Review (pts. 1-2), 68 Harv. L. Rev. 1122, 1326 (1955).
For these reasons, petitioners’ complaint should be dismissed, and, accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals ordering dismissal of the complaint is affirmed.
It is so ordered.
See, e. g., Borchard, Declaratory Judgments (2d ed., 1941); Borchard, Challenging “Penal” Statutes by Declaratory Action, 52 Yale L. J. 445 (1943); Davis, Sovereign Immunity in Suits Against Officers for Relief Other than Damages, 40 Cornell L. Q. 3 (1954); Davis, Suing the Government by Suing an Officer, 29 U. of Chi. L. Rev. 435 (1962); Jaffe, Suits Against Governments and Officers: Sovereign Immunity, 77 Harv. L. Rev. 1 (1963).
This section had previously been amended in 1942 to cover any person “engaging or agreeing to engage only in private, nonpolitical, financial, mercantile, or other activities in furtherance of the bona fide trade or commerce of such foreign principal 56 Stat. 254.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Stevens
delivered the opinion, of the Court.
The question presented is whether Congress has the power to require that a dependent child's social security benefits terminate upon marriage even though his spouse is permanently disabled. Answering that question in the negative, the District Court held that 42 U. S. C. §§ 402 (d) (1) (D) and 402 (d) (5) deprive appellee of property without due process of law. Jobst v. Richardson, 368 F. Supp. 909. We reverse.
Mr. Jobst has been disabled by cerebral palsy since his birth in 1932. He qualified for child’s insurance benefits in 1957, several months after his father died. In 1970 he married another cerebral palsy victim. Since his wife was not entitled to benefits under the federal Act, the statute required the Secretary to terminate his benefits.
Mr. Jobst brought this suit to review the Secretary’s action. The District Court held that the statute violated the equality principle applicable to the Federal Government by virtue of the Fifth Amendment, Bolling v. Sharpe, 347 U. S. 497, because all child’s insurance beneficiaries are not treated alike when they marry disabled persons. Beneficiaries who marry other social security beneficiaries continue to receive benefits whereas those who marry nonbeneficiaries lose their benefits permanently. The court held this distinction irrational. 368 F. Supp., at 913.
The Secretary appealed directly to this Court. 28 U. S. C. § 1262. Noting that Mr. Jobst and his wife had become entitled to benefits under a newly enacted statute authorizing supplemental security income for the aged, blind, and disabled, this Court remanded the case for reconsideration in the light of that program. Weinberger v. Jobst, 419 U. S. 811. The District Court reviewed the new program, concluded that it had no relevance to the issues presented by this case, and reinstated its original judgment. The Secretary again appealed, and we noted probable jurisdiction. 429 U. S. 1089.
Although the District Court focused on the statutory consequences of a marriage between two disabled persons, the Secretary argues that the relevant statutory classification is much broader. We therefore first describe the statutory scheme, then consider the validity of a general requirement that benefits payable to a wage earner’s dependent terminate upon marriage, and finally decide whether such a general requirement is invalidated by an exception limited to marriages between persons who are both receiving benefits.
I
As originally enacted in 1935, the Social Security Act authorized a monthly benefit for qualified wage earners at least 65 years old and a death benefit payable to the estate of a wage earner who died at an earlier age. 49 Stat. 622-624. In 1939 Congress created secondary benefits for wives, children, widows, and parents of wage earners. See 53 Stat. 1362, 1364-1366. The benefits were intended to provide persons dependent on the wage earner with protection against the economic hardship occasioned by loss of the wage earner’s support. Mathews v. De Castro, 429 U. S. 181, 185-186. Generally speaking, therefore, the categories of secondary beneficiaries were defined to include persons who were presumed to be dependent on the wage earner at the time of his death, disability, or retirement.
Specifically, the child’s benefit as authorized in 1939 was available only to a child who was unmarried, under 18, and dependent upon the wage earner at the time of his death or retirement. 53 Stat. 1364. Since Mr. Jobst was 23 at the time of his father’s death, he would not have been eligible for a child’s benefit under the 1939 Act. Under that statute, the child’s benefit, like the benefits for widows and parents, terminated upon marriage. 53 Stat. 1364-1366.
In 1956, Congress enlarged the class of persons entitled to a child’s benefit to include those who, like Mr. Jobst, were under a disability which began before age 18. For such a person the benefit continued beyond the age of 18 but, as with other secondary benefits, it terminated upon marriage.
In 1958, Congress adopted the amendment that created the basis for Mr. Jobst’s constitutional attack. The amendment provided that marriage would not terminate a child’s disability benefit if the child married a person who was also entitled to benefits under the Act. See 72 Stat. 1030-1031. A similar dispensation was granted to widows, widowers, divorced wives, and parents. In each case the secondary benefit survives a marriage to another beneficiary, but any other marriage — even to a disabled person unable to provide the beneficiary with support — is a terminating event unaffected by the 1958 amendment.
It was the failure of Congress in 1958 to create a larger class of marriages that do not terminate the child's benefit for disabled persons that the District Court found irrational.
II
The provision challenged in this case is part of a complex statutory scheme designed to administer a trust fund financed, in large part, by taxes levied on the wage earners who are the primary beneficiaries of the fund. The entitlement of any secondary beneficiary is predicated on his or her relationship to a contributing wage earner. If the statutory requirements for eligibility are met, the amount of the benefit is unrelated to the actual need of the beneficiary. See, e. g., Mathews v. De Castro, supra, at 185-186. The statute is designed to provide the wage earner and the dependent members of his family with protection against the hardship occasioned by his loss of earnings; it is not simply a welfare program generally benefiting needy persons. Califano v. Coldfarb, 430 U. S. 199, 213-214 (opinion of Brennan, J.).
Nor has Congress made actual dependency on the wage earner either a sufficient or a necessary condition of eligibility in every case. Instead of requiring individualized proof on a case-by-case basis, Congress has elected to use simple criteria, such as age and marital status, to determine probable dependency. A child who is married or over 18 and neither disabled nor a student is denied benefits because Congress has assumed that such a child is not normally dependent on his parents. There is no question about the power of Congress to legislate on the basis of such factual assumptions. General rules are essential if a fund of this magnitude is to be administered with a modicum of efficiency, even though such rules inevitably produce seemingly arbitrary consequences in some individual cases. Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U. S. 749, 776.
Of course, a general rule may not define the benefited class by reference to a distinction which irrationally differentiates between identically situated persons. Differences in race, religion, or political affiliation could not rationally justify a difference in eligibility for social security benefits, for such differences are totally irrelevant to the question whether one person is economically dependent on another. But a distinction between married persons and unmarried persons is of a different character.
Both tradition and common experience support the conclusion that marriage is an event which normally marks an important change in economic status. Traditionally, the event not only creates a new family with attendant new responsibilities, but also modifies the pre-existing relationships between the bride and groom and their respective families. Frequently, of course, financial independence and marriage do not go hand in hand. Nevertheless, there can be no question about the validity of the assumption that a married person is less likely to be dependent on his parents for support than one who is unmarried.
Since it was rational for Congress to assume that marital status is a relevant test of probable dependency, the general rule which obtained before 1958, terminating all child’s benefits when the beneficiary married, satisfied the constitutional test normally applied in cases like this. See Mathews v. De Castro, 429 U. S., at 185; Weinberger v. Salfi, supra, and cases cited at 768-770. That general rule is not rendered invalid simply because some persons who might otherwise have married were deterred by the rule or because some who did marry were burdened thereby. For the marriage rule cannot be criticized as merely an unthinking response to stereotyped generalizations about a traditionally disadvantaged group, or as an attempt to interfere with the' individual’s freedom to make a decision as important as marriage.
The general rule, terminating upon marriage the benefits payable to a secondary beneficiary, is unquestionably valid.
Ill
The question that remains is whether the 1958 amendment invalidates this general rule by carving out an exception for marriages between beneficiaries.
The exception does create a statutory classification, but it is not as narrow as that described by the District Court. The District Court identified the relevant classification as one distinguishing between (1) the marriage of a disabled beneficiary to another disabled person who is receiving social security benefits and (2) the marriage of a disabled beneficiary to another disabled person who is not receiving benefits. It is true that persons in the former category are treated more favorably than those in the latter category. It is also true that persons in the latter category may have as great a need for benefits as those in the former category. But it is not correct to conclude, as the District Court did, that only disabled persons are affected by the exception, or that the legislative classification is wholly irrational.
Both the class of persons favored by the 1958 amendment and the class which remains subject to the burdens of the general marriage rule include persons who are not disabled. The broad legislative classification must be judged by reference to characteristics typical of the affected classes rather than by focusing on selected, atypical examples. When so judged, both the exception and its limits are valid.
The 1958 amendment reflects a legislative judgment that a marriage between two persons receiving benefits will not normally provide either spouse with protection against the economic hardship that would be occasioned by the termination of benefits. The Secretary submits, and we agree, that it was reasonable for Congress to ameliorate the severity of the earlier rule by protecting both spouses from the dual hardship which it effected.
Mr. Jobst argues, however, that the reason for the amendment applies equally to his situation. He urges that his hardship is just as great as that which the amendment avoids when one beneficiary marries another, because his spouse is also disabled. He therefore attacks the exception as irrationally underinclusive. We are persuaded, however, that, even if the benign purpose of the 1958 amendment encompasses this case, legitimate reasons justify the limits that Congress placed on it. See Richardson v. Belcher, 404 U. S. 78. The exception, like the general rule itself, is simple to administer. It requires no individualized inquiry into degrees of hardship or need. It avoids any necessity for periodic review of the beneficiaries’ continued entitlement. In the cases to which the exception does apply, it is a reliable indicator of probable hardship. Since the test is one that may be applied without introducing any new concepts into the administration of the trust fund, Congress could reasonably take one firm step toward the goal of eliminating the hardship caused by the general marriage rule without accomplishing its entire objective in the same piece of legislation. Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S. 483, 489. Even if it might have been wiser to take a larger step, the step Congress did take was in the right direction and had no adverse impact on persons like the Jobsts.
It is true, as Mr. Jobst urges, that the limited exception may have an impact on a secondary beneficiary’s desire to marry, and may make some suitors less welcome than others. But unless Congress should entirely repudiate marriage as a terminating event, that criticism will apply to any limited exception to the general rule. No one suggests that Congress was motivated by antagonism toward any class of marriages or marriage partners not encompassed by the exception. Congress’ purpose was simply to remedy the particular injustice that occurred when two dependent individuals married and simultaneously lost their benefits.
We are satisfied that both the general rule and the 1958 exception are legitimate exercises of Congress’ power to decide who will share in the benefits of the trust fund. The favored treatment of marriages between secondary beneficiaries does not violate the principle of equality embodied in the Due' Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment.
The judgment is reversed.
It is so ordered.
Mrs. Jobst was receiving welfare assistance from the Division of Welfare of the State of Missouri, but was not receiving any social security benefits under 42 U. S. C. §§401-432 (1970 ed. and Supp. V).
Section 202 of the Social Security Act, 49 Stat. 623, as amended, 42 U. S. C. §402 (1970 ed. and Supp. V), provides in pertinent part:
“(d)(1) Every child (as defined in section 416 (e) of this title) of an individual entitled to old-age or disability insurance benefits or of an individual who dies a fully or currently insured individual, if such child—
“ (A) has filed application for child’s insurance benefits,
“(B) at the time such application was filed was unmarried and (i) either had not attained the age of 18 or was a full-time student and had not attained the age of 22, or (ii) is under a disability (as defined in section 423 (d) of this title) which began before he attained the age of 22, and
“(C) was dependent upon such individual—
“shall be entitled to a child’s insurance benefit for each month, beginning with the first month after August 1950 in which such child becomes so entitled to such insurance benefits and ending with the month preceding whichever of the following first occurs—
“ (D) the month in which such child dies or marries,
“(5) In the case of a child who has attained the age of eighteen and who marries—
“(A) an individual entitled to benefits under subsection (a), (b), (e), (f), (g), or (h) of this section or under section 423 (a) of this title, or
“(B) another individual who has attained the age of eighteen and is entitled to benefits under this subsection,
“such child’s entitlement to benefits under this subsection shall, notwithstanding the provisions of paragraph (1) of this subsection but subject to subsection (s) of this section, not be terminated by reason of such marriage ....
“(s)(2) . . . [S]o much of subsectio[n] . . . (d) (5) ... of this section as precedes the semicolon, shall not apply in the case of any child unless such child, at the time of the marriage referred to therein, was under a disability . . . .”
Mr. Jobst first exhausted his administrative remedies. A hearing examiner found in his favor, ruling that the denial of benefits was unconstitutional. The Appeals Council reversed; it held that an administrative agency has no power to rule on the constitutionality of the Act it administers.
See Title XVI of the Social Security Act, as amended by the Social Security Amendments of 1972, 86 Stat. 1465, 42 U. S. C. § 1381 et seq. (1970 ed., Supp. V).
The 1956 amendment replaced the requirement that the child be under 18 at the time of application with a requirement that he be either under 18 or “under a disability . . . which began before he attained the age of eighteen . . . 70 Stat. 807. In 1972, Congress raised the age before which the child’s disability must begin from 18 to 22. 86 Stat. 1343-1345.
72 Stat. 1030-1032. The House Report explained the purpose of this change:
“When a secondary beneficiary marries, such person’s benefit is terminated under present law. If he marries a person who is or who will become entitled to an old-age insurance benefit, he may qualify for a new benefit based on the earnings of the new spouse. But if the new spouse is also receiving a secondary benefit, the benefits of both are terminated and ordinarily neither beneficiary can become entitled to any new benefits. Your committee’s bill would eliminate the hardship in these cases by providing that marriage would not terminate a benefit where a person receiving mother’s, widow’s, widower’s, parent’s, or childhood disability benefits marries a person receiving any of these benefits or where a person receiving mother’s or childhood disability benefits marries a person entitled to old-age insurance benefits.” H. R. Rep. No. 2288, 85th Cong., 2d Sess., 18 (1958).
No doubt there are many distant relatives and unrelated persons who do not qualify for benefits even though they are actually dependent on a wage earner. Similarly, some married children and some 19-year-old children remain dependent on their parents because they are unable to support themselves while their younger brothers and sisters may be self-sufficient.
The idea that marriage changes dependency is expressed throughout the Social Security Act. Most secondary beneficiaries are eligible only if. they have not married or remarried. See 42 U. S. C. §402 (b)(1)(C) (divorced wives); § 402 (e) (1) (A) (widows); § 402 (f) (1) (A) (widowers); § 402 (g) (1) (A) (surviving or divorced mothers); § 402 (h) (1) (C) (parents). With some limited exceptions, §§ 402 (e) (4) and (f) (5), marriage or remarriage marks the end of secondary benefits. §§ 402 (b) (1) (H) (1970 ed., Supp. V), 402 (e)(1), 402 (f)(1), 402 (g)(1), and 402 (h)(1). In each case, however, Congress has excepted marriages to some social security beneficiaries. §§402 (b)(3), 402 (e)(3), 402(f)(4), 402 (g)(3), and 402 (h) (4).
This proposition is not questioned by appellee. “As a general premise the Secretary undoubtedly correctly concludes it is reasonable to terminate social security payments to child beneficiaries in the event of marriage.” Brief for Appellee 21.
See Weinberger v. Wiesenfeld, 420 U. S. 636; Jimenez v. Weinberger, 417 U. S. 628; Loving v. Virginia, 388 U. S. 1.
See Whalen v. Roe, 429 U. S. 589, 599-600, 603. Congress adopted this rule in the course of constructing a complex social welfare system that necessarily deals with the intimacies of family life. This is not a case in which government seeks to foist orthodoxy on the unwilling by banning, or criminally prosecuting, nonconforming marriages. See Loving v. Virginia, supra. Congress has simply recognized that marriage traditionally brings changed responsibilities.
As we have seen, the burden of the general marriage rule is not limited to disabled beneficiaries; children, widowers, widows, divorced wives, and parents — all are affected by the rule. And although the District Court singled out for analysis marriages to disabled nonbeneficiaries, Congress did not; Mr. Jobst would also have lost his benefits if he had married’an able-bodied woman who was not receiving social security benefits. Finally, the protection extended by the 1958 amendment encompasses many more persons than those described by the District Court. Like the marriage rule itself, the amendment affects widows, widowers, parents, and divorced wives, as well as disabled children. See n. 8, supra.
The fact that marriage characteristically signifies the end of a child’s dependency on parental support justifies a general rule terminating benefits when a child marries. The fact that a marriage between two spouses who are both receiving dependents’ benefits does not characteristically signify a similar change in economic status justifies the exception. In other words, since the justifying characteristic of the general class does not apply to the excepted class, the exception rests on a reasonable predicate. This is true even though some members of each class may possess the characteristic more commonly found in the other class.
Even if we were to sustain his attack, and even though we recognize the unusual hardship that the general rule has inflicted upon him, it would not necessarily follow that Mr. Jobst is entitled to benefits. Cf. Stanton v. Stanton, 421 U. S. 7, 17-18; Stanton v. Stanton, 429 U. S. 501. For the vice in the statute stems from the exception created by the 1958 amendment; that vice could be cured either by invalidating the entire exception or by enlarging it. Since the choice involves legislation having a nationwide impact, the equities of Mr. Jobst’s case would not control. See Developments in the Law — Equal Protection, 82 Harv. L. Rev. 1065, 1136— 1137 (1969). If we were to enlarge the exception, it would be necessary to fashion some new test of need, dependency, or disability. Although the District Court only granted relief for persons marrying a “totally disabled” spouse, its rationale would equally apply to any marriage of a secondary beneficiary to a needy nonbeneficiary.
We note, however, that Congress could have rationally concluded that beneficiaries who marry other beneficiaries present a more compelling case for legislative relief than beneficiaries who marry needy nonbeneficiaries. Secondary beneficiaries who marry each other lose two sets of benefits and thus may suffer a greater loss than does a couple that sacrifices only one set of benefits.
In the very Act that created the exception for marriages between beneficiaries, Congress showed its reluctance to use individualized determinations in allocating social security benefits. The 1958 amendments abolished a requirement that disabled children over 18 prove their individual dependency on the wage earner to qualify for benefits. Pub. L. 85-840 § 306, 72 Stat. 1030. Congress concluded that these beneficiaries should be “deemed dependent” because “the older child who has been totally disabled since before age 18 is also likely to be dependent on his parent.” H. R. Rep. No. 2288, 85th Cong., 2d Sess., 17 (1958).
A logical application of Mr. Jobst’s position would permit the Secretary to end benefits only after an individual determination of disability or need. Congress, however, has sought to make social security payments independent of individual need, while establishing a separate program to serve those who are needy but ineligible for social security benefits. The Supplemental Security Income program is a federally funded welfare program administered through the Social Security Administration. Its purpose is plainly stated by H. R. Rep. No. 92-231, p. 147 (1971):
“[S]ome people who because of age, disability, or blindness are not able to support themselves through work may receive relatively small social security benefits. Contributory social insurance, therefore, must be complemented by an effective assistance program.”
Mr. and Mrs. Jobst became eligible for the Supplemental Security Income program as soon as it was instituted. On remand the parties stipulated that, based on the couple’s need, they were receiving monthly payments only $20 less than the amount they would have been receiving if Mr. Jobst’s child’s benefits had been restored.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Blackmun
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Davis-Bacon Act requires that certain federal construction contracts contain a stipulation that laborers and mechanics will be paid not less than prevailing wages, as determined by the Secretary of Labor. The question presented in this case is whether the Act confers upon an employee a private right of action for back wages under a contract that has been administratively determined not to call for Davis-Bacon work, and that therefore does not contain a prevailing wage stipulation.
I
Section 1 (a) of the Davis-Bacon Act of March 3, 1931 (Act), ch. 411, § 1, 46 Stat. 1494, as amended, 40 U. S. C. § 276a (a), provides that the advertised specifications for every federal contract in excess of $2,000 “for construction, alteration, and/or repair... of public buildings or public works of the United States... shall contain a provision stating the minimum wages to be paid various classes of laborers and mechanics which shall be based upon the wages that will be determined by the Secretary of Labor to be prevailing” for corresponding classes of laborers and mechanics employed on similar projects in the locality. Every contract based upon these specifications must contain a stipulation that the contractor shall pay wages not less than those stated in the specifications.
A contract entered into pursuant to the Act must also provide that if the contractor fails to pay the minimum wages specified in the contract, the Government contracting officer may withhold so much of the accrued payments as may be considered necessary to pay the laborers and mechanics the difference between the contract wages and those actually paid. Section 3 of the Act, as added Aug. 30, 1935, 49 Stat. 1012, 40 U. S. C. § 276a-2, authorizes the Comptroller General to pay these accrued payments directly to the laborers and mechanics.
Should the withheld funds prove insufficient to reimburse the employees, § 3 confers on them "the right of action and/or of intervention against the contractor and his sureties conferred by law upon persons furnishing labor or materials.” Laborers and mechanics working under a contract that contains Davis-Bacon Act stipulations thus may themselves bring suit against the contractor on the payment bond that the Miller Act of August 24, 1935, 49 Stat. 793, as amended, 40 U. S. C. § 270a et seq. (1976 ed. and Supp. Ill), requires for the protection of persons supplying labor or materials under certain federal construction contracts. In addition, if the contractor fails to pay at least the stipulated minimum wages, the contract may be terminated and the contractor debarred from all Government contracts for a period of three years.
Pursuant to Reorganization Plan No. 14 of 1950, 5 U. S. C. App., p. 746, the Secretary of Labor (Secretary) has issued regulations designed to “assure coordination of administration and consistency of enforcement” of the Act and some 60 related statutes. See 29 CFR Parts 1, 3, 5, 7 (1980). In their turn, various contracting agencies have issued detailed regulations concerning the applicability of the Act to the contracts they let. See, e. g., 41 CFR Subpart 9-18.7 (1979) (Department of Energy). The contracting agency has the initial responsibility for determining whether a particular contract is subject to the Davis-Bacon Act. See A. Thieblot, The Davis-Bacon Act 31 (Labor Relations and Public Policy Series Report No. 10, Univ. of Pa., 1975) (hereinafter Thie-blot). If the agency determines that the contract is subject to the Act, it must determine the appropriate prevailing wage rate, and ensure that the rate chosen is inserted in the requests for bids on the project, as well as in any resulting contract. See 29 CFR § 5.5 (1980); Thieblot, at 31-34.
The contracting agency’s coverage and classification determinations are subject to administrative review. Prior to the award of a contract, a contractor, labor organization, or employee may appeal a final agency determination that a project is not covered by the Act to the Department of Labor. 29 CFR §§5.12 and 7.9 (1980). Disputes over the proper classification of workers under a contract containing Davis-Bacon provisions must be referred to the Secretary for determination. 41 CFR § 1-18.703-1 (i) (1979); 29 CFR § 5.12 (1980). See North Georgia Bldg. & C. T. C. v. U. S. Dept. of Transp., 399 F. Supp. 58 (ND Ga. 1975). In turn, any “interested person” may appeal the Secretary’s wage rate determination to the Wage Appeals Board of the Department of Labor, provided review is sought prior to the award of the contract at issue. 29 CFR § 1.16 (1980); 29 CFR Part 7 (1980). See Thieblot, at 40-43.
II
Petitioner Universities Research Association, Inc., is a not-for-profit consortium of North American universities. In 1967, petitioner made a contract with the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) to provide scientific and management services to the United States in connection with the construction, alteration, and repair of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, a high-energy physics research facility located in Kane and Du Page Counties, Ill. Effective April 1972, this contract was modified to provide that petitioner also would furnish personnel to administer and operate the Fermi Laboratory. The contract was later assumed in turn by the AEC’s successors, the Energy Research and Development Agency (ERDA) and the Department of Energy (DOE).
At all relevant times the funding for the Fermi Laboratory was supplied entirely by the United States through the AEC. The contract, which tracked AEC procurement regulations, specified the rates of compensation to be paid certain classifications of employees; in addition, petitioner was required to obtain approval from the AEC prior to adopting new classifications of employees or making any changes in employee compensation.
Article XXXIII of the contract expressly stated that it was not contemplated that petitioner would use its own employees to perform work that the AEC determined to be subject to the Act; such work, if any, was to be procured by subcontracts approved by the AEC and containing Davis-Bacon stipulations. In a letter dated January 23, 1968, from the AEC to petitioner, the AEC stated that Art. XXXIII was included in the contract with the understanding that the contract would be modified to incorporate Davis-Bacon stipulations “[i]f presently unforeseen conditions” arose making it necessary that Davis-Bacon work be performed by petitioner with its own employees. Another letter, dated April 6, 1972, with identical provisions was sent to petitioner by the AEC following the modification of the contract in 1972. App. 63. In order to implement Art. XXXIII, a committee of AEC officials was designated to review specific work projects and to make Davis-Bacon Act coverage determinations as was necessary.
In April 1975, respondent Stanley E. Coutu, a former employee of petitioner, brought suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois on behalf of himself and other mechanics and laborers similarly situated, seeking more than $5 million in damages on the theory that petitioner had violated the Davis-Bacon Act by failing to pay prevailing wages for construction work performed by its employees under the contract with the AEC. Respondent had been employed by petitioner as an electronics technician from September 25, 1972, until September 10, 1975. During that time, he was compensated in accordance with the wage schedules for the “technician” classification set forth in the contract. Respondent’s duties involved monitoring computers, providing assistance to scientific personnel, supervising accelerator operation, and recordkeeping. He also would make minor repairs to malfunctioning equipment, assemble prefabricated items, and assist in connecting power sources to experimental equipment. Respondent’s supervisors typically were high-rated technicians, engineers, and physicists.
Respondent’s complaint was in seven counts. The first alleged that petitioner had failed to pay “the minimum wages required to be paid pursuant to the said contract and the prevailing wage determinations of the Secretary of Labor and the Davis-Bacon Act.” App. 4 The second alleged that the contract was within the purview of the Davis-Bacon Act and that the contract by its terms provided for payment “at the legal wage rate applicable to the work actually performed.” Id., at 6-7. The remaining counts rested on common-law bases, for which pendent federal jurisdiction was asserted.
On October 8, 1975, the District Court dismissed respondent’s first cause of action on the ground that it was not “totally borne out” by the contract. Id., at 22. The court, however, denied petitioner’s motion to dismiss the second count and the pendent claims. It relied on the Seventh Circuit’s first decision in McDaniel v. University of Chicago, 512 F. 2d 583 (McDaniel I), vacated and remanded, 423 U. S. 810 (1975), judgment re-entered on remand, 548 F. 2d 689 (1977) (McDaniel II), cert. denied, 434 U. S. 1033 (1978). McDaniel I held that the Davis-Bacon Act conferred an implied private right of action upon an employee seeking to enforce a contractor’s commitment to pay prevailing wages. The District Court reasoned that the AEC letter of April 6, 1972, interpreting Art. XXXIII of the contract, left open the possibility that petitioner’s employees had performed work covered by the Act pursuant to proper determinations by the AEC. The court accordingly gave respondent “leave to show that the Secretary of Labor through [AEC] has made Davis-Bacon Act determinations with respect to the alleged contract, and that [respondent] and the class have performed such work at [petitioner’s] direction, pursuant to the contract.” App. 25.
After discovery, petitioner moved for summary judgment. In support of its motion, petitioner submitted an affidavit of the chief legal counsel for the Fermi Laboratory, which stated that “[n]o Davis-Bacon Act... stipulations requiring the payment of prevailing wages have ever been made a part of or incorporated in [the] Contract.” Id.., at 31-32. The District Court noted that respondent “as much concedes that the contract fails to include Davis-Bacon specifications,” and it found that “[o]n the present state of the record it is clear that no Davis-Bacon Act determinations have been made a part of this contract.” Id., at 32-33. After reviewing the statutory and regulatory framework of the Act, the court concluded that “it would be improper for this court to declare in the first instance that this contract is now subject to the Davis-Bacon Act and to make appropriate wage determinations for the parties.” Id., at 34. The court therefore dismissed the second count and, “in the exercise of its discretion,” ibid., declined to assume jurisdiction over the pendent state-law claims.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed and remanded the case. 595 F. 2d 396 (1979). That court recognized that the affidavit submitted by petitioner tended to disprove that there were express Davis-Bacon Act stipulations in the contract; it determined, however, that summary judgment on the second count was not appropriate, since “there may have been other evidence that the contract was one for Davis-Bacon Act work, in which case the required stipulations arguably become a part of the contract by operation of law.” Id., at 398. Reasoning from its prior opinions in McDaniel I and II, the court concluded that “if the [petitioner] actually performed [Davis-Bacon Act] work with its own employees at the Fermi Laboratory, [respondent and his class] became entitled to the prevailing wages in Kane County where the work was to be performed.” 595 F. 2d, at 399. After rejecting petitioner’s alternative argument that exhaustion of administrative remedies was required, the court remanded the case to allow respondent the opportunity on remand to demonstrate, if he could, that petitioner had used respondent and his class to perform Davis-Bacon construction work at the Fermi Laboratory. Id., at 402.
Because of the importance of the implied-right-of-action issue, we granted certiorari. 445 U. S. 925 (1980).
Ill
Before us, petitioner makes two major arguments. It contends first that the federal courts do not have jurisdiction to make coverage, classification, or wage determinations under the Davis-Bacon Act. Alternatively, petitioner contends that Congress did not intend that the Davis-Bacon Act be enforced through private actions. Because we conclude that the Act does not confer a private right of action for back wages under a contract that administratively has been determined not to call for Davis-Bacon work, we find it unnecessary to reach the broader question whether federal courts have any jurisdiction to review agency coverage and classification determinations. Similarly, we do not decide whether the Act creates an implied private right of action to enforce a contract that contains specific Davis-Bacon Act stipulations.
Relying on McDaniel, respondent argues that it must be assumed that no statutory relief is available to him, and that therefore the implication of a private right of action is necessary to effectuate the purpose of Congress in passing the Act. But as the Court’s recent opinions have made clear, the question whether a statute creates a private right of action is ultimately “one of congressional intent, not one of whether this Court thinks that it can improve upon the statutory scheme that Congress enacted into law.” Touche Ross & Co. v. Redington, 442 U. S. 560, 578 (1979). See Transamerica Mortgage Advisors, Inc. v. Lewis, 444 U. S. 11, 15-16 (1979). In order to determine whether Congress intended to create the private right of action asserted here, we consider three factors set forth in Cort v. Ash, 422 U. S. 66, 78 (1975), that we have “traditionally relied upon in determining legislative intent”: the “language and focus of the statute, its legislative history, and its purpose.” See Touche Ross, 442 U. S., at 575-576. We conclude that each of these factors points to the conclusion that Congress did not intend to create a private right of action in favor of an employee under a contract that does not contain prevailing wage stipulations.
A
We turn first to the language of the Act itself. See Transamerica, 444 U. S., at 16; Touche Ross, 442 U. S., at 568. Section 1 of the Act states that the advertised specifications for every federal construction contract in excess of the specified amount “shall contain” a provision stating the minimum wages to be paid laborers and contractors, which wages shall be based on those the Secretary determines to be prevailing in the locality. Section 1 further provides that “every contract based upon these specifications shall contain a stipulation” that the contractor shall pay wages “not less than those stated in the advertised specifications.”
The Court’s previous opinions have recognized that “[o]n its face, the Act is a minimum wage law designed for the benefit of construction workers.” United States v. Binghamton Constr. Co., 347 U. S. 171, 178 (1954); Walsh v. Schlect, 429 U. S. 401, 411 (1977). But the fact that an enactment is designed to benefit a particular class does not end the inquiry; instead, it must also be asked whether the language of the statute indicates that Congress intended that it be enforced through private litigation. See Transamerica, 444 U. S., at 17-18. The Court consistently has found that Congress intended to create a cause of action “where the language of the statute explicitly confer fs] a right directly on a class of persons that include [s] the plaintiff in the case.” Cannon v. University of Chicago, 441 U. S. 677, 690, n. 13 (1979). Conversely, it has noted that there “would be far less reason to infer a private remedy in favor of individual persons” where Congress, rather than drafting the legislation “with an unmistakable focus on the benefited class,” instead has framed the statute simply as a general prohibition or a command to a federal agency. Id., at 690-692. Section 1 of the Davis-Bacon Act requires that certain stipulations be placed in federal construction contracts for the benefit of mechanics and laborers, but it does not confer rights directly on those individuals. Since § 1 is simply “phrased as a directive to federal agencies engaged in the disbursement of public funds,” 441 U. S., at 693, n. 14, its language provides no support for the implication of a private remedy.
Moreover, § 3 of the Act demonstrates that in this context, as in others, “when Congress wished to provide a private damages remedy, it knew how to do so and did so expressly.” Touche Ross, 442 U. S., at 572. Under § 1 of the Act, the contracting agency is entitled to withhold “so much of accrued payments” as may be considered necessary to pay to laborers and mechanics the difference between “the rates of wages required by the contract” and the rates actually paid. If the wages so withheld are insufficient to reimburse the laborers and mechanics, then § 3 confers on them the same “right of action and/or intervention” conferred by the Miller Act on laborers and materialmen. The absence of a comparable provision authorizing a suit for back wages where there are no prevailing wage stipulations in the contract buttresses our conclusion that Congress did not intend to create such a remedy.
B
The legislative history of the Davis-Bacon Act provides further support for the result we reach. The Act was “designed to protect local wage standards by preventing contractors from basing their bids on wages lower than‘‘those prevailing in the area.” House Committee on Education and Labor, Legislative History of the Davis-Bacon Act, 87th Cong., 2d Sess., 1 (Comm. Print 1962) (Legislative History). Passage of the Act was spurred by the economic conditions of the early 1930’s, which gave rise to an oversupply of labor and increased the importance of federal building programs, since private construction was limited. See Thieblot, at 7; Elisburg, Wage Protection Under the Davis-Bacon Act, 28 Lab. L. J. 323, 324 (1977); S. Rep. No. 1445, 71st Cong., 3d Sess., 1 (1931). In the words of Representative Bacon, the Act was intended to combat the practice of “certain itinerant, irresponsible contractors, with itinerant, cheap, bootleg labor, [who] have been going around throughout the country 'picking’ off a contact here and a contract there.” The purpose of the bill was “simply to give local labor and the local contractor a fair opportunity to participate in this building program.” 74 Cong. Rec. 6510 (1931).
As originally enacted in 1931, ch. 411, 46 Stat. 1494, the Act required that every federal contract in excess of $5,000 in amount for “construction, alteration, and/or repair of any public buildings” contain a provision stating that the rate of wages paid laborers and mechanics would not be less than the prevailing rate for similar work in the locality; the Act further required that every contract contain a provision stating that disputes as to what the prevailing wage was on any given project were to be conclusively determined by the Secretary if the contracting officer was unable to resolve the controversy. The original Act thus did not provide for predetermination of prevailing wages by the Secretary; it also did not establish any enforcement mechanism.
Congress soon concluded, however, that the Act as originally drafted was inadequate. Discontent focused on the lack of effective enforcement provisions and the “postdeter-mination” of the prevailing wage. Legislative History 2. Contractors called for predetermination of prevailing wages, claiming that they had been put to unexpected expense by postcontract determinations that the prevailing wage was higher than the rate upon which they had based their bids. Ibid.; Hearings on H. R. 12 et al. before the House Committee on Labor, 72d Cong., 1st Sess., 8, 12, 14, 50-51, 54-55, 58, 65 (1932). While the labor movement was divided on this issue, most of the national leadership opposed predetermination. Legislative History 2. See 75 Cong. Rec. 12379 (1932) (remarks of Rep. Ramspeck); Hearings on H. R. 12, at 24, 114, 116, 122-123. Labor was united, however, in calling for the establishment of an enforcement mechanism. Legislative History 2. See Hearings on H. R. 12, at 122-123; 75 Cong. Rec. 12379 (1932) (remarks of Rep. Ramspeck).
In 1932, both Houses of Congress passed an amendment to the Act providing for predetermination of prevailing wages by the Secretary and for penalties for failure to pay the rate “stated in the advertised specifications and made a part of the contract.” See S. 3847, 72d Cong., 1st Sess. (1932). The bill, however, was vetoed by the President. See Veto Message, S. Doc. No. 134, 72d Cong., 1st Sess. (1932). But in 1935, Congress succeeded in adding the predetermination and enforcement provisions found in the current statute. Act of Aug. 30, 1935, 49 Stat. 1011.
The legislative history accompanying these amendments is significant in two respects. First, it indicates that Congress amended the Act to provide for predetermination of wages not only in order to end abuses, but “so that the contractor may know definitely in advance of submitting his bid what his approximate labor costs will be.” S. Rep. No. 1155, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1935); H. R. Rep. No. 1756, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1935). Second, it demonstrates that Congress intended to give laborers and mechanics only “the same right of action against the contractor and his sureties in court which is now conferred by the bond statute.” S. Rep. No. 1155, at 2; H. R. Rep. No. 1756, at 2. To imply a private right of action here would be to defeat each of these congressional objectives.
The legislative history of the 1964 amendment to the Act also cuts against respondent’s position. In 1964, Congress considered and passed H. R. 6041, 88th Cong., 1st Sess., a bill to amend the Act in order to include fringe benefits within the definition of wages. Pub. L. 88-349, § 1, 78 Stat. 238. While H. R. 6041 was under consideration, Representative Goodell introduced a bill that would have amended the Act to provide for judicial review of the Secretary’s wage determinations at the behest of any aggrieved person, and that also would have conferred a private right of action on any laborer or mechanic who claimed that his employer had “refused or failed to pay the wages that he is required to pay by reason of a wage determination issued by the Secretary of Labor.” H. R. 9590, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., § 2, p. 4 (1964). Representative Goodell sought to have the substance of H. R. 9590 considered during the House debate on H. R. 6041. After extended debate on the merits of judicial review of Davis-Bacon determinations, however, the House invoked its rule against nongermane amendments, and therefore refused to consider Mr. Goodell’s proposals. 110 Cong. Rec. 1194— 1204 (1964).
Since the Goodell amendments were not defeated on their merits, it cannot be said that Congress has flatly rejected the proposition that judicial review should be available under the Act. Nor can the views of this later Congress be treated as determinative of the question whether the Act’s drafters intended to preclude any form of judicial review. Nonetheless, we think it significant that both the proponents and opponents of the Goodell amendments assumed that the Act did not contemplate judicial review of determinations made by the Secretary; they differed only over whether the Act should be amended to permit such review. Ibid. Further, although much of the debate centered on the desirability of permitting judicial review of wage determinations, respondent errs in contending that that was the sole topic of discussion, for several speakers expressed their view that the Act did not permit judicial review of any determination under the Act whatsoever. In particular Representative Bell pointed out that workers could not seek judicial review of the Secretary’s determination that certain work was “ 'the installation of equipment’ and not the type of construction work which was subject to Davis-Bacon,” and “neither employers nor employees have any recourse except to beg the mercy of the Secretary or prevail upon their Congressman to intercede.” Id., at 1201-1202. Thus, while not dispositive, the debate on the Goodell amendments reinforces the conclusion that it would be inappropriate for this Court to find that the Act implicitly creates the right of action contended for here.
Respondent, however, asserts that a contrary inference must be drawn from the Portal-to-Portal Act of 1947, 61 Stat. 84, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 251 et seq. Relying on the analysis set forth in McDaniel II, 548 F. 2d, at 694, respondent points out that § 6 of the Portal-to-Portal Act, 61 Stat. 87, 29 U. S. C. §255 (a), imposes a 2-year limitation on any cause of action for nonwillful “unpaid minimum wages, unpaid overtime compensation, or liquidated damages” under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U. S. C. § 201 et seq., the Walsh-Healey Act, 41 U. S. C. § 35 et seq., or the Davis-Bacon Act. Since the Miller Act imposes a 1-year limitation on suits on the contractor’s bond, 40 U. S. C. § 270b (b), respondent contends that the 2-year statute of limitations set forth in the Portal-to-Portal Act not only affirms the existence of a private cause of action under the Act, but excludes the proposition that that cause of action is limited to a suit on the Miller Act bond.
We agree with amicus United States, however, that this argument reads too much into the Portal-to-Portal Act. That statute was intended to curtail the numerous suits for unpaid compensation and liquidated damages under the FLSA that were filed after this Court’s decision in Anderson v. Mount Clemens Pottery Co., 328 U. S. 680 (1946). See Unexcelled Chemical Corp. v. United States 345 U. S. 59, 61 (1953). Although no portal-to-portal suits had been filed under the Davis-Bacon or Walsh-Healey Acts, see 93 Cong. Rec. 2088 (1947) (remarks of Sens. Donnell and McGrath), Congress chose to include those statutes within the scope of the Portal-to-Portal Act on the ground that they, like the FLSA, related to minimum wages and were therefore affected by the Mount Clemens decision. See H. R. Rep. No. 71, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., 5 (1947); 93 Cong. Rec. 2088 (1947) (remarks of Sen. Donnell). The legislative history of the bills that became the Portal-to-Portal Act makes clear, however, that Congress simply did not recognize that it had created two incompatible statutes of limitations under the Davis-Bacon Act. Moreover, even if the Portal-to-Portal Act had been intended to create a longer statute of limitations for actions under the Davis-Bacon Act than that applicable to suits on the Miller Act bond, respondent has pointed to nothing in the legislative history of the Portal-to-Portal Act that suggests that Congress believed that the Davis-Bacon Act conferred a private right of action for back wages under a contract lacking prevailing wage stipulations; to the contrary, Congress’ concern was to foreclose the possibility of portal-to-portal suits for back wages under contracts that did contain Davis-Bacon Act provisions.
c
Finally, the underlying purpose of the legislative scheme indicates that Congress did not intend to create the right of action asserted by respondent. As noted above, the 1935 amendments added two key features to the Act: administrative predetermination of the minimum wages that the contractor must pay his laborers and mechanics, and a means whereby laborers and mechanics could recover back wages under a contract containing prevailing wage stipulations. The Act thus carefully balances the interests of contractors and their employees. The contractor is able to “know definitely in advance of submitting his bid what his approximate labor costs will be,” S. Rep. No. 1155, at 2, while the laborer or mechanic is given a right of action to enforce the stipulated wages. To imply a private right of action to sue for Davis-Bacon wages under a contract that does not contain prevailing wage stipulations would destroy this careful balance.
In addition, as petitioner and amicus United States point out, the implication of a private right of action where there has been no Davis-Bacon determination would introduce substantial uncertainty into Government contracting. In the ease of cost-plus contracts, federal budgeting would be disrupted by a postcontract judicial determination that wages higher than those set forth in the contract must be paid. Fixed-price contracting also would be adversely affected, since it is likely that contractors would submit inflated bids to take into account the possibility that they would have to pay wages higher than those set forth in the specifications. Finally, postcontract challenges would disrupt timely and efficient performance of Government contracts, and might well provoke jurisdictional disputes between construction unions and unions representing nonconstruction workers.
The implication of a private right of action here would undercut as well the elaborate administrative scheme promulgated pursuant to Reorganization Plan No. 14. The goal of that plan was to introduce consistency into the administration and enforcement of the Act and related statutes; to that end, the Secretary and contracting agencies have issued detailed regulations governing, among other things, coverage determinations. The uniformity fostered by those regulations would be short-lived if courts were free to make postcontract coverage rulings. Respondent, however, replies that no administrative functions would be disrupted by judicial intervention, since Davis-Bacon stipulations are incorporated by operation of law into every federal construction contract, regardless of whether the contracting agency has made a coverage determination. But this assertion ignores the fact that the Act does not define the terms “construction, alteration, and/or repair,” “public buildings or public works,” and “mechanics and/or laborers.” A number of commentators have noted the difficulty of determining whether particular work constitutes “construction” within the meaning of the Act, particularly when the work is performed in the context of an AEC contract involving a nuclear facility. Like other contracting agencies, AEC and its successors have developed detailed guidelines for determining whether particular work is covered by the Act. See n. 15, supra. Whatever may be the merits of allowing judicial review of these complex coverage determinations prior to contracting, it clearly would be inappropriate for a court to substitute its judgment for that of the contracting agency in a private action brought after the contract was let.
IV
In sum, to imply a private right of action under these circumstances would severely disrupt federal contracting. Nothing in the language, history, or purpose of the Davis-Bacon Act suggests that Congress intended that result. Accordingly, 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.
Section 1 (a) reads:
“(a) The advertised specifications for every contract in excess of $2,000, to which the United States or the District of Columbia is a party, for construction, alteration, and/or repair, including painting and decorating, of public buildings or public works of the United States or the District of Columbia within the geographical limits of the States of the Union, or the District of Columbia, and which requires or involves the employment of mechanics and/or laborers shall contain a provision stating the minimum wages to be paid various classes of laborers and mechanics which shall be based upon the wages that will be determined by the Secretary of Labor to be prevailing for the corresponding classes of laborers and mechanics employed on projects oí a character similar to the contract work in the city, town, village, or other civil subdivision of the State, in which the work is to be performed, or in the District of Columbia if the work is to be perfoimed there; and every contract based upon these specifications shall contain a stipulation that the contractor or his subcontractor shall pay all mechanics and laborers employed directly upon the site of the work, unconditionally and not less often than once a week, and without subsequent deduction or rebate on any account, the full amounts accrued at time of payment, computed at wage rates not less than those stated in the advertised specifications, regardless of any contractual relationship which may be alleged to exist between the contractor or subcontractor and such laborers and mechanics, and that the scale of wages to be paid shall be posted by the contractor in a prominent and easily accessible place at the site of the work; and the further stipulation that there may be withheld from the contractor so much of accrued payments as may be considered necessary by the contracting officer to pay to laborers and mechanics employed by the contractor or any subcontractor on the work the difference between the rates of wages required by the contract to be paid laborers and mechanics on the work and the rates of wages received by such laborers and mechanics and not refunded to the contractor, subcontractors, or their agents.”
The Act also applies to contracts entered into without advertising for proposals, if the Act would be otherwise applicable. Act of Mar. 23, 1941, 55 Stat. 53; Act of Aug. 21, 1941, 55 Stat. 664, 40 U. S. C. § 276a-7.
Section 3 provides:
“(a) The Comptroller General of the United States is hereby authorized and directed to pay directly to laborers and mechanics from any accrued payments withheld under the terms of the contract any wages found to be due laborers and mechanics pursuant to this Act; and the Comptroller General of the United States is further authorized and is directed to distribute a list to all departments of the Government giving the names of persons or firms whom he has found to have disregarded their obligations to employees and subcontractors. No contract shall be awarded to the persons or firms appearing on this list or to any firm, corporation, partnership, or association in which such persons or firms have an interest until three years have elapsed from the date of publication of the list containing the names of such persons or firms.
“(b) If the accrued payments withheld under the terms of the contract, as aforesaid are insufficient to reimburse all the laborers and mechanics, with respect to whom there has been a failure to pay the wages required pursuant to this Act, such laborers and mechanics shall have the right of action and/or of intervention against the contractor and his sureties conferred by law upon persons furnishing labor or materials, and in such proceedings it shall
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We granted certiorari to decide whether in a state civil proceeding a lawyer may be cited for contempt for advising his client, a party to the litigation, that the client may refuse on Fifth Amendment grounds to produce subpoenaed material.
I
Petitioner is a lawyer. In January 1973 his client was convicted before a Municipal Court in the city of Temple, Texas, of selling seven obscene magazines in violation of a Temple ordinance. Six days later the client, Michael McKelva, was served by a Bell County deputy sheriff with a subpoena duces tecum directing him to produce 52 magazines before the 169th Judicial District Court. The titles of the magazines were given, but no other description was contained in the warrant.
Under the Texas Penal Code upon application by any city attorney the district courts may issue injunctions to prevent illegal distribution of obscene matter. The subpoena here was requested by the Temple City Attorney in order to obtain such an injunction. Besides commanding production of the magazines it ordered petitioner’s client to appear at a hearing on Febrúary 1, 1973, and give testimony.
McKelva appeared represented by petitioner and an associate, Karl A. Maley. Earlier, Maley had filed a written motion to quash the subpoena. The motion claimed, inter alia, that the issuance of the subpoena was merely an attempt to require materials and testimony in violation of McKelva’s constitutional right not to incriminate himself.
At the hearing petitioner orally argued the motion to quash. He, too, contended that the city was attempting, through a civil proceeding, to discover evidence which properly should be discovered, if at all, through criminal process. He freely admitted that the magazines dealt explicitly with acts of a sexual nature, and that they were • “of the same character” as the magazines for distribution of which McKelva previously had been convicted. Thus, he argued, it was quite clear that a “substantial possibility of self-incrimination” existed if McKelva was required to produce the magazines. Petitioner foresaw possible criminal prosecution either under the Temple ordinance again, or under Art. 527 itself.
Although petitioner claimed the Fifth Amendment's protection was available in any proceeding whether civil or criminal, he also urged that under the. circumstances the injunctive proceeding for which the magazines were subpoenaed was quasi-criminal in nature. He noted that it was brought under the Penal Code of Texas and concluded that the city should secure a search warrant, describing with particularity the magazines it desired produced.
The City Attorney responded that the proceeding was purely civil and that “there is no contention on the part of the City or any attempt on the part of the City to get any evidence for any criminal prosecution,” and thus any material produced would not be incriminating. Further, he maintained, because there “are no criminal sanctions... there will be no evidence that would be incriminating under the rules....”
In reply petitioner drew an analogy to tax cases where, he argued, courts have prohibited the Internal Revenue Service from using subpoenas to discover records which night tend to incriminate taxpayers. Petitioner concluded that the nature of the proceeding in which evidence is sought is irrelevant to the compass of the Fifth Amendment, and that the character of the mate-■ial requested is the only relevant inquiry. He asserted ;hat the sole test is whether production of the material would create a substantial probability of criminal prose-jution for his client. He noted that the City Attorney’s representation that the city is not interested in a criminal prosecution “certainly does not bind for example the County Attorney, or anyone else... who might be interested in prosecuting such a case.”
The court then denied the motion to quash and petitioner’s client, McKelva, took the stand. In answer to preliminary questions he gave his name and address and stated that he was the operator of Mike’s News in Temple. He admitted to having been served with the subpoena, but when he was asked whether he had brought the magazines he replied: “[U]nder the advice of Counsel, I refuse to answer on the grounds that it may tend to incriminate me.” The City Attorney then moved the court to instruct the witness to answer, and if he failed to do so to hold him in contempt. The court asked petitioner’s cocounsel what would be a reasonable time to allow for the witness to bring the magazines into court, because the court understood the applicable rule to require time for compliance before a motion for contempt should be entertained. Counsel replied that according to their position no time need be allowed because, in any event, the subpoena would require production of evidence which would tend to incriminate the witness. The court then recessed until the afternoon and instructed the witness to return at that time with the requested magazines. Petitioner’s cocounsel said he understood the instruction.
When the court reconvened, McKelva was recalled, and he responded negatively when the City Attorney asked whether he had made any effort to obtain the subpoenaed magazines. He did, however, acknowledge that he had understood the court's order to bring them. After he indicated that the sole reason for his failure to comply was his belief that if he did so it would entail a substantial possibility of self-incrimination, the City Attorney again moved for a contempt citation. This time the court found McKelva in contempt and stated that the failure to respond would be treated as an admission that the subpoenaed magazines are obscene. Petitioner objected, arguing that a person may not be penalized for asserting a constitutional right by way of making an adverse finding against him. The judge replied that no finding had been made, but in view of petitioner’s admission that the magazines were of the same nature as those for which his client previously had been convicted, there was justification for treating a refusal to produce them as an admission to be considered with other evidence. Petitioner responded that he was obliged to assert that although the other magazines had been held obscene the subpoenaed magazines were not.
After other testimony was heard, McKelva was again recalled and the court asked him if his disobedience was his own decision, or if it was on the advice of counsel. McKelva replied that it was on the advice of counsel, specifically petitioner and Maley. Petitioner then asked his client whether he would produce the magazines if counsel advised him they were not incriminatory. McKelva replied that he would. This made it clear that but for the advice of counsel McKelva would have produced the subpoenaed matter.
After a short recess the court ruled the subpoenaed magazines obscene, and enjoined their continued exhibition and sale. Finally, the court held petitioner and his cocounsel in contempt, as well as their client, and fixed punishment for each of them at 10 days’ confinement and a $200 fine.
The judge noted his reluctance to find the attorneys in contempt, stating this was the first time he had ever done so, but he felt that the attorneys had usurped the authority of the court: “This Court has not been permitted to rule on the admissibility of that evidence. You have ruled on it....” Before the hearing ended, however, petitioner stated that he and his cocounsel had not deliberately and intentionally attempted to frustrate the court. Petitioner felt there was merely a philosophical difference between counsel and the court as to the scope of the Fifth Amendment protection. The court responded that the self-incrimination defense could have been reached either by a motion to suppress the evidence after it had been produced for injunctive purposes, or by an objection to an attempt to introduce it at a criminal trial.
The record shows no indication whatsoever of contumacious conduct on the part of petitioner or his cocoun-sel. The court appears to have been offended, in a strictly legal sense, only by the lawyers’ advice which caused their client to decline on Fifth Amendment grounds to produce subpoenaed material. There is nothing in the record to suggest that petitioner or his cocounsel acted otherwise than in the good-faith belief that if their client produced the materials he would run a substantial risk of self-incrimination.
The day the contempt citation was issued petitioner, on behalf of McKelva, applied to the Supreme Court of Texas for an original writ of habeas corpus. The same day that court denied the application pending further information to complete the record, and then finally denied the writ on February 5, 1973.
On February 8, 1973, petitioner filed an application on behalf of McKelva for a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas, Waco Division. However, at 10 a. m. that day the judge who issued the contempt citation ordered McKelva released from custody although he had only served seven of his 10 days. The release was “for good behavior.”
Pursuant to Texas procedure the citation of the attorneys was reviewed by another state district judge, the respondent here, Judge James R. Meyers. A hearing was held on May 11, 1973, with the Texas Attorney General’s office appearing in support of the contempt citation. The parties agreed that the burden of proof was on the Attorney General, and also agreed that the record of the injunction hearing would provide the basis for the court’s decision.
The court noted that it felt that the record supported a finding beyond a reasonable doubt that the client was advised not to bring the materials, and the court was dubious that materials displayed for public sale are protected by the Fifth Amendment. However, the court also stated, “I think it is a very close point.” Counsel for petitioner agreed that the record clearly reflected that petitioner had advised his client that he had a Fifth Amendment privilege on the issue, but claimed that it did not reflect that petitioner had instructed him not to bring the subpoenaed materials.
On October 1, 1973, Judge Meyers affirmed the finding of contempt but changed the penalty to a $500 fine with no confinement.. It is that judgment which is under review here.
Both Texas appellate courts refused to review the judgment. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals denied petitioner’s motion for leave to file an original application for a writ of habeas corpus, and the Supreme Court of Texas also denied a petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Both courts’ orders were entered October 11. By order of Judge Meyers, personal recognizance bonds of petitioner and Maley were continued in order that Maley could seek a writ of habeas corpus from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas and petitioner could petition for a writ of certiorari from this Court.
On December 20, 1973, Judge Jack Roberts of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas, Waco Division, granted Maley’s petition for a. writ of habeas corpus. He noted that, even incorrect orders from courts ordinarily must be obeyed until set aside, but he concluded that McKelva had asserted a valid Fifth Amendment privilege, and therefore neither he nor his lawyer could be held in contempt for asserting that privilege. Since civil and criminal liability under Art. 527 arise from the same act the judge also concluded that the Fifth Amendment applied even in the injunctive action. Indeed, he noted that the leading case of Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616 (1886), involved forfeiture proceedings which, “though they may be civil • in form, are in their nature criminal.” Id., at 634. He held that since Maley was only acting to protect rights guaranteed by the Constitution to his client, “he cannot be held in contempt.”
An appeal has been filed from that judgment and is now pending before the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. On April 15, 1974, we granted the petition for a writ of certiorari, 416 U. S. 934; we are advised that the case is being held pending our decision in this case.
II
The narrow issue in this case is whether a lawyer may be held in contempt for advising his client, during the trial of a civil case, to refuse to produce material demanded by a subpoena duces tecum when the lawyer believes in good faith the material may tend to incriminate his client.
We begin with the basic proposition that all orders and judgments of courts must be complied with promptly. If a person to whom a court directs an order believes that order is incorrect the remedy is to appeal, but, absent a stay, he must comply promptly with the order pending appeal. Persons who make private determinations of the law and refuse to obey an order generally risk criminal contempt even if the order is ultimately ruled incorrect. Howat v. Kansas, 258 U. S. 181, 189-190 (1922); Worden v. Searls, 121 U. S. 14 (1887). The orderly and expeditious administration of justice by the courts requires that “an order issued by a court with jurisdiction over the subject matter and person must be obeyed by the parties until it is reversed by orderly and proper proceedings.” United States v. Mine Workers, 330 U. S. 258, 293 (1947). This principle is especially applicable to orders issued during trial. E. g., Illinois v. Allen, 397 U. S. 337 (1970). Such orders must be complied with promptly and completely, for the alternative would be to frustrate and disrupt the progress of the trial with issues collateral to the central questions in litigation. This does not mean, of course, that every ruling by a presiding judge must be accepted in silence. Counsel may object to a ruling. An objection alerts opposing counsel and the court to an issue so that the former may respond and the latter may be fully advised before ruling. United States v. La Franca, 282 U. S. 568, 570 (1931). But, once the court has ruled, counsel and others involved in the action must abide by the ruling and comply with the court’s orders. While claims of error may be preserved in whatever way the applicable rules provide, counsel should neither engage the court in extended discussion once a ruling is made, nor advise a client not to comply. A lawyer who coun-seis his client not to comply with a court order during trial would, first, subject his client to contempt, and in addition, if he persisted the lawyer would be exposed to sanctions for obstructing the trial. Remedies for judicial error may be cumbersome but the injury flowing from an error generally is not irreparable, and orderly processes are imperative to the operation of the adversary system of justice.
When a court during trial orders a witness to reveal information, however, a different situation may be presented. Compliance could cause irreparable injury because appellate courts cannot always “unring the bell” once the information has been released. Subsequent appellate vindication does not necessarily have its ordinary consequence of totally repairing the error. In those situations we have indicated the person to whom such an order is directed has an alternative:
“[W]e have consistently held that the necessity for expedition in the administration of the criminal law justifies putting one who seeks to resist the production of desired information to a choice between compliance with a trial court’s order to produce prior to any review of that order, and resistance to that order with the concomitant possibility of an adjudication of contempt if his claims are rejected on appeal. Cobbledick v. United States, [309 U. S. 323 (1940)]; Alexander v. United States, 201 U. S. 117 (1906); cf. United States v. Blue, 384 U. S. 251 (1966); DiBella v. United States, 369 U. S. 121 (1962); Carroll v. United States, 354 U. S. 394 (1957).” United States v. Ryan, 402 U. S. 530, 532-533 (1971).
This method of achieving precompliance review is particularly appropriate where the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination is involved. The privilege has ancient roots, see, e. g., Brown v. Walker, 161 U. S. 591, 596-597 (1896); Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436, 458-463 (1966); see especially id., at 458 n. 27. This Court has always broadly construed its protection to assure that an individual is not compelled to produce evidence which later may be used against him as an accused in a criminal action. Counselman v. Hitchcock, 142 U. S. 547, 562 (1892); Arndstein v. McCarthy, 254 U. S. 71, 72-73 (1920). The protection does not merely encompass evidence which may lead to criminal conviction, but includes information which would furnish a link in the chain of evidence that could lead to prosecution, as well as evidence which an individual reasonably believes could be used against him in a criminal prosecution. Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, 486 (1951). In view of the place this privilege occupies in the Constitution and in our adversary system of justice, as well as the traditional respect for the individual that undergirds the privilege, the procedure described in Ryan seems an eminently reasonable method to allow precom-pliance review.
In the present case the City Attorney argued that if petitioner’s client produced the magazines he was amply protected because in any ensuing criminal action he could always move to suppress, or object on Fifth Amendment grounds to the introduction of the magazines into evidence. Laying to one side possible waiver problems that might arise if the witness followed that course, cf. Rogers v. United States, 340 U. S. 367 (1951), we nevertheless cannot conclude that it would afford adequate protection. Without something more “he would be compelled to surrender the very protection which the privilege is designed to guarantee.” Hoffman v. United States, supra, at 486.
Our views as to the effectiveness of a later objection or motion to suppress do not conflict with United States v. Blue, 384 U. S. 251 (1966). There we said:
“Even if we assume that the Government did acquire incriminating evidence in violation of the Fifth Amendment, Blue would at most be entitled to suppress the evidence and its fruits if they were sought to be used against him at trial.” Id., at 255.
But the crucial distinction between that case and the instant question is that there the Government indeed “did acquire” the information. Blue had turned it over during a civil investigation without asserting the Fifth Amendment privilege. Here, on the contrary, petitioner’s client had not yet delivered the subpoenaed material, and he consistently and vigorously asserted his privilege. Here the “cat” was not yet “out of the bag” and reliance upon a later objection or motion to suppress would “let the cat out” with no assurance whatever of putting it back.
Thus in advising his client to resist and risk a contempt citation, thereby allowing precompliance appellate review of the claim, petitioner counseled a familiar procedure. Although it is clear that noncomplianee risked both an immediate contempt citation and a final criminal contempt judgment against the witness if, on appeal, petitioner’s advice proved to be wrong, the issue here is whether petitioner, as counsel, can be penalized for good-faith advice to claim the' privilege.
It appears that here the trial judge rejected the Fifth Amendment claim primarily because it was raised in a civil and not a criminal case. The City Attorney relied most heavily on that distinction in his argument - in opposition to the motion to quash. Just as vigorously, petitioner contended that the privilege against self-incrimination protected his client regardless of the nature of the proceeding. He said:
“It is very clear that the coverage of the Fifth Amendment is not to be determined by the nature of the proceeding in which it is asserted. The Fifth Amendment applies to all proceedings, to injunctive proceedings, to administrative proceedings, and to criminal proceedings. It applies to interrogation by Police Officers out of Court. It applies across the board. We are not talking about the context of the proceedings in which the privilege against self-incrimination is asserted. We are talking about the character of material that is sought to be taken from the person who is subject to the subpoena.
“... [T]he test in those circumstances is whether there is a substantial probability in requiring the party that is served with the subpoena to produce the evidence, which evidence would entail self-incrimination, and with the production of the magazines for possible use in a criminal prosecution, and we say that this would amount to a violation of the privilege under the Fifth Amendment, and we contend that it most certainly would, and that it must.” App. 13-14.
In overruling the claimed privilege the trial judge seems to have accepted the City Attorney’s contention that the claim is not available in a civil proceeding. We disagree.
In Kastigar v. United States, 406 U. S. 441 (1972), we recently reaffirmed the principle that the privilege against self-incrimination can be asserted “in any proceeding, civil or criminal, administrative or judicial, investigatory or adjudicatory.” Id., at 444; Lefkowitz v. Turley, 414 U. S. 70, 77 (1973); Murphy v. Waterfront Comm’n, 378 U. S. 52, 94 (1964) (White, J., concurring) ; McCarthy v. Arndstein, 266 U. S. 34, 40 (1924); United States v. Saline Bank, 1 Pet. 100 (1828); cf. Gardner v. Broderick, 392 U. S. 273 (1968). The trial judge seems to have proceeded upon the mistaken premise that petitioner’s client was misadvised even to assert the privilege in a civil proceeding, regardless of its ultimate merit. This error explains the severe sanction the court placed— albeit reluctantly — upon petitioner because his advice seemed to have caused the witness’ refusal to obey. Thus the issue is whether in a civil proceeding a lawyer may be held in contempt for counseling a witness in good faith to refuse to produce court-ordered materials on the ground that the materials may tend to incriminate the witness in another proceeding. We hold that on this record petitioner may not be penalized even though his advice caused the witness to disobey the court’s order.
The privilege against compelled self-incrimination would be drained of its meaning if counsel, being lawfully present, as here, could be penalized for advising his client in good faith to assert it. The assertion of a testimonial privilege, as of many other rights, often depends upon legal advice from someone who is trained and skilled in the subject matter, and who may offer a more objective opinion. A layman may not be aware of the precise scope, the nuances, and boundaries of his Fifth Amendment privilege. It is not a self-executing mechanism; it can be affirmatively waived, or lost by not asserting it in a timely fashion. If performance of a lawyer’s duty to advise a client that a privilege is available exposes a lawyer to the threat of contempt for giving honest advice it is hardly debatable that some advocates may lose their zeal for forthrightness and independence.
There is a crucial distinction between citing a recalcitrant witness for contempt, United States v. Ryan, supra, and citing the witness’ lawyer for contempt based only on advice given in good faith to assert the privilege against self-incrimination. The witness, once advised of the right, can choose for himself whether to risk contempt in order to test the privilege before evidence is produced. That decision is, and should be, for the wit-' ness. But, if his lawyer may be punished for advice so given there is a genuine risk that a witness exposed to possible self-incrimination will not be advised of his right. Then the witness may be deprived of the opportunity to decide whether or not to assert the privilege.
An early example of this situation is found in In re Watts, 190 U. S. 1 (1903). There lawyers advised their clients in good faith that state, not federal, courts had bankruptcy jurisdiction over a certain property in the hands of a state receiver. This advice led to a collision between the state and federal courts, and contempt citations for the lawyers. Although this Court held that the lawyers’ advice was substantively incorrect, it refused to allow the federal contempt convictions to stand because there was no evidence the advice was given in bad faith. Id., at 32. Mr. Chief Justice Fuller, speaking.for,the Court, said:
“In the ordinary case of advice to clients, if an attorney acts in good faith and in the honest belief that his advice is well founded and in the just interests of his client, he cannot be held liable for error in judgment. The preservation of the independence of the bar is too vital to the due administration of justice to allow of the application of any other general rule.” Id., at 29.
We conclude that an advocate is not subject to the penalty of contempt for advising his client, in good faith, to assert the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination in any proceeding embracing the power to compel testimony. To hold otherwise would deny the constitutional privilege against self-incrimination the means of its own implementation. When a witness is so advised the advice becomes an integral part of the protection accorded the witness by the Fifth Amendment.
Ill
In applying these principles it is important to note what this case does not involve: the claim is not based solely on privacy; this is not a case where state law is clear that a response to compulsory process under protest renders the response inadmissible in any criminal prosecution against the witness; most important, there is no contention here as to lack of good faith or reasonable grounds for assertion of a Fifth Amendment claim.
Both in a pretrial written motion and orally during trial, petitioner cogently stated his reasons for believing the privilege applied:
“In view of the fact that there is this substantial possibility of self-incrimination; in view of the fact that seven other magazines that are of the same character as the.... magazines named in the subpoena, that they have provided the basis for past criminal prosecutions; in view of the fact that criminal prosecutions are not only a very definite possibility, they are in fact a pronounced possibility, and so there is little reasonable doubt in these circumstances that the subpoena should be quashed because in fact it seeks to compel the person named in the subpoena to incriminate himself, and, of course, this is prohibited by the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.” App. 9-10.
Petitioner stated that the magazines were “of the same character” as magazines for distribution of which his client had recently suffered a criminal conviction. There was therefore, at the very least, a reasonable basis for petitioner to assume that a risk of further criminal prosecution existed. Both sides agree that the record is devoid of evidence of contumacious conduct or any disrespect for the court, cf., e. g., In re Little, 404 U. S. 553, 554-555 (1972). The highly professional tone of the proceeding is revealed by the statements of the judge, and by petitioner’s closing comments to the judge after he had been cited for contempt:
“If it please the Court, I certainly appreciate the Court’s position. I think what we have here is not a situation, and I hope this is correct, where Counsel have deliberately and intentionally attempted to frustrate the Court. I think that rather what we have is where there is a philosophical difference between Counsel for the Defendant and the Court with regard to the applicable law as to self-inerimi-nation and the production of evidence in a civil case.” App. 32.
On this record, with no state statute or rule guaranteeing a privilege or assuring that at a later criminal prosecution the compelled magazines would be inadmissible, it appears that there was no avenue other than assertion of the privilege, with the risk of contempt, that would have provided assurance of appellate review in advance of surrendering the magazines. We are satisfied that petitioner properly performed his duties as an advocate here, and he cannot suffer any penalty for performing such duties in good faith.
Reversed.
Texas Penal Code, Art. 527 (Supp. 1973), regulates distribution of obscene articles. Generally, it provides criminal penalties for specific acts of distribution. In § 13, however, it provides for an injunction to enforce its other provisions:
“Sec. 13. The district courts of this State and the judges thereof shall have full power, authority, and jurisdiction, upon application by any district, county, or city attorney within their respective jurisdictions, or the Attorney General to issue any and all proper restraining orders, temporary and permanent injunctions, and any other writs and processes appropriate to carry out and enforce the provisions of this article. Such restraining orders or injunctions may issue to prevent any person from violating any of the provisions of this article. However, no restraining order or injunction shall issue except upon notice to the person sought to be enjoined. Such person shall be entitled to a trial of the issues within one day after joinder' of issue and a decision shall be rendered by the court within two days of the conclusion of the trial. In the event that a final order or judgment of injunction be entered against the person sought to be.enjoined, such final order or judgment shall contain a provision directing the person to surrender to the sheriff of the county in which the action was brought any obscene matter, in his possession and such sheriff shall be directed to seize and destroy such matter.” The entire article was repealed by Acts 1973, 63d Leg., c. 399, § 3 (a), p. 992, effective January 1, 1974. The new law does not seem to ■ have any provision equivalent to § 13.
The parties stipulated that the conviction had occurred and was then under appeal.
It appears that the Temple city criminal ordinance dealing with obscenity is substantially identical to the criminal provisions of Art. 527. Texas Penal Code, Art. 527, § 12 (Supp. 1973), provides:
“Sec. 12. No city, county or other political subdivision may enact any regulation of obscene material which conflicts with the provisions of this Act; however, a city, county, or other political subdivision is authorized to regulate further the means and manner of distribution and exhibition of matter.”
At the hearing the court took judicial notice of the similarity between Art. 527 and the Temple criminal ordinance. App. 29.
The correctness of the conclusion as to inferences to be drawn from a witness’ failure to respond is not before us for decision.
The only question presented here is the validity of the contempt penalty imposed upon the attorney. The validity of the contempt • penalty imposed on petitioner's client is not before us.
“Art. 1911a. Contempt; power of courts; penalties
“Penalties for contempt
“Sec. 2. (a) Every court other than a justice court or municipal court may punish by a fine of not more than $500, or by confinement in the county jail for not more than six months, or both, any person guilty of contempt of the court.
“(c) Provided, however, an officer of a court held in contempt by a trial court, shall, upon proper motion filed in the offended court, be released upon his own personal recognizance pending a determination of his guilt or innocence by a judge of a district court, other than the offended court. Said judge to be appointed for that purpose by the presiding judge of the Administrative Judicial District wherein the alleged contempt occurred.
“Confinement to enforce order
“Sec. 3. Nothing in this Act affects a court’s power to confine a contemner in order to compel him to obey a court order.” Tex. Rev. Civ. Stat., Art. 1911 (Supp. 1974-1975).
In a case dealing with misconduct of attorneys but decided under the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, Mr. Justice Jackson discussed these same elementary propositions:
“Of course, it is the right of counsel for every litigant to press his claim, even if it appears farfetched and untenable, to obtain the court’s considered ruling. Full enjoyment of that right, with due allowance for the heat of controversy, will be protected by appellate courts when infringed by trial courts. But if the ruling is adverse, it is not counsel’s right to resist or to insult the judge — his right is only respectfully to preserve his point for appeal. During a trial, lawyers must speak, each in his own time and within his allowed time, and with relevance and moderation. These are such obvious matters that we should not remind the bar of them were it not for the misconceptions manifest in this case.” Sacher v. United States, 343 U. S. 1, 9 (1952).
This case deals only with the privilege against self-incrimination contained in the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution and made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 1 (1964). The constitutional basis for this privilege distinguishes it from other privileges established by state statute or common law such as those arising from the relation of priest and penitent, lawyer and client, physician and patient, and husband and wife. We are not now presented with questions as to the scope of privileges not found in the Constitution.
Counsel for respondent could cite no Texas statute or case giving assurance that the magazines would be suppressed because they were produced involuntarily so the witness could avoid a contempt citation.
It is important here that the witness was not granted immunity from prosecution on the basis of any magazines he might produce. Quite the contrary, he was ordered to produce after vulnerability to prosecution had been made only too clear to him. In response to the City Attorney’s assertion that he did not intend to prosecute based on the magazines, petitioner noted that the State or county might still prosecute, supra, at 452, 453, and neither the City Attorney nor the judge disagreed. See n. 9, supra.
Had the witness been granted formal immunity a different case would be presented; in that event a witness may be compelled to testify. Kastigar v. United States. 406 U. S. 441 (1972). If counsel, in the face of a grant of immunity, advised his client not to testify or produce information, a different question would be presented because the good faith of the attorney would be open to doubt.
Petitioner also argued, as we noted earlier, that the proceeding was not civil at all but rather was “quasi criminal.” App. 10. He noted that the proceeding was based upon “the provisions of Section 13 of Article 527 of the Texas Penal Code.” Ibid. He viewed the injunctive action as a mere prelude to a criminal prosecution. Thus he contended that the city should have sought the magazines with a search warrant instead of a subpoena duces tecum.
Id., at 12.
Petitioner readily concedes that his advice indeed caused his client to disobey the order. When the court gave petitioner’s client a final chance to purge himself of the contempt citation this colloquy took place:
“THE COURT: Mr. McKelva, you have been adjudged to be in contempt of this Court for having failed to observe a subpoena duces tecum to bring certain matters with you as a witness. In your testimony with reference to why you failed to do this, you first indicated that it was on the advice of Counsel that you were declining to obey the subpoena, and so I want to ask you directly this morning, is your disobedience to this subpoena your own decision, or is it on the advice of Counsel, and if so, what Counsel?
“A. It is on the advice of Counsel, sir, and Mr. Friedman, Mr. Maley and Mr. Maness.
“THE COURT: Does either Counsel have any questions that they want to ask this witness?
“MR. MANESS: Your Honor, I would only like to ask Mr. McKelva, in the event that his Counsel were to advise him that his privileges against self-incrimination were not endangered by producing the... magazines in question, whether or not under those circumstances he would produce the magazines?
“A. I would.” App.27.
Counsel thus took full responsibility for his client’s acts, as, of course, his duty to his client required.
Under Texas procedure and the rulings of the trial court in this case the client was undoubtedly entitled to consult with counsel at the times and in the manner he did.
Mr. Justice
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
Petitioners, state correctional officials, seek review of a decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit finding petitioners in violation of 42 U. S. C. § 1983 for opposing respondents’ application for an arrest warrant. We grant the motion of respondents for leave to proceed in forma pauperis and the petition for writ of certiorari and reverse on the basis of our decision in Linda R. S. v. Richard D., 410 U. S. 614 (1973).
I
Respondents were prison inmates in the Central Correctional Institution in Columbia, S. C., at the time of a prison uprising in August 1973. Respondents contend that during the uprising they were unnecessarily beaten by prison guards. Respondent Timmerman sought criminal arrest warrants against four prison guards. In support of his action, Timmerman presented sworn statements to a Magistrate along with alleged “confidential information” from an employee at the prison who purportedly investigated the incident and concluded that respondents were victimized by the prison guards. Although a subsequent hearing in the Federal District Court indicated that the information provided by Timmerman was “suspect at best,” it provided sufficient evidence to convince the state-court Magistrate that probable cause existed for issuance of arrest warrants against the prison guards. The Magistrate informed the legal adviser to the South Carolina Department of Corrections of his intent to issue the warrants and the legal adviser relayed this information to the prison Warden.
In an effort to have the criminal action against the correctional officers dropped, the legal adviser and Warden met with the County Sheriff, Deputy Attorney, and State Solicitor. At the meeting, the State Solicitor reviewed the facts and stated that there would be no indictment against three of the accused guards, but that he was unsure whether an indictment would be sought against the fourth guard. As a result of the meeting, the State Solicitor wrote a letter to the Magistrate requesting that the warrants not be issued. The Solicitor also stated that he intended to ask the State Law Enforcement Division to conduct an investigation concerning the charges made against the officers involved; the Magistrate did not issue the warrants and no state investigation was initiated.
Respondents subsequently filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina contending, among other claims, that petitioners conspired in bad faith to block the issuance of the arrest warrants for the prosecution of the prison guards. The District Court concluded that petitioners denied respondents their right to “a meaningful ability to set in motion the governmental machinery because [petitioners’ activities] stopped the machinery unlawfully, not in a proper way, as for example, upon a valid determination of lack of probable cause.” Although the State Solicitor and the Magistrate were found to be immune from damages, the District Court concluded that the legal adviser to the prisons and the Director of the Department of Corrections were liable for their actions in requesting the State Solicitor to discourage issuance of the warrants. Respondents were awarded $3,000 in compensatory damages, $1,000 in punitive damages and attorney’s fees against the two petitioners.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed and acknowledged that under Linda R. S. v. Richard D., supra, at 619, “a private citizen lacks a judicially cognizable interest in the prosecution or nonprosecution of another.” The Court of Appeals concluded, however, that Linda R. S. did not foreclose respondents’ right to seek an arrest warrant.
II
In Linda R. S. the mother of an illegitimate child brought an action in United States District Court to enjoin “discriminatory application” of a Texas Penal Code provision that imposed criminal sanctions on a parent who willfully deserted, neglected, or refused to provide child support. The Texas courts had held that the statute applied only to the parents of legitimate children and did not apply to the parents of illegitimate children. We held that the appellant in Linda R. S. did not have standing to challenge the statute because she had failed to allege a sufficient nexus between her injury and the government’s failure to prosecute fathers of illegitimate children. Even if the appellant in Linda R. S. were granted the requested relief, the Court concluded that the remedy sought by the appellant would not guarantee payment of child support. The remedy sought would only increase the probability of prosecution of the father for the failure to provide support, and “a private citizen lacks a judicially cognizable interest in the prosecution or nonprosecution of another.” Ibid.
Our holding in Linda R. S. controls disposition here. The threshold inquiry is whether respondents have standing to challenge the actions of petitioners. As in Linda R. S., there is a questionable nexus between respondents’ injury— the alleged beatings — and the actions of the state officials in which they gave information to a Magistrate prior to issuance of an arrest warrant. Even without the prosecutor’s acts, there is no guarantee that issuance of the arrest warrant would remedy claimed past misconduct of guards or prevent future misconduct. Even if a prosecution could remedy respondents’ injury, the issuance of an arrest warrant in this case is simply a prelude to actual prosecution. Respondents concede that the decision to prosecute is solely within the discretion of the prosecutor. It is equally clear that issuance of the arrest warrant in this case would not necessarily lead to a subsequent prosecution.
A private citizen therefore has no judicially cognizable right to prevent state officials from presenting information, through intervention of the state solicitor, that will assist the magistrate in determining whether to issue the arrest warrant. Just as respondents were able to present arguments as to why an arrest warrant should issue, a state solicitor must be able to present arguments as to why an arrest warrant should not issue. This is not a case in which prison officials interfered with the transmittal of information from respondents to the magistrate, thereby interfering with respondents’ ability under South Carolina law to seek the arrest of another. S. C. Code §22-3-710 (1976).
In this case respondents had access to judicial procedures to redress any claimed wrongs. Respondents, in other words, were able to “set in motion the governmental machinery,” Lane v. Correll, 434 F. 2d 598, 600 (CA5 1970), and bring their complaints to the attention of the Magistrate. The actions of the state officials, by which they influenced the decision of the State Solicitor to oppose issuance of the arrest warrants, thus did not violate any judicially cognizable rights of respondents.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Reversed.
The case had previously been appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, at which time the Court of Appeals determined that the State Magistrate and State Solicitor were not insulated from declaratory and injunctive relief by judicial immunity and that the action was not barred by Younger v. Harris, 401 U. S. 37 (1971). Timmerman v. Brown, 528 F. 2d 811 (1975).
As early as 1870 the South Carolina Supreme Court indicated that under South Carolina law, “[slave for the just and proper vindication of the law, no one has an interest in the conviction of [another].” State v. Addison, 2 S. C. 356, 364.
This conclusion comports with the smooth functioning of the criminal justice system. The American Bar Association Standards for Criminal Justice, The Prosecution Function 3-3.4 (2d ed. 1980), propose that where the law permits a private citizen to complain directly to a judicial officer, the complainant “should be required to present the complaint for prior approval to the prosecutor, and the prosecutor’s actions or recommendation thereon should be communicated to the judicial officer or grand jury.” Many jurisdictions contain provisions for private citizens to initiate the criminal process, and some have required or encouraged input of the prosecuting attorney before issuance of an arrest warrant. See, e. g., Neb. Rev. Stat. §29-404 (1979); Ohio Rev. Code Ann. §2935.10 (1975); S. D. Comp. Laws Ann. §23A-2-2 (1979); Wis. Stat. §968.02(3) (1977).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Stevens
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Like Anders v. California, 386 U. S. 738 (1967), this case concerns the scope of court-appointed appellate counsel’s duty to an indigent client after counsel has conscientiously determined that the indigent’s appeal is wholly frivolous. In Anders, we held that counsel could not withdraw by simply advising the court of his or her conclusion, but must include with the request to withdraw “a brief referring to anything in the record that might arguably support the appeal.” Id., at 744. The Wisconsin Supreme Court has adopted a Rule that requires such a brief also to include “a discussion of why the issue lacks merit.” Appellant challenged the constitutionality of the Rule in the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Over the dissent of three of its justices, the court upheld the Rule, rejecting appellant’s contentions that the Rule is inconsistent with Anders and that it forces counsel to violate his or her client’s Sixth Amendment rights. Wisconsin ex rel. McCoy v. Wisconsin Court of Appeals, 137 Wis. 2d 90, 403 N. W. 2d 449 (1987). We noted probable jurisdiction, 484 U. S. 813 (1987), and now affirm.
I
Appellant is indigent. A Wisconsin trial judge found him guilty of abduction and sexual assault and sentenced him to prison for 12 years. He has filed an appeal from that conviction and an attorney has been appointed to represent him. After studying the case, the attorney advised him that further appellate proceedings would be completely useless and that he had three options: He could voluntarily dismiss the appeal; he could go forward without a lawyer; or he could authorize the attorney to file a brief that would present the strongest arguments the lawyer could make in support of the appeal but would also advise the court of the lawyer’s conclusion that the appeal is frivolous. Appellant selected the third option.
Appellant’s counsel then prepared a brief that can fairly be characterized as schizophrenic. In his role as an advocate for appellant, counsel stated the facts, advanced four arguments for reversal, and prayed that the conviction be set aside. In his role as an officer of the court, counsel stated that further appellate proceedings on behalf of his client “would be frivolous and without any arguable merit,” App. 14, and prayed that he be permitted to withdraw, id., at 27. Thus, in the same document, the lawyer purported to maintain that there were arguments warranting a reversal and also that those arguments were wholly without merit. The brief did not contain an explanation of the reasons for counsel’s conclusion. Instead, counsel explained why he believed that it would be both unethical and contrary to Anders to discuss the reasons why the appeal lacked merit. Because the brief did not comply with the discussion requirement in Rule 809.32(1), the court ordered it stricken and directed counsel to submit a conforming brief within 15 days. App. 30.
Appellant’s counsel did not comply with that order. Instead, after unsuccessfully attempting to obtain a ruling on the constitutionality of the Rule in the intermediate appellate court, he filed an original action in the Wisconsin Supreme Court seeking to have the discussion requirement in Rule 809.32(1) declared unconstitutional. The Supreme Court agreed with portions of appellant’s argument, but rejected his ultimate conclusion. The court reaffirmed its acceptance of the principle that appointed counsel have the same obligations as paid counsel to provide their clients with adequate representation, and it agreed that the Anders opinion had not sanctioned a discussion requirement. Moreover, the court also agreed that it is ultimately the responsibility of the court — and not of counsel — to decide whether an appeal is wholly frivolous. It explained, however, that the discussion requirement in the Wisconsin Rule assists the court in making that determination:
“When the court has before it a reasoned summary of the law militating against further appellate proceedings, it can be assured that the attorney has made an inquiry into the relative merits of the appeal and that the attorney’s withdrawal request is valid and grounded in fact and in the law.” 137 Wis. 2d, at 101, 403 N. W. 2d, at 454.
The court noted that because its procedures for handling frivolous appeals were far removed from the simple statement of counsel’s conclusion that this Court condemned in Anders, they did not raise the “quality and equality of attorney representation” concerns that underlay our decision in Anders. 137 Wis. 2d, at 101-102, 403 N. W. 2d, at 454. The court also pointed out that the Rule does not require an attorney to argue against his or her client; rather it merely requires the attorney to fulfill his or her duty to the courts. Accordingly, the court upheld the Rule.
The dissenting justices expressed the view that the discussion requirement was not necessary and that it improperly required defense counsel to assume the role of either an ami-cus curiae, or even an adversary, instead of acting exclusively as an advocate for the client.
In this Court appellant makes two basic attacks on the Rule. He argues that it discriminates against the indigent appellant and that it violates his right to effective representation by an advocate. Both arguments rest largely on the assumption that retained counsel will seldom, if ever, advise an appellate court that he or she has concluded that a client’s appeal is meritless, or provide the court with a discussion of the reasons supporting such a conclusion. In determining whether Wisconsin’s Rule requiring appointed counsel to provide an appellate court with such advice is constitutional, it is appropriate to begin by restating certain propositions established by our previous decisions concerning the right to counsel and the obligations of both paid and appointed counsel.
r-H W
A State s enforcement of its criminal laws must comply with the principles of substantial equality and fair procedure that are embodied in the Fourteenth Amendment. The Sixth Amendment’s requirement that “the accused shall enjoy the right to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense” is therefore binding on the States. Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963). As we explained in Gideon, “in our adversary system of criminal justice, any person hailed into court, who is too poor to hire a lawyer, cannot be assured a fair trial unless counsel is provided for him.” Id., at 344. It is therefore settled law that an indigent defendant has the same right to effective representation by an active advocate as a defendant who can afford to retain counsel of his or her choice. The “guiding hand of counsel,” see Powell v. Alabama, 287 U. S. 45, 68-69 (1932), is essential for the evaluation of the prosecution’s case, the determination of trial strategy, the possible negotiation of a plea bargain and, if the case goes to trial, making sure that the prosecution can prove the State’s case with evidence that was lawfully obtained and may lawfully be considered by the trier of fact.
At the trial level, defense counsel’s view of the merits of his or her client’s case never gives rise to a duty to withdraw. That a defense lawyer may be convinced before trial that any defense is wholly frivolous does not qualify his or her duty to the client or to the court. Ethical considerations and rules of court prevent counsel from making dilatory motions, adducing inadmissible or perjured evidence, or advancing frivolous or improper arguments, but those constraints do not qualify the lawyer’s obligation to maintain that the stigma of guilt may not attach to the client until the presumption of innocence has been overcome by proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
After a judgment of conviction has been entered, however, the defendant is no longer protected by the presumption of innocence. If a convicted defendant elects to appeal, he retains the Sixth Amendment right to representation by competent counsel, but he must assume the burden of convincing an appellate tribunal that reversible error occurred at trial. Although trial counsel may remain silent and force the prosecutor to prove every element of the offense, counsel for an appellant cannot serve the client’s interest without asserting specific grounds for reversal. In so doing, however, the lawyer may not ignore his or her professional obligations. Neither paid nor appointed counsel may deliberately mislead the court with respect to either the facts or the law, or consume the time and the energies of the court or the opposing party by advancing frivolous arguments. An attorney, whether appointed or paid, is therefore under an ethical obligation to refuse to prosecute a frivolous appeal.
“A lawyer, after all, has no duty, indeed no right, to pester a court with frivolous arguments, which is to say arguments that cannot conceivably persuade the court, so if he believes in good faith that there are no other arguments that he can make on his client’s behalf he is honor-bound to so advise the court and seek leave to withdraw as counsel.” United States v. Edwards, 111 F. 2d 364, 365 (CA7 1985).
When retained counsel concludes that an appeal would be frivolous, he or she has a duty to advise the client that it would be a waste of money to prosecute the appeal and that it would be unethical for the lawyer to go forward with it. When appointed counsel conies to the same conclusion, the same duty to withdraw arises. Appointed counsel, however, is presented with a dilemma because withdrawal is not possible without leave of court, and advising the court of counsel’s opinion that the appeal is frivolous would appear to conflict with the advocate’s duty to the client. It is well settled, however, that this dilemma must be resolved by informing the court of counsel’s conclusion. As we stated three decades ago:
“If counsel is convinced, after conscientious investigation, that the appeal is frivolous, of course, he may ask to withdraw on that account. If the court is satisfied that counsel has diligently investigated the possible grounds of appeal, and agrees with counsel’s evaluation of the case, then leave to withdraw may be allowed and leave to appeal may be denied.” Ellis v. United States, 356 U. S. 674, 675 (1958).
We reaffirmed this basic proposition in Anders. Moreover, the fact that an appointed appellate lawyer may find it necessary to file a motion to withdraw because he or she has concluded that an appeal is frivolous does not indicate that the indigent defendant has received less effective representation than the affluent. We categorically rejected that suggestion in Polk County v. Dodson, 454 U. S. 312 (1981). As Justice Powell explained in his opinion for the Court:
“Dodson’s argument assumes that a private lawyer would have borne no professional obligation to refuse to prosecute a frivolous appeal. This is error. In claiming that a public defender is peculiarly subject to divided loyalties, Dodson confuses a lawyer’s ethical obligations to the judicial system with an allegiance to the adversary interests of the State in a criminal prosecution. Although a defense attorney has a duty to advance all col-orable claims and defenses, the canons of professional ethics impose limits on permissible advocacy. It is the obligation of any lawyer — whether privately retained or publicly appointed — not to clog the courts with frivolous motions or appeals. Dodson has no legitimate complaint that his lawyer refused to do so.” Id., at 323 (footnote omitted).
In Anders we squarely held that the principle of substantial equality is not compromised when appointed counsel files a “no merit” brief even though such briefs are seldom, if ever, filed by retained counsel. As we stated in Douglas v. California, 372 U. S. 353, 357 (1963), “[ajbsolute equality is not required.”
The principle of substantial equality does, however, require that appointed counsel make the same diligent and thorough evaluation of the case as a retained lawyer before concluding that an appeal is frivolous. Every advocate has essentially the same professional responsibility whether he or she accepted a retainer from a paying client or an appointment from a court. The appellate lawyer must master the trial record, thoroughly research the law, and exercise judgment in identifying the arguments that may be advanced on appeal. In preparing and evaluating the case, and in advising the client as to the prospects for success, counsel must consistently serve the client’s interest to the best of his or her ability. Only after such an evaluation has led counsel to the conclusion that the appeal is “wholly frivolous” is counsel justified in making a motion to withdraw. This is the central teaching of Anders.
In Anders we held that a motion to withdraw must be accompanied by “a brief referring to anything in the record that might arguably support the appeal.” 386 U. S., at 744. That requirement was designed to provide the appellate courts with a basis for determining whether appointed counsel have fully performed their duty to support their clients’ appeals to the best of their ability. The Anders requirement assures that indigent defendants have the benefit of what wealthy defendants are able to acquire by purchase — a diligent and thorough review of the record and an identification of any arguable issues revealed by that review. Thus, the Anders brief assists the court in making the critical determination whether the appeal is indeed so frivolous that counsel should be permitted to withdraw.
I — » h-J HH
The question whether the Wisconsin Rule is consistent with our holding in Anders must be answered in light of the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s explanation of the Rule’s requirements:
“We interpret the discussion rule to require a statement of reasons why the appeal lacks merit which might include, for example, a brief summary of any case or statutory authority which appears to support the attorney’s conclusions, or a synopsis of those facts in the record which might compel reaching that same result. We do not contemplate the discussion rule to require an attorney to engage in a protracted argument in favor of the conclusion reached; rather, we view the rule as an attempt to provide the court with ‘notice’ that there are facts on record or cases or statutes on point which would seem to compel a conclusion of no merit.” 137 Wis. 2d, at 100, 403 N. W. 2d, at 454.
As so construed, the Rule appears to require that the attorney cite the principal cases and statutes and the facts in the record that support the conclusion that the appeal is merit-less. The Rule also requires a brief statement of why these citations lead the attorney to believe the appeal lacks merit. The former requirement is, as far as the Federal Constitution is concerned, entirely unobjectionable. Attorneys are obligated to act with candor in presenting claims for judicial resolution. The rules of ethics already prescribe circumstances in which an attorney must disclose facts and law contrary to his or her client’s interests. That the Wisconsin Rule requires counsel also to do so when seeking to withdraw on the ground that the appeal is frivolous does not deny the client effective assistance of counsel any more than the rules of ethics do.
The aspect of the Rule that has provoked the concern of counsel for petitioner and other members of the defense bar is that which calls for the attorney to reveal the basis for his or her judgment. Although neither appellant nor amici supporting appellant debate the propriety of allowing defense counsel to satisfy his or her ethical obligations to the court by asserting his or her belief that the appeal is frivolous and seeking to withdraw, they do contend that requiring the attorney to assert the basis for this conclusion violates the client’s Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights and is contrary to Anders. We disagree.
The Wisconsin Rule is fully consistent with the objectives that are served by requiring that a motion to withdraw be accompanied by a brief referring to all claims that might arguably support the appeal. Unlike the typical advocate’s brief in a criminal appeal, which has as its sole purpose the persuasion of the court to grant relief to the defendant, the Anders brief is designed to assure the court that the indigent defendant’s constitutional rights have not been violated. To satisfy federal constitutional concerns, an appellate court faces two interrelated tasks as it rules on counsel’s motion to withdraw. First, it must satisfy itself that the attorney has provided the client with a diligent and thorough search of the record for any arguable claim that might support the client’s appeal. Second, it must determine whether counsel has correctly concluded that the appeal is frivolous. Because the mere statement of such a conclusion by counsel in Anders was insufficient to allow the court to make the required determinations, we held that the attorney was required to submit for the court’s consideration references to anything in the record that might arguably support the appeal. Wisconsin’s Rule merely requires that the attorney go one step further. Instead of relying on an unexplained assumption that the attorney has discovered law or facts that completely refute the arguments identified in the brief, the Wisconsin court requires additional evidence of counsel’s diligence. This requirement furthers the same interests that are served by the minimum requirements of Anders. Because counsel may discover previously unrecognized aspects of the law in the process of preparing a written explanation for his or her conclusion, the discussion requirement provides an additional safeguard against mistaken conclusions by counsel that the strongest arguments he or she can find are frivolous. Just like the references to favorable aspects of the record required by Anders, the discussion requirement may forestall some motions to withdraw and will assist the court in passing on the soundness of the lawyer’s conclusion that the appeal is frivolous.
The Rule does not place counsel in the role of amicus curiae. In Anders petitioner argued that California’s rule allowing counsel to withdraw on the basis of a conclusory statement that the appeal was meritless posed the danger that some counsel might seek to withdraw not because they thought the appeal frivolous but because, seeing themselves as friends of the court, they thought after weighing the probability of success against the time burdens on the court and the attorney if full arguments were presented that it would be best not to pursue the appeal. Brief for Petitioner in Anders v. California, O. T. 1966, No. 98, p. 13. We agreed that the California rule might improperly encourage counsel to consider the burden on the court in determining whether to prosecute an appeal. Wisconsin’s Rule requiring the attorney to outline why the appeal is frivolous obviously does not pose this danger.
We also do not find that the Wisconsin Rule burdens an indigent defendant’s right to effective representation on appeal or to due process on appeal. We have already rejected the contention that by filing a motion to withdraw on the ground that the appeal is frivolous counsel to an indigent defendant denies his or her client effective assistance of counsel or provides a lesser quality of representation than an affluent defendant could obtain. If an attorney can advise the court of his or her conclusion that an appeal is frivolous without impairment of the client’s fundamental rights, it must follow that no constitutional deprivation occurs when the attorney explains the basis for that conclusion. A supported conclusion that the appeal is frivolous does not implicate Sixth or Fourteenth Amendment concerns to any greater extent than does a bald conclusion.
The Anders brief is not a substitute for an advocate’s brief on the merits. As explained above, it is a device for assuring that the constitutional rights of indigent defendants are scrupulously honored. The Wisconsin Rule does no injury to that purpose, nor does it diminish any right a defendant may have under state law to an appeal on the merits. Once the court is satisfied both that counsel has been diligent in examining the record for meritorious issues and that the appeal is frivolous, federal concerns are satisfied and the case may be disposed of in accordance with state law. Of course, if the court concludes that there are nonfrivolous issues to be raised, it must appoint counsel to pursue the appeal and direct that counsel to prepare an advocate’s brief before deciding the merits.
It bears emphasis that the attorney’s obligations as an advocate are not diminished by the additional requirement imposed by the Wisconsin Rule. The attorney must still provide his or her client precisely the services that an affluent defendant could obtain from paid counsel — a thorough review of the record and a discussion of the strongest arguments revealed by that review. In searching for the strongest arguments available, the attorney must be zealous and must resolve all doubts and ambiguous legal questions in favor of his or her client. Once that obligation is fulfilled, however, and counsel has determined that the appeal is frivolous — and therefore that the client’s interests would not be served by proceeding with the appeal — the advocate does not violate his or her duty to the client by supporting a motion to withdraw with a brief that complies with both Anders and the Wisconsin Rule.
The judgment of the Wisconsin Supreme Court is
Affirmed.
Justice Kennedy took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Rule 809.32, Wis. Rules of App. Proc., provides:
“Rule (No merit reports) (1). If an attorney appointed under s.809.30 or ch. 977 is of the opinion that further appellate proceedings on behalf of the defendant would be frivolous and without any arguable merit within the meaning of Anders v. California, 386 U. S. 738 (1967), the attorney shall file with the court of appeals 3 copies of a brief in which is stated anything in the record that might arguably support the appeal and a discussion of why the issue lacks merit. The attorney shall serve a copy of the brief on the defendant and shall file a statement in the court of appeals that service has been made upon the defendant. The defendant may file a response to the brief within 30 days of service.
“(2) The attorney shall file in the trial court a notice of appeal of the judgment of conviction and of any order denying a postconviction motion. The clerk of the trial court shall transmit the record in the case to the court pursuant to s.809.15. The no merit brief and notice of appeal must be filed within 180 days of the service upon the defendant of the transcript under s.809.30(l)(e).
“(3) In the event the court of appeals finds that further appellate proceedings would be frivolous and without any arguable merit, the court of appeals shall affirm the judgment of conviction and the denial of any post-conviction motion and relieve the attorney of further responsibility in the ease. The attorney shall advise the defendant of the right to file a petition for review to the supreme court under s.809.62.”
The brief stated, in part:
“Counsel would no longer be an advocate, as required by Anders, but would be in the awkward position of arguing why his client’s appeal lacks merit. This would be contrary to the mandate of Anders that the attorney not brief the case against the client and that the attorney act as an advocate. Since an attorney is legally bound to represent the best interests of his or her client until relieved from further representation by this court, defendant and this attorney submit that a discussion of why any issue lacks merit would violate the sixth amendment.” App. 15-16.
In his request for a declaratory judgment and a writ of prohibition, appellant asked the Supreme Court to “strike that portion of rule 809.32(1) which requires that the attorney provide reasons why the issue lacks merit as unconstitutional, prohibit the court of appeals from striking the brief already filed, and prohibit the court of appeals from requiring petitioner to provide reasons why relator’s appeal lacks merit in compliance with Rule 809.32(1).” Id., at 54.
“We have previously recognized, in a case decided prior to the enactment of the no-merit rule, that the Anders analysis compels appointed counsel to ‘perform his duties as adequately as paid counsel so the indigent will not be deprived of adequate representation because of his indigency.’ Cleghorn v. State, 55 Wis. 2d 466, 471, 198 N. W. 2d 577 (1972). We reaffirm our belief in that principle.” 137 Wis. 2d, at 97, 403 N. W. 2d, at 452.
“While Anders does not sanction the use of the discussion requirement, it does not proscribe it, either.” Ibid.
“[W]e do not believe the rule requires an attorney to argue against the client; rather, we believe the rule requires an attorney to fulfill a duty that co-exists with the duty owed to the client — that duty which is owed to the court. The court will be better equipped to make the correct decision about the potential merits of the appeal if it has before it not only the authorities which might favor an appeal, but also the authorities which might militate against it.” Id,. at 100-101, 403 N. W. 2d, at 454.
“Appointed appellate criminal defense counsel’s request to withdraw in itself puts the court on notice that counsel considers the arguments in the no-merit brief frivolous. Once raised, frivolous arguments by their very nature should not be difficult for a court to evaluate on its own without counsel supplying case authorities or factual references which militate against the appeal.” Id., at 106, 403 N. W. 2d, at 456 (Abrahamson, J., dissenting).
“See ABA Standards for Criminal Justice, Commentary to 4 — 3.9 (2d ed. 1980) (‘No lawyer, whether assigned by the court, part of a legal aid or defender staff, or privately retained or paid, has any duty to take any steps or present dilatory or frivolous motions or any actions that are unfounded according to the lawyer’s informed professional judgment. On the contrary, to do so is unprofessional conduct’); ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, Informal Opinion 956, Obligation to Take Criminal Appeal, reprinted in 2 Informal Ethics Opinions 955-956 (1975) (like court-appointed lawyer, private counsel ‘ethically, should not clog the courts with frivolous motions or appeals’). See also Nickols v. Gagnon, 454 F. 2d 467, 472 (CA7 1971).” Polk County v. Dodson, 454 U. S. 312, 323-324, n. 14 (1981).
“Of course, if counsel finds his ease to be wholly frivolous, after a conscientious examination of it, he should so advise the court and request permission to withdraw.” 386 U. S., at 744 (emphasis added).
The terms “wholly frivolous” and “without merit” are often used interchangeably in the Anders-hrief context. Whatever term is used to describe the conclusion an attorney must reach as to the appeal before requesting to withdraw and the court must reach before granting the request, what is required is a determination that the appeal lacks any basis in law or fact.
The question presented by Anders’ certiorari petition read as follows: “May a State appellate court refuse to provide counsel to brief and argue an indigent criminal defendant’s first appeal as of right on the basis of a conelusory statement by the appointed attorney on appeal that the case has no merit and that he will file no brief?” See Brief for Petitioner in Anders v. California, O. T. 1966, No. 98, p. 2.
The court gave a negative answer to that question. A “condusory statement” by counsel is not sufficient to justify an appellate court’s refusal to provide counsel to argue an indigent defendant’s appeal. For the court — not counsel — must “decide whether the [appeal] is wholly frivolous,” 386 U. S., at 744, and counsel must provide the court with sufficient guidance to make sure that counsel’s appraisal of the case is correct.
Although a wealthy defendant cannot pay to have frivolous arguments presented to the court unless he or she locates an unscrupulous attorney, such a defendant can pay to have a competent attorney examine the trial court record, search for error, and explain to him or her the strongest arguments that could be made in support of an appeal.
It is essential to keep in mind that the so-called “Anders brief” is not expected to serve as a substitute for an advocate’s brief on the merits, for it would be a strange advocate’s brief that would contain a preface advising the court that the author of the brief is convinced that his or her arguments are frivolous and wholly without merit. Rather, the function of the brief is to enable the court to decide whether the appeal is so frivolous that the defendant has no federal right to have counsel present his or her case to the court.
Rule 3.3 of the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct (1984) provides in part:
“CANDOR TOWARD THE TRIBUNAL
“(a) A lawyer shall not knowingly:
“(1) make a false statement of material fact or law to a tribunal;
“(2) fail to disclose a material fact to a tribunal when disclosure is necessary to avoid assisting a criminal or fraudulent act by the client;
“(3) fail to disclose to the tribunal legal authority in the controlling jurisdiction known to the lawyer to be directly adverse to the position of the client and not disclosed by opposing counsel; oí
“(4) offer evidence that the lawyer knows to be false.”
The commentary to the Rule explains, “[t]here are circumstances where failure to make a disclosure is the equivalent of an affirmative misrepresentation.” See also G. Hazard & W. Hodes, The Law of Lawyering: A Handbook on the Model Rules of Professional Conduct 352 (1985) (“The duty to reveal adverse precedent is well established”).
See Brief for the National Legal Aid and Defender Association et al. as Amici Curiae 6.
Anders argued in his brief that counsel should be required to state why he or she thought the appeal frivolous. He referred with approval in his brief to the practice of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which required counsel to “convince the court that the issues are truly ‘frivolous’ ... in a documented memorandum which analyzes the facts and applicable law.” Brief for Petitioner in Anders v. California, O. T. 1966, No. 98, p. 16.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
This case concerns the rules for determining whether a person being questioned by law enforcement officers is held in custody, and thus entitled to the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966). We hold, not for the first time, that an officer’s subjective and undisclosed view concerning whether the person being interrogated is a suspect is irrelevant to the assessment whether the person is in custody.
I
Ten-year-old Robyn Jackson disappeared from a playground in Baldwin Park, California, at around 6:30 p.m. on September 28, 1982. Early the next morning, about 10 miles away in Pasadena, Andrew Zimmerman observed a large man emerge from a turquoise American, sedan and throw something into a nearby flood control channel. Zimmerman called the police, who arrived at the seene and discovered the girl’s body in the channel. There was evidence that she had been raped, and the cause of death was determined to be asphyxia complicated by blunt force trauma to the head.
Lieutenant Thomas Johnston, a detective with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, investigated the homicide. From witnesses interviewed on the day the body was discovered, he learned that Robyn had talked to two ice cream truck drivers, one being petitioner Robert Edward Stansbury, in the hours before her disappearance. Given these contacts, Johnston thought Stansbury and the other driver might have some connection with the homicide or knowledge thereof, but for reasons unimportant here Johnston considered only the other driver to be a leading suspect. After the suspect driver was brought in for interrogation, Johnston asked Officer Lee of the Baldwin Park Police Department to contact Stansbury to see if he would come in for questioning as a potential witness.
Lee and three other plainclothes officers arrived at Stansbury’s trailer home at about 11:00 that evening. The officers surrounded the door and Lee knocked. When Stansbury answered, Lee told him the officers were investigating a homicide to which Stansbury was a possible witness and asked if he would accompany them to the police station to answer some questions. Stansbury agreed to the interview and accepted a ride to the station in the front seat of Lee’s police car.
At the station, Lieutenant Johnston, in the presence of another officer, questioned Stansbury about his whereabouts and activities during the afternoon and evening of September 28. Neither Johnston nor the other officer issued Miranda warnings. Stansbury told the officers (among other things) that on the evening of the 28th he spoke with the victim at about 6:00, returned to his trailer home after work at 9:00, and left the trailer at about midnight in his housemate’s turquoise, American-made car. This last detail aroused Johnston’s suspicions, as the turquoise car matched the description of the one Andrew Zimmerman had observed in Pasadena. When Stansbury, in response to a further question, admitted to prior convictions for rape, kidnaping, and child molestation, Johnston terminated the interview and another officer advised Stansbury of his Miranda rights. Stansbury declined to make further statements, requested an attorney, and was arrested. Respondent State of California charged Stansbury with first-degree murder and other crimes.
Stansbury filed a pretrial motion to suppress all statements made at the station, and the evidence discovered as a result of those statements. The trial court denied the motion in relevant part, ruling that Stansbury was not “in custody” — and thus not entitled to Miranda warnings — until he mentioned that he had taken his housemate’s turquoise car for a midnight drive. Before that stage of the interview, the trial court reasoned, “the focus in [Lieutenant Johnston’s] mind certainly was on the other ice cream [truck] driver,” Tr. 2368; only “after Mr. Stansbury made the comment . . . describing the . . . turquoise-colored automobile” did Johnston’s suspicions “shif[t] to Mr. Stansbury,” ibid. Based upon its conclusion that Stansbury was not in custody until Johnston’s suspicions had focused on him, the trial court permitted the prosecution to introduce in its case in chief the statements Stansbury made before that time. At trial, the jury convicted Stansbury of first-degree murder, rape, kidnaping, and lewd act on a child under the age of 14, and fixed the penalty for the first-degree murder at death.
The California Supreme Court affirmed. Before determining whether Stansbury was in custody during the interview at the station, the court set out what it viewed as the applicable legal standard:
“In deciding the custody issue, the totality of the circumstances is relevant, and no one factor is dispositive. However, the most important considerations include (1) the. site of the interrogation, (2) whether the investigation has focused on the subject, (3) whether the objective indicia of arrest are present, and (4) the length and form of questioning.” 4 Cal. 4th 1017, 1050, 846 R 2d 756, 775 (1993) (internal quotation marks omitted).
The court proceeded to analyze the second factor in detail, in the end accepting the trial court’s factual determination “that suspicion focused on [Stansbury] only when he mentioned that he had driven a turquoise car on the night of the crime.” Id., at 1052, 846 P. 2d, at 776. The court “conclude[d] that [Stansbury] was not subject to custodial interrogation before he mentioned the turquoise car,” and thus approved the trial court’s ruling that Miranda v. Arizona did not bar the admission of statements Stansbury made before that point. 4 Cal. 4th, at 1054, 846 P. 2d, at 777-778.
We granted certiorari. 510 U. S. 943 (1993).
II
We held in Miranda that a person questioned by law enforcement officers after being “taken into custody or otherwise deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way” must first “be warned that he has a right to remain silent, that any statement he does make may be used as evidence against him, and that he has a right to the presence of an attorney, either retained or appointed.” 384 U. S., at 444. Statements elicited in noncompliance with this rule may not be admitted for certain purposes in a criminal trial. Compare id., at 492, 494, with Harris v. New York, 401 U. S. 222 (1971). An officer’s obligation to administer Miranda warnings attaches, however, “only where there has been such a restriction on a person’s freedom as to render him ‘in custody.’” Oregon v. Mathiason, 429 U. S. 492, 495 (1977) (per curiam); see also Illinois v. Perkins, 496 U. S. 292, 296 (1990). In determining whether an individual was in custody, a court must examine all of the circumstances surrounding the interrogation, but “the ultimate inquiry is simply whether there [was] a ‘formal arrest or restraint on freedom of movement’ of the degree associated with a formal arrest.” California v. Beheler, 463 U. S. 1121, 1125 (1983) (per curiam) (quoting Mathiason, supra, at 495).
Our decisions make clear that the initial determination of custody depends on the objective circumstances of the interrogation, not on the subjective views harbored by either the interrogating officers or the person being questioned. In Beckwith v. United States, 425 U. S. 341 (1976), for example, the defendant, without being advised of his Miranda rights, made incriminating statements to Government agents during an interview in a private home. He later asked that Miranda “be extended to cover interrogation in noncustodial circumstances after a police investigation has focused on the suspect.” 425 U. S., at 345 (internal quotation marks omitted). We found his argument unpersuasive, explaining that it “was the compulsive aspect of custodial interrogation, and not the strength or content of the government’s suspicions at the time the questioning was conducted, which led the Court to impose the Miranda requirements with regard to custodial questioning.” Id., at 346-347 (internal quotation marks omitted). As a result, we concluded that the defendant was not entitled to Miranda warnings: “Although the ‘focus’ of an investigation may indeed have been on Beckwith at the time of the interview ... , he hardly found himself in the custodial situation described by the Miranda Court as the basis for its holding.” 425 U. S., at 347.
Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U. S. 420 (1984), reaffirmed the conclusions reached in Beckwith. Berkemer concerned the roadside questioning of a motorist detained in a traffic stop. We decided that the motorist was not in custody for purposes of Miranda even though the traffic officer “apparently decided as soon as [the motorist] stepped out of his car that [the motorist] would be taken into custody and charged with a traffic offense.” 468 U. S., at 442. The reason, we explained, was that the officer “never communicated his intention to” the motorist during the relevant questioning. Ibid. The lack of communication was crucial, for under Miranda “[a] policeman’s unarticulated plan has no bearing on the question whether a suspect was ‘in custody’ at a particular time”; rather, “the only relevant inquiry is how a reasonable man in the suspect’s position would have understood his situation.” 468 U. S., at 442. Other cases of ours have been consistent in adhering to this understanding of the custody element of Miranda. See, e. g., Mathias on, supra, at 495 (“Nor is the requirement of warnings to be imposed simply because . . . the questioned person is one whom the police suspect. Miranda warnings are required only where there has been such a restriction on a person’s freedom as to render him ‘in custody’”); Beheler, supra, at 1124, n. 2 (“Our holding in Mathiason reflected our earlier decision in [Beck-with], in which we rejected the notion that the ‘in custody’ requirement was satisfied merely because the police interviewed a person who was the ‘focus’ of a criminal investigation”); Minnesota v. Murphy, 465 U. S. 420, 431 (1984) (“The mere fact that an investigation has focused on a suspect does not trigger the need for Miranda warnings in noncustodial settings, and the probation officer’s knowledge and intent have no bearing on the outcome of this case”) (citation omitted); cf. Pennsylvania v. Bruder, 488 U. S. 9, 11, n. 2 (1988).
It is well settled, then, that a police officer’s subjective view that the individual under questioning is a suspect, if undisclosed, does not bear upon the question whether the individual is in custody for purposes of Miranda. See F. Inbau, J. Reid, & J. Buckley, Criminal Interrogation and Confessions 232, 236, 297-298 (3d ed. 1986). The same principle obtains if an officer’s undisclosed assessment is that the person being questioned is not a suspect. In either instance, one cannot expect the person under interrogation to probe the officer’s innermost thoughts. Save as they are communicated or otherwise manifested to the person being ques-. tioned, an officer’s evolving but unarticulated suspicions do not affect the objective circumstances of an interrogation or interview, and thus cannot affect the Miranda custody inquiry. “The threat to a citizen’s Fifth Amendment rights that Miranda was designed to neutralize has little to do with the strength of an interrogating officer’s suspicions.” Berkemer, supra, at 435, n. 22.
An officer’s knowledge or beliefs may bear upon the custody issue if they are conveyed, by word or deed, to the individual being questioned. Cf. Michigan v. Chesternut, 486 U. S. 567,575, n. 7 (1988) (citing United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U. S. 544,554, n. 6 (1980) (opinion of Stewart, J.)). Those beliefs are relevant only to the extent they would affect how a reasonable person in the position of the individual being questioned would gauge the breadth of his or her “ ‘freedom of action.’” Berkemer, supra, at 440. Even a clear statement from an officer that the person under interrogation is a prime suspect is not, in itself, dispositive of the custody issue, for some suspects are free to come and go until the police decide to make an arrest. The weight and pertinence of any communications regarding the officer’s degree of suspicion will depend upon the facts and circumstances of the particular case. In sum, an officer’s views concerning the nature of an interrogation, or beliefs concerning the potential culpability of the individual being questioned, may be one among many factors that bear upon the assessment whether that individual was in custody, but only if the officer’s views or beliefs were somehow manifested to the individual under interrogation and would have affected how a reasonable person in that position would perceive his or her freedom to leave. (Of course, instances may arise in which the officer’s undisclosed views are relevant in testing the credibility of his or her account of what happened during an interrogation; but it is the objective surroundings, and not any undisclosed views, that control the Miranda custody inquiry.)
We decide on this state of the record that the California Supreme Court’s analysis of whether Stansbury was in custody is not consistent in all respects with the foregoing principles. Numerous statements in the court’s opinion are open to the interpretation that the court regarded the officers’ subjective beliefs regarding Stansbury’s status as a suspect (or nonsuspect) as significant in and of themselves, rather than as relevant only to the extent they influenced the objective conditions surrounding his interrogation. See 4 Cal. 4th, at 1050, 846 P. 2d, at 775 (“whether the investigation ha[d] focused on the” person being questioned is among the “most important considerations” in assessing whether the person was in custody). So understood, the court’s analysis conflicts with our precedents. The court’s apparent conclusion that Stansbury’s Miranda rights were triggered by virtue of the fact that he had become the focus of the officers’ suspicions, see 4 Cal. 4th, at 1052, 1054, 846 P. 2d, at 776, 777-778; cf., e.g., State v. Blanding, 69 Haw. 583, 586-587, 752 P. 2d 99, 101 (1988); State v. Hartman, 703 S. W. 2d 106, 120 (Tenn. 1985), cert, denied, 478 U. S. 1010 (1986); People v. Herdon, 42 Cal. App. 3d 300, 307, n. 10, 116 Cal. Rptr. 641, 645, n. 10 (1974), is incorrect as well. Our cases make clear, in no uncertain terms, that any inquiry into whether the interrogating officers have focused their suspicions upon the individual being questioned (assuming those suspicions remain undisclosed) is not relevant for purposes of Miranda. See generally 1 W. LaFave & J. Israel, Criminal Procedure §6.6(a), pp. 489-490 (1984).
The State acknowledges that Lieutenant Johnston’s and the other officers’ subjective and undisclosed suspicions (or lack thereof) do not bear upon the question whether Stansbury was in custody, for purposes of Miranda, during the station house interview. It maintains, however, that the objective facts in the record support a finding that Stansbury was not in custody until his arrest. Stansbury, by contrast, asserts that the objective circumstances show that he was in custody during the entire interrogation. We think it appropriate for the California Supreme Court to consider this question in the first instance. We therefore reverse its judgment and remand the case for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
After a jury trial in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, petitioner was convicted of violating a 1917 statute which prohibits any person from “knowingly and willfully . . . [making] any threat to take the life of or to inflict bodily harm upon the President of the United States ....” The incident which led to petitioner’s arrest occurred on August 27, 1966, during a public rally on the Washington Monument grounds. The crowd present broke up into small discussion groups and petitioner joined a gathering scheduled to discuss police brutality. Most of those in the group were quite young, either in their teens or early twenties. Petitioner, who himself was 18 years old, entered into the discussion after one member of the group suggested that the young people present should get more education before expressing their views. According to an investigator for the Army Counter Intelligence Corps who was present, petitioner responded: “They always holler at us to get an education. And now I have already received my draft classification as 1-A and I have got to report for my physical this Monday coming. I am not going. If they ever make me carry a rifle the first man I want to get in my sights is L. B. J.” “They are not going to make me kill my black brothers.” On the basis of this statement, the jury found that petitioner had committed a felony by knowingly and willfully threatening the President. The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed by a two-to-one vote. 131 U. S. App. D. C. 125, 402 F. 2d 676 (1968). We reverse.
At the close of the Government’s case, petitioner’s trial counsel moved for a judgment of acquittal. He contended that there was “absolutely no evidence on the basis of which the jury would be entitled to find that [petitioner] made a threat against the life of the President.” He stressed the fact that petitioner’s statement was made during a political debate, that it was expressly made conditional upon an event — induction into the Armed Forces — which petitioner, vowed would never occur, and that both petitioner and the crowd laughed after the statement was made. He concluded, “Now actually what happened here in all this was a kind of very crude offensive method of stating a political opposition to the President. What he was saying, he says, I don’t want to shoot black people because I don’t consider them my enemy, and if they put a rifle in my hand it is the people that put the rifle in my hand, as symbolized by the President, who are my real enemy.” We hold that the trial judge erred in denying this motion.
Certainly the statute under which petitioner was convicted is constitutional on its face. The Nation undoubtedly has a valid, even an overwhelming, interest in protecting the safety of its Chief Executive and in allowing him to perform his duties without interference from threats of physical violence. See H. R. Rep. No. 652, 64th Cong., 1st Sess. (1916). Nevertheless, a statute such as this one, which makes criminal a form of pure speech, must be interpreted with the commands of the First Amendment clearly in mind. What is a threat must be distinguished from what is constitutionally protected speech.
The judges in the Court of Appeals differed over whether or not the “willfullness” requirement of the statute implied that a defendant must have intended to carry out his “threat.” Some early cases found the will-fullness requirement met if the speaker voluntarily uttered the charged words with “an apparent determination to carry them into execution.” Ragansky v. United States, 253 F. 643, 645 (C. A. 7th Cir. 1918) (emphasis supplied); cf. Pierce v. United States, 365 F. 2d 292 (C. A. 10th Cir. 1966). The majority below seemed to agree. Perhaps this interpretation is correct, although we have grave doubts about it. See the dissenting opinion below, 131 U. S. App. D. C., at 135-142, 402 F. 2d, at 686-693 (Wright, J.). But whatever the “willfullness” requirement implies, the statute initially requires the Government to prove a true “threat.” We do not believe that the kind of political hyperbole indulged in by petitioner fits within that statutory term. For we must interpret the language Congress chose “against the background of a profound national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials.” New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254, 270 (1964). The language of the political arena, like the language used in labor disputes, see Linn v. United Plant Guard Workers of America, 383 U. S. 53, 58 (1966), is often vituperative, abusive, and inexact. We agree with petitioner that his only offense here was “a kind of very crude offensive method of stating a political opposition to the President.” Taken in context, and regarding the expressly conditional nature of the statement and the reaction of the listeners, we do not see how it could be interpreted otherwise.
The motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis and the petition for a writ of certiorari are granted and the judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed. The case is remanded with instructions that it be returned to the District Court for entry of a judgment of acquittal.
It is so ordered.
Mr. Justice Stewart would deny the petition for certiorari.
Mr. Justice White dissents.
18 U. S. C. §871 (a) provides:
“Whoever knowingly and willfully deposits for conveyance in the mail or for a delivery from any post office or by any letter carrier any letter, paper, writing, print, missive, or document containing any threat to take the life of or to inflict bodily harm upon the President of the United States, the President-elect, the Vice President or other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President of the United States, or the Vice President-elect, or knowingly and willfully otherwise makes any such threat against the President, President-elect, Vice President or other officer next in the order of succession to the office of President, or Vice President-elect, shall be fined not more than $1,000 or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Brennan delivered the opinion of the Court.
Both Iowa and Nebraska filed Exceptions to the Report submitted by the Special Master in this original action brought by Nebraska against Iowa for construction and enforcement of the Iowa-Nebraska Boundary Compact of 1943.
The Missouri River is the boundary between the two States. In 1892, in another suit brought by Nebraska against Iowa, this Court held that the boundary line in the river at Carter Lake, Iowa, was to be located according to the principle that the boundary “is a varying line” so far as affected by “changes of diminution and accretion in the mere washing of the waters of the stream,” but not where the river is shifted by avulsion: “By this selection of a new channel the boundary was not changed, and it remained as it was prior to the avulsion, the centre line of the old channel; . . . unless the waters of the river returned to their former bed, [such center line] became a fixed and unvarying boundary, no matter what might be the changes of the river in its new channel.” Nebraska v. Iowa, 143 U. S. 359, 370 (1892); the decree is in 145 U. S. 519 (1892). The Compact adopts this line at Carter Lake, and for the rest of the boundary fixes the line in “the middle of the main channel of the Missouri river,” defined as the “center line of the proposed stabilized channel of the Missouri river as established by the United States engineers’ office, Omaha, Nebraska, and shown on the alluvial plain maps of the Missouri river from Sioux City, Iowa, to Rulo, Nebraska, and identified by file numbers AP-1 to 4 inclusive, dated January 30, 1940, and file numbers AP-5 to 10 inclusive, dated March 29, 1940, which maps are now on file in the United States engineers’ office at Omaha, Nebraska, and copies of which maps are now on file with the secretary of state of the State of Iowa and with the secretary of state of the State of Nebraska.” The “proposed stabilized channel” refers to a project begun in the early 1930’s by the United States Army Corps of Engineers to tame the river along its entire length by containing it within a designed channel. The work had been partially completed by 1943, but was suspended when World War II intervened. When work resumed in 1948, the channel was partly redesigned, and by 1959 the river had been confined in the newly designed channel.
The States determined in 1943 to agree by compact upon a permanent location of the boundary line when experience showed that “the fickle Missouri River . . . refused to be bound by the Supreme Court decree [of 1892]. In the past thirty-five years the river has changed its course so often that it has proved impossible to apply the court decision in all cases, since it is difficult to determine whether the channel of the river has changed by ‘the law of accretion’ or ‘that of avulsion.’ ” Eriksson, Boundaries of Iowa, 25 Iowa J. of Hist, and Pol. 163, 234 (1927). The Special Master found, on ample evidence, and we adopt his findings, that by 1943 the shifts of the river channel had been so numerous and intricate, both in its natural state and as a result of the work of the Corps of Engineers, that it would be practically impossible to locate the original boundary line.
The fixing of the permanent boundary by Compact resulted in some riparian lands formerly in each State being located within the other State. This created the problem of the effect to be given by the new State to titles, mortgages, and other liens that had arisen under the laws of the other State. Sections 2 and 3 of the Compact were designed to solve this problem. Under § 2 each State “cedes” to the other State “and relinquishes jurisdiction over” all such lands now located within the Compact boundary of the other. Under § 3, “[tjitles, mortgages, and other liens” affecting such lands “good in” the ceding State “shall be good in” the other State.
The instant dispute between the States arose when Iowa in 1963 claimed state ownership of some 30 separate areas of land, water, marsh, or mixture of the three wholly on the Iowa side of the Compact boundary. The eighth and part of a ninth such areas were formed before 1943. The 21st and part of a 22d were formed after 1943. Iowa's claim was based on Iowa common law that private titles to riparian lands run only to the ordinary high-water mark on navigable streams and that the State is the owner of the beds of all navigable streams within the State and is also the owner of any islands that may form therein. McManus v. Carmichael, 3 Iowa 1 (1856); Holman v. Hodges, 112 Iowa 714, 84 N. W. 950 (1901). The areas formed before 1943 lie south of Omaha and those formed after 1943 lie north of Omaha. Two of the pre-1943 areas are Nottleman Island and Sehemmel Island. Each is the subject of an action to quiet title brought by Iowa in Iowa courts. The defense in each case is that there exist “titles . . . good in Nebraska” to the islands that, under § 3 of the Compact, Iowa obligated itself to recognize to be “good in Iowa” as against any claim of Iowa under its doctrine of state ownership.
Thus, the controversy between the States in this case centers around the proper construction of their Compact. The Special Master’s Findings and Conclusions generally favor Nebraska’s position on the merits of the controversy over the areas that formed before July 12, 1943, and Iowa’s exceptions are addressed to them. On the other hand, the Findings and Conclusions favor Iowa’s position on the merits of the controversy over the areas that formed after July 12, 1943, and Nebraska’s exceptions are primarily addressed to them. We overrule all exceptions, save two, of Nebraska’s addressed to printing errors in the Report, except as we sustain, infra, Iowa’s Exceptions IV and V insofar as the Special Master recommended that an injunction issue, and except as mentioned in n. 8, infra.
The Special Master construed the word “cedes” in § 2 as meant by the States to describe all areas formed before July 12, 1943, regardless of their location with reference to the original boundary, whose “[tjitles, mortgages, and other liens” were, at the date of the Compact, “good in” the ceding State, and ruled that, under § 3, the other State is bound to recognize such “[tjitles, mortgages, and other liens” to be “good in” its State, and not to claim ownership in itself. Iowa urges, in its Exceptions II and III, that this construction is erroneous and that §§ 2 and 3 should be construed as relating only to areas formed before July 12, 1943, that can be proved by clear, satisfactory, and convincing evidence to have been on the Nebraska side of the original boundary before the Compact fixed the permanent boundary. We overrule Iowa’s Exceptions. Iowa’s construction would require the claimant who proves title “good in-Nebraska” also to shoulder the burden of proving the location of the original boundary before 1943, as well as proving that the lands were on the Nebraska side of that boundary. That, said the Special Master, and we agree, “would be placing a burden upon the land owner which the states themselves refused to undertake in 1943 and agreed would not be necessary. The states would in effect be saying to the land owners, ‘we could not prove where the boundary was in 1943 but now, after we have waited 27 years, we are going to make you prove where it was at your expense even though we know it is impossible.’ ”
Iowa’s Exceptions IV and V concern the Special Master’s findings that the State of Iowa does not own Nottleman Island and Schemmel Island. The Special Master found that the proofs sufficed to establish title “good in Nebraska” to Nottleman Island and Schemmel Island, but did not suffice to prove title “good in Nebraska” to the other areas claimed by Iowa that were formed before 1943. He found, and we agree, that titles “good in Nebraska” include private titles to riparian lands that under Nebraska law, differing from Iowa law, run to the thread of the contiguous stream. Kinkead v. Turgeon, 74 Neb. 573, 104 N. W. 1061 (1905), 74 Neb. 580, 109 N. W. 744 (1906). He found further that titles “good in Nebraska” embrace titles obtained by 10 years’ open, notorious, and adverse possession under claim of right without any requirement of a record title; under Iowa law, a claim must be under “color of title,” requiring some type of record title to commence the period of adverse possession.
The Special Master recommended that as to areas formed before July 12, 1943, §§ 2 and 3 should be construed as limiting the State of Iowa to contesting with private litigants in state or federal courts the question whether the private claimants can prove title “good in Nebraska,” and when private litigants prove such title, as obliging Iowa not to interpose Iowa’s doctrine of state ownership as defeating such title. We agree, and to that extent overrule Iowa’s Exceptions IV and Y. As to Nottleman Island and Schemmel Island, however, the Special Master recommended that, in addition to a judgment that titles “good in Nebraska” have been proved as to those islands, so that Iowa is precluded from claiming title thereto under its doctrine of state ownership, this Court should enjoin the State of Iowa, its officers, agents, and servants from further prosecution of the cases now pending in the Iowa courts. We see no reason for an injunction at this stage. We are confident that the State of Iowa will abide by our adoption of the Special Master’s conclusion that in any proceeding between a private litigant and the State of Iowa in which a claim of title good under the law of Nebraska is proved, the State of Iowa will not invoke its common-law doctrine of state ownership as defeating such title. Iowa’s Exceptions IV and V are therefore sustained insofar as the Special Master recommended that an injunction issue.
Nebraska’s basic Exception is to the Findings and Conclusion of the Special Master that ownership of areas that have formed since July 12, 1943, should be determined under the law of the State in which they formed, the boundary fixed by the Compact being the line that determines in which State they formed. This pertains to the 21 areas and part of a 22d that lie north of Omaha. See n. 4, supra.
Although the Special Master recommended, and we agree, that claimants of title to these areas as against Iowa may also have the opportunity to show title “good in Nebraska” on the Compact date, July 12, 1943, Nebraska offered no proof to support such a claim as to any of the areas. Nebraska does contend, however, that any accretions to Nebraska riparian lands that cross the Compact boundary line into Iowa, caused when the river moves gradually and imperceptibly, should be declared to accrue to the Nebraska riparian owner under Nebraska law, since under Nebraska law the boundary of the Nebraska owner moves with the thalweg or main navigable channel, regardless of which State the movement is in. The Special Master rejected that contention. We agree that the contention is without merit for the reasons stated in Tyson v. State of Iowa, 283 F. 2d 802 (CA8 1960). That was a condemnation action by the United States in which the question was the ownership of an island at Tyson Bend, one of the areas north of Omaha to which Iowa claims ownership. See n. 4, supra. The island had formed between the designed channel and a main channel created when the river escaped from the designed channel between 1943 and 1948. The island had then become connected to the Nebraska shore when the designed channel filled with sediment after a 1952 flood. The Corps of Engineers determined to dredge a canal in the designed channel to place the river back in the designed channel. Condemnation of an easement on the island was necessary to carry the project forward, and the question of ownership of the island had to be settled to determine who was entitled to compensation. The Tyson claimants claimed the land as an accretion to Nebraska land or river beds belonging to them. The State of Iowa claimed it as an island formed over the state-owned river bed in Iowa under the Iowa doctrine of state ownership. The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit held that the ownership of the island should be determined by the law of the State in which the land was situated, that is, by the law of Iowa, since the island was on the Iowa side of the Compact boundary. The Court of Appeals expressly rejected the same contention urged upon us by Nebraska, holding, in agreement with the District Court in the case, that “the Nebraska law of accretion did not operate to create riparian rights within the territorial limits of Iowa.” 283 F. 2d, at 811. Hence, whether the Nebraska riparian owner has title to the accretions that cross the boundary into Iowa is determined by Iowa law. Nebraska argues that Tyson was wrongly decided. We do not agree. Tyson is consistent with what the Court said in Arkansas v. Tennessee, 246 U. S. 158, 175-176 (1918):
“How the land that emerges on either side of an interstate boundary stream shall be disposed of as between public and private ownership is a matter to be determined according to the law of each State, under the familiar doctrine that it is for the States to establish for themselves such rules of property as they deem expedient with respect to the navigable waters within their borders and the riparian lands adjacent to them. . . . But these dispositions are in each case limited by the interstate boundary, and cannot be permitted to press back the boundary line from where otherwise it should he located.” (Emphasis added.)
The States may submit a proposed decree in accord with this opinion. If the States cannot agree, the Special Master is requested, after appropriate hearing, to prepare and submit a recommended decree.
It is so ordered.
Iowa Code 1971, p. lxiv; Iowa Acts 1943, c. 306; Nebraska Laws 1943, c. 130; Act of July 12, 1943, 57 Stat. 494.
Leave to file the action was granted in 1965. 379 U. S. 876 (1964); 379 U. S. 996 (1965). There have been successive Special Masters. See 380 U. S. 968 (1965); 392 U. S. 918 (1968); 393 U. S. 910 (1968). Senior Judge Joseph P. Willson completed the case after extensive hearings and filed his Report on November 9, 1971. 404 U. S. 933 (1971). The Exceptions of the States were orally argued before this Court on March 29, 1972.
Iowa’s Exception I renews the objection to the Court’s jurisdiction that was overruled when leave to file was granted. We overrule the Exception. “Just as this Court has power to settle disputes between States where there is no compact, it must have final power to pass upon the meaning and validity of compacts.” West Virginia ex rel. Dyer v. Sims, 341 U. S. 22, 28 (1951); Const. Art. III, § 2; 28 U. S. C. § 1251.
Report 63, 65, 67, 68, 80.
Each State Legislature adopted a statute to evidence its agreement to the Compact. Sections 2 and 3 of each statute create obligations reciprocated by the other State in §§ 2 and 3 of its statute. In the Iowa statute the sections are:
“Sec. 2. The State of Iowa hereby cedes to the State of Nebraska and relinquishes jurisdiction over all lands now in Iowa but lying westerly of said boundary line and contiguous to lands in Nebraska.
"Sec. 3. Titles, mortgages, and other liens good in Nebraska shall be good in Iowa as to any lands Nebraska may cede to Iowa and any pending suits or actions concerning said lands may be prosecuted to final judgment in Nebraska and such judgments shall be accorded full force and effect in Iowa.”
The areas formed before 1943 are Nottleman Island, Schemmel Island, St. Mary’s Bend, Auldon Bar, Copeland Bend, State Line Island, Wilson Island, Deer Island, and a portion of Winnebago Bend. Report 106, 165.
The areas formed since 1943 are Dakota Bend, Omadi Bend, Between Omadi and Browers Bends, Snyder Bend, Glover’s Point Bend, Rabbit Island, Upper Monona Bend, Monona Bend, Blackbird Bend, Tieville Bend, Upper Decatur Bend, Middle Decatur Bend, Lower Decatur Bend, Louisville Bend, Blencoe Bend, Little Sioux Bend, Bullard Bend, Soldier Bend, Sandy Point Bend, Tyson Bend, and California Bend. Id., at 107.
On March 18, 1963, Iowa filed, in the District Court for Mills County, State of Iowa v. Darwin Merrit Babbit et al., Equity No. 17433 to quiet title to Nottleman Island. On March 26, 1963, Iowa filed, in the District Court of Fremont County, State of Iowa v. Henry E. Sehemmel et al., Equity No. 19765 to quiet title to Sehemmel Island. Proceedings in the actions have been suspended pending our decision.
Exceptions of the State of Nebraska, No. 6, p. 8, and No. 12, p. 11. Iowa concedes that the Exceptions are well taken. Iowa Reply 5, 7. The errors will be deemed corrected as suggested by the Exceptions.
Report 88-89.
Id., at 174. The Special Master found, alternatively, that if his construction of §§2 and 3 was not accepted, nevertheless the landowners met the burden of proving that Nottleman and Schemmel Islands were actually on the Nebraska side of the original boundary. Since we agree with the Special Master’s construction, we consider no Exceptions addressed to those findings.
In Iowa’s Reply, filed January 19, 1972, Iowa for the first time in this protracted litigation retracts its concession, made often and throughout the proceedings, that Kinkead established this principle of Nebraska law. In its Reply, at 15-16, Iowa contends that “the common law of the State of Nebraska did not in fact give the Nebraska riparian owners along the Missouri River title or ownership of the bed of the navigable channel of the river, and they acquired no property right to such bed until it was abandoned by the river.” Our reading of the Nebraska cases satisfies us that the argument is frivolous.
Report 68-69. Claimants to titles to areas of Nottleman Island rested at least in part on the Nebraska law of adverse possession. Report 121-126.
Id., at 174-175.
Id., at 201; see n. 5, supra.
Id., at 193.
Id., at 192.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
K
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
CHIEF Justice Rehnquist
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In this case we consider whether the rule of Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U. S. 106 (1977) (per curiam), that a police officer may as a matter of course order the driver of a lawfully stopped car to exit his vehicle, extends to passengers as well. We hold that it does.
At about 7:30 p.m. on a June evening, Maryland state trooper David Hughes observed a passenger car driving southbound on 1-95 in Baltimore County at a speed of 64 miles per hour. The posted speed limit was 55 miles per hour, and the car had no regular license tag; there was a torn piece of paper reading “Enterprise Rent-A-Car” dangling from its rear. Hughes activated his lights and sirens, signaling the car to pull over, but it continued driving for another mile and a half until it finally did so.
During the pursuit, Hughes noticed that there were three occupants in the car and that the two passengers turned to look at him several times, repeatedly ducking below sight level and then reappearing. As Hughes approached the car on foot, the driver alighted and met him halfway. The driver was trembling and appeared extremely nervous, but nonetheless produced a valid Connecticut driver’s license. Hughes instructed him to return to the car and retrieve the rental documents, and he complied. During this encounter, Hughes noticed that the front-seat passenger, respondent Jerry Lee Wilson, was sweating and also appeared extremely nervous. While the driver was sitting in the driver’s seat looking for the rental papers, Hughes ordered Wilson out of the car.
When Wilson exited the car, a quantity of crack cocaine fell to the ground. Wilson was then arrested and charged with possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. Before trial, Wilson moved to suppress the evidence, arguing that Hughes’ ordering him out of the ear constituted an unreasonable seizure under the Fourth Amendment. The Circuit Court for Baltimore County agreed, and granted respondent’s motion to suppress. On appeal, the Court of Special Appeals of Maryland affirmed, 106 Md. App. 24, 664 A. 2d 1 (1995), ruling that Pennsylvania v. Mimms does not apply to passengers. The Court of Appeals of Maryland denied certiorari. 340 Md. 502, 667 A. 2d 342 (1995). We granted certiorari, 518 U. S. 1003 (1996), and now reverse.
In Mimms, we considered a traffic stop much like the one before us today. There, Mimms had been stopped for driving with an expired license plate, and the officer asked him to step out of his car. When Mimms did so, the officer noticed a bulge in his jacket that proved to be a .38-caliber revolver, whereupon Mimms was arrested for carrying a concealed deadly weapon. Mimms, like Wilson, urged the suppression of the evidence on the ground that the officer’s ordering him out of the car was an unreasonable seizure, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, like the Court of Special Appeals of Maryland, agreed.
We reversed, explaining that “[t]he touchstone of our analysis under the Fourth Amendment is always ‘the reasonableness in all the circumstances of the particular governmental invasion of a citizen’s personal security,’ ” 434 U. S., at 108-109 (quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1, 19 (1968)), and that reasonableness “depends ‘on a balance between the public interest and the individual’s right to personal security free • from arbitrary interference by law officers,’ ” 434 U. S., at 109 (quoting United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U. S. 873, 878 (1975)). On the public interest side of the balance, we noted that the State “freely concede[d]” that there had been nothing unusual or suspicious to justify ordering Mimms out of the car, but that it was the officer’s “practice to order all drivers [stopped in traffic stops] out of their vehicles as a matter of course” as a “precautionary measure” to protect the officer’s safety. 434 U. S., at 109-110. We thought it “too plain for argument” that this justification — officer safety — was “both legitimate and weighty.” Id., at 110. In addition, we observed that the danger to the officer of standing by the driver’s door and in the path of oncoming traffic might also be “appreciable.” Id., at 111.
On the other side of the balance, we considered the intrusion into the driver’s liberty occasioned by the officer’s ordering him out of the car. Noting that the driver’s car was already validly stopped for a traffic infraction, we deemed the additional intrusion of asking him to step outside his car “de minimis.” Ibid. Accordingly, we concluded that “once a motor vehicle has been lawfully detained for a traffic violation, the police officers may order the driver to get out of the vehicle without violating the Fourth Amendment’s proscription of unreasonable seizures.” Id., at 111, n. 6.
Respondent urges, and the lower courts agreed, that this per se rule does not apply to Wilson because he was a passenger, not the driver. Maryland, in turn, argues that we have already implicitly decided this question by our statement in Michigan v. Long, 463 U. S. 1032 (1983), that “[i]n [Mimms], we held that police may order persons out of an automobile during a stop for a traffic violation,” id., at 1047-1048 (emphasis added), and by Justice Powell’s statement in Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U. S. 128 (1978), that “this Court determined in [Mimms] that passengers in automobiles have no Fourth Amendment right not to be ordered from their vehicle, once a proper stop is made,” id., at 155, n. 4 (Powell, J., joined by Burger, C. J., concurring) (emphasis added). We agree with respondent that the former statement was dictum, and the latter was contained in a concurrence, so that neither constitutes binding precedent.
We must therefore now decide whether the rule of Mimms applies to passengers as well as to drivers. On the public interest side of the balance, the same weighty interest in officer safety is present regardless of whether the occupant of the stopped car is a driver or passenger. Regrettably, traffic stops may be dangerous encounters. In 1994 alone, there were 5,762 officer assaults and 11 officers killed during traffic pursuits and stops. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reports: Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted 71, 33 (1994). In the case of passengers, the danger of the officer’s standing in the path of oncoming traffic would not be present except in the case of a passenger in the left rear seat, but the fact that there is more than one occupant of the vehicle increases the possible sources of harm to the officer.
On the personal liberty side of the balance, the case for the passengers is in one sense stronger than that for the driver. There is probable cause to believe that the driver has committed a minor vehicular offense, but there is no such reason to stop or detain the passengers. But as a practical matter, the passengers are already stopped by virtue of the stop of the vehicle. The only change in their circumstances which will result from ordering them out of the car is that they will be outside of, rather than inside of, the stopped car. Outside the car, the passengers will be denied access to any possible weapon that might be concealed in the interior of the passenger compartment. It would seem that the possibility of a violent encounter stems not from the ordinary reaction of a motorist stopped for a speeding violation, but from the fact that evidence of a more serious crime might be uncovered during the stop. And the motivation of a passenger to employ violence to prevent apprehension of such a crime is every bit as great as that of the driver. 452
We think that our opinion in Michigan v. Summers, 452 U. S. 692 (1981), offers guidance by analogy here. There the police had obtained a search warrant for contraband thought to be located in a residence, but when they arrived to execute the warrant they found Summers coming down the front steps. The question in the case depended “upon a determination whether the officers had the authority to require him to re-enter the house and to remain there while they conducted their search.” Id., at 695. In holding as it did, the Court said:
“Although no special danger to the police is suggested by the evidence in this record, the execution of a warrant to search for narcotics is the kind of transaction that may give rise to sudden violence or frantic efforts to conceal or destroy evidence. The risk of harm to both the police and the occupants is minimized if the officers routinely exercise unquestioned command of the situation.” Id., at 702-703 (footnote omitted).
In summary, danger to an officer from a traffic stop is likely to be greater when there are passengers in addition to the driver in the stopped car. While there is not the same basis for ordering the passengers out of the car as there is for ordering the driver out, the additional intrusion on the .* passenger is minimal. We therefore hold that an officer making a traffic stop may order passengers to get out of the car pending completion of the stop.
The judgment of the Court of Special Appeals of Maryland is reversed, and the case is remanded for proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Respondent argues that, because we have generally eschewed bright-line rules in the Fourth Amendment context, see, e. g., Ohio v. Robinette, ante, p. 33, we should not here conclude that passengers may constitutionally be ordered out of lawfully stopped vehicles. But, that we typically avoid per se rules concerning searches and seizures does not mean that we have always done so; Mimms itself drew a bright line, and we believe the principles that underlay that decision apply to as well.
Justice Stevens’ dissenting opinion points out, post, at 416, that these statistics are not further broken down as to assaults by passengers and assaults by drivers. It is, indeed, regrettable that the empirical data on a subject such as this are sparse, but we need not ignore the data which do exist simply because further refinement would be even more helpful. Justice Stevens agrees that there is “a strong public interest in minimizing” the number of assaults on law officers, ibid., and we believe that our holding today is more likely to accomplish that result than would be the case if his views were to prevail.
Maryland urges us to go further and hold that an officer may forcibly detain a passenger for the entire duration of the stop. But respondent was subjected to no detention based on the stopping of the ear once he had left it; his arrest was based on probable cause to believe that he was guilty of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. The question which Maryland wishes answered, therefore, is not presented by this ease, • and we express no opinion upon it.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Warren
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a denaturalization proceeding under § 340 (a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. The sole question is whether § 340 (a) makes the filing of the “affidavit showing good cause” a prerequisite to maintenance of the suit. The District Court held that it does and ordered the complaint dismissed unless the Government filed an affidavit showing good cause within 60 days. As this was not done, the complaint was dismissed without prejudice to the Government’s right to institute an action to denaturalize the respondent upon filing the affidavit. 125 F. Supp. 551. On appeal by the Government the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed, adopting the opinion of the District Court. 221 F. 2d 805. We granted certiorari, 350 U. S. 817, because of an asserted conflict with decisions of the Seventh and Ninth Circuits and because of the importance of the question in the administration of the immigration and naturalization laws.
Respondent Ettore Zueca was naturalized on January 4, 1944. In 1954, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, proceeding under §340 (a), filed a verified complaint in the United States District Court in his District seeking revocation of respondent’s naturalization on the grounds of illegality, concealment of material facts, and willful misrepresentation.
The complaint alleged that respondent, at his naturalization hearing and in his petition for naturalization, had falsely sworn “that he did not belong to and was not associated with any organization which teaches or advocates the overthrow of existing government in this country . . . ,” that it was his “intention in good faith to become a citizen of the United States and to renounce absolutely and forever all allegiance and fidelity to any [foreign powers] . . . ,” and that he was and had been “attached to the principles of the Constitution of the United States and well disposed to the good order and happiness of the United States.” This was followed by a general allegation of membership in the Communist Party and “other organizations affiliated with or controlled by the Communist Party of the United States from 1925 to 1947,” and equally general allegations that respondent procured his naturalization by concealment and willful misrepresentation in that he concealed the facts relating to his membership in the Communist Party and affiliated organizations and otherwise swore falsely as to his intentions and beliefs. The pleader concluded that “good cause exists for the institution of this suit . . . .” The complaint, no part of which was alleged on information and belief, was verified by an Assistant United States Attorney. When respondent sought to take depositions of this Attorney, he was met with an affidavit in opposition denying personal knowledge. Respondent then filed his motion to dismiss on the ground, inter alia, that § 340 (a) required the filing of an affidavit showing good cause and that this requirement had not been complied with. As stated above, the motion to dismiss was granted on this ground.
The Government argues that a reading of the statute and its legislative history leads to the conclusion that the filing of an “affidavit showing good cause” is not a prerequisite to maintaining denaturalization proceedings under § 340 (a). We do not agree.
The affidavit provision with which we are here concerned first appeared in § 15 of the Act of June 29, 1906. Without substantial change, it was carried forward in the laws of 1940 and 1952, currently reading as follows:
“Sec. 340. (a) It shall be the duty of the United States district attorneys for the respective districts, upon affidavit showing good cause therefor, to institute proceedings in any court specified in subsection (a) of section 310 of this title in the judicial district in which the naturalized citizen may reside at the time of bringing suit, for the purpose of revoking and setting aside the order admitting such person to citizenship and canceling the certificate of naturalization on the ground that such order and certificate of naturalization were procured by concealment of a material fact or by willful misrepresentation, . . . .” (Emphasis added.)
Were we obliged to rely solely on the wording of the statute, we would have no difficulty in reaching the conclusion that the filing of the affidavit is a prerequisite to maintaining a denaturalization suit. This conclusion is not altered by a consideration of the Government’s highly speculative suggestions as to the meaning of the legislative history. On the contrary, we think that it is entirely consistent with the Court’s statement in Bindczyck v. Finucane, 342 U. S. 76, that Congress acted “[w]ith a view to protecting the Government against fraud while safeguarding citizenship from abrogation except by a clearly defined procedure . . . .” Id., at 83.
The natural meaning of the language used in § 340 (a) is that filing of the affidavit is a procedural prerequisite to maintenance of the suit. In the Bindczyck case, this Court held that § 338 (a) of the Nationality Act of 1940, predecessor of § 340 (a), sets forth the exclusive procedure for denaturalization. Despite that decision, the Government would have us hold now that the grant of power to maintain denaturalization suits is found in the general duty of United States Attorneys to prosecute all civil actions in which the United States is concerned, and that § 340 (a) merely imposes the “additional duty ... to act, not alone on their own knowledge and judgment, but on the basis of an affidavit of good cause furnished by private citizens.” In effect the Government argues that the affidavit is required only when the proceeding is to be brought on the complaint of a private citizen. We need not decide whether a private citizen may ever file such a complaint. The short answer in this case is that the Government laid its complaint expressly under § 340 (a).
While arguing that the words of § 340 are words of limitation on the discretion of the United States Attorney, the Government apparently concedes that the venue -and notice provisions of the Section are generally applicable to denaturalization proceedings. Its argument overlooks the fact that the affidavit and venue provisions are in the same sentence. If the affidavit were required only when the United States Attorney proceeded on the complaint of a private citizen, then only in such a case would the venue be restricted to the district of the defendant's residence. We could accept such a limiting construction of the statute only upon a very clear showing that Congress meant something other than what it said.
The original Act of 1906 was the culmination of many years of study by Congress and a commission of which the Attorney General was a leading spirit and his Assistant the Chairman. Shortly after its enactment, the same Attorney General rendered an opinion to the Secretary of Commerce and Labor to the effect that the filing of an affidavit was “necessary to give a United States attorney authority to institute proceedings in any court for the cancellation of a naturalization certificate.” In such circumstances, a contemporaneous construction of a statute by the officer charged with its enforcement is entitled to great weight. Fawcus Machine Co. v. United States, 282 U. S. 375, 378; Norwegian Nitrogen Products Co. v. United States, 288 U. S. 294, 315. Over a period of years, however, there has been some conflict among the circuits concerning the affidavit requirement. The Government relies particularly on our affirmance of the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Schwinn v. United States, 311 U. S. 616. The Court decided that case on the sole ground of illegal procurement. Although the necessity of the affidavit was considered below in view of the Government’s failure to offer proof in support of its allegation that an affidavit of good cause had been furnished, the question was not presented to this Court.
Prior to the decision in the Schwinn case the practice of the Justice Department seems generally to have been to institute denaturalization proceedings upon affidavit showing good cause. The Government does not now contend that it has abandoned that practice. It merely claims the right not to do so when it chooses, as clearly appears from portions of a Department of Justice memorandum which has been brought to the Court’s attention. We are unimpressed by the reasoning of that memorandum. We think that the public interest is not served by taking such liberties with a specific statutory requirement designed for the protection of naturalized citizens. And we fail to see that the requirement imposes a burden on the Government. At this Term, it has been represented to us that the usual practice is that, “if sufficient grounds are shown, an ‘affidavit showing good cause’ (see Section 340 (a) of the Act . . .) is prepared and executed, and is forwarded as an aid to the formal judicial proceedings . . . .”
Lastly the Government contends, as an alternate ground for reversal, that no harm is done to the defendant because the complaint itself is verified and, therefore, accomplishes the function of the affidavit. With this we cannot agree. The complaint, under modern practice, is required merely to allege ultimate facts while the affidavit must set forth evidentiary matters showing good cause for cancellation of citizenship.
In the Bindczyck case, supra, the Court summed up the purpose of and approach to denaturalization proceedings as follows:
“[W]e cannot escape the conclusion that in its detailed provisions for revoking a naturalization because of fraud or illegal procurement not appearing on the face of the record, Congress formulated a self-contained, exclusive procedure. With a view to protecting the Government against fraud while safeguarding citizenship from abrogation except by a clearly defined procedure, Congress insisted on the detailed, explicit provisions of § 15.
. . if citizenship was granted, it was to be proof against attacks for fraud or illegal procurement based on evidence outside the record, except through the proceedings prescribed in § 15. The congressional scheme, providing carefully for the representation of the Government’s interest before the grant of citizenship and a detailed, safeguarded procedure for attacking the decree on evidence of fraud outside the record, covers the whole ground. Every national interest is thereby protected.” 342 U. S., at 83, 84.
This proceeding was concededly brought under § 340 (a). We hold that this is the only Section under which a United States attorney may institute denaturali-zation proceedings, and that the affidavit showing good cause is a procedural prerequisite to the maintenance of proceedings thereunder.
The mere filing of a proceeding for denaturalization results in serious consequences to a defendant. Even if his citizenship is not cancelled, his reputation is tarnished and his standing in the community damaged. Congress recognized this danger and provided that a person, once admitted to American citizenship, should not be subject to legal proceedings to defend his citizenship without a preliminary showing of good cause. Such a safeguard must not be lightly regarded. We believe that, not only in some cases but in all cases, the District Attorney must, as a prerequisite to the initiation of such proceedings, file an affidavit showing good cause. The District Court below correctly dismissed the proceedings in this case because of the failure of the Government to file the required affidavit and the judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore
A „ , Affirmed.
Mr. Justice Harlan took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
66 Stat. 163, 260, as amended, 68 Stat. 1232, 8 U. S. C. (Supp. II) §1451 (a).
United States v. Tuteur, 215 F. 2d 415.
Schwinn v. United States, 112 F. 2d 74, affirmed per curiam, 311 U.S. 616.
The affidavit read as follows:
“George C. Mantzoros, being duly sworn, deposes and says as follows:
“That he is one of the Assistant United States Attorneys on the staff of J. Edward Lumbard, United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York in charge of the above-entitled case.
“That the only knowledge or information which he has in this case has been obtained through files turned over to him for use in preparation of the complaint.
“That he has no personal knowledge of any of the facts herein and is not a prospective witness.
“That on information and belief his superior, the said J. Edward Lumbard likewise has no personal knowledge of any of the facts herein and is not a prospective witness.
“That he has carefully reviewed the files in this case and finds nothing therein which would indicate any special or unusual circumstances requiring the production of the documents requested by the defendant in his notice to take depositions, dated July 8, 1954.
“That many of the documents in said files are privileged because of their confidential nature.” R. 8.
34 Stat. 596, 601.
Section 338 (a) of the Nationality Act of 1940, 54 Stat. 1137, 1158.
66 Stat. 163, 260, as amended, 68 Stat. 1232, 8 U. S. C. (Supp. II) §1451 (a).
The specific holding, that § 338 (a) of the 1940 Act overrode local rules concerning time limitations upon the power of state courts to reopen their judgments, was abrogated by § 340 (j) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, 66 Stat. 163, 262. The underlying philosophy of Bindczyck remains intact.
28 U. S. C. § 507 (a) (2).
Letter of Attorney General Bonaparte, March 26, 1907 (unpublished, National Archives), cited in a contemporary treatise by a recognized authority on the statute. Van Dyne, Law of Naturalization (1907), 138. The letter is reproduced at p. 50 of the Brief for the United States.
The Courts of Appeals for the Third, Fifth, and District of Columbia Circuits had taken the position adopted by the Second Circuit in this case. United States v. Richmond, 17 F. 2d 28; United States v. Salomon, 231 F. 928; Cohen v. United States, 38 App. D. C. 123. The Seventh and Ninth Circuits favored the contrary position. United States v. Tuteur, 215 F. 2d 415; Schwinn v. United States, 112 F. 2d 74, affirmed per curiam, 311 U. S. 616; United States v. Knight, 291 F. 129 (U. S. D. C. Mont.), affirmed 299 F. 571; United States v. Leles, 227 F. 189.
On two prior occasions this Court has had occasion to notice the affidavit provision without suggesting that it was not an essential procedural step in the denaturalization proceeding. See Johannessen v. United States, 225 U. S. 227, 242; Schneiderman v. United States, 320 U. S. 118, 159, n. 54.
“As indicated below in ‘IV. Pre-Trial Procedure,’ the defendant can probably obtain most of the government’s evidence by a proper utilization of the methods of discovery provided in Rules 16, 33, and 34. It, therefore, may be advisable at the outset to furnish him with a reasonable amount of the government’s evidence in order to reduce the chance of these discovery rules being employed, and thus avoid the ensuing delay. If this is done, it would seem that the affidavit rather than the complaint is the proper place in which to recite evidence.
“In the event it is decided in a given case to furnish the defendant with some of the government’s evidence, it is recommended that an affidavit be prepared and served with the complaint and that in the affidavit there be recited briefly the nature of the evidence to be relied upon. This recitation of evidence should be of a general nature but sufficient to reduce the ordinary chance of the discovery rules being employed and at the same time to reduce the likelihood of the government having to oppose a motion for a bill of particulars. On the other hand, it should not be so complete as to provide the defendant with the names of witnesses and possibly can be so phrased as not to disclose their identity. Similarly, it may be disadvantageous to make it so complete as to identify specific instruments or writings, for this may increase the likelihood of a demand for their production under Rule 34. It would seem sufficient to set out the general substance or type of statements or writings known to have been made without quoting them. It would also seem proper to aver generally membership and leadership in the German-American Bund or other un-American organizations, refusal of military service, general propaganda activities, etc.
“If it is believed undesirable to attach an affidavit to the complaint and to serve it upon the defendant, as discussed above, in that instance no reference should be made in the complaint to an affidavit having been prepared and as constituting the basis of the action.” Circular No. 3663, Dept, of Justice, Supp. No. 9, April 6, 1943 (mimeographed), p. 87, printed in a supplemental memorandum filed by the Government in this case.
Brief for the United States, United States v. Minker, 350 U. S. 179 (No. 35, October Term, 1955), at p. 34.
United States v. Richmond, 17 F. 2d 28; United States v. Salomon, 231 F. 928.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
This is an appeal from the Court of Appeals’ reversal of a summary judgment entered for the appellant in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Alabama. The suit, based on diversity of citizenship, sought contractual reimbursement of taxes paid to the City of Mobile relative to sales of natural gas to the appellees. They defended on the ground that the contracts contemplated reimbursement only of valid tax payments, and that the License Code of the City of Mobile, § 1, par. 193 (1955), under which the tax was exacted and paid, was invalid under the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution. The Court of Appeals sustained this contention, by interpreting both the primary and enforcement provisions of the License Code and its surrounding state legislation as operating not to tax a separable local portion of interstate commerce but as a means of licensing appellant’s right of entry into the City from without the State. 282 F. 2d 574, 580. We postponed determination of our jurisdiction to consideration of the merits, 366 U. S. 916, and now find that the case is properly here under 28 U. S. C. § 1254 (2).
The interpretation of state law by the Court of Appeals, in an opinion by its Alabama member, was rendered in advance of construction of the License Code by the courts of the State, which alone, of course, can define its authoritative meaning. We ought not, certainly on this record, either accept the Court of Appeals’ construction or, on an independent consideration, reject what the Alabama Supreme Court may later definitively approve. The availability of appropriate declaratory-judgment proceedings under Ala. Code, Tit. 7, §§ 156-168 (1940), avoids this unsatisfactory dilemma. Wise judicial administration in this case counsels that decision of the federal question be deferred until the potentially controlling state-law issue is authoritatively put to rest. See Leiter Minerals, Inc., v. United States, 352 U. S. 220, 228-229. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated to permit a construction of the License Code of the City of Mobile, so far as relevant to this litigation, to be sought with every expedition in the state courts.
It is so ordered.
Mr. Justice Whittaker took no part in the disposition of this case.
Mr. Justice Douglas.
This case should be disposed of here; the long-drawn-out litigation foisted on the parties by the Court is needless. No matter how the local ordinance is construed the tax is constitutional.
Congress under the Natural Gas Act, as amended, would have the authority to prevent interstate pipelines from delivering any gas for industrial use. Federal Power Comm’n v. Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp., 365 U. S. 1. Yet once the interstate movement commences, the line between permissible and impermissible local regulation is no longer a puzzle.
United is an interstate pipeline company that brings natural gas into Alabama and supplies it in the City of Mobile to a distributor, Mobile Gas. United delivers gas to Mobile Gas at three stations not for resale, but for delivery to appellees under contracts between appellant and appellees. The gas, when delivered to Mobile Gas, is at a lower pressure than when it enters the State. When Mobile Gas delivers it to the industrial customers here involved, the gas is at a still lower pressure. The case is therefore on all fours with East Ohio Gas Co. v. Tax Comm’n, 283 U. S. 465. In speaking of the delivery of gas at a reduced pressure within Ohio by an interstate carrier, the Court said that the gas was then
“divided into the many thousand relatively tiny streams that enter the small service lines connecting such mains with the pipes on the consumers’ premises. So segregated the gas in such service lines and pipes remains in readiness or moves forward to serve as needed. The treatment and division of the large compressed volume of gas is like the breaking of an original package, after shipment in interstate commerce, in order that its contents may be treated, prepared for sale and sold at retail. ... It follows that the furnishing of gas to consumers in Ohio municipalities by means of distribution plants to supply the gas suitably for the service for which it is intended is not interstate commerce but a business of purely local concern exclusively within the jurisdiction of the State.” Id., at 471.
Here too the package is broken on delivery of the gas intrastate to Mobile Gas, the distributor, at a reduced pressure.
It matters not that the City of Mobile calls the tax levied here a “license tax.” In Interstate Pipe Line Co. v. Stone, 337 U. S. 662, Mississippi levied a “privilege” tax on the gross receipts of a pipeline that was bringing oil from Mississippi fields to loading racks in that State, where the oil was pumped into railroad cars for shipment out of state.
Mr. Justice Rutledge, speaking for himself and three others, said:
“Since all the activities upon which the tax is imposed are carried on in Mississippi, there is no due process objection to the tax. The tax does not discriminate against interstate commerce in favor of competing intrastate commerce of like character. The nature of the subject of taxation makes apportionment unnecessary; there is no attempt to tax interstate activity carried on outside Mississippi’s borders. No other state can repeat the tax. For these reasons the commerce clause does not invalidate this tax.” Id., at 667-668.
Mr. Justice Burton, who also joined in the judgment, approved the tax for the following reason: “I concur in the judgment solely on the ground that the tax imposed by the State of Mississippi was a tax on the privilege of operating a pipe line for transporting oil in Mississippi in intrastate commerce and that, as such, it was a valid tax.” Id., at 668.
In Southern Natural Gas Corp. v. Alabama, 301 U. S. 148, an interstate pipeline company made deliveries in Alabama to three distributors and one industrial user. These activities were held to be local, on which a nondiscriminatory franchise tax could be levied. In Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co. v. Public Service Comm’n, 332 U. S. 507, 514, direct sales by interstate pipelines to local consumers (as distinguished from deliveries to local distributing companies for resale) were held to be subject to state regulation. Speaking of the Natural Gas Act, we said:
"Congress, it is true, occupied a field. But it was meticulous to take in only territory which this Court had held the states could not reach. That area did not include direct consumer sales, whether for industrial or other uses. Those sales had been regulated by the states and the regulation had been repeatedly sustained. In no instance reaching this Court had it been stricken down.” Id., at 519.
The “license tax” in the present case, if it be such, is only a tax on a wholly intrastate activity, to wit — the delivery of gas to the local distributor for delivery to local consumers.
This conclusion is more in the tradition of our cases than was Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Co. v. Public Service Comm’n, 341 U. S. 329, where a State was allowed to exact from an interstate pipeline company a certificate of public convenience and necessity to make direct deliveries of gas to industrial consumers. The Court said that “the sale and distribution of gas to local consumers” was a transaction “essentially local” and was “subject to state regulation without infringement of the Commerce Clause.” Id., at 333. The sales there proposed were to be made directly from the pipeline to the industrial users. Here the gas first goes to the local distributor, which in turn reduces the pressure and makes delivery to the industrial customers. The local nature of the transaction is more apparent and less complicated than it was in the Panhandle case.
I would reverse the judgment below and hold the tax valid.
The practice of remitting parties who sue in court to an administrative remedy (see, e. g., Pennsylvania R. Co. v. United States, 363 U. S. 202) or of remitting those who sue in a federal court to a state court (Clay v. Sun Insurance Office, 363 U. S. 207; Clark, Federal Procedural Reform and States’ Rights, 40 Tex. L. Rev. 211) places a financial burden on litigants, which can be afforded only by those who can take the cost as a tax deduction or get reimbursement through increased rates. For a case where the parties at the end of 14 years were still litigating a $7,000 (approx.) claim after starting in one court, being shunted to an agency, and then ending in a different court, see Pennsylvania R. Co. v. United States, supra.
In Gardner, The Administrative Process, Legal Institutions Today and Tomorrow (1959), pp. 139-140, it was said:
“Anyone who considers judicial review of agency action must allow about a year if he has access to direct review by a court of appeals and about two years if he must file in a district court and then carry the controversy to the court of appeals. If a certiorari question should develop which would warrant Supreme Court review, another year should be added. If the result of the review should be to require further agency proceedings, yet another year or so must be added. Except for the litigant who advantages by delay, not many administrative issues warrant an investment of time such as this. In probably a majority of the circumstances, it would be sounder business practice to adjust at once to the agency decision and go on from there, rather than to endure several years of uncertainty in order to try to improve the result.
“The matter of expense is closely related to that of delay. It is not possible to be precise, and surely it is not polite to mention money. Yet none can discuss realistically judicial review unless he recognizes that an issue of average complexity cannot adequately be carried to the courts except at a cost which will range upward from $5,000.” See also Landis, Report on Regulatory Agencies to the President-Elect (1960), pp. 5-13.
The cost of printing records for this Court is now $3.80 a page.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
We vacate the judgment of the Supreme Court of Virginia and remand the case for further proceedings not inconsistent with the opinion in Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, 557 U. S. 305 (2009).
It is so ordered.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The writ is dismissed as improvidently granted without prejudice to an application for a writ of habeas corpus in the appropriate United States District Court.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Jackson
announced the judgment of the Court and an opinion in which Mr. Justice Frankfurter and Mr. Justice Minton join.
These cases present unsuccessful attempts, by two different procedures, to enforce the view of the Department of Justice as to construction of the Act of January 2, 1951 which prohibits shipment of gambling machines in interstate commerce but includes incidental registration and reporting provisions. Two indictments charge Denmark and Braun severally with engaging in the business of dealing in gambling devices without registering with the Attorney General and reporting sales and deliveries. Both indictments were dismissed. The other proceeding is a libel to forfeit five gambling machines seized by Federal Bureau of Investigation agents from a country club in Tennessee. It also was dismissed.
The three cases, here on Government appeals, are similar in features which led to their dismissal and which raise constitutional issues. The indictments do not allege that the accused dealers, since the effective date of the Act or for that matter at any other time, have bought, sold or moved gambling devices in interstate commerce, or that the devices involved in their unreported sales have, since the effective date of the Act or at any other time, moved in interstate commerce or ever would do so. The libel does not show that the country club’s machines were at any time transported in or in any way affect interstate commerce.
Section 2 of the Act prohibits transportation of gambling devices in interstate commerce except to any state which exempts itself or its subdivision by state law. Section 3 requires every manufacturer and dealer in gambling devices annually to register his business and name and monthly to file detailed information as to each device sold and delivered during the preceding month. Section 6 provides criminal penalties for failure to register or for violation of the transportation section, and § 7 authorizes forfeiture of devices sold in violation of the Act.
The information requirements are not expressly limited to persons engaged or transactions occurring in interstate commerce or conditioned on any connection therewith. Neither does the Act by any specific terms direct its application to transactions such as we have here.
Appellees contend, first, that the Act should not be construed to reach dealers, transactions or machines unless shown to have some relation to interstate commerce; second, construed otherwise, the Act exceeds the power delegated to Congress under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution; third, the statute is unconstitutionally vague.
The Government answers, first, that the statute, literally read, reaches all dealers and transactions and the possession of all unreported devices without reference to interstate commerce; second, to make effective the prohibition of transportation in interstate commerce, Congress may constitutionally require reporting of all intrastate transactions; and, third, while Congress, by oversight, left an inappropriate and confusing phrase in the Act, the defect is not fatal inasmuch as the Attorney General has power to supplement the Act by regulations which will cure its indefiniteness.
We do not intimate any ultimate answer to the appel-lees’ constitutional questions other than to observe that they cannot be dismissed as frivolous, nor as unimportant to the the nature of our federation. No precedent of this Court sustains the power of Congress to enact legislation penalizing failure to report information concerning acts not shown to be in, or mingled with, or found to affect commerce. The course of decision relied on by the Government on analysis falls short of the holding asked of us here. Indeed, we find no instance where Congress has attempted under the commerce power to impose reporting duties under penal sanction which would raise the question posed by these proceedings. It is apparent that the Government’s pleadings raise, and no doubt were intended to raise, a far-reaching question as to the extent of congressional power over matters internal to the individual states.
Of course, Congress possesses not only power to regulate commerce among the several states but also an inexact power “to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution” its enumerated powers. In some instances Congress has left to an administrative body, such as the Interstate Commerce Commission or the National Labor Relations Board, the power to decide on a case-to-case basis whether the particular intrastate activity affects interstate commerce so as to warrant exercise of the power to reach into intrastate affairs. Decisions under this type of legislation give the Government no support, for no such determination is required by this Act, and the Government asserts no such finding by anyone is necessary. In other statutes Congress has set up economic regulations which lay hold of activities in interstate commerce but also include intrastate activities so intermingled therewith that separation is impractical or impossible. Of course, decisions upholding legislation requiring information in aid of the taxing power afford no support here, because the taxing power penetrates and permeates every activity, intrastate or interstate, within the Nation. While general statements, out of these different contexts, might bear upon the subject one way or another, it is apparent that the precise question tendered to us now is not settled by any prior decision.
The principle is old and deeply imbedded in our jurisprudence that this Court will construe a statute in a manner that requires decision of serious constitutional questions only if the statutory language leaves no reasonable alternative. United States v. Rumely, 345 U. S. 41. This is not because we would avoid or postpone difficult decisions. The predominant consideration is that we should be sure Congress has intentionally put its power in issue by the legislation in question before we undertake a pronouncement which may have far-reaching consequences upon the powers of the Congress or the powers reserved to the several states. To withhold passing upon an issue of power until we are certain it is knowingly precipitated will do no great injury, for Congress, once we have recognized the question, can make its purpose explicit and thereby necessitate or avoid decision of the question. Judicial abstention is especially wholesome where we are considering a penal statute. Our policy in constitutional cases is reinforced by the long tradition and sound reasons which admonish against enlargement of criminal statutes by interpretation.
This Court does and should accord a strong presumption of constitutionality to Acts of Congress. This is not, a mere polite gesture. It is a deference due to deliberate judgment by constitutional majorities of the two Houses of Congress that an Act is within their delegated power or is necessary and proper to execution of that power. The rational and practical force of the presumption is at its maximum only when it appears that the precise point in issue here has been considered by Congress and has been explicitly and deliberately resolved. But the presumption can have little realism when responsible congressional committees and leaders, in managing a bill, have told Congress that the bill will not reach that which the Act is invoked in this Court to cover.
We do not question that literal language of this Act is capable of the broad, unlimited construction urged by the Government. Indeed, if it were enacted for a unitary system of government, no other construction would be appropriate. But we must assume that the implications and limitations of our federal system constitute a major premise of all congressional legislation, though not repeatedly recited therein. Against the background of our tradition and system of government, we cannot say that the lower courts, which have held as a matter of statutory construction that this Act does not reach purely intrastate matters, have not made a permissible interpretation. We find in the text no unmistakable intention of Congress to raise the constitutional questions implicit in the Government’s effort to apply the Act in its most extreme impact upon affairs considered normally reserved to the states.
Judges differ as to the value of legislative history in statutory construction, but the Government often relies upon it to sustain its interpretation of statutes. However, in this case its reference to legislative history is conspicuously meager and unenlightening. On the other hand, for what it is worth, appellees point out much that was reported by responsible committees and said by proponents of this antigambling-device legislation to indicate that Congress did not intend to raise the issues here presented and was not aware it was doing so. For example, Senator Johnson, sponsor of the bill which eventually became this Act, declared that “. . . it keeps the Federal Government out of State and local police powers; no Federal official is going to become an enforcement officer in any State or locality.” The committee handling the bill reported: “On the other hand, the committee desires to emphasize that Federal law enforcement in the field of gambling cannot and should not be considered a substitute for State and local law enforcement in this field.” But here it was the Federal Bureau of Investigation which entered a country club and seized slot machines not shown ever to have had any connection with interstate commerce in any manner whatever. If this is not substituting federal for state enforcement, it is difficult to know how it could be accomplished. A more local and detailed act of enforcement is hardly conceivable. These cases, if sustained, would substantially take unto the Federal Government the entire pursuit of the gambling device.
No committee appears to have anticipated this, for the then Attorney General informed the committee, and it reported itself in agreement with the view, that “Actually enforcement against those people who gamble or use these machines wrongfully in the States is left with the States, and with the local officials, and there is absolutely no intention on the part of the Federal Government, express or otherwise, in this bill or anything that accompanies it, to get us into a prohibition era.” It is impossible to reconcile statements of this kind, on which the Congress may have placed reliance, with the Government’s present interpretation of the Act.
As we have indicated, the present indictments and libel are so framed as to apply in extreme form the most expansive interpretation of this Act. All that we would decide at present is a question of statutory construction. We think the Act does not have the explicitness necessary to sustain the pleadings which the Government has drafted in these cases. On this ground alone, we would affirm the judgments below.
Judgments affirmed.
64 Stat. 1134, 15 U. S. C. (Supp. V) §§ 1171-1177.
In pertinent part: “It shall be unlawful knowingly to transport any gambling device to any place in a State, the District of Columbia, or a possession of the United States from any place outside of such State, the District of Columbia, or possession: Provided, That this section shall not apply to transportation of any gambling device to a place in any State which has enacted a law providing for the exemption of such State from the provisions of this section, or to a place in any subdivision of a State if the State in which such subdivision is located has enacted a law providing for the exemption of such subdivision from the provisions of this section. . . .” 64 Stat. 1134, 15 U. S. C. (Supp. V) § 1172.
“Upon first engaging in business, and thereafter on or before the 1st day of July of each year, every manufacturer of and dealer in gambling devices shall register with the Attorney General his name or trade name, the address of his principal place of business, and the addresses of his places of business in such district. On or before the last day of each month every manufacturer of and dealer in gambling devices shall file with the Attorney General an inventory and record of all sales and deliveries of gambling devices as of the close of the preceding calendar month for the place or places of business in the district. The monthly record of sales and deliveries of such gambling devices shall show the mark and number identifying each article together with the name and address of the buyer or consignee thereof and the name and address of the carrier. Duplicate bills or invoices, if complete in the foregoing respects, may be used in filing the record of sales and deliveries. For the purposes of this Act, every manufacturer or dealer shall mark and number each gambling device so that it is individually identifiable. In cases of sale, delivery, or shipment of gambling devices in unassembled form, the manufacturer or dealer shall separately mark and number the components of each gambling device with a common mark and number as if it were an assembled gambling device. It shall be unlawful for any manufacturer or dealer to sell, deliver, or ship any gambling device which is not marked and numbered for identification as herein provided; and it shall be unlawful for any manufacturer or dealer to manufacture, recondition, repair, sell, deliver, or ship any gambling device without having registered as required by this section, or without filing monthly the required inventories and records of sales and deliveries.” 64 Stat. 1136, 15 U. S. C. (Supp. V) § 1173.
“Whoever violates any of the provisions of sections 2, 3, 4, or 5 of this Act shall be fined not more than $5,000 or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.” 64 Stat. 1135, 15 U. S. C. (Supp. V) § 1176.
“Any gambling device transported, delivered, shipped, manufactured, reconditioned, repaired, sold, disposed of, received, possessed, or used in violation of the provisions of this Act shall be seized and forfeited to the United States. All provisions of law relating to the seizure, summary and judicial forfeiture, and condemnation of vessels, vehicles, merchandise, and baggage for violation of the customs laws; the disposition of such vessels, vehicles, merchandise, and baggage or the proceeds from the sale thereof; the remission or mitigation of such forfeitures; and the compromise of claims and the award of compensation to informers in respect of such forfeitures shall apply to seizures and forfeitures incurred, or alleged to have been incurred, under the provisions of this Act, insofar as applicable and not inconsistent with the provisions hereof: Provided, That such duties as are imposed upon the collector of customs or any other person with respect to the seizure and forfeiture of vessels, vehicles, merchandise, and baggage under the customs laws shall be performed with respect to seizures and forfeitures of gambling devices under this Act by such officers, agents, or other persons as may be authorized or designated for that purpose by the Attorney General.” 64 Stat. 1135, 15 U.S.C. (Supp. V) §1177.
The ambiguity in the statute arose from the following facts: In the bill originally submitted to the Senate, S. 3357, § 3 began: “. . . every manufacturer of and dealer in gambling devices shall register with the collector of internal revenue for each district in which such business is to be carried on, his name [etc.] . . . .” (Emphasis added.) See 96 Cong. Rec. 13649; Hearings before House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce on S. 3357, 81st Cong., 2d Sess. 2. However, the Treasury Department wrote the House committee that since the bill did not concern the collection of revenue, the Justice Department should handle the registration of gambling devices. See H. R. Rep. No. 2769, 81st Cong., 2d Sess. 14; Hearings on S. 3357, supra, at 8-9. The House committee therefore deleted from the bill the language italicized above and substituted the words “Attorney General.” See H. R. Rep. No. 2769, supra, at 8-9; 96 Cong. Rec. 13650, 14735, 15106, 15108, 16701. The deletion left without meaning the phrase “in such district,” which appeared later in the section and which had previously referred back to the district in which the business was to be carried on.
The Attorney General attempted to clarify the ambiguity by issuing Department of Justice Order No. 4173, 28 CFR, 1952 Supp., § 3. He claimed authority to issue such a regulation under R. S. § 161, 5 U. S. C. §22, which reads: “The head of each department is authorized to prescribe regulations, not inconsistent with law, for the government of his department, the conduct of its officers and clerks, the distribution and performance of its business, and the custody, use, and preservation of the records, papers, and property appertaining to it.”
Under the liquor law enforcement statutes, the offense was only complete when the unlabeled liquor was shipped in interstate commerce. E. g., 35 Stat. 1137, as amended, 49 Stat. 1930, 18 U. S. C. § 390. See Blumenthal v. United States, 88 F. 2d 522, 524-525; Arnold v. United States, 115 F. 2d 523, 524. The marking and labeling section of the Ashurst-Sumners Act, 49 Stat. 494, 18 U. S. C. § 396c, specifically provided that prison-made goods must be marked “when shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce.” See Kentucky Whip & Collar Co. v. Illinois Central R. Co., 299 U. S. 334, 344, 352-353, where a suit for mandatory injunction under the Act alleged that the goods had been delivered in interstate commerce. A similar provision appeared in the subsequent statute. 62 Stat. 786, 18 U. S. C. (Supp. III) § 1762 (a). The Lacey Act of 1900, 31 Stat. 188, required packages containing dead animals to be plainly marked “when shipped by interstate commerce.” See Rupert v. United States, 181 F. 87, 88, 91, where an indictment under the Act charged interstate shipments. The statute preventing passage of lottery tickets in interstate commerce, 62 Stat. 762, 18 U. S. C. (Supp. III) § 1301, contains no labeling, marking, or information requirements. Neither do the stolen property statutes. 62 Stat. 805, 806, 807, 63 Stat. 96, 18 U. S. C. (Supp. Ill) §§ 2311-2317.
Interstate Commerce Act, 36 Stat. 550, as amended, 41 Stat. 484, 49 U. S. C. § 13 (4), Houston, E. & W. T. R. Co. v. United States, 234 U. S. 342, 357-359; Florida v. United States, 282 U. S. 194; North Carolina v. United States, 325 U. S. 507, 511; King v. United States, 344 U. S. 254, 267-276. National Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 450, 452, 453, 454, 455, 29 U. S. C. §§ 152 (6), (7), 155, 160 (a), (e), (f), as amended, 61 Stat. 138, 140, 146, 147-148, 29 U. S. C. (Supp. III) §§ 152 (6), (7), 155, 160 (a), (e), (f), Labor Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 U. S. 1, 31, 47; Myers v. Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp., 303 U. S. 41, 49-50; Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co. v. Schauffler, 303 U. S. 54, 57-58; Santa Cruz Fruit Packing Co. v. Labor Board, 303 U. S. 453, 466-468; Consolidated Edison Co. v. Labor Board, 305 U. S. 197, 223-224; Labor Board v. Denver Building & Construction Trades Council, 341 U. S. 675, 683-684.
Hours of Service Acts (Railroads), 34 Stat. 1415, 45 U. S. C. §§ 61-64, Baltimore & O. R. Co. v. I. C. C., 221 U. S. 612; Interstate Commerce Act, 34 Stat. 584, 49 U. S. C. § 1 et seq., Interstate Commerce Comm’n v. Goodrich Transit Co., 224 U. S. 194; Grain Futures Act, 42 Stat. 998, as amended, Commodity Exchange Act, 49 Stat. 1491, 7 U. S. C. § 1 et seq., Board of Trade of Chicago v. Olsen, 262 U. S. 1; Ashurst-Sumners Act (Convict-Made Goods), 49 Stat. 494, 18 U. S. C. §§ 396b, 396c, Kentucky Whip & Collar Co. v. Illinois Central R. Co., 299 U. S. 334; Tobacco Inspection Act, 49 Stat. 731, 7 U. S. C. §§ 511a—511q, Currin v. Wallace, 306 U. S. 1; Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938, 52 Stat. 31, as amended, 7 U. S. C. § 1281 et seq., Mulford v. Smith, 307 U. S. 38; as amended, 55 Stat. 203, 7 U. S. C. § 1340, Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U. S. 111; Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, 52 Stat. 1060, 29 U. S. C. § 201 et seq., United States v. Darby, 312 U. S. 100; Oklahoma Press Publishing Co. v. Walling, 327 U. S. 186; Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act of 1937, 50 Stat. 246, 7 U. S. C. § 608c, United States v. Wrightwood Dairy Co., 315 U. S. 110; Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, 52 Stat. 1040, 21 U. S. C. § 301 et seq., United States v. Walsh, 331 U. S. 432; United States v. Sullivan, 332 U. S. 689.
United States v. Doremus, 249 U. S. 86; Nigro v. United States, 276 U. S. 332; Sonzinsky v. United States, 300 U. S. 506; United States v. Kahriger, 345 U. S. 22.
Cf. United States v. Bekins, 304 U. S. 27, with Ashton v. Cameron County Water Improvement District, 298 U. S. 513.
United States v. Denmark, 119 F. Supp. 647; United States v. Braun, 119 F. Supp. 646; United States v. Five Gambling Devices, 119 F. Supp. 641; United States v. 15 Mills Blue Bell Gambling Machines, 119 F. Supp. 74; United States v. 178 Gambling Devices, 107 F. Supp. 394.
The Government cites passages from the House Committee Report to the effect that slot machines and similar gambling devices are resulting in substantial revenues to Nation-wide crime syndicates. H. R. Rep. No. 2769, supra, at 4-6. The Government also refers to statements by a Congressman and the president of a company which manufactures gambling devices to the effect that these syndicates operate in every state in the Union and reap profits in the billions of dollars. Hearings on S. 3357, supra, at 10-12, 23, 28, 29, 182, 185, 191-192; 96 Cong. Rec. 13638.
96 Cong. Rec. 15107. For similar statements by Senator Johnson, see 96 Cong. Rec. 15103, 15105.
H. R. Rep. No. 2769, supra, at 5.
Ibid. See also statements by Senator Ferguson, 96 Cong. Rec. 15104; and Representatives Rogers, 96 Cong. Rec. 13643-13644, 16853; Bryson, 96 Cong. Rec. 13649; Rees, 96 Cong. Rec. 13654, and Dolliver, 96 Cong. Rec. 13638.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
In an information filed in the United States District Court for the District of Montana, petitioner was charged with knowingly fishing on a portion of the Big Horn River in Montana reserved for use by the Crow Indians, in violation of 18 U. S. C. § 1165. The case was submitted to the District Court on an agreed statement of facts, which showed that petitioner had cast his lure into the river while standing on land owned by the State of Montana within the exterior boundaries of the Crow Reservation. After considering the stipulated facts and reviewing the applicable treaties, the court dismissed the information for failure to state an offense. 395 F. Supp. 205 (1975).
On the Government’s appeal, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed. 548 F. 2d 822 (1976). The court held that the appeal was permissible under 18 U. S. C. § 3731 and the Double Jeopardy Clause because, as in United States v. Wilson, 420 U. S. 332 (1975), no further factual proceedings would be required in the District Court in the event that its legal conclusions were found to be erroneous:
“Here, as in Wilson, it is easy to separate factual resolutions from determinations of law. No additional facts must be found to determine whether the stipulation supports the conviction of the defendant. The only determination to be made is a legal one.” 548 F. 2d, at 827.
On the merits, the court viewed the pertinent treaties differently from the District Court and held that petitioner had violated 18 U. S. C. § 1165 “by willfully and knowingly fishing without lawful authority or permission of the tribe.” 548 F. 2d, at 835. The court directed entry of a judgment of conviction.
We think that the Court of Appeals was without jurisdiction to entertain the appeal. When the District Court dismissed the information, jeopardy had attached, see Serfass v. United States, 420 U. S. 377, 388 (1975), but no formal finding of guilt or innocence had been entered, see United States v. Jenkins, 420 U. S. 358 (1975); Lee v. United States, 432 U. S. 23, 28 n. 4, 29 n. 7 (1977). In these circumstances, the holding of United States v. Wilson is inapposite. A successful Government appeal “would not justify a reversal with instructions to reinstate the general finding of guilt: there was no such finding, in form or substance, to reinstate.” United States v. Jenkins, supra, at 368. Absent a plea of guilty or nolo con-tendere, see Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 11, a verdict or general finding of guilt by the trial court is a necessary predicate to conviction. See Rule 23 (c). Because the dismissal was granted prior to any declaration of guilt or innocence, “on the ground, correct or not, that the defendant simply cannot be convicted of the offense charged,” Lee, supra, at 30, we hold that the Government's appeal was barred by the Double Jeopardy Clause.
We grant the petition for certiorari, vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals, and remand to that court with directions that the appeal be dismissed.
R g0 Qrdere±
MR. Justice Stevens would grant certiorari and set the case for oral argument.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Brennan
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In this Federal Employers’ Liability Act case, the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed the judgment of the District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, which was entered on a directed verdict in favor of the respondent. The Court of Appeals agreed with the District Court that there was a complete absence of probative facts to support the conclusion of negligence. This Court granted certiorari to determine whether the petitioner was erroneously deprived of a jury determination of his case.
The petitioner was the conductor in charge of a 67-car freight train which on February 1, 1951, was en route from Richmond, Indiana, to Columbus, Ohio. He was in the caboose at the end of the train when it came to a sudden stop about three miles before a scheduled stop in Dayton, Ohio. He brought this action for damages for injuries allegedly suffered from a fall in the caboose which occurred when the train stopped. He testified: “Well, we were coming through there at a slow like speed and I don’t know what wént wrong, the train went in emergency and threw me into this table and tore it up and I was up on the floor with my flagman on top of me, when we finally got straightened up.” He immediately left the caboose and satisfied himself that the stop was not caused by a mechanical failure of the braking equipment, but rather that the engineer had applied the brakes to bring the train to a stop. At the end of the run, he filed his routine conductor’s report of the incident. He read that report into the record, without objection, during his cross-examination. The report states: “CN 28, Engine 8800 and 5680 moving east through Dayton, with 67 cars, at estimated speed of eight or ten miles per hour. Automobile drove over crossing just east of Dayton Rubber Works. To prevent striking automobile engineman applied air in emergency causing rough stop. I was standing in cabin observing air gauge and when stop was made knocked me to floor of cabin bruising my hip.” He also stated that the engineer had told him that there were school children in the automobile. There was no evidence that the stop was made with any special or unusual severity.
The sole issue raised is whether a jury question was presented by the evidence under the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur. We agree with the lower courts that a jury question of negligence was not presented by the proofs. The proofs do not meet the tests laid down by this Court in Jesionowski v. Boston & M. R. Co., 329 U. S. 452. The employee’s injuries in the Jesionowski case resulted from a derailment. This Court held that derailments are “extraordinary, not usual, happenings,” so that when they occur “a jury may fairly find that they occurred as a result of negligence.”
In this case, there is no evidence to show that unscheduled and sudden stops of trains are unusual or extraordinary occurrences. In fact, the only evidence was petitioner’s testimony that they are not unusual or extraordinary. He testified: “We got to expect them or think about them.” The facts of this occurrence thus do not warrant the inference that the respondent was negligent.
The judgment is
Affirmed.
[For dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Frankfurter, see post, p. 524.]
[For opinion of Mr. Justice Harlan, concurring in this case, see post, p. 559.]
35 Stat. 65, as amended, 36 Stat. 291, 53 Stat. 1404, 45 U. S. C. § 51 et seq.
228 F. 2d 902.
351 U. S. 906.
Jesionowski v. Boston & M. R. Co., 329 U. S. 452, 458.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Fortas
announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion in which The Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Stewart, and Mr. Justice White join.
On the petition of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers and pursuant to its powers under § 9 of the National Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 453, 29 U. S. C. § 159, the National Labor Relations Board ordered an election among the production and maintenance employees of the respondent company. At the election, the employees were to select one of two labor unions as their exclusive bargaining representative, or to choose not to be represented by a union at all. In connection with the election, the Board ordered the respondent to furnish a list of the names and addresses of its employees who could vote in the election, so that the unions could use the list for election purposes, The respondent refused to comply with the order, and the election was held without the list. Both unions were defeated in the election.
The Board upheld the unions’ objections to the election because the respondent had not furnished the list, and the Board ordered a new election. The respondent again refused to obey a Board order to supply a list of employees, and the Board issued a subpoena ordering the respondent to provide the list or else produce its personnel and payroll records showing the employees’ names and addresses. The Board filed an action in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts seeking to have its subpoena enforced or to have a mandatory injunction issued to compel the respondent to comply with its order.
The District Court held the Board’s order valid and directed the respondent to comply. 270 F. Supp. 280 (1967). The United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit reversed. 397 F. 2d 394 (1968). The Court of Appeals thought that the order in this case was invalid because it was based on a rule laid down in an earlier decision by the Board, Excelsior Underwear Inc., 156 N. L. R. B. 1236 (1966), and the Excelsior rule had not been promulgated in accordance with the requirements that the Administrative Procedure Act prescribes for rule making, 5 U. S. C. § 553. We granted certiorari to resolve a conflict among the circuits concerning the validity and effect of the Excelsior rule. 393 U. S, 932 (1968).
I.
The Excelsior case involved union objections to the certification of the results of elections that the unions had lost at two companies. The companies had denied the unions a list of the names and addresses of employees eligible to vote. In the course of the proceedings, the Board “invited certain interested parties” to file briefs and to participate in oral argument of the issue whether the Board should require the employer to furnish lists of employees. 156 N. L. R. B., at 1238. Various employer groups and trade unions did so, as amici curiae. After these proceedings, the Board issued its decision in Excelsior. It purported to establish the general rule that such a list must be provided, but it declined to apply its new rule to the companies involved in the Excelsior case. Instead, it held that the rule would apply “only in those elections that are directed, or consented to, subsequent to 30 days from the date of [the] Decision.” Id., at 1240, n. 5.
Specifically, the Board purported to establish “a requirement that will be applied in all election cases. That is, within 7 days after the Regional Director has approved a consent-election agreement entered into by the parties ... , or after the Regional Director or the Board has directed an election . . . , the employer must file with the Regional Director an election eligibility list, containing the names and addresses of all the eligible voters. The Regional Director, in turn, shall make this information available to all parties in the case. Failure to comply with this requirement shall be grounds for setting aside the election whenever proper objections are filed.” Id., at 1239-1240.
Section 6 of the National Labor Relations Act empowers the Board “to make ... , in the manner prescribed by the Administrative Procedure Act, such rules and regulations as may be necessary to carry out the provisions of this Act.” 29 U. S. C. § 156. The Administrative Procedure Act contains specific provisions governing agency rule making, which it defines as “an agency statement of general or particular applicability and future effect,” 5 U. S. C. § 551 (4). The Act requires, among other things, publication in the Federal Register of notice of proposed rule making and of hearing; opportunity to be heard; a statement in the rule of its basis and purposes; and publication in the Federal Register of the rule as adopted. See 5 U. S. C. § 553. The Board asks us to hold that it has discretion to promulgate new rules in adjudicatory proceedings, without complying with the requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act.
The rule-making provisions of that Act, which the Board would avoid, were designed to assure fairness and mature consideration of rules of general application. See H. R. Rep. No. 1980, 79th Cong., 2d Sess., 21-26 (1946); S. Rep. No. 752, 79th Cong., 1st Sess., 13-16 (1945). They may not be avoided by the process of making rules in the course of adjudicatory proceedings. There is no warrant in law for the Board to replace the statutory scheme with a rule-making procedure of its own invention. Apart from the fact that the device fashioned by the Board does not comply with statutory command, it obviously falls short of the substance of the requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act. The “rule” created in Excelsior was not published in the Federal Register, which is the statutory and accepted means of giving notice of a rule as adopted; only selected organizations were given notice of the “hearing,” whereas notice in the Federal Register would have been general in character; under the Administrative Procedure Act, the terms or substance of the rule would have to be stated in the notice of hearing, and all interested parties would have an opportunity to participate in the rule making.
The Solicitor General does not deny that the Board ignored the rule-making provisions of the Administrative Procedure Act. But he appears to argue that Excelsior’s command is a valid substantive regulation, binding upon this respondent as such, because the Board promulgated it in the Excelsior proceeding, in which the requirements for valid adjudication had been met. This argument misses the point. There is no question that, in an adjudicatory hearing, the Board could validly decide the issue whether the employer must furnish a list of employees to the union. But that is not what the Board did in Excelsior. The Board did not even apply the rule it made to the parties in the adjudicatory proceeding, the only entities that could properly be subject to the order in that case. Instead, the Board purported to make a rule: i. e., to exercise its quasi-legislative power.
Adjudicated cases may and do, of course, serve as vehicles for the formulation of agency policies, which are applied and announced therein. See H. Friendly, The Federal Administrative Agencies 36-52 (1962). They generally provide a guide to action that the agency may be expected to take in future cases. Subject to the qualified role of stare decisis in the administrative process, they may serve as precedents. But this is far from saying, as the Solicitor General suggests, that commands, decisions, or policies announced in adjudication are “rules” in the sense that they must, without more, be obeyed by the affected public.
In the present case, however, the respondent itself was specifically directed by the Board to submit a list of the names and addresses of its employees for use by the unions in connection with the election. This direction, which was part of the order directing that an election be held, is unquestionably valid. See, e. g., NLRB v. Waterman S. S. Co., 309 U. S. 206, 226 (1940). Even though the direction to furnish the list was followed by citation to “Excelsior Underwear Inc., 156 NLRB No. 111,” it is an order in the present case that the respondent was required to obey. Absent this direction by the Board, the respondent was under no compulsion to furnish the list because no statute and no validly adopted rule required it to do so.
Because the Board in an adjudicatory proceeding directed the respondent itself to furnish the list, the decision of the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit must be reversed.
II.
The respondent also argues that it need not obey the Board’s order because the requirement of disclosure of employees’ names and addresses is substantively invalid. This argument lacks merit. The objections that the respondent raises to the requirement of disclosure were clearly and correctly answered by the Board in its Excelsior decision. All of the United States Courts of Appeals that have passed on the question have upheld the substantive validity of the disclosure requirement, and the court below strongly intimated a view that the requirement was substantively a proper one, 397 F. 2d, at 396.
We have held in a number of cases that Congress granted the Board a wide discretion to ensure the fair and free choice of bargaining representatives. See, e. g., NLRB v. Waterman S. S. Co., supra, at 226; NLRB v. A. J. Tower Co., 329 U. S. 324, 330 (1946). The disclosure requirement furthers this objective by encouraging an informed employee electorate and by allowing unions the right of access to employees that management already possesses. It is for the Board and not for this Court to weigh against this interest the asserted interest of employees in avoiding the problems that union solicitation may present.
III.
The respondent contends that even if the disclosure requirement is valid, the Board lacks power to enforce it by subpoena. Section 11 (1) of the National Labor Relations Act provides that the Board shall have access to “any evidence of any person being investigated or proceeded against that relates to any matter under investigation or in question,” and empowers the Board to issue subpoenas “requiring the attendance and testimony of witnesses or the production of any evidence in such proceeding or investigation.” Section 11 (2) gives the district courts jurisdiction, upon application by the Board, to issue an order requiring a person who has refused to obey the Board's subpoena “to appear before the Board . . . there to produce evidence if so ordered, or there to give testimony touching the matter under investigation or in question . . . .” 29 U. S. C. §§ 161 (1), (2).
The respondent takes the position that these statutory provisions do not give the Board authority to subpoena the lists here in question because they are not “evidence” within the meaning of the statutory language. The District Court held, however, that “in the context of § 11 of the Act, 'evidence' means not only proof at a hearing but also books and records and other papers which will be of assistance to the Board in conducting a particular investigation.” The courts of appeals that have passed on the question have construed the term “evidence” in a similar manner. NLRB v. Hanes Hosiery Division, 384 F. 2d 188, 191-192 (C. A. 4th Cir. 1967). See NLRB v. Rohlen, 385 F. 2d 52, 55-58 (C. A. 7th Cir. 1967); NLRB v. Beech-Nut Life Savers, Inc., 406 F. 2d 253, 259 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1968); British Auto Parts, Inc. v. NLRB, 405 F. 2d 1182, 1184 (C. A. 9th Cir. 1968); NLRB v. Q-T Shoe Mfg. Co., 409 F. 2d 1247 (C. A. 3d Cir. 1969). We agree that the list here in issue is within the scope of § 11 so that the Board’s subpoena power may be validly exercised.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded to the District Court with directions to reinstate its judgment.
It is so ordered.
When we granted certiorari, the Fifth Circuit had expressly approved the procedure the Board followed in adopting the Excelsior rule. Howell Refining Co. v. NLRB, 400 F. 2d 213 (1968). Two other circuits had approved enforcement of the Excelsior rule without explicitly passing on the correctness of the method by which it was adopted. NLRB v. Hanes Hosiery Division, 384 F. 2d 188 (C. A. 4th Cir. 1967); NLRB v. Rohlen, 385 F. 2d 52 (C. A. 7th Cir. 1967). After our grant of certiorari in the present case; three more courts of appeals explicitly upheld the Excelsior rule and the procedure by which it was adopted, NLRB v. Beech-Nut Life Savers, Inc., 406 F. 2d 253 (C. A. 2d Cir. 1968); British Auto Parts, Inc. v. NLRB, 405 F. 2d 1182 (C. A. 9th Cir. 1968); NLRB v. Q-T Shoe Mfg. Co., 409 F. 2d 1247 (C. A. 3d Cir. 1969); and the Fifth Circuit reaffirmed its earlier holding in Howell Refining Co., Groendyke Transport, Inc. v. Davis, 406 F. 2d 1158 (1969).
We agree with the opinion of Chief Judge Aldrich below that the Excelsior rule involves matters of substance and that it therefore does not fall within any of the Act’s exceptions. See 5 U. S. C. §553 (b) (A).
The Board has never utilized the Act’s rule-making procedures. It has been criticized for contravening the Act in this manner. See, e. g., 1 K. Davis, Administrative Law Treatise § 6.13 (Supp. 1965); Peck, The Atrophied Rule-Making Powers of the National Labor Relations Board, 70 Yale L. J. 729 (1961).
The Solicitor General argues that this Court has previously approved “rules” articulated by the Board in the adjudication of particular cases without questioning the propriety of that procedure. He cites Republic Aviation Corp. v. NLRB, 324 U. S. 793 (1945); NLRB v. A. J. Tower Co., 329 U. S. 324 (1946); NLRB v. Seven-Up Bottling Co., 344 U. S. 344 (1953); and Brooks v. NLRB, 348 U. S. 96 (1954). In none of these cases has this Court ruled upon or sanctioned the exercise of quasi-legislative power—i. e., rule making—without compliance with § 6 of the NLRA and the rule-making provisions of the Administrative Procedure Act.
In his Decision and Direction of Election, the Regional Director ordered that “[a)n election eligibility list, containing the names and addresses of all the eligible voters, must be filed with the Regional Director within seven (7) days of the date of this Decision and Direction of Election. The Regional Director shall make the list available to all parties to the election. . . .”
Mr. Justice Harlan’s dissent argues that because the Board improperly relied upon the Excelsior “rule” in issuing its order, we are obliged to remand. He relies on SEC v. Chenery Corp., 318 U. S. 80 (1943). To remand would be an idle and useless formality. Chenery does not require that we convert judicial review of agency action into a ping-pong game. In Chenery, the Commission had applied the wrong standards to the adjudication of a complex factual situation, and the Court held that it would not undertake to decide whether the Commission’s result might have been justified on some other basis. Here, by contrast, the substance of the Board’s command is not seriously contestable. There is not the slightest uncertainty as to the outcome of a proceeding before the Board, whether the Board acted through a rule or an order. It would be meaningless to remand.
See NLRB v. J. P. Stevens & Co., 409 F. 2d 1207 (C. A. 4th Cir. 1969), and the cases cited in n. 1, supra.
270 F. Supp., at 285. The Court of Appeals did not reach the issue whether the Board could subpoena the lists in question.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The petition in this case presents the following question: May a federal court count the vote of a judge who dies before the decision is issued?
A judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, the Honorable Stephen Reinhardt, died on March 29, 2018, but the Ninth Circuit counted his vote in cases decided after that date. In the present case, Judge Reinhardt was listed as the author of an en banc decision issued on April 9, 2018, 11 days after he passed away. By counting Judge Reinhardt's vote, the court deemed Judge Reinhardt's opinion to be a majority opinion, which means that it constitutes a precedent that all future Ninth Circuit panels must follow. See United States v. Caperna , 251 F.3d 827, 831, n. 2 (2001). Without Judge Reinhardt's vote, the opinion attributed to him would have been approved by only 5 of the 10 members of the en banc panel who were still living when the decision was filed. Although the other five living judges concurred in the judgment, they did so for different reasons. The upshot is that Judge Reinhardt's vote made a difference. Was that lawful?
I
Aileen Rizo, an employee of the Fresno County Office of Education, brought suit against the superintendent of schools, claiming, among other things, that the county was violating the Equal Pay Act of 1963, 77 Stat. 56-57, 29 U.S.C. § 206(d). The District Court denied the county's motion for summary judgment, and the Ninth Circuit granted the county's petition for interlocutory review. A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit vacated the decision of the District Court based on a prior Ninth Circuit decision, Kouba v. Allstate Ins. Co. , 691 F.2d 873 (1982), that the panel "believed it was compelled to follow." 887 F.3d 453, 459 (2018) (en banc). The court then granted en banc review "to clarify the law, including the vitality and effect of Kouba ." Ibid. Like other courts of appeals, the Ninth Circuit takes the position that a panel decision like that in Kouba can be overruled only by a decision of the en banc court or this Court, see Naruto v. Slater , 888 F.3d 418, 421 (2018), and therefore a clear purpose of the en banc decision issued on April 9 was to announce a new binding Ninth Circuit interpretation of the Equal Pay Act issue previously addressed by Kouba . The opinion authored by Judge Reinhardt and issued 11 days after his death purports to do that, but its status as a majority opinion of the en banc court depends on counting Judge Reinhardt's vote.
The opinions issued by the en banc Ninth Circuit state that they were "Filed April 9, 2018," and they were entered on the court's docket on that date. A footnote at the beginning of the en banc opinion states:
"Prior to his death, Judge Reinhardt fully participated in this case and authored this opinion. The majority opinion and all concurrences were final, and voting was completed by the en banc court prior to his death." 887 F.3d at 455, n. *.
II
The Ninth Circuit did not expressly explain why it concluded that it could count Judge Reinhardt's opinion as "[t]he majority opinion" even though it was not endorsed by a majority of the living judges at the time of issuance, but the justification suggested by the footnote noted above is that the votes and opinions in the en banc case were inalterably fixed at least 12 days prior to the date on which the decision was "filed," entered on the docket, and released to the public. This justification is inconsistent with well-established judicial practice, federal statutory law, and judicial precedent.
As for judicial practice, we are not aware of any rule or decision of the Ninth Circuit that renders judges' votes and opinions immutable at some point in time prior to their public release. And it is generally understood that a judge may change his or her position up to the very moment when a decision is released.
We endorsed this rule in United States v. American-Foreign S. S. Corp. , 363 U.S. 685, 80 S.Ct. 1336, 4 L.Ed.2d 1491 (1960), which interpreted an earlier version of 28 U.S.C. § 46(c), the statutory provision authorizing the courts of appeals to hear cases en banc. The current version of this provision permits a circuit to adopt a rule allowing a senior circuit judge to sit on an en banc case under certain circumstances, but at the time of our decision in American-Foreign S. S. Corp. , this was not allowed. Instead, only active judges could sit en banc. See 28 U.S.C. § 46(c) (1958 ed.).
In American-Foreign S. S. Corp. , Judge Harold Medina was one of the five active judges on the Second Circuit when the court granted a petition for rehearing en banc. After briefing was complete but before an opinion issued, Judge Medina took senior status. When the en banc court issued its decision, the majority opinion was joined by Judge Medina and two active Circuit Judges; the two other active Circuit Judges dissented. We vacated the judgment and remanded the case, holding that "[a]n 'active' judge is a judge who has not retired 'from regular active service,' " and "[a] case or controversy is 'determined' when it is decided." 363 U.S. at 688, 80 S.Ct. 1336. Because Judge Medina was not in regular active service when the opinion issued, he was "without power to participate" in the en banc decision. Id. , at 687, 691, 80 S.Ct. 1336 ; cf., id., at 691-692, 80 S.Ct. 1336 (Harlan, J., dissenting).
Our holding in American-Foreign S. S. Corp. applies with equal if not greater force here. When the Ninth Circuit issued its opinion in this case, Judge Reinhardt was neither an active judge nor a senior judge. For that reason, by statute he was without power to participate in the en banc court's decision at the time it was rendered.
In addition to § 46(c), § 46(d) also shows that what the Ninth Circuit did here was unlawful. That provision states:
"A majority of the number of judges authorized to constitute a court or panel thereof, as provided in paragraph (c), shall constitute a quorum."
Under § 46(c), a court of appeals case may be decided by a panel of three judges, and therefore on such a panel two judges constitute a quorum and are able to decide an appeal-provided, of course, that they agree. Invoking this rule, innumerable court of appeals decisions hold that when one of the judges on a three-judge panel dies, retires, or resigns after an appeal is argued or is submitted for decision without argument, the other two judges on the panel may issue a decision if they agree. See, e.g., United States v. Allied Stevedoring Corp. , 241 F.2d 925, 927 (C.A.2 1957) ; Murray v. National Broadcasting Co. , 35 F.3d 45, 47 (C.A.2 1994) ; Singh v. Ashcroft , 121 Fed. Appx. 471, 472, n. (C.A.3 2005) ; ASW Allstate Painting & Constr. Co. v. Lexington Ins. Co. , 188 F.3d 307, 309, n. (C.A.5 1999) ; Clark v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co. , 67 F.3d 299, n. ** (C.A.6 1995) ; Kulumani v. Blue Cross Blue Shield Ass'n , 224 F.3d 681, 683, n. ** (C.A.7 2000). See also Nguyen v. United States , 539 U.S. 69, 82, 123 S.Ct. 2130, 156 L.Ed.2d 64 (2003) ("[S]ettled law permits a quorum to proceed to judgment when one member of the panel dies or is disqualified."). With the exception of one recent decision issued by the Ninth Circuit after Judge Reinhardt's death but subsequently withdrawn, see supra , at 707 - 708 n., we are aware of no cases in which a court of appeals panel has purported to issue a binding decision that was joined at the time of release by less than a quorum of the judges who were alive at that time.
* * *
Because Judge Reinhardt was no longer a judge at the time when the en banc decision in this case was filed, the Ninth Circuit erred in counting him as a member of the majority. That practice effectively allowed a deceased judge to exercise the judicial power of the United States after his death. But federal judges are appointed for life, not for eternity.
We therefore grant the petition for certiorari, vacate the judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice SOTOMAYOR concurs in the judgment.
In Altera Corp. v. Commissioner , 2018 WL 3542989 (C.A.9, July 24, 2018), decided four months after Judge Reinhardt died, his vote was initially counted as one of the two judges in the majority. A footnote in the opinion stated: "Judge Reinhardt fully participated in this case and formally concurred in the majority opinion prior to his death." Id. , at *1, n. **. Later, however, the court vacated the opinion and issued an order reconstituting the panel. Altera Corp. v. Commissioner , 898 F.3d 1266 (C.A.9 2018). No similar action was taken in this case.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
I
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Warren
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We granted certiorari to consider the scope of the constitutional protection to be enjoyed by persons when the publication of their thoughts and opinions is alleged to be in conflict with the fair administration of justice in state courts. The petitioner, an elected sheriff in Bibb County, Georgia, contends that the Georgia courts, in holding him in contempt of court for expressing his personal ideas on a matter that was presently before the grand jury for its consideration, have abridged his liberty of free speech as protected by the First Amendment and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution.
On June 6, 1960, a judge of the Bibb Superior Court issued a charge to a regularly impaneled grand jury, giving it special instructions to conduct an investigation into a political situation which had allegedly arisen in the county. The jury was advised that there appeared to be “an inane and inexplicable pattern of Negro bloc voting” in Bibb County, and that “rumors and accusations” had been made which indicated candidates for public office had paid large sums of money in an effort to gain favor and to obtain the Negro vote. The charge explained that certain Negro leaders, after having met and endorsed a candidate, had switched their support to an opposing candidate who put up a large sum of money, and that this “create [d] an unhealthy, dangerous, and unlawful situation [which] tend[ed] to corrupt public office holders and some candidates for public office.” The charge continued by indicating the violations of law which would be involved should the grand jury find the charges to be founded in truth. In addition, certain questions were posed to the jury which it was to investigate in inquiring into the charges of election law violations. The instructions were given in the midst of a local political campaign and the judge, in order to publicize the investigation, requested reporters for all local news media to be present in the courtroom when the charge was delivered.
The following day, while the grand jury was in session investigating the matters set forth in the instructions delivered by the court, the petitioner issued to the local press a written statement in which he criticized the judges’ action and in which he urged the citizenry to take notice when their highest judicial officers threatened political intimidation and persecution of voters in the county under the guise of law enforcement. This news release, which was published and disseminated to the general public, stated:
“Whatever the Judges’ intention, the action... ordering [the grand jury]... to investigate ‘negro block voting’ will be considered one of the most deplorable examples of race agitation to come out of Middle Georgia in recent years.
“At a time when all thinking people want to preserve the good will and cooperation between the races in Bibb County, this action appears either as a crude attempt at judicial intimidation of negro voters and leaders, or, at best, as agitation for a ‘negro vote’ issue in local politics.
“No one would question the duty of a Grand Jury to investigate any and all election law violations. However, simple justice would demand that the Judge not single out the negro people for particular investigation....
“Negro people will find little difference in principle between attempted intimidation of their people by judicial summons and inquiry and attempted intimidation by physical demonstration such as used by the K. K. K.
“It is hoped that the present Grand Jury will not let its high office be a party to any political attempt to intimidate the negro people in this community.
“It seems incredible that all three of our Superior Court Judges, who themselves hold high political office, are so politically nieve [naive] as to actually believe that the negro voters in Bibb County sell their votes in any fashion, either to candidates for office or to some negro leaders.
“If anyone in the community [should] be free of racial prejudice, it should be our Judges. It is shocking to find a Judge charging a Grand Jury in the style and language of a race baiting candidate for political office.
“However politically popular the judges action may be at this time, they are employing a practice far more dangerous to free elections than anything they want investigated. „J¡>mes t Wood,,
The following day, the petitioner delivered to the bailiff of the'court, stationed at the entrance to the grand jury room, “An Open Letter to the Bibb County Grand Jury,” which was made available to the grand jury at petitioner’s request. This letter, implying that the court’s charge was false, asserted that in the petitioner’s opinion, the Bibb County Democratic Executive Committee was the organization responsible for corruption in the purchasing of votes, and that the grand jury would be well-advised also to investigate that organization.
A month later, on July 7, 1960, the petitioner was cited in two counts of contempt based on the above statements. The citation charged that the language used by the petitioner was designed and calculated to be contemptuous of the court, to ridicule the investigation ordered by the charge, and “to hamper, hinder, interfere with and obstruct” the grand jury in its investigation. It also alleged that the news release was issued from the Bibb County Sheriff's Office, located in the courthouse in which the grand jury had been charged and where it was deliberating, and that the language imputed lack of judicial integrity to the three judges of the court responsible for the charge. An amendment to the citation alleged that the statements “in and of [themselves] created... a clear, present and imminent danger to the investigation being conducted... and... to the proper administration of justice in Bibb Superior Court.”
The next day the petitioner issued a further press release in which he repeated substantially the charges he had made in the release on June 7, and in which he asserted that his defense to the contempt citation would be that he had spoken the truth. The contempt citation was thereupon amended by including a third count based on this latter statement. The third count contained the same allegations as the other counts and, in addition, charged that the petitioner’s action presented a clear and present danger to the handling of the contempt citation against the petitioner.
At a hearing before the trial judge, certain facts were stipulated: that the petitioner’s statements were made while the grand jury was in session investigating matters suggested in the charge by the court; that the grand jury had before it the voting tabulations and other documents, including endorsements by certain political groups relating to primaries and elections in which the petitioner participated as a candidate and as an active supporter for other candidates; and that the members of the grand jury and the judges themselves had seen and read the press releases issued by the petitioner. In addition, it was stipulated that the petitioner’s sworn response be admitted as evidence. The allegations in this response, which must be considered as true in the absence of contrary evidence and in the absence of findings of fact by the trial judge, included the verification that the statements were made by petitioner in his capacity as a private citizen and not as sheriff of the county; that petitioner was directly and personally interested in the outcome of the current primary election not only as a private citizen but also as an announced candidate for public office in the general election to be held the following November, and in which election the petitioner would be running against the contestant who prevailed in the democratic primary; that he believed the language employed in the charge was of such a nature that it tended to create or emphasize issues likely to have a drastic impact upon the outcome of the primary; that his purpose in issuing the statements was simply to inform the public of what he sincerely believed to be the other side of the issue created by the charge; and that the statements were not intended to be contemptuous of the court or to hinder the investigation. The petitioner also asserted that he adopted the same method of distributing his views to the general public as did the court in disseminating the grand jury charge. No witnesses were presented at the hearing and no evidence was introduced to show that the publications resulted in any actual interference or obstruction of the court or the work of the grand jury. The gravamen of the contempt citation, and of the State’s case against the petitioner, was that the mere publishing of the news release and defense statement constituted a contempt of court, and in and of itself was a clear and present danger to the administration of justice.
The trial court, without making any findings and without giving any reasons, adjudged petitioner guilty on all counts and imposed concurrent sentences of 20 days and separate fines of $200 on each. On writ of error to the Court of Appeals the convictions on counts one and three were affirmed and the conviction on count two, based on the open letter to the grand jury, was reversed. Wood v. Georgia, 103 Ga. App. 305, 119 S. E. 2d 261. After the Georgia Supreme Court, without opinion, declined to review the convictions on the first and third counts, the petitioner sought a writ of certiorari to this Court which we granted. 368 U. S. 894.
We start with the premise that the right of courts to conduct their business in an untrammeled way lies at the foundation of our system of government and that courts necessarily must possess the means of punishing for contempt when conduct tends directly to prevent the discharge of their functions. While courts have continuously had the authority and power to maintain order in their courtrooms and to assure litigants a fair trial, the exercise of that bare contempt power is not what is questioned in this case. Here it is asserted that the exercise of the contempt power, to commit a person to jail for an utterance out of the presence of the court, has abridged the accused's liberty of free expression. In this situation the burden upon this Court is to define the limitations upon the contempt power according to the terms of the Federal Constitution.
In Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252, this Court for the first time had occasion to review a State’s exercise of the contempt power utilized to punish the publisher of an out-of-court statement. The accused contended that the exercise abridged his right of free speech guaranteed against state infringement by the Fourteenth Amendment. To determine the scope of this constitutional protection, the Court reviewed the history of the contempt power, both in England and in this country. It held that “the only conclusion supported by [that] history is that the unqualified prohibitions laid down by the framers were intended to give to liberty of the press, as to the other liberties, the broadest scope that could be countenanced in an orderly society.” Id,., at 265. Thus clarifying the exercise of this judicial power in the context of the protections assured by the First Amendment, the Court held that out-of-court publications were to be governed by the clear and present danger standard, described as “a working principle that the substantive evil must be extremely serious and the degree of imminence extremely high before utterances can be punished.” Id., at 263. Subsequently, in Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331, after noting that “[f]ree discussion of the problems of society is a cardinal principle of Americanism — a principle which all are zealous to preserve” (id., at 346), the Court reaffirmed its belief that the “essential right of the courts to be free of intimidation and coercion... [is] consonant with a recognition that freedom of the press must be allowed in the broadest scope compatible with the supremacy of order.” Id., at 334. The Court’s last occasion to consider the application of the clear and present danger principle to a ease of the type under review was in Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367. There the Court held that to warrant a sanction “[t]he fires which [the expression] kindles must constitute an imminent, not merely a likely, threat to the administration of justice. The danger must not be remote or even probable; it must immediately imperil.” Id., at 376.
It is with these principles in mind that we consider the case before us. Initially, however, it should be noted that the Georgia courts have determined that the power to punish for contempt of court is inherent in its state judiciary and the Court of Appeals thus ignored the express limitations imposed by the Georgia Legislature in punishing out-of-court statements. This holding thus deprives the judgment of coming to this Court “encased in the armor wrought by prior legislative deliberation,” Bridges v. California, supra, at 261, and it is upon this basis that we proceed.
This case differs from Bridges and Pennekamp, first, in that the court below has upheld petitioner’s - conviction on the basis that his conduct presented a clear and present danger to the proceedings of the court and grand jury, a standard this Court has held to warrant punishment for alleged contemptuous conduct. But state courts may not preclude us from our responsibility to examine “the evidence to see whether it furnishes a rationál basis for the characterization put on it” {In re Sawyer, 360 U. S. 622, 628) by the enunciation of a constitutionally acceptable standard in describing the effect of the conduct. The ultimate responsibility to define the limits of state power regarding freedom of speech and expression rests with this Court, Pennekamp v. Florida, supra, at 335; see Chambers v. Florida, 309 U. S. 227, 228-229; Fiske v. Kansas, 274 U. S. 380, 385-386; and when it is claimed that such liberties have been abridged, we cannot allow a presumption of validity of the exercise of state power to interfere with our close examination of the substantive claim presented.
Despite its conclusion that the petitioner’s conduct created a serious evil to the fair administration of justice, the Court of Appeals did not cite or discuss the Bridges, Pennekamp or Harney cases, nor did it display an awareness of the standards enunciated in those cases to support a finding of clear and present danger. It simply adopted as conclusions of law the allegations made in the contempt citation. The court did not indicate in any manner how the publications interfered with the grand jury’s investigation, or with the administration of justice. Unlike those cases in which elaborate findings have been made to support such a conclusion, this record is barren of such findings. The prosecution called no witnesses to show that the functioning of the jury was in any way disturbed; no showing was made that the members of the grand jury, upon reading the petitioner’s comments in the newspapers, felt unable or unwilling to complete their assigned task because petitioner “interfered” with its completion. There is nothing in the record to indicate that the investigation was not ultimately successful or, if it was not, that the petitioner’s conduct was responsible for its failure. And to the extent that the conviction on the third count was upheld because petitioner’s last statement presented a clear and present danger to the contempt hearing, it is indeed novel that under the circumstances of this case the petitioner might be responsible for a substantial interference with his contempt hearing because he had made public his defense to the charges made against him. What interference to petitioner’s hearing or what harm this assertion might inflict on the administration of justice is not stated in the opinion. Nor is there any evidence of either in the record.
Thus we have simply been told, as a matter of law without factual support, that if a State is unable to punish persons for expressing their views on matters of great public importance when those matters are being considered in an investigation by the grand jury, a clear and present danger to the administration of justice will be created. We find no such danger in the record before us. The type of “danger” evidenced by the record is precisely one of the types of activity envisioned by the Founders in presenting the First Amendment for ratification. “Those who won our independence had confidence in the power of free and fearless reasoning and communication of ideas to discover and spread political... truth.” Thornhill v. Alabama, 310 U. S. 88, 95. In Thornhill the Court also reiterated the thinking of the Founders when it said that a broad conception of the First Amendment is necessary Men are entitled to speak as they please on matters vital to them; errors in judgment or unsubstantiated opinions may be exposed, of course, but not through punishment for contempt for the expression. Under our system of government, counterargument and education are the weapons available to expose these matters, not abridgment of the rights of free speech and assembly. Cf. Mr. Justice Brandéis, concurring in Whitney v. California, 274 U. S. 357, 378. Hence, in the absence of some other showing of a substantive evil actually designed to impede the course of justice in justification of the exercise of the contempt power to silence the petitioner, his utterances are entitled to be protected.
“to supply the public need for information and education with respect to the significant issues of the times. [Footnote omitted.]... Freedom of discussion, if it would fulfill its historic function in this nation, must embrace all issues about which information is needed or appropriate to enable the members of society to cope with the exigencies of their period.” Id., at 102.
The respondent attempts to distinguish this case from Bridges by offering, as support for the Georgia court’s conclusion thát the petitioner’s conduct presented a clear and present danger to the administration of justice, the fact that here there was an alleged interference with a grand jury and not an attempt to influence or coerce a judge. In the circumstances of this case, we find this argument unpersuasive.
First, it is important to emphasize that this case does not represent a situation where an individual is on trial; there was no “judicial proceeding pending” in the sense that prejudice might result to one litigant or the other by ill-considered misconduct aimed at influencing the outcome of a trial or a grand jury proceeding. Compare Smith v. Texas, 311 U. S. 128; Chambers v. Florida, 309 U. S. 227; Pierre v. Louisiana, 306 U. S. 354; Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U. S. 510; and Moore v. Dempsey, 261 U. S. 86. Moreover, we need not pause here to consider the variant factors that would be present in a case involving a petit jury. Neither Bridges, Pennekamp nor Harney involved a trial by jury. In Bridges it was noted that “trials are not like elections, to be won through the use of the meeting-hall, the radio, and the newspaper” (314 U. S., at 271), and of course the limitations on free speech assume a different proportion when expression is directed toward a trial as compared to a grand jury investigation. Rather, the grand jury here was conducting a general investigation into a matter touching each member of the community.
Historically, this body has been regarded as a primary security to the innocent against hasty, malicious and oppressive persecution; it serves the invaluable function in our society of standing between the accuser and the accused, whether the latter be an individual, minority group, or other, to determine whether a charge is founded upon reason or was dictated by an intimidating power or by malice and personal ill will. Particularly in matters of local political corruption and investigations is it important that freedom of communication be kept open and that the real issues not become obscured to the grand jury. It cannot effectively operate in a vacuum. It has been said that the “ancestors of our ‘grand jurors’ are from the first neither exactly accusers, nor exactly witnesses; they are to give voice to common repute.” 2 Pollock and Maitland, History of the English Law (2d ed. 1909), 642. The necessity to society of an independent and informed grand jury becomes readily apparent in the context of the present case. For here a panel of judges, themselves elected officers and charged under state law with the responsibility of instructing a grand jury to investigate political corruption, have exercised the contempt power to hold in contempt another elected repre-sentativé of the people for publishing views honestly held and contrary to those contained in the charge. And, an effort by the petitioner to prove the truth of his allegations was rejected, the court holding irrelevant the truth or falsity of the facts and opinions expressed in the publications. 103 Ga. App. 305, 321, 119 S. E. 2d 261, 273. If the petitioner could be silenced in this manner, the problem to the people in the State of Georgia and indeed in all the States becomes evident.
The administration of the law is not the problem of the judge or prosecuting attorney alone, but necessitates the active cooperation of an enlightened public. Nothing is to be gained by an attitude on the part of the citizenry of civic irresponsibility and apathy in voicing their sentiments on community problems. The petitioner’s attack on the charge to the grand jury would have been likely to have an impeding influence on the outcome of the investigation only if the charge was so manifestly unjust that it could not stand inspection. In this sense discussion serves as a corrective force to political, economic and other influences which are inevitably present in matters of grave importance. The charge given to the jury indicated that the motivation for it was founded on rumor, but that the situation had existed for several years. Yet the charge was directed primarily against one group in the community and was given at the height of the highly important Democratic primary, in which, because of their elected positions, both the judges and the petitioner were interested personally and apart from their official status. The First Amendment envisions that persons be given the opportunity to inform the community of both sides of the issue under such circumstances. That this privilege should not lightly be curtailed is ably expressed in a passage from Judge Cooley’s 2 Constitutional Limitations (8th ed. 1927) 885, where he stated that the purpose of the First Amendment includes the need:
“... to protect parties in the free publication of matters of public concern, to secure their right to a free discussion of public events and public measures, and to enable every citizen at any time to bring the government and any person in authority to the bar of public opinion by any just criticism upon their conduct in the exercise of the authority which the people have conferred upon them.”
Moreover, it is difficult to imagine how the voting problem may be alleviated by an abridgment of talk and comment regarding its solution. This problem is important not only to an individual or some isolated group or to individual litigants in a particular lawsuit, but affects the entire Nation. When the grand jury is performing its investigatory function into a general (problem area, without specific regard to indicting a particular individual, society’s interest is best served by a thorough and extensive investigation, and a greater degree of disinterestedness and impartiality is assured by allowing free expression of contrary opinion. Consistent suppression of discussion likely to affect pending investigations would mean that some continuing public grievances could never be discussed at all, or at least not at the moment when public discussion is most needed. The conviction here produces its “restrictive results at the precise time when public interest in the matters discussed would naturally be at its height,” and “[n]o suggestion can be found in the Constitution that the freedom there guaranteed for speech and the press bears an inverse ratio to the timeliness and importance of the ideas seeking expression.” Bridges v. California, supra, at 268, 269. Thus, in the absence of any showing of an actual interference with the undertakings of the grand jury, this record lacks persuasion in illustrating the serious degree of harm to the administration of law necessary to justify exercise of the contempt power. Compare Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367, 376, 378; Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331, 349-350.
Finally, we are told by the respondent that, because the petitioner is sheriff of Bibb County and thereby owes a special duty and responsibility to the court and its judges, his right to freedom of expression must be more severely curtailed than that of an average citizen. Under the circumstances of this case, this argument must be rejected.
First, although we do not rely on the point exclusively, we noted at the outset of this opinion that there was no finding by the trial court that the petitioner issued the statements in his capacity as sheriff; in fact, the only evidence in the record on this point is the petitioner’s allegation in his response, accepted as evidence by the trial court and uncontroverted by the respondent, that the statements were distributed by petitioner as a private citizen. Nowhere in the record, including the contempt citation as twice amended, can we find one word indicating that the prosecution relied on the fact that petitioner was sheriff to show a more substantial likelihood that his conduct would disrupt the administration of justice. The opinion of the Court of Appeals does not articulate any specific reliance on this fact, and responses to our inquiries on this subject during oral argument were not illuminating. Moreover, the two counts before us were based on out-of-court publications which the petitioner signed without reference to his official capacity. Only in the letter sent directly to the grand jury room did the petitioner indicate in the statement that he was sheriff, and the Court of Appeals held that this statement did not present a clear and present danger to the administration of the law. In the light of this finding it is difficult to understand how the fact that the petitioner was sheriff of the county can be considered significant as to his news releases.
However, assuming that the Court of Appeals did consider to be significant the fact that petitioner was a sheriff, we do not believe this fact provides any basis for curtailing his right of free speech. There is no evidence that the publications interfered with the performance of his duties as sheriff or with his duties, if any he had, in connection with the grand jury’s investigation. We are not dealing with a situation where a sheriff refuses to issue summonses or to maintain order in the court building; nor, so far as the record shows, did the petitioner do any act which might present a substantive harm to the jury’s solution of the problem placed before it. We are dealing here only with public expression.
The petitioner was an elected official and had the right to enter the field of political controversy, particularly where his political life was at stake. Cf. In re Sawyer, 360 U. S. 622. The role that elected officials play in our society makes it all the more imperative that they be allowed freely to express themselves on matters of current public importance.
Our examination of the content of petitioner’s statements and the circumstances under which they were published leads us to conclude that they did not present a danger to the administration of justice that should vitiate his freedom to express his opinions in the manner chosen.
The judgment is reversed.
Mr. Justice Frankfurter took no part in the decision of this case.
Mr. Justice White took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
The Georgia Legislature has provided that it shall be a misdemeanor for any person to “[b]uy or sell, or offer to buy or sell, a vote, or [to]... be in any way concerned in buying or selling, or contribute money or any óther thing of value for the purpose of buying a vote at any election....” Ga. Code Ann., § 34-9907. See also Ga. Code Ann., § 34-1907, included in the court’s charge.
More fully, the charge, in relevant part, contained the following:
“GENTLEMEN OP THE GRAND JURY!
“The special instructions now about to be given to you were determined upon and formulated by all of the Judges of this Court en banc after joint consultations and are fully sanctioned by all the Judges.
“A situation has arisen in Bibb County over the last few years which this Court feels should be thoroughly and completely investigated by the Grand Jury....
“In election after election where no racial issues are involved, and where there are no other issues involved which could possibly cause any particular group to be honestly concerned about supporting or opposing any particular candidate, we find what appears an inane and inexpicable pattern of Negro bloc voting.
“Now there is an answer to the existing situation which should be brought to light so that people of this community may understand what is going on in some of our elections, and do something about it. The people are entitled to know how one candidate or another is able to gather to himself thousands of Negro votes in bloc where there is no apparent reason for it.
“This Grand Jury is hereby instructed by the Court to investigate and examine into the facts of every election of every kind in this County for the past several years in which bloc voting is apparent. Although there are many intelligent and independent voters among the colored people who deplore this situation, it is nevertheless obvious that about 80% to 85% of the Negro voters engage in bloc voting....
“... [T]he matter you are directed to investigate is the persistent rumors and accusations concerning the methods used in the solicitation of the Negro vote and the alleged bartering of the bloc vote. There are accusations that candidates for public office have paid large sums of money to certain leaders of the Negro in an effort to gain their favor and get the Negro -vote. There are accusations that candidates and their supporters have paid, and these leaders of the Negroes have accepted, money for the purpose of influencing the Negro people to bloc vote for certain candidates....
“These rumors being circulated, and about which you have been charged, are either true or false and it is the duty of this Grand Jury to determine wherein the truth lies.
“Some questions which this Jury should have answered in your investigation of elections are: Was the Negro vote delivered in bloc to any candidate or candidates? If so, who delivered it and how was it done? What contact did the candidates or their supporters have with the Negro group or its leaders? What money was involved, if any? How was the money used? What workers were employed? What promises did the candidate make, if any, in order to obtain the bloc vote?
“Now, gentlemen, it is your duty to develop the facts of this situation and if there is sufficient evidence of unlawful acts, then all parties participating, white and colored, candidates or non-candidates, should be indicted by this Grand Jury so that the guilty parties, if there are any, may be brought to trial.
“Furthermore, it is your duty to bring to light those practices which, while not technically in violation of any law, are yet so immoral or corrupt as to be destructive of the purposes of our system of elections. It is further your right and duty to determine what additional laws, or amendments to existing laws, are needed to adequately deal with the situation with which we are faced and to recommend enactment thereof by the Legislature.
“The enormity of the task assigned you by these instructions is recognized, but surely all good citizens, both public and private, who stand for good government and an honest elective system will be willing to come before this Grand Jury and disclose every fact concerning the matters about which you are being instructed.”
The charge that was delivered to the grand jury was prepared by the three judges of the Bibb County Superior Court, and was delivered by one of them. Another one of the three presided at petitioner’s contempt hearing.
Thornhill v. Alabama, 310 U. S. 88, 95; Schneider v. State, 308 U. S. 147, 160; De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U. S. 353; Near v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 697, 707; Gitlow v. New York, 268 U. S. 652, 666.
Specifically, the Court, after a thorough review of the history behind both the exercise of the contempt power and the adoption of the First Amendment, rejected the idea that the interests were to be accommodated by applying the common law of England at the time the Constitution was adopted. Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252, 263-268. For source materials on this subject, see Chafee, Free Speech in the United States (1941), c. 1; Fox, The History of Contempt of Court (1927), passim; Stansbury, Trial of James H. Peck (1833), passim; Thayer, Legal Control of the Press (3d ed. 1956), 483 et seq. See also Deutsch, Liberty of Expression and Contempt of Court, 27 Minn. L. Rev. 296 (1943); Nelles and King, Contempt by Publication in the United States, 28 Col. L. Rev. 401, 525 (1928).
The Court went on to say that the clear and present danger standard does not “purport to mark the furthermost constitutional boundaries of protected expression... [and that it does] no more than recognize a minimum compulsion of the Bill of Rights.” Bridges v. California, supra, at 263.
In Pennekamp the Court concluded that “the danger under... [the] record to fair judicial administration has not the clearness and immediacy necessary to close the door of permissible public comment. When that door is closed, it closes all doors behind it.” 328 U. S., at 350.
In none of these cases, as is also true of the one presently under review, did the Court find it necessary to determine the full power of the State to protect the administration of justice by use of the contempt power. See Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S., at 373.
Atlanta Newspapers, Inc., v. State, 216 Ga. 399, 116 S. E. 2d 580; McGill v. State, 209 Ga. 500, 74 S. E. 2d 78; Bradley v. State, 111 Ga. 168, 36 S. E. 630. But see Townsend v. State, 54 Ga. App. 627, 188 S. E. 560.
The state legislature has enacted a statute designed to limit the courts in that State in the exercise of the contempt power. Ga. Code Ann., §24-105, provides:
“Powers of courts to punish for contempt. — The powers of the several courts to issue attachments and inflict summary punishment for contempt of court shall extend only to cases of misbehavior of any person or persons in the presence of said courts or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice, the misbehavior of any of the officers of said courts in their official transactions, and the disobedience or resistance by any officer of said courts, party, juror, witness, or other person or persons to any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command of the said courts...
Compare the legislative determination made by the State of California discussed briefly in Bridges v. California, supra, at 260-261, n. 3.
When the claim is that such a right has been abridged by a state court, “it is incumbent upon us to analyze the facts in order that the appropriate enforcement of the federal right may be assured.” Norris v. Alabama, 294 U. S. 587, 590. See Hooven & Allison Co. v. Evatt, 324 U. S. 652, 659; Truax v. Corrigan, 257 U. S. 312, 325.
Compare the findings of the Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas in Ex parte Craig, 150 Tex. Cr. 598, 193 S. W. 2d 178. See this Court’s discussion of these findings and of the conclusion drawn by the Texas court on the basis of those findings, Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367, 370-371, 385-389.
See, e. g., Toledo Newspaper Co. v. United States, 247 U. S. 402, 414-416.
Georgia law presumably permits grand jurors to so testify: “Grand jurors shall disclose everything which occurs in their service whenever it becomes necessary in any court of record in this State.” Ga. Code Ann., § 59-302.
Compare Toledo Newspaper Co. v. United States, supra, note 13, at 425 (Holmes, J., dissenting).
See also Lovell v. City of Griffin, 303 U. S. 444; Stromberg v. California, 283 U. S. 359. See generally 2 Bancroft, History of the United States (1885), 261.
Orfield, Criminal Procedure from Arrest to Appeal (1947), 144-146. See Hale
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
C
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Ginsburg
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In Skilling v. United States, decided today, ante, p. 358, we vacated the Court of Appeals judgment and remanded the case because the indictment rested, in part, on an improper construction of the “honest services” component of the federal ban on mail fraud, 18 U. S. C. §§ 1341, 1346. A similar infirmity is present in this case. Here, too, the Government and trial court advanced an interpretation of § 1346 rejected by the Court’s opinion in Skilling. Nevertheless, the Government urges, the convictions of the defendants below, petitioners here, should be affirmed for an independent reason. At trial, the Government pursued alternative theories: (1) money-or-property fraud; and (2) honest-services fraud. To pinpoint whether the jury based its verdict on money-or-property fraud, or honest-services fraud, or both, the Government proposed special interrogatories to accompany the verdict. The defendants resisted, preferring an unelaborated general verdict, and the Government ultimately acquiesced in that standard form of submission.
The Court of Appeals held that the defendants, by opposing the Government-suggested special interrogatories, forfeited their objection to the honest-services-fraud instructions given to the jury. 530 F. 3d 596, 603 (CA7 2008). We reverse that ruling. A criminal defendant, we hold, need not request special interrogatories, nor need he acquiesce in the Government’s request for discrete findings by the jury, in order to preserve in full a timely raised objection to jury instructions on an alternative theory of guilt.
I
Petitioners Conrad Black, John Boultbee, and Mark Kipnis, as well as Peter Atkinson, (collectively, Defendants) were leading executives of Hollinger International, Inc. (Hollinger), a publicly held U. S. company that, through subsidiaries, owned newspapers here and abroad. In 2005, the Government indicted Defendants on multiple counts, of prime concern here, three counts of mail fraud in violation of §§1341 and 1346. Two theories were pursued by the Government on each mail-fraud count. The Government charged that (1) Defendants stole millions from Hollinger by fraudulently paying themselves bogus “noncompetition fees”; and that (2) by failing to disclose their receipt of those fees, Defendants deprived Hollinger of their honest services as managers of the company. App. to Pet. for Cert. 24a-54a.
At the close of the four-month trial, the U. S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois instructed the jury, discretely, on the theft-of-money-or-property and honest-services-deprivation theories advanced by the Government. Id., at 235a. As to the latter, the District Court informed the jury, over Defendants’ objection, that a person commits honest-services fraud if he “misuse[s] his position for private gain for himself and/or a co-schemer” and “knowingly and intentionally breache[s] his duty of loyalty.” Id., at 235a-236a.
Before jury deliberations began, the Government asked the District Court to employ a special-verdict form, which would reveal, in the event that the jury voted to convict on a mail-fraud count, the theory or theories accounting for the verdict — money-or-property fraud, honest-services fraud, or both. See App. 430a. Defendants opposed the Government-proposed special interrogatories and urged, instead, standard general-verdict forms. Id., at 432a. Comprehending, however, that in the event of a guilty verdict, “the jury’s specification of the [mail-]fraud theory might [aid] appellate review,” ibid., Defendants proposed an accommodation: Upon return of a guilty verdict on any mail-fraud count, jurors could be asked to specify the theory on which they relied, id., at 433a.
The Government objected to special interrogatories presented to the jury postverdict, App. to Pet. for Cert. 222a, and the District Court declined to adopt that procedure, id., at 225a. When the court rejected postverdict interrogatories, the Government represented that it would not object to submission of the mail-fraud counts for jury decision by general verdict. Id., at 228a. The jury returned general verdicts of “guilty” on the three mail-fraud counts; it also found defendant Black guilty of obstruction of justice in violation of 18 U. S. C. § 1512(c)(1), and it acquitted Defendants on all other charges.
On appeal, Defendants urged the invalidity of the jury instructions on honest-services fraud. Under the rule declared by this Court in Yates v. United States, 354 U. S. 298, 312 (1957), a general verdict may be set aside “where the verdict is supportable on one ground, but not on another, and it is impossible to tell which ground the jury selected.” Relying on that rule, Defendants urged reversal of their mail-fraud convictions. The Court of Appeals found no infirmity in the honest-services instructions, 530 F. 3d, at 600-602, but further determined that Defendants could not prevail even if those instructions were wrong, id., at 602-603. For this determination, the court homed in on the Government’s special-verdict proposal.
The challenge to the honest-services instructions would have become moot, the court observed, had the jury received special-verdict forms separating money-or-property fraud from honest-services fraud, and reported on the forms that Defendants were not guilty of honest-services fraud. Defendants, the Court of Appeals reasoned, bore responsibility for the obscurity of the jury’s verdict. True, the court acknowledged, it was not incumbent on Defendants to request special verdicts. But by resisting the Government’s proposal for separate findings on money-or-property fraud and on honest-services fraud, and requesting general verdicts instead, the Seventh Circuit concluded, Defendants had “forfeited their objection to the [honest-services] instruction[s].” Id., at 603. Defendants’ suggestion of postverdict interrogatories did not, in the Court of Appeals’ view, overcome the forfeiture, for “[questioning the jurors after they have handed down their verdict is not a good procedure and certainly not one that a district judge is required to employ.” Ibid.
We granted certiorari in this case, 556 U. S. 1234 (2009), along with Skilling v. United States, 558 U. S. 945 (2009), and Weyhrauch v. United States, 557 U. S. 934 (2009), to determine what conduct Congress rendered criminal by proscribing, in § 1346, fraudulent deprivation of “the intangible right of honest services.” We also agreed to consider in this case the question whether Defendants forfeited their objection to the honest-services jury instructions by opposing the Government’s request for special verdicts.
II
We decided in Skilling that §1346, properly confined, criminalizes only schemes to defraud that involve bribes or kickbacks. See ante, p. 358. That holding renders the honest-services instructions given in this case incorrect, and brings squarely before us the question presented by the Seventh Circuit’s forfeiture ruling: Did Defendants, by failing to acquiesce in the Government’s request for special verdicts, forfeit their objection, timely made at trial, to the honest-services instructions?
In addressing this issue, we note first the absence of any provision in the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure for submission of special questions to the jury. See Stein v. New York, 346 U. S. 156,178 (1953) (“Our own Rules of Criminal Procedure make no provision for anything but a general verdict.”), overruled on other grounds, Jackson v. Denno, 378 U. S. 368 (1964). The sole call for special findings in the Criminal Rules concerns nonjury trials. Rule 23(c) provides: “If a party [in a case tried without a jury] requests before the finding of guilty or not guilty, the court must state its specific findings of fact in open court or in a written decision or opinion.”
In contrast, the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provide for jury interrogatories of two kinds: special verdicts, which instruct the jury to return “a special written finding on each issue of fact,” Rule 49(a); and general verdicts with answers to “written questions on one or more issues of fact,” Rule 49(b). Although not dispositive, the absence of a Criminal Rule authorizing special verdicts counsels caution.
While the Criminal Rules are silent on special verdicts, they are informative on objections to instructions. Rule 30(d) “clarifies what. . . counsel must do to preserve a claim of error regarding an instruction.” Advisory Committee’s Notes on 2002 Amendment on Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 30(d), 18 U. S. C. App., p. 915. The Rule provides: “A party who objects to any portion of the instructions or to a failure to give a requested instruction must inform the court of the specific objection and the grounds for the objection before the jury retires to deliberate.” Defendants here, it is undisputed, complied with that requirement.
The Court of Appeals, in essence, added a further requirement for preservation of a meaningful objection to jury instructions. It devised a forfeiture sanction unmoored to any federal statute or criminal rule. And it placed in the prosecutor’s hands authority to trigger the sanction simply by requesting a special verdict. See 530 F. 3d, at 603. To boot, the Court of Appeals applied the sanction to Defendants, although they lacked any notice that forfeiture would attend their resistance to the Government’s special-verdict request. There is a Rule designed to ward off judicial invention of the kind present here. Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 57(b) admonishes: “No sanction or other disadvantage may be imposed for noncompliance with any requirement not in federal law [or] federal rules . . . unless the alleged violator was furnished with actual notice of the requirement before the noncompliance.”
We hold, in short, that, by properly objecting to the honest-services jury instructions at trial, Defendants secured their right to challenge those instructions on appeal. They did not forfeit that right by declining to acquiesce in the Government-proposed special-verdict forms. Our decision in Skilling makes it plain that the honest-services instructions in this case were indeed incorrect. As in Skilling, ante, at 414, we express no opinion on the question whether the error was ultimately harmless, but leave that matter for consideration on remand.
* * *
For the reasons stated, we vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Peter Atkinson is a respondent in support of petitioners who qualifies for relief under this Court’s Rule 12.6. See Letter from Michael S. Schachter to the Clerk of Court (July 29, 2009).
Section 1341 criminalizes use of the mails to further “any scheme or artifice to defraud, or for obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises.” Section 1346 defines the § 1341 term “scheme or artifice to defraud” to include “a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services.”
The Government proposed this language for each defendant on each mail-fraud count:
“If you find the defendant. . . Guilty with respect to [this Count], you must answer the following question by checking the applicable lines.
“With respect to [this Count], we, the jury, find the following has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt (cheek all that apply):
“Defendant engaged in a scheme to defraud [Hollinger] and its shareholders of money or property-
“Defendant engaged in a scheme to defraud [Hollinger] and its shareholders of their intangible right to honest services-.” App. 480a.
In her years at the bar and on the bench, the trial judge commented, she had “absolutely” never seen the postverdict procedure used. App. to Pet. for Cert. 225a.
The District Court later granted Kipnis’ motion for judgment of acquittal on one of these counts.
See, e. g., Jacobs Mfg. Co. v. Sam Brown Co., 19 P. 3d 1259, 1267 (CA8 1994) (“Postverdict interrogatories may imply the jury’s verdict is unjustified and cause the jury to answer the interrogatories in a manner inconsistent with the verdict.”); cf. Yeager v. United States, 557 U. S. 110, 122 (2009) (“Courts properly avoid . . . explorations into the jury’s sovereign space.”).
The scheme to defraud alleged here did not involve any bribes or kickbacks.
The absence of a special-verdict or interrogatory provision in the Criminal Rules is hardly accidental. See Skidmore v. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co., 167 F. 2d 54, 70 (CA2 1948) (L. Hand, J., concurring) (“I should like to subject a verdict, as narrowly as was practical, to a review which should make it in fact, what we very elaborately pretend that it should be: a decision based upon law. In criminal prosecutions there may be, and in my judgment there are, other considerations which intervene to make such an attempt undesirable.”).
Although the special interrogatories requested by the Government in this case have been called “special verdicts” by the parties and the courts below, they more closely resemble what Civil Rule 49(b) describes as “general verdict[s] with answers to written questions.” (Capitalization omitted.)
See Fed. Rule Crim. Proe. 57(b) (when there is no controlling law, “[a] judge may regulate practice in any manner consistent with federal law, these rules, and the local rules of the district”).
By calling for caution, we do not mean to suggest that special verdicts in criminal eases are never appropriate. See United States v. Ruggiero, 726 F. 2d 913, 922-923 (CA2 1984) (in complex Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act cases, “it can be extremely useful for a trial judge to request the jury to record their specific dispositions of the separate predicate acts charged, in addition to their verdict of guilt or innocence”); id., at 927 (Newman, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (“[A] District Court should have the discretion to use a jury interrogatory in eases where risk of prejudice to the defendant is slight and the advantage of securing particularized fact-finding is substantial.”).
The Government asserts that Defendants’ opposition to a special verdict resulted in forfeiture not of their jury-instruction objection, but of their “Yates argument” that any instructional error may “requir[e] reversal.” Brief for United States 52, and n. 21 (internal quotation marks omitted). The Government thus appears to concede that Defendants preserved their instructional challenge, but maintains that they are powerless to ask a court to assess the prejudicial effect of any error they may be able to demonstrate. See Reply Brief 29, n. 10 (on Government’s view, “[Defendants] could still ‘claim’ they were wrongly convicted, they just could not ask a court to do anything about it”). We see little merit in the Government’s attempt to divorce preservation of a claim from preservation of the right to redress should the claim succeed.
Rendering the Seventh Circuit’s forfeiture ruling all the more anomalous, at the time the trial court settled on the general-verdict form, the Government was no longer pressing its special-verdict request. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 228a.
Black contends that spillover prejudice from evidence introduced on the mail-fraud counts requires reversal of his obstruction-of-justice conviction. Brief for Petitioners 47-49. That question, too, is one on which we express no opinion.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Powell
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents the related questions whether a previously sentenced probationer is entitled to a hearing when his probation is revoked and, if so, whether he is entitled to be represented by appointed counsel at such a hearing.
I
Respondent, Gerald Scarpelli, pleaded guilty in July 1965, to a charge of armed robbery in Wisconsin. The trial Judge sentenced him to 15 years’ imprisonment, but suspended the sentence and placed him on probation for seven years in the custody of the Wisconsin Department of Public Welfare (the Department). At that time, he signed an agreement specifying the terms of his probation and a “Travel Permit and Agreement to Return” allowing him to reside in Illinois, with supervision there under an interstate compact. On August 5, 1965, he was accepted for supervision by the Adult Probation Department of Cook County, Illinois.
On August 6, respondent was apprehended by Illinois police, who had surprised him and one Fred Kleckner, Jr., in the course of the burglary of a house. After being apprised of his constitutional rights, respondent admitted that he and Kleckner had broken into the house for the purpose of stealing merchandise or money, although he now asserts that his statement was made under duress and is false. Probation was revoked by the Wisconsin Department on September 1, without a hearing. The stated grounds for revocation were that:
“1. [Scarpelli] has associated with known criminals, in--direct violation of his probation regulations and his supervising agent’s instructions;
“2. [Scarpelli,] while associating with a known criminal, namely Fred Kleckner, Jr., was involved in, and arrested for, a burglary ... in Deerfield, Illinois.” App. 20.
On September 4, 1965, he was incarcerated in the Wisconsin State Reformatory at Green Bay to begin serving the 15 years to which he had been sentenced by the trial judge. At no time was he afforded a hearing.
Some three years later, on December 16, 1968, respondent applied for a writ of habeas corpus. After the petition had been filed, but before it had been acted upon, the Department placed respondent on parole. The District Court found that his status as parolee was sufficient custody to confer jurisdiction on the court and that the petition was not moot because the revocation carried “collateral consequences,” presumably including the restraints imposed by his parole. On the merits, the District Court held that revocation without a hearing and counsel was a denial of due process. 317 F. Supp. 72 (ED Wis. 1970). The Court of Appeals affirmed sub nom. Gunsolus v. Gagnon, 454 F. 2d 416 (CA7 1971), and we granted certiorari. 408 U. S. 921 (1972).
II
Two prior decisions set the bounds of our present inquiry. In Mempa v. Rhay, 389 U. S. 128 (1967), the Court held that a probationer is entitled to be represented by appointed counsel at a combined revocation and sentencing hearing. Reasoning that counsel is required “at every stage of a criminal proceeding where substantial rights of a criminal accused may be affected,” id., at 134, and that sentencing is one such stage, the Court concluded that counsel must be provided an indigent at sentencing even when it is accomplished as part of a subsequent probation revocation proceeding. But this line of reasoning does not require a hearing or counsel at the time of probation revocation in a case such as the present one, where the probationer was sentenced at the time of trial.
Of greater relevance is our decision last Term in Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S. 471 (1972). There we held that the revocation of parole is not a part of a criminal prosecution.
“Parole arises after the end of the criminal prosecution, including imposition of sentence. . . . Revocation deprives an individual, not of the absolute liberty to which every citizen is entitled, but only of the conditional liberty properly dependent on observance of special parole restrictions.” Id., at 480.
Even though the revocation of parole is not a part of the criminal prosecution, we held that the loss of liberty entailed is a serious deprivation requiring that the parolee be accorded due process. Specifically, we held that a parolee is entitled to two hearings, one a preliminary hearing at the time of his arrest and detention to determine whether there is probable cause to believe that he has committed a violation of his parole, and the other a somewhat more comprehensive hearing prior to the making of the final revocation decision.
Petitioner does not contend that there is any difference relevant to the guarantee of due process between the revocation of parole and the revocation of probation, nor do we perceive one. Probation revocation, like parole revocation, is not a stage of a criminal prosecution, but does result in a loss of liberty. Accordingly, we hold that a probationer, like a parolee, is entitled to a preliminary and a final revocation hearing, under the conditions specified in Morrissey v. Brewer, supra.
III
The second, and more difficult, question posed by this case is whether an indigent probationer or parolee has a due process right to be represented by appointed counsel at these hearings. In answering that question, we draw heavily on the opinion in Morrissey. Our first point of reference is the character of probation or parole. As noted in Morrissey regarding parole, the “purpose is to help individuals reintegrate into society as constructive individuals as soon as they are able . . . .” 408 U. S., at 477. The duty and attitude of the probation or parole officer reflect this purpose:
“While the parole or probation officer recognizes his double duty to the welfare of his clients and to the safety of the general community, by and large concern for the client dominates his professional attitude. The parole agent ordinarily defines his role as representing his client’s best interests as long as these do not constitute a threat to public safety.”
Because the probation or parole officer’s function is not so much to compel conformance to a strict code of behavior as to supervise a course of rehabilitation, he has been entrusted traditionally with broad discretion to judge the progress of rehabilitation in individual cases, and has been armed with the power to recommend or even to declare revocation.
In Morrissey, we recognized that the revocation decision has two analytically distinct components:
“The first step in a revocation decision thus involves a wholly retrospective factual question: whether the parolee has in fact acted in violation of one or more conditions of his parole. Only if it is determined that the parolee did violate the conditions does the second question arise: should the parolee be recommitted to prison or should other steps be taken to protect society and improve chances of rehabilitation?” 408 U. S., at 479-480.
The parole officer’s attitude toward these decisions reflects the rehabilitative rather than punitive focus of the probation/parole system:
“Revocation ... is, if anything, commonly treated as a failure of supervision. While presumably it would be inappropriate for a field agent never to revoke, the whole thrust of the probation-parole movement is to keep men in the community, working with adjustment problems there, and using revocation only as a last resort when treatment has failed or is about to fail.”
But an exclusive focus on the benevolent attitudes of those who administer the probation/parole system when it is working successfully obscures the modification in attitude which is likely to take place once the officer has decided to recommend revocation. Even though the officer is not by this recommendation converted into a prosecutor committed to convict, his role as counsellor to the probationer or parolee is then surely compromised.
When the officer’s view of the probationer’s or parolee’s conduct differs in this fundamental way from the latter’s own view, due process requires that the difference be resolved before revocation becomes final. Both the probationer or parolee and the State have interests in the accurate finding of fact and the informed use of discretion — the probationer or parolee to insure that his liberty is not unjustifiably taken away and the State to make certain that it is neither unnecessarily interrupting a successful effort at rehabilitation nor imprudently prejudicing the safety of the community.
It was to serve all of these interests that Morrissey mandated preliminary and final revocation hearings. At the preliminary hearing, a probationer or parolee is entitled to notice of the alleged violations of probation or parole, an opportunity to appear and to present evidence in his own behalf, a conditional right to confront adverse witnesses, an independent decisionmaker, and a written report of the hearing. 408 U. S., at 487. The final hearing is a less summary one because the decision under consideration is the ultimate decision to revoke rather than a mere determination of probable cause, but the “minimum requirements of due process” include very similar elements:
“(a) written notice of the claimed violations of [probation or] parole; (b) disclosure to the [probationer or] parolee of evidence against him; (c) opportunity to be heard in person and to present witnesses and documentary evidence; (d) the right to confront and cross-examine adverse witnesses (unless the hearing officer specifically finds good cause for not allowing confrontation); (e) a 'neutral and detached’ hearing body such as a traditional parole board, members of which need not be judicial officers or lawyers; and (f) a written statement by the fact-finders as to the evidence relied on and reasons for revoking [probation or] parole.” Morrissey v. Brewer, supra, at 489.
These requirements in themselves serve as substantial protection against ill-considered revocation, and petitioner argues that counsel need never be supplied. What this argument overlooks is that the effectiveness of the rights guaranteed by Morrissey may in some circumstances depend on the use of skills which the probationer or parolee is unlikely to possess. Despite the informal nature of the proceedings and the absence of technical rules of procedure or evidence, the unskilled or uneducated probationer or parolee may well have difficulty in presenting his version of a disputed set of facts where the presentation requires the examining or cross-examining of witnesses or the offering or dissecting of complex documentary evidence.
By the same token, we think that the Court of Appeals erred in accepting respondent’s contention that the State is under a constitutional duty to provide counsel for indigents in all probation or parole revocation cases. While such a rule has the appeal of simplicity, it would impose direct costs and serious collateral disadvantages without regard to the need or the likelihood in a particular case for a constructive contribution by counsel. In most cases, the probationer or parolee has been convicted of committing another crime or has admitted the charges against him. And while in some cases he may have a justifiable excuse for the violation or a convincing reason why revocation is not the appropriate disposition, mitigating evidence of this kind is often not susceptible of proof or is so simple as not to require either investigation or exposition by counsel.
The introduction of counsel into a revocation proceeding will alter significantly the nature of the proceeding. If counsel is provided for the probationer or parolee, the State in turn will normally provide its own counsel; lawyers, by training and disposition, are advocates and bound by professional duty to present all available evidence and arguments in support of their clients’ positions and to contest with vigor all adverse evidence and views. The role of the hearing body itself, aptly described in Morrissey as being “predictive and discretionary” as well as factfinding, may become more akin to that of a judge at a trial, and less attuned to the rehabilitative needs of the individual probationer or parolee. In the greater self-consciousness of its quasi-judicial role, the hearing body may be less tolerant of marginal deviant behavior and feel more pressure to reincarcerate than to continue nonpunitive rehabilitation. Certainly, the decisionmaking process will be prolonged, and the financial cost to the State — for appointed counsel, counsel for the State, a longer record, and the possibility of judicial review — will not be insubstantial.
In some cases, these modifications in the nature of the revocation hearing must be endured and the costs borne because, as we have indicated above, the probationer’s or parolee’s version of a disputed issue can fairly be represented only by a trained advocate. But due process is not so rigid as to require that the significant interests in informality, flexibility, and economy must always be sacrificed.
In so concluding, we are of course aware that the case-by-case approach to the right to counsel in felony prosecutions adopted in Betts v. Brady, 316 U. S. 455 (1942), was later rejected in favor of a per se rule in Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 (1963). See also Argersinger v. Hamlin, 407 U. S. 25 (1972). We do not, however, draw from Gideon and Argersinger the conclusion that a case-by-case approach to furnishing counsel is necessarily inadequate to protect constitutional rights asserted in varying types of proceedings: there are critical differences between criminal trials and probation or parole revocation hearings, and both society and the probationer or parolee have stakes in preserving these differences.
In a criminal trial, the State is represented by a prosecutor; formal rules of evidence are in force; a defendant enjoys a number of procedural rights which may be lost if not timely raised; and, in a jury trial, a defendant must make a presentation understandable to untrained jurors. In short, a criminal trial under our system is an adversary proceeding with its own unique characteristics. In a revocation hearing, on the other hand, the State is represented, not by a prosecutor, but by a parole officer with the orientation described above; formal procedures and rules of evidence are not employed; and the members of the hearing body are familiar with the problems and practice of probation or parole. The need for counsel at revocation hearings derives, not from the invariable attributes of those hearings, but rather from the peculiarities of particular cases.
The differences between a criminal trial and a revocation hearing do not dispose altogether of the argument that under a case-by-case approach there may be cases in which a lawyer would be useful but in which none would be appointed because an arguable defense would be uncovered only by a lawyer. Without denying that there is some force in this argument, we think it a sufficient answer that we deal here, not with the right of an accused to counsel in a criminal prosecution, but with the more limited due process right of one who is a probationer or parolee only because he has been convicted of a crime.
We thus find no justification for a new inflexible constitutional rule with respect to the requirement of counsel. We think, rather, that the decision as to the need for counsel must be made on a case-by-case basis in the exercise of a sound discretion by the state authority charged with responsibility for administering the probation and parole system. Although the presence and participation of counsel will probably be both undesirable and constitutionally unnecessary in most revocation hearings, there will remain certain cases in which fundamental fairness — the touchstone of due process — will require that the State provide at its expense counsel for indigent probationers or parolees.
It is neither possible nor prudent to attempt to formulate a precise and detailed set of guidelines to be followed in determining when the providing of counsel is necessary to meet the applicable due process requirements. The facts and circumstances in preliminary and final hearings are susceptible of almost infinite variation, and a considerable discretion must be allowed the responsible agency in making the decision. Presumptively, it may be said that counsel should be provided in cases where, after being informed of his right to request counsel, the probationer or parolee makes such a request, based on a timely and colorable claim (i) that he has not committed the alleged violation of the conditions upon which he is at liberty; or (ii) that, even if the violation is a matter of public record or is uncontested, there are substantial reasons which justified or mitigated the violation and make revocation inappropriate, and that the reasons are complex or otherwise difficult to develop or present. In passing on a request for the appointment of counsel, the responsible agency also should consider, especially in doubtful cases, whether the probationer appears to be capable of speaking effectively for himself. In every case in which a request for counsel at a preliminary or final hearing is refused, the grounds for refusal should be stated succinctly in the record.
IV
We return to the facts of the present case. Because respondent was not afforded either a preliminary hearing or a final hearing, the revocation of his probation did not meet the standards of due process prescribed in Morrissey, which we have here held applicable to probation revocations. Accordingly, respondent was entitled to a writ of habeas corpus. On remand, the District Court should allow the State an opportunity to conduct such a hearing. As to whether the State must provide counsel, respondent’s admission to having committed another serious crime creates the very sort of situation in which counsel need not ordinarily be provided. But because of respondent’s subsequent assertions regarding that admission, see supra, at 780, we conclude that the failure of the Department to provide respondent with the assistance of counsel should be re-examined in light of this opinion. The general guidelines outlined above should be applied in the first instance by those charged with conducting the revocation hearing.
Affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded.
The Court’s order placing respondent on probation provided, among other things, that “[i]n the event of his failure to meet the conditions of his probation he will stand committed under the sentence all ready [sic] imposed.” App. 10. The agreement specifying the conditions of the probation, duly executed by respondent, obligated him to “make a sincere attempt to avoid all acts which are forbidden by law . . . .” App. 12.
Respondent was initially paroled to a federal detainer to serve a previously imposed federal sentence arising from another conviction. He was subsequently released from federal custody, but remains a parolee under the supervision of the Department.
Despite the undoubted minor differences between probation and parole, the commentators have agreed that revocation of probation where sentence has been imposed previously is constitutionally indistinguishable from the revocation of parole. See, e. g., Van Dyke, Parole Revocation Hearings in California: The Right to Counsel, 59 Calif. L. Rev. 1215, 1241-1243 (1971); Sklar, Law and Practice in Probation and Parole Revocation Hearings, 55 J. Crim. L. C. & P. S. 175, 198 n. 182 (1964).
It is clear at least after Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U. S. 471 (1972), that a probationer can no longer be denied due process, in reliance on the dictum in Escoe v. Zerbst, 295 U. S. 490, 492 (1935), that probation is an “act of grace.”
Petitioner argues, in addition, that the Morrissey hearing requirements impose serious practical problems in cases such as the present one in which a probationer or parolee is allowed to leave the convicting State for supervision in another State. Such arrangements are made pursuant to an interstate compact adopted by all of the States, including Wisconsin. Wis. Stat. Ann. §57.13 (1957). Petitioner’s brief asserts that as of June 30, 1972, Wisconsin had a total of 642 parolees and probationers under supervision in other States and that incomplete statistics as of June 30,1971, indicated a national total of 24,693 persons under out-of-state supervision. Brief for Petitioner 21-22.
Some amount of disruption inevitably attends any new constitutional ruling. We are confident, however, that modification of the interstate compact can remove without undue strain the more serious technical hurdles to compliance with Morrissey. An additional comment is warranted with respect to the rights to present witnesses and to confront and cross-examine adverse witnesses. Petitioner’s greatest concern is with the difficulty and expense of procuring witnesses from perhaps thousands of miles away. While in some cases there is simply no adequate alternative to live testimony, we emphasize that we did not in Morrissey intend to prohibit use where appropriate of the conventional substitutes for live testimony, including affidavits, depositions, and documentary evidence. Nor did we intend to foreclose the States from holding both the preliminary and the final hearings at the place of violation or from developing other creative solutions to the practical difficulties of the Morrissey requirements.
In Morrissey v. Brewer, we left open the question “whether the parolee is entitled to the assistance of retained counsel or to appointed counsel if he is indigent.” 408 U. S., at 489. Since respondent did not attempt to retain counsel but asked only for appointed counsel, we have no occasion to decide in this case whether a probationer or parolee has a right to be represented at a revocation hearing by retained counsel in situations other than those where the State would be obliged to furnish counsel for an indigent.
F. Remington, D. Newman, E. Kimball, M. Melli & H. Goldstein, Criminal Justice Administration, Materials and Cases 910-911 (1969).
The factors entering into these decisions relate in major part to a professional evaluation, by trained probation or parole officers, as to the overall social readjustment of the offender in the community, and include consideration of such variables as the offender’s relationship toward his family, his attitude toward the fulfillment of financial obligations, the e:xtent of his cooperation with the probation or parole officer assigned to his case, Ms personal associations, and — of course — whether there have been specific and sigmficant violations of the conditions of the probation or parole. The importance of these considerations, some factual and others entirely judgmental, is illustrated by a Wisconsin empirical study which disclosed that, in the sample studied, probation or parole was revoked in only 34.5% of the cases in which the probationer or parolee violated the terms of Ms release. S. Hunt, The Revocation Decision: A Study of Probation and Parole Agents’ Discretion 10 (unpublished thesis on file at the library of the University of Wisconsin) (1964), cited in Brief for Petitioner, Addendum 106.
Remington, Newman, Kimball, Melli & Goldstein, supra, n. 7, at 910.
See Sklar, supra, n. 3, at 192 (parole), 193 (probation).
The scope of the practical problem which would be occasioned by a requirement of counsel in all revocation cases is suggested by the fact that in the mid-1960’s there was an estimated average of 20,000 adult felony parole revocations and 108,000 adult probation revocations each year. President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, Task Force Report: The Courts 56 n. 28 (1967).
Cf. In re Gault, 387 U. S. 1 (1967), establishing a juvenile’s right to appointed counsel in a delinquency proceeding which, while denominated civil, was functionally akin to a criminal trial. A juvenile charged with violation of a generally applicable statute is differently situated from an already-convicted probationer or parolee, and is entitled to a higher degree of protection. See In re Winship, 397 U. S. 358 (1970) (the standard of proof in a juvenile delinquency-proceeding must be “proof beyond a reasonable doubt”).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice O’Connor
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We decide whether the parent of a seaman who died from injuries incurred aboard respondents’ vessel may recover under general maritime law for loss of society, and whether a claim for the seaman’s lost future earnings survives his death.
I
Ludwick Torregano was a seaman aboard the vessel MW Archon. On the evening of July 18, 1984, Clifford Melrose, a fellow crew member, stabbed Torregano repeatedly, killing him. At the time, the ship was docked in the harbor of Vancouver, Washington.
Mercedel Miles, Torregano’s mother and administratrix of his estate, sued Apex Marine Corporation and Westchester Marine Shipping Company, the vessel’s operators, Archon Marine Company, the charterer, and Aeron Marine Company, the Archon’s owner (collectively Apex), in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana. Miles alleged negligence under the Jones Act, 41 Stat. 1007, as amended, 46 U. S. C. App. § 688, for failure to prevent the assault on her son, and breach of the warranty of seaworthiness under general maritime law for hiring a crew member unfit to serve. She sought compensation for loss of support and services and loss of society resulting from the death of her son, punitive damages, and compensation to the estate for Torregano’s pain and suffering prior to his death and for his lost future income.
At trial, the District Court granted Apex’s motion to strike the claim for punitive damages, ruled that the estate could not recover Torregano’s lost future income, and denied Miles’ motion for a directed verdict as to negligence and unseaworthiness. The court instructed the jury that Miles could not recover damages for loss of society if they found that she was not financially dependent on her son.
The jury found that Apex was negligent and that Torre-gano was 7% contributorily negligent in causing his death, but that the ship was seaworthy. After discounting for Torregano’s contributory negligence, the jury awarded Miles $7,254 for the loss of support and services of her son and awarded the estate $130,200 for Torregano’s pain and suffering. The jury also found that Miles was not financially dependent on her son and therefore not entitled to damages for loss of society. The District Court denied both parties’ motions for judgment notwithstanding the verdict and entered judgment accordingly.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded. 882 F. 2d 976 (1989). The court affirmed the judgment of negligence on the part of Apex, but held that there was insufficient evidence to support the contributory negligence finding. Id., at 983-985. Miles was therefore entitled to the full measure of $7,800 for loss of support and services, and the estate was entitled to $140,000 for Torregano’s pain and suffering. The court also found that Melrose’s extraordinarily violent disposition demonstrated that he was unfit and therefore that the Archon was unseaworthy as a matter of law. Id., at 983. Because this ruling revived Miles’ general maritime claim, the court considered two questions concerning the scope of damages under general maritime law. The court reaffirmed its prior decision in Sistrunk v. Circle Bar Drilling Co., 770 F. 2d 455 (1985), holding that a nondependent parent may not recover for loss of society in a general maritime wrongful death action. 882 F. 2d, at 989. It also held that general maritime law does not permit a survival action for decedent’s lost future earnings. Id., at 987.
We granted Miles’ petition for certiorari on these two issues, 494 U. S. 1003 (1990), and now affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
II
We rely primarily on Moragne v. States Marine Lines, Inc., 398 U. S. 375 (1970). Edward Moragne was a longshoreman who had been killed aboard a vessel in United States and Florida territorial waters. His widow brought suit against the shipowner, seeking to recover damages for wrongful death due to the unseaworthiness of the ship. The District Court dismissed that portion of the complaint because neither federal nor Florida statutes allowed a wrongful death action sounding in unseaworthiness where death occurred in territorial waters. General maritime law was also no help; in The Harrisburg, 119 U. S. 199 (1886), this Court held that maritime law does not afford a cause of action for wrongful death. The Court of Appeals affirmed.
This Court overruled The Harrisburg. After questioning whether The Harrisburg was a proper statement of the law even in 1886, the Court set aside that issue because a “development of major significance ha[d] intervened.” Moragne, supra, at 388. Specifically, the state legislatures and Congress had rejected wholesale the rule against wrongful death. Every State in the Union had enacted a wrongful death statute. In 1920, Congress enacted two pieces of legislation creating a wrongful death action for most maritime deaths. The Jones Act, 41 Stat. 1007, as amended, 46 U. S. C. App. §688, through incorporation of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act (FELA), 35 Stat. 65, as amended, 45 U. S. C. §§ 51-59, created a wrongful death action in favor of the personal representative of a seaman killed in the course of employment. The Death on the High Seas Act (DOHSA), 41 Stat. 537, 46 U. S. C. App. §§761, 762, created a similar action for the representative of anyone killed on the high seas.
These statutes established an unambiguous policy in abrogation of those principles that underlay The Harrisburg. Such a policy is “to be given its appropriate weight not only in matters of statutory construction but also in those of deci-sional law.” Moragne, supra, at 391. Admiralty is not created in a vacuum; legislation has always served as an important source of both common law and admiralty principles. 398 U. S., at 391, 392, citing Landis, Statutes and the Sources of Law, in Harvard Legal Essays 213, 214, 226-227 (R. Pound ed. 1934). The unanimous legislative judgment behind the Jones Act, DOHSA, and the many state statutes created a strong presumption in favor of a general maritime wrongful death action.
But legislation sends other signals to which an admiralty court must attend. “The legislature does not, of course, merely enact general policies. By the terms of a statute, it also indicates its conception of the sphere within which the policy is to have effect.” Moragne, supra, at 392. Congress, in the exercise of its legislative powers, is free to say “this much and no more.” An admiralty court is not free to go beyond those limits. The Jones Act and DOHSA established a policy in favor of maritime wrongful death recovery. The central issue in Moragne was whether the limits of those statutes proscribed a more general maritime cause of action. 398 U. S., at 393.
The Court found no such proscription. Rather, the unfortunate situation of Moragne’s widow had been created by a change in the maritime seascape that Congress could not have anticipated. At the time Congress passed the Jones Act and DOHSA, federal courts uniformly applied state wrongful death statutes for deaths occurring in state territorial waters. Except in those rare cases where state statutes were also intended to apply on the high seas, however, there was no recovery for wrongful death outside territorial waters. See Moragne, supra, at 393, and n. 10. DOHSA filled this void, creating a wrongful death action for all persons killed on the high seas, sounding in both negligence and unseaworthiness. Congress did not extend DOHSA to territorial waters because it believed state statutes sufficient in those areas. 398 U. S., at 397-398.
And so they were when DOHSA was passed. All state statutes allowed for wrongful death recovery in negligence, and virtually all DOHSA claims sounded in negligence. Unseaworthiness was “an obscure and relatively little used remedy,” largely because a shipowner’s duty at that time was only to use due diligence to provide a seaworthy ship. See G. Gilmore & C. Black, The Law of Admiralty 383, 375 (2d ed. 1975). Thus, although DOHSA permitted actions in both negligence and unseaworthiness, it worked essentially as did state wrongful death statutes. DOHSA created a near uniform system of wrongful death recovery.
“The revolution in the law began with Mahnich v. Southern S. S. Co., [321 U. S. 96 (1944)],” in which this Court transformed the warranty of seaworthiness into a strict liability obligation. Gilmore & Black, supra, at 384, 386. The shipowner became liable for failure to supply a safe ship irrespective of fault and irrespective of the intervening negligence of crew members. Mahnich v. Southern S. S. Co., 321 U. S. 96, 100 (1944) (“[T]he exercise of due diligence does not relieve the owner of his obligation to the seaman to furnish adequate appliances. ... If the owner is liable for furnishing an unseaworthy appliance, even when he is not negligent, a for-tiori his obligation is unaffected by the fact that the negligence of the officers of the vessel contributed to the unseaworthiness”). The Court reaffirmed the rule two years later in Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U. S. 85, 94-95 (1946) (“[Unseaworthiness] is essentially a species of liability without fault”). As a consequence of this radical change, unseaworthiness “[became] the principal vehicle for recovery by seamen for injury or death.” Moragne, 398 U. S., at 399. DOHSA claims now sounded largely in unseaworthiness. “The resulting discrepancy between the remedies for deaths covered by [DOHSA] and for deaths that happen to fall within a state wrongful-death statute not encompassing unseaworthiness could not have been foreseen by Congress.” Ibid.
The emergence of unseaworthiness as a widely used theory of liability made manifest certain anomalies in maritime law that had not previously caused great hardship. First, in territorial waters, general maritime law allowed a remedy for unseaworthiness resulting in injury, but not for death. Second, DOHSA allowed a remedy for death resulting from unseaworthiness on the high seas, but general maritime law did not allow such recovery for a similar death in territorial waters. Finally, in what Moragne called the “strangest” anomaly, in those States whose statutes allowed a claim for wrongful death resulting from unseaworthiness, recovery was available for the death of a longshoreman due to unseaworthiness, but not for the death of a Jones Act seaman. See Moragne, supra, at 395-396. This was because wrongful death actions under the Jones Act are limited to negligence, and the Jones Act pre-empts state law remedies for the death or injury of a seaman. See Gillespie v. United States Steel Corp., 379 U. S. 148, 154-156 (1964).
The United States, as amicus curiae, urged the Moragne Court to eliminate these inconsistencies and render maritime wrongful death law uniform by creating a general maritime wrongful death action applicable in all waters. The territorial limitations placed on wrongful death actions by DOHSA did not bar such a solution. DOHSA was itself a manifestation of congressional intent “to achieve ‘uniformity in the exercise of admiralty jurisdiction.’” Moragne, supra, at 401, quoting Gillespie, supra, at 155. Nothing in that Act or in the Jones Act could be read to preclude this Court from exercising its admiralty power to remedy nonuniformities that could not have been anticipated when those statutes were passed. Moragne, supra, at 399-400. The Court therefore overruled The Harrisburg and created a general maritime wrongful death cause of action. This result was not only consistent with the general policy of both 1920 Acts favoring wrongful death recovery, but also effectuated “the constitutionally based principle that federal admiralty law should be ‘a system of law coextensive with, and operating uniformly in, the whole country.’” Moragne, supra, at 402, quoting The Lottawanna, 21 Wall. 558, 575 (1875).
rH HH
We have described Moragne at length because it exemplifies the fundamental principles that guide our decision in this case. We no longer live in an era when seamen and their loved ones must look primarily to the courts as a source of substantive legal protection from injury and death; Congress and the States have legislated extensively in these areas. In this era, an admiralty court should look primarily to these legislative enactments for policy guidance. We may supplement these statutory remedies where doing so would achieve the uniform vindication of such policies consistent with our constitutional mandate, but we must also keep strictly within the limits imposed by Congress. Congress retains superior authority in these matters, and an admiralty court must be vigilant not to overstep the well-considered boundaries imposed by federal legislation. These statutes both direct and delimit our actions.
Apex contends that Moragne’s holding, creating a general maritime wrongful death action, does not apply in this case because Moragne was a longshoreman, whereas Torregano was a true seaman. Apex is correct that Moragne does not apply on its facts, but we decline to limit Moragne to its facts.
Historically, a shipowner’s duty of seaworthiness under general maritime law ran to seamen in the ship’s employ. See Sieracki, 328 U. S., at 90. In Sieracki, we extended that duty to stevedores working aboard ship but employed by an independent contractor. Id., at 95. As this was Mo-ragne’s situation, Moragne’s widow was able to bring an action for unseaworthiness under general maritime law. In a narrow sense, Moragne extends only to suits upon the death of longshoremen like Moragne, so-called Sieracki seamen. Torregano was a true seaman, employed aboard the Archon. Were we to limit Moragne to its facts, Miles would have no general maritime wrongful death action. Indeed, were we to limit Moragne to its facts, that case would no longer have any applicability at all. In 1972, Congress amended the Longshore and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act (LHWCA), 86 Stat. 1251, as amended, 33 U. S. C. §§901-950, to bar any recovery from shipowners for the death or injury of a longshoreman or harbor worker resulting from breach of the duty of seaworthiness. See 33 U. S. C. § 905(b); American Export Lines, Inc. v. Alvez, 446 U. S. 274, 282, n. 9 (1980). If Moragne’s widow brought her action today, it would be foreclosed by statute.
Apex asks us not to extend Moragne to suits for the death of true seamen. This limitation is warranted, they say, because true seamen, unlike longshoremen, are covered under the Jones Act. The Jones Act provides a cause of action against the seaman’s employer for wrongful death resulting from negligence that Apex contends is preclusive of any recovery for death from unseaworthiness. See 46 U. S. C. App. §688.
This Court first addressed the preclusive effect of the Jones Act wrongful death provision in Lindgren v. United States, 281 U. S. 38 (1930). Petitioner, who was not a wrongful death beneficiary under the Jones Act, attempted to recover for the negligence of the shipowner under a state wrongful death statute. The Court held that the Jones Act pre-empted the state statute: “[The Jones] Act is one of general application intended to bring about the uniformity in the exercise of admiralty jurisdiction required by the Constitution, and necessarily supersedes the application of the death statutes of the several States.” Id., at 44. The Court also concluded that the Jones Act, limited as it is to recovery for negligence, would preclude recovery for the wrongful death of a seaman resulting from the unseaworthiness of the vessel. Id., at 47-48. In Gillespie v. United States Steel Corp., 379 U. S. 148 (1964), the Court reaffirmed Lindgren and held that the Jones Act precludes recovery under a state statute for the wrongful death of a seaman due to unseaworthiness. 379 U. S., at 154-156.
Neither Lindgren nor Gillespie considered the effect of the Jones Act on a general maritime wrongful death action. Indeed, no such action existed at the time those cases were decided. Moragne addressed the question explicitly. The Court explained there that the preclusive effect of the Jones Act established in Lindgren and Gillespie extends only to state remedies and not to a general maritime wrongful death action. See Moragne, 398 U. S., at 396, n. 12.
The Jones Act provides an action in negligence for the death or injury of a seaman. It thereby overruled The Osceola, 189 U. S. 158 (1903), which established that seamen could recover under general maritime law for injuries resulting from unseaworthiness, but not negligence. The Jones Act evinces no general hostility to recovery under maritime law. It does not disturb seamen’s general maritime claims for injuries resulting from unseaworthiness, Pacific S. S. Co. v. Peterson, 278 U. S. 130, 139 (1928), and it does not preclude the recovery for wrongful death due to unseaworthiness created by its companion statute, DOHSA. Kernan v. American Dredging Co., 355 U. S. 426, 430, n. 4 (1958). Rather, the Jones Act establishes a uniform system of seamen’s tort law parallel to that available to employees of interstate railway carriers under FELA. As the Court concluded in Moragne, the extension of the DOHSA wrongful death action to territorial waters furthers rather than hinders uniformity in the exercise of admiralty jurisdiction. Moragne, supra, at 396, n. 12.
There is also little question that Moragne intended to create a general maritime wrongful death action applicable beyond the situation of longshoremen. For one thing, Moragne explicitly overruled The Harrisburg. Moragne, supra, at 409. The Harrisburg involved a true seaman. The Harrisburg, 119 U. S., at 200. In addition, all three of the “anomalies” to which the Moragne cause of action was directed involved seamen. The “strangest” anomaly — that recovery was available for the wrongful death in territorial waters of a longshoreman, but not a true seaman — could only be remedied if the Moragne wrongful death action extended to seamen. It would be strange indeed were we to read Moragne as not addressing a problem that in large part motivated its result. If there has been any doubt about the matter, we today make explicit that there is a general maritime cause of action for the wrongful death of a seaman, adopting the reasoning of the unanimous and carefully crafted opinion in Moragne.
IV
Moragne did not set forth the scope of the damages recoverable under the maritime wrongful death action. The Court first considered that question in Sea-Land Services, Inc. v. Gaudet, 414 U. S. 673 (1974). Respondent brought a general maritime action to recover for the wrongful death of her husband, a longshoreman. The Court held that a dependent plaintiff in a maritime wrongful death action could recover for the pecuniary losses of support, services, and funeral expenses, as well as for the nonpecuniary loss of society suffered as the result of the death. Id., at 591. Gaudet involved the death of a longshoreman in territorial waters. Consequently, the Court had no need to consider the preclu-sive effect of DOHSA for deaths on the high seas or the Jones Act for deaths of true seamen.
We considered DOHSA in Mobil Oil Corp. v. Higginbotham, 436 U. S. 618 (1978). That case involved death on the high seas and, like Gaudet, presented the question of loss of society damages in a maritime wrongful death action. The Court began by recognizing that Gaudet, although broadly written, applied only in territorial waters and therefore did not decide the precise question presented. 436 U. S., at 622-623. Congress made the decision for us. DOHSA, by its terms, limits recoverable damages in wrongful death suits to “pecuniary loss sustained by the persons for whose benefit the suit is brought.” 46 U. S. C. App. §762 (emphasis added). This explicit limitation forecloses recovery for nonpecuniary loss, such as loss of society, in a general maritime action.
Respondents argued that admiralty courts have traditionally undertaken to supplement maritime statutes. The Court’s answer in Higginbotham is fully consistent with those principles we have here derived from Moragne: Congress has spoken directly to the question of recoverable damages on the high seas, and “when it does speak directly to a question, the courts are not free to ‘supplement’ Congress’ answer so thoroughly that the Act becomes meaningless.” Higginbotham, supra, at 625. Moragne involved gap filling in an area left open by statute; supplementation was entirely appropriate. But in an “area covered by the statute, it would be no more appropriate to prescribe a different measure of damages than to prescribe a different statute of limitations, or a different class of beneficiaries.” Higginbotham, supra, at 625.
The logic of Higginbotham controls our decision here. The holding of Gaudet applies only in territorial waters, and it applies only to longshoremen. Gaudet did not consider the preclusive effect of the Jones Act for deaths of true seamen. We do so now.
Unlike DOHSA, the Jones Act does not explicitly limit damages to any particular form. Enacted in 1920, the Jones Act makes applicable to seamen the substantive recovery provisions of the older FELA. See 46 U. S. C. App. § 688. FELA recites only that employers shall be liable in “damages” for the injury or death of one protected under the Act. 45 U. S. C. §51. In Michigan Central R. Co. v. Vreeland, 227 U. S. 59 (1913), however, the Court explained that the language of the FELA wrongful death provision is essentially identical to that of Lord Campbell’s Act, 9 & 10 Vict. ch. 93 (1846), the first wrongful death statute. Lord Campbell’s Act also did not limit explicitly the “damages” to be recovered, but that Act and the many state statutes that followed it consistently had been interpreted as providing recovery only for pecuniary loss. Vreeland, 227 U. S., at 69-71. The Court so construed FELA. Ibid.
When Congress passed the Jones Act, the Vreeland gloss on FELA, and the hoary tradition behind it, were well established. Incorporating FELA unaltered into the Jones Act, Congress must have intended to incorporate the pecuniary limitation on damages as well. We assume that Congress is aware of existing law when it passes legislation. See Cannon v. University of Chicago, 441 U. S. 677, 696-697 (1979). There is no recovery for loss of society in a Jones Act wrongful death action.
The Jones Act also precludes recovery for loss of society in this case. The Jones Act applies when a seaman has been killed as a result of negligence, and it limits recovery to pecuniary loss. The general maritime claim here alleged that Torregano had been killed as a result of the unseaworthiness of the vessel. It would be inconsistent with our place in the constitutional scheme were we to sanction more expansive remedies in a judicially created cause of action in which liability is without fault than Congress has allowed in cases of death resulting from negligence. We must conclude that there is no recovery for loss of society in a general maritime action for the wrongful death of a Jones Act seaman.
Our decision also remedies an anomaly we created in Hig-ginbotham. Respondents in that case warned that the elimination of loss of society damages for wrongful deaths on the high seas would create an unwarranted inconsistency between deaths in territorial waters, where loss of society was available under Gaudet, and deaths on the high seas. We recognized the value of uniformity, but concluded that a concern for consistency could not override the statute. Higgin-botham, supra, at 624. Today we restore a uniform rule applicable to all actions for the wrongful death of a seaman, whether under DOHSA, the Jones Act, or general maritime law.
V
We next must decide whether, in a general maritime action surviving the death of a seaman, the estate can recover decedent’s lost future earnings. Under traditional maritime law, as under common law, there is no right of survival; a seaman’s personal cause of action does not survive the seaman’s death. Cortes v. Baltimore Insular Line, Inc., 287 U. S. 367, 371 (1932); Romero v. International Terminal Operating Co., 358 U. S. 354, 373 (1959); Gillespie, 379 U. S., at 157.
Congress and the States have changed the rule in many instances. The Jones Act, through its incorporation of FELA, provides that a seaman’s right of action for injuries due to negligence survives to the seaman’s personal representative. See 45 U. S. C. § 59; Gillespie, supra, at 157. Most States have survival statutes applicable to tort actions generally, see 1 S. Speiser, Recovery for Wrongful Death 2d §3.2 (1975 and Supp. 1989), 2 id., §§14.1, 14.3, App. A, and admiralty courts have applied these state statutes in many instances to preserve suits for injury at sea. See, e. g., Just v. Chambers, 312 U. S. 383, 391 (1941). See also Kernan v. Ameri can Dredging Co., 355 U. S., at 430, n. 4; Kossick v. United Fruit Co., 365 U. S. 731, 739 (1961); Gillespie, supra, at 157; Comment, Application of State Survival Statutes in Maritime Causes, 60 Colum. L. Rev. 534, 535, n. 11 (1960); Nagy, The General Maritime Law Survival Action: What are the Elements of Recoverable Damages?, 9 U. Haw. L. Rev. 5, 27 (1987). Where these state statutes do not apply, however, or where there is no state survival statute, there is no survival of unseaworthiness claims absent a change in the traditional maritime rule.
Several Courts of Appeals have relied on Moragne to hold that there is a general maritime right of survival. See Spiller v. Thomas M. Lowe, Jr., & Assocs., Inc., 466 F. 2d 903, 909 (CA8 1972); Barbe v. Drummond, 507 F. 2d 794, 799-800 (CA1 1974); Law v. Sea Drilling Corp., 523 F. 2d 793, 795 (CA5 1975); Evich v. Connelly, 759 F. 2d 1432, 1434 (CA9 1985). As we have noted, Moragne found that congressional and state abrogation of the maritime rule against wrongful death actions demonstrated a strong policy judgment, to which the Court deferred. Moragne, 398 U. S., at 388-393. Following this reasoning, the lower courts have looked to the Jones Act and the many state survival statutes and concluded that these enactments dictate a change in the general maritime rule against survival. See, e. g., Spiller, supra, at 909; Barbe, supra, at 799-800, and n. 6.
Miles argues that we should follow the Courts of Appeals and recognize a general maritime survival right. Apex urges us to reaffirm the traditional maritime rule and overrule these decisions. We decline to address the issue, because its resolution is unnecessary to our decision on the narrow question presented: whether the income decedent would have earned but for his death is recoverable. We hold that it is not.
Recovery of lost future income in a survival suit will, in many instances, be duplicative of recovery by dependents for loss of support in a wrongful death action; the support dependents lose as a result of a seaman’s death would have come from the seaman’s future earnings. Perhaps for this reason, there is little legislative support for such recovery in survival. In only a few States can an estate recover in a survival action for income decedent would have received but for death. At the federal level, DOHSA contains no survival provision. The Jones Act incorporates FELA’s survival provision, but, as in most States, recovery is limited to losses suffered during the decedent’s lifetime. See 45 U. S. C. §59; Van Beeck v. Sabine Towing Co., 300 U. S. 342, 347 (1937); St. Louis, I. M. & S. R. Co. v. Craft, 237 U. S. 648, 658 (1915).
This state and federal legislation hardly constitutes the kind of “wholesale” and “unanimous” policy judgment that prompted the Court to create a new cause of action in Moragne. See Moragne, supra, at 388, 389. To the contrary, the considered judgment of a large majority of American legislatures is that lost future income is not recoverable in a survival action. Were we to recognize a right to such recovery under maritime law, we would be adopting a distinctly minority view.
This fact alone would not necessarily deter us, if recovery of lost future income were more consistent with the general principles of maritime tort law. There are indeed strong policy arguments for allowing such recovery. See, e. g., R. Posner, Economic Analysis of Law 176-181 (3d ed. 1986) (recovery of lost future income provides efficient incentives to take care by ensuring that the tortfeasor will have to bear the total cost of the victim’s injury or death). Moreover, Miles reminds us that admiralty courts have always shown a special solicitude for the welfare of seamen and their families. “[Cjertainly it better becomes the humane and liberal character of proceedings in admiralty to give than to withhold the remedy.” Moragne, supra, at 387, quoting Chief Justice Chase in The Sea Gull, 21 F. Cas. 909, 910 (No. 12,578) (CC Md. 1865). See also Gaudet, 414 U. S., at 583.
We are not unmindful of these principles, but they are insufficient in this case. We sail in occupied waters. Maritime tort law is now dominated by federal statute, and we are not free to expand remedies at will simply because it might work to the benefit of seamen and those dependent upon them. Congress has placed limits on recovery in survival actions that we cannot exceed. Because this case involves the death of a seaman, we must look to the Jones Act.
The Jones Act/FELA survival provision limits recovery to losses suffered during the decedent’s lifetime. See 45 U. S. C. §59. This was the established rule under FELA when Congress passed the Jones Act, incorporating FELA, see St. Louis, I. M. & S. R. Co., supra, at 658, and it is the rule under the Jones Act. See Van Beech, supra, at 347. Congress has limited the survival right for seamen’s injuries resulting from negligence. As with loss of society in wrongful death actions, this forecloses more expansive remedies in a general maritime action founded on strict liability. We will not create, under our admiralty powers, a remedy that is disfavored by a clear majority of the States and that goes well beyond the limits of Congress’ ordered system of recovery for seamen’s injury and death. Because Torregano’s estate cannot recover for his lost future income under the Jones Act, it cannot do so under general maritime law.
>
Cognizant of the constitutional relationship between the courts and Congress, we today act in accordance with the uniform plan of maritime tort law Congress created in DOHSA and the Jones Act. We hold that there is a general maritime cause of action for the wrongful death of a seaman, but that damages recoverable in such an action do not include loss of society. We also hold that a general maritime survival action cannot include recovery for decedent’s lost future earnings. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Affirmed.
Justice Souter took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
As with Moragne, the 1972 amendments to LHWCA have rendered Gaudet inapplicable on its facts. See supra, at 28; 33 U. S. C. § 905(b). Suit in Gaudet was filed before 1972. Gaudet v. Sea-Land Services, Inc., 463 F. 2d 1331, 1332 (CA5 1972).
In Offshore Logistics, Inc. v. Tallentire, 477 U. S. 207, 215, n. 1 (1986), we declined to approve or disapprove the practice of some courts of applying state survival statutes to cases involving death on the high seas.
See Mich. Comp. Laws §§600.2921, 600.2922 (1986); Olivier v. Houghton County St. R. Co., 134 Mich. 367, 368-370, 96 N. W. 434, 435 (1903); 42 Pa. Cons. Stat. §8302 (1988); Incollingo v. Ewing, 444 Pa. 263, 307-308, 282 A. 2d 206, 229 (1971); Wash. Rev. Code § 4.20.060 (1989); Balmer v. Dilley, 81 Wash. 2d 367, 370, 502 P. 2d 456, 458 (1972). See generally 2 S. Speiser, Recovery for Wrongful Death 2d, § 14.7, App. A (1975 and Supp. 1989). Speiser explains that many States do not allow any recovery of lost earnings in survival, and that among those that do, recovery is generally limited to earnings lost from the time of injury to the time of death. Ibid.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice O’Connor
delivered the opinion of the Court.
“Opportunity doesn’t always knock . . . sometimes it rings.” App. 113 (ETS Payphones promotional brochure). And sometimes it hangs up. So it did for the 10,000 people who invested a total of $300 million in the payphone sale- and-leaseback arrangements touted by respondent under that slogan. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) argues that the arrangements were investment contracts, and thus were subject to regulation under the federal securities laws. In this case, we must decide whether a moneymaking scheme is excluded from the term “investment contract” simply because the scheme offered a contractual entitlement to a fixed, rather than a variable, return.
I
Respondent Charles Edwards was the chairman, chief executive officer, and sole shareholder of ETS Payphones, Inc. (ETS). ETS, acting partly through a subsidiary also controlled by respondent, sold payphones to the public via independent distributors. The payphones were offered packaged with a site lease, a 5-year leaseback and management agreement, and a buyback agreement. All but a tiny fraction of purchasers chose this package, although other management options were offered. The purchase price for the payphone packages was approximately $7,000. Under the leaseback and management agreement, purchasers received $82 per month, a 14% annual return. Purchasers were not involved in the day-to-day operation of the payphones they owned. ETS selected the site for the phone, installed the, equipment, arranged for connection and long-distance service, collected coin revenues, and maintained and repaired the phones. Under the buyback agreement, ETS promised to refund the full purchase price of the package at the end of the lease or within 180 days of a purchaser’s request.
In its marketing materials and on its Web site, ETS trumpeted the “incomparable pay phone” as “an exciting business opportunity,” in which recent deregulation had “open[ed] the door for profits for individual pay phone owners and operators.” According to ETS, “[v]ery few business opportunities can offer the potential for ongoing revenue generation that is available in today’s pay telephone industry.” App. 114-115 (ETS brochure); id., at 227 (ETS Web site); see id., at 13 (Complaint ¶¶ 37-38).
The payphones did not generate enough revenue for ETS to make the payments required by the leaseback agreements, so the company depended on funds from new investors to meet its obligations. In September 2000, ETS filed for bankruptcy protection. The SEC brought this civil enforcement action the same month. It alleged that respondent and ETS had violated the registration requirements of §§ 5(a) and (c) of the Securities Act of 1933, 68 Stat. 684, 15 U. S. C. §§ 77e(a), (c), the antifraud provisions of both § 17(a) of the Securities Act of 1933, 114 Stat. 2763A-452, 15 U. S. C. § 77q(a), and § 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 48 Stat. 891, as amended, 114 Stat. 2763A-454, 15 U. S. C. § 78j(b), and Rule 10b-5 thereunder, 17 CFR § 240.10b-5 (2003). The District Court concluded that the payphone sale-and-leaseback arrangement was an investment contract within the. meaning of, and therefore was subject to, the federal securities laws. SEC v. ETS Payphones, Inc., 123 F. Supp. 2d 1349 (ND Ga. 2000). The Court of Appeals reversed. 300 F. 3d 1281 (CA11 2002) (per curiam). It held that respondent’s scheme was not an investment contract, on two grounds. First, it read this Court’s opinions to require that an investment contract offer either capital appreciation or a participation in the earnings of the enterprise, and thus to exclude schemes, such as respondent’s, offering a fixed rate of return. Id., at 1284-1285. Second, it held that our opinions’ requirement that the return on the investment be “derived solely from the efforts of others” was not satisfied when the purchasers had a contractual entitlement to the réturn. Id., at 1285. We conclude that it erred on both grounds.
II
“Congress’ purpose in enacting the securities laws was to regulate investments, in whatever form they are made and by whatever name they are called.” Reves v. Ernst & Young, 494 U. S. 56, 61 (1990). To that end, it enacted a broad definition of “security,” sufficient “to encompass virtually any instrument that might be sold as an investment.” Ibid. Section 2(a)(1) of the 1933 Act, 15 U. S. C. § 77b(a)(l), and § 3(a)(10) of the 1934 Act, 15 U. S. C. §78c(a)(10), in slightly different formulations which we have treated as essentially identical in meaning, Reves, supra, at 61, n. 1, define “security” to include “any note, stock, treasury stock, security future, bond, debenture,... investment contract,... [or any] instrument commonly known as a ‘security.’” “Investment contract” is not itself defined.
The test for whether a particular scheme is an investment contract was established in our decision in SEC v. W. J. Howey Co., 328 U. S. 293 (1946). We look to “whether the scheme involves an investment of money in a common enterprise with profits to come solely from the efforts of others.” Id., at 301. This definition “embodies a flexible rather than a static principle, one that is capable of adaptation to meet the countless and variable schemes devised by those who seek the use of the money of others on the promise of profits.” Id., at 299.
In reaching that result, we first observed that when Congress included “investment contract” in the definition of security, it “was using a term the meaning of which had been crystallized’' by the state courts’ interpretation of their “‘blue sky’” laws. Id., at 298. (Those laws were the precursors to federal securities regulation and were so named, it seems, because they were “aimed at promoters who ‘would sell building lots in the blue sky in fee simple.’ ” 1 L. Loss & J. Seligman, Securities Regulation 36, 31-43 (3d ed. 1998) (quoting Mulvey, Blue Sky Law, 36 Can. L. Times 37 (1916)).) The state courts had defined an investment contract as “a contract or scheme for ‘the placing of capital or laying out of money in a way intended to secure income or profit from its employment,”’ and had “uniformly applied” that definition to “a variety of situations where individuals were led to invest money in a common enterprise with the expectation that they would earn a profit solely through the efforts of the promoter or [a third party].” Howey, supra, at 298 (quoting State v. Gopher Tire & Rubber Co., 146 Minn. 52, 56, 177 N. W. 937, 938 (1920)). Thus, when we held that “profits” must “come solely from the efforts of others,” we were speaking of the profits that investors seek on their investment, not the profits of the scheme in which they invest. We used “profits” in the sense of income or return, to include, for example, dividends, other periodic payments, or the increased value of the investment.
There is no reason to distinguish between promises of fixed returns and promises of variable returns for purposes of the test, so understood. In both cases, the investing public is attracted by representations of investment income, as purchasers were in this case by ETS’ invitation to “ ‘watch the profits add up.’ ” App. 13 (Complaint ¶ 38). Moreover, investments pitched as low risk (such as those offering a “guaranteed” fixed return) are particularly attractive to individuals more vulnerable to investment fraud, including older and less sophisticated investors. See 2 S. Rep. No. 102-261, App., p. 326 (1992) (Staff Summary of Federal Trade Commission Activities Affecting Older Consumers). Under the reading respondent advances, unscrupulous marketers of investments could evade the securities laws by picking a rate of return to promise. We will not read into the securities laws a limitation not compelled by the language that would so undermine the laws’ purposes.
Respondent protests that including investment schemes promising a fixed return among investment contracts conflicts with our precedent. We disagree. No distinction between fixed and variable returns was drawn in the blue sky law cases that the Howey Court used, in formulating the test, as its evidence of Congress’ understanding of the term. 328 U. S., at 298, and n. 4. Indeed, two of those cases involved an investment contract in which a fixed return was promised. People v. White, 124 Cal. App. 548, 550-551, 12 P. 2d 1078, 1079 (1932) (agreement between defendant and investors stated that investor would give defendant $5,000, and would receive $7,500 from defendant one year later); Stevens v. Liberty Packing Corp., 111 N. J. Eq. 61, 62-63, 161 A. 193, 193-194 (1932) (“ironclad contract” offered by defendant to investors entitled investors to $56 per year for 10 years on initial investment of $175, ostensibly in sale and leaseback of breeding rabbits).
None of our post-Howey decisions is to the contrary. In United Housing Foundation, Inc. v. Forman, 421 U. S. 837 (1975), we considered whether “shares” in a nonprofit housing cooperative were investment contracts under the securities laws. We identified the “touchstone" of an investment contract as “the presence of an investment in a common venture premised on a reasonable expectation of profits to be derived from the entrepreneurial or managerial efforts of others,” and then laid out two examples of investor interests that we had previously found to be “profits.” Id., at 852. Those were “capital appreciation resulting from the development of the initial investment” and “participation in earnings resulting from the use of investors’ funds.” Ibid. We contrasted those examples, in which “the investor is ‘attracted solely by the prospects of a return’ ” on the investment, with housing cooperative shares, regarding which the purchaser “is motivated by a desire to use or consume the item purchased.” Id., at 852-853 (quoting Howey, supra, at 300). Thus, Forman supports the commonsense understanding of “profits” in the Howey test as simply “financial returns on... investments.” 421 U. S., at 853.
Concededly, Forman’s illustrative description of prior decisions on “profits” appears to have been mistaken for an exclusive list in a case considering the scope of a different term in the definition of a security, “note.” See Reves, 494 U. S., at 68, n. 4. But that was a misreading of Forman, and we will not bind ourselves unnecessarily to passing dictum that would frustrate Congress’ intent to regulate all of the “countless and variable schemes devised by those who seek the use of the money of others on the promise of profits.” Howey, supra, at 299.
Given that respondent’s position is supported neither by the purposes of the securities laws nor by our precedents, it is no surprise that the SEC has consistently taken the opposite position, and maintained that a promise of a fixed return does not preclude a scheme from being an. investment contract. It has done so in formal adjudications, e. g., In re Abbott, Sommer & Co., 44 S. E. C. 104 (1969) (holding that mortgage notes, sold with a package of management services and a promise to repurchase the notes in the event of default, were investment contracts); see also In re Union Home Loans (Dec. 16, 1982), 26 S. E. C. Docket 1517, 1519 (report and order regarding settlement, stating that sale of promissory notes secured by deeds of trust, coupled with management services and providing investors “a specified percentage return on their investment,” were investment contracts), and in enforcement actions, e. g., SEC v. Universal Service Assn., 106 F. 2d 232, 234, 237 (CA7-1939) (accepting SEC’s position that an investment scheme promising “assured profit of 30% per annum with no chance of risk or loss to the contributor” was a security because it satisfied the pertinent substance of the Howey test, “‘[t]he investment of money with the expectation of profit through the efforts of other persons’ ”); see also SEC v. American Trailer Rentals Co., 379 U. S. 594, 598 (1965) (noting that “the SEC advised” the respondent that its “sale and lease-back arrangements,” in which investors received “a set 2% of their investment per month for 10 years,” “were investment contracts and therefore securities” under the 1933 Act).
The Eleventh Circuit’s perfunctory alternative holding, that respondent’s scheme falls outside the definition because purchasers had a contractual entitlement to a return, is incorrect and inconsistent with our precedent. We are considering investment contracts. The fact that investors have bargained for a return on their investment does not mean that the return is not also expected to come solely from the efforts of others. Any other conclusion would conflict with our holding that an investment contract was offered in Howey itself. 328 U. S., at 295-296 (service contract entitled investors to allocation of net profits).
We hold that an investment scheme promising a fixed rate of return can be an “investment contract” and thus a “security” subject to the federal securities laws. The judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Because the Court of Appeals ordered the complaint dismissed, we treat the case as we would an appeal from a successful motion to dismiss and accept as true the allegations in the complaint. SEC v. Zandford, 535 U. S. 813, 818 (2002); Saudi Arabia v. Nelson, 507 U. S. 349, 351, 354 (1993).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Black
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1957 petitioner brought this action under the Federal Employers’ Liability Act to recover damages for an industrial disease he allegedly contracted in 1952 while working for respondent. Although § 6 of the Act provides that “No action shall be maintained under this chapter unless commenced within three years from the day the cause of action accrued,” petitioner claimed that respondent was estopped from raising this limitation because it had induced the delay by representing to petitioner .that he had seven years in which to sue. Respondent contended that while estoppel often prevents defendants from relying on statutes of limitations it can have no-such effect in FELA cases for there the time limitation is an integral part of a new cause of action and that cause is irretrievably lost at the end of the statutory period. The District Court; after discussing two lines of cases “in sharp conflict,” one supporting respondent and one supporting petitioner, concluded with apparent reluctance that it was required by prior decisions of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit to dismiss petitioner’s suit. The Court of Appeals affirmed, saying “For the reasons well stated by [the District Court] we should not attempt to retrace our footsteps now, but may well await resolution of the conflict by the Supreme Court.” 253 F. 2d 957, 958. Since the question is important and recurring we granted certiorari. 358 U. S. 814.
To decide the case we need look no further than the maxim that no man may take advantage of his own wrong. Deeply rooted in our jurisprudence this principle has been applied in many diverse classes of cases by both law and equity courts and has frequently been employed to bar inequitable reliance on statutes of limitations. In Schroeder v. Young, 161 U. S. 334, this Court allowed a debtor to redeem property sold to satisfy a judgment, after the statutory time, for redemption had expired although the statute granting the right to redeem also limited that right as to time. The Court held that the purchasers could not rely bn the limitation because one of them «had told the debtor “that he would not be pushed, that the statutory time to redeem would not be insisted upon, and [the debtor] believed and relied upon such assurance.” The Court pointed out that in “such circumstances the courts have held with great unanimity that the purchaser is estopped to. insist upon the statutory period, notwithstanding the assurances were not in writing and were made without consideration, upon the ground that the debtor was lulled into a false security.” 161 U. S., at 344. As Mr. Justice Miller expressed it in Insur ance Co. v. Wilkinson, 13 Wall. 222, 233, “The principle is that where one party has by his representations or his conduct induced the other party to a transaction to give him an advantage which it would be against equity and good conscience for him to assert, he would not in a court of justice be permitted to avail himself of -that advantage. And .although the cases to which this principiéis,to be applied-are not as well defined as could be wished, the •general doctrine is well understood and is applied by courts of law as well as equity where the technical advantage thus obtained is set up and relied on to defeat the ends of justice or establish, a dishonest claim.”
We have been shown nothing in the language or history of the Federal Employers’ Liability Act to indicate that this principle of law, older than the coúntry itself, was >nót to ápply in suits arising under that statute. Nor has counsel made any convincing arguments which might lead uS to make an exception to the doctrine of estoppel in this case. To be sure language in seme decisions of this. Court can be taken as supporting such an exception. But that language is in dicta and is neither binding nor persuasive. Accordingly, we hold that it was error to dismiss this case. Despite the delay in filing his suit petitioner is entitled to have his cause tried on the merits if he can prove , that respondent’s responsible agents, agents with some authority in the particular matter, conducted themselves in such a way that petitioner was justifiably misled into a good-faith belief that he could begin his action at any time within seven years after it had accrued.
It is no answer to say,, as respondent does, that the representations alleged were of law and not of . fact and therefore could not justifiably be relied-on by'petitioner. Whether they could or could' not depends on who made them and the circumstances in which they were made. See Scarborough v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 190. F. 2d 935! Such questions cannot be decided at this stage of' the proceedings.
It may well be that petitioner’s complaint as now drawn is too vague, but that is no gróund for dimissing his action. Cf. Conley v. Gibson, 355 U. S. 41, 47-48. His allegations are sufficient for the present. Whether petitioner qan in fact make out a case calling for application of the doctrine of estoppel must await trial.
Reversed.
35 Stat. 65, as amended, 45 U. S. C. §§ 51-60.
Paragraph 9 of petitioner’s complaint states, “Subsequent thereto defendant’s agents, servants arid emFployees fraudulently or Unintentionally misstated to plaintiff that he had seven years within which to bring an action against said defendant as a result of his industrial disease and in reliance thereon plaintiff withheld suit until the present time.” ' '
American R. Co. v. Coronas, 230 F. 545; Bell v. Wabash R. Co., 58 F. 2d 569; Damiano v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 161 F. 2d 534; Ahern v. South Buffalo R. Co., 303 N. Y. 545, 563, 104 N. E. 2d 898, 908, aff’d on other, grounds, 344 U. S. 367.
Scarborough v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 178 F. 2d. 253, 190 F. 2d 935, 202 F. 2d 84; Fravel v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 104 F. Supp. 84; Toran v. New York, N. H. & H. R. Co., 108 F. Supp. 564.
The District Court noted, “The reasoning of [petitioner’s] .cases is not unpersuasive. But I feel that I am bound by the decisions of the Court of Appeals of this Circuit . . . .” 154 F. Supp. 863, 866.
See, e. g., The Arrogante Barcelones, 7 Wheat. 496, 519; Sprigg v. Bank of Mount Pleasant, 10 Pet. 257, 264-265; Van Rensselaer v. Kearney, 11 How. 297, 322-329; Gregg v. Von Phul, 1 Wall. 274, 280-281; Morgan v. Railroad Co., 96 U. S. 716, 720-722; Reynolds v. United States, 98 U. S. 145, 158-160; Dickerson v. Colgrove, 100 U. S. 578; Kirk v. Hamilton, 102 U. S. 68, 76-79; Daniels v. Tearney, 102 U. S. 415, 420-422.
See, e. g., Howard v. West Jersey & S. R. Co., 102 N. J. Eq. 517, 141 A. 755, aff’d on opinion below, 104 N. J. Eq. 201,144 A. 919. See also Dawson, Estoppel and Statutes of Limitation, 34 Mich. L. Rev. 1; cases collected in 77 A. L. R. 1044; 130 A. L. R. 8; 15 A. L. R. 2d 500; 24 A. L. R. 2d 1413.
Compare 2 Utah Comp. Laws (1888), Tit. IX, §§3442-:3445 (derived from Act of Feb. 1870, Utah Laws 1870; p. 17, §§ 229-232) with 2 Utah Comp. Laws (1888), Tit. II, §§ 3129-3168. See also Act of Jan. 18, 1867, Utah Laws 1867, p. 32.
See also Graffam v. Burgess, 117 U. S. 180, where a judgment debtor who had been deceived by his creditors was allowed to redeem land sold on execution even though the time limitation on redemptions had expired and- despite a dissent which argued that jt was “of the utmost importance . . . - that the right thus granted should be strictly exercised according to the statute. For _. . . the favor of allowing the’ debtor one year more to save his land . . . only adds to his obligation jto exercise the right thus granted in strict accordance with its terms.” Id., at 196.
See Dickerson v. Colgrove, 100 U. S. 578, 582 (citing discussions of the doctrine by Coke and Littleton). See also Sprigg v. Bank of Mount Pleasant, 10 Pet. 257, 265; Van Rensselaer v. Kearney, 11 How. 297, 322-325.
See, e. g., Phillips Co. v. Grand Trunk W. R. Co., 236 U. S. 662, 666-668; Atlantic Coast Line R. Co. v. Burnette, 239 U. S. 199; Danzer & Co. v. Gulf & S. I. R. Co., 268 U. S. 633, 637. But cf. The Harrisburg, 119 U. S. 199, 214, “The liability and the remedy, are created by the same statutes, and the limitations of the'remédy are, therefore,, to be treated as limitations of the right. No question arises in this case as to the power of'a court of admiralty to allow an equitable excuse for delay in suing, because no excuse -of any kind has been shown.”
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Douglas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
These cases challenge the constitutionality of §§ 9, 11, and 20 of the Illinois Motor Vehicle Law, as amended. Ill. Rev. Stat., 1951, c. 95%. The statute imposes a tax for the use of the public highways and measures the tax exclusively by gross weight of the vehicle. Appellants, most of whom are interstate carriers, challenged the tax as violating the Commerce Clause (Art. I, § 8) of the Constitution and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court of Illinois sustained the statute. 412 Ill. 204, 321, 106 N. E. 2d 521, 510. The cases are here by appeal. 28 U. S. C. § 1257 (2).
The main emphasis of the argument is on the Commerce Clause. The argument starts from the premise found in our opinions that a state may levy a tax on an interstate motor vehicle that is “measured by or has some fair relationship to the use of the highways for which the charge is made.” McCarroll v. Dixie Lines, 309 U. S. 176, 181. It is contended that the present tax is not so measured but has the same infirmities as the tax on motor vehicles which the Court invalidated in Interstate Transit, Inc. v. Lindsey, 283 U. S. 183. An elaborate argument is advanced to the effect that a large fraction of the costs of installing and maintaining highways has no relation to the weight of the vehicles that pass over them. Therefore, a tax such as this one, which is determined solely with reference to weight, is a tax part of which is exacted for a purpose other than the use of the highways.
We do not stop to analyze the evidence tendered by appellants. For we do not reach the issue in this case. It is true that some of the appellants are interstate carriers. But it is also true that each of the interstate carriers does an intrastate business as well. The tax is required from any motor vehicle that moves on the highways. It is, indeed, a tax for the privilege of using the highways of Illinois. Clearly it is within the police power of Illinois to exact such a tax at least from intrastate operators. Hendrick v. Maryland, 235 U. S. 610. No showing has been made by any of the appellants that the tax bears no reasonable relation to the use he makes of the highways in his intrastate operations. No effort is made to show that in that way or in some other manner the tax is increased by reason of the interstate operations of any appellant. In short appellants have failed to carry the burden of showing that the tax deprives them of rights which the Commerce Clause protects. Cf. Southern R. Co. v. King, 217 U. S. 524, 534. The case is therefore to be distinguished from those situations where by nature of the tax or its incidence (Sprout v. South Bend, 277 U. S. 163, 170, 171; Spector Motor Service v. O’Connor, 340 U. S. 602, 609) an issue of unreasonable burden on interstate commerce is presented.
The objections under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment are without substance. The power of a state to tax, basic to its sovereignty, is limited only if in substance and effect it is the exertion of a different and a forbidden power (Magnano Co. v. Hamilton, 292 U. S. 40, 44), as for example the taxation of a privilege protected by the First Amendment. See Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U. S. 105, 112. No such problem is even remotely involved here. Complaint is made that private carriers are taxed at the same rate as carriers for hire. Yet so far as the Fourteenth Amendment is concerned, that objection is frivolous, since neither private nor public carriers have the right to use the highways without payment of a fee (see Hendrick v. Maryland, supra); and we cannot say that the exaction of the same fee from each is out of bounds. Appellants make other arguments to the effect that the statute is so inconsistent, vague, and uncertain in its classification as to violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. But even if we assume that the vagaries of the law reach that dignity, no showing is made that any of the appellants is the victim of an invidious classification. Cf. Stephenson v. Binford, 287 U. S. 251, 277.
We need notice only one other argument and that is that the statute requires Illinois residents to pay the tax, whereas nonresidents are exempted provided the states of their residence reciprocate and grant like exemptions to Illinois residents. That objection, so far as the Fourteenth Amendment is concerned, was adequately answered in Storaasli v. Minnesota, 283 U. S. 57, 62. And contrary to appellants’ suggestions, that kind of reciprocal arrangement between states has never been thought to violate the Compact Clause of Art. I, § 10 of the Constitution. See St. Louis & S. F. R. Co. v. James, 161 U. S. 545, 562; Kane v. New Jersey, 242 U. S. 160, 168.
Affirmed.
Mr. Justice Burton concurs in the result.
Mr. Justice Clark took no part in the consideration or decision of these cases.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Kennedy
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The death sentence of the petitioner in this case was decreed by a judgment that became final before we decided either Maynard v. Cartwright, 486 U. S. 356 (1988), or Clemons v. Mississippi, 494 U. S. 738 (1990). The petitioner argues that the State of Mississippi committed the same error in his case as it did in Clemons, and that under both Maynard and Clemons his sentence is unconstitutional. The question presented is whether in a federal habeas corpus proceeding a petitioner is foreclosed from relying on Maynard and Clemons because either or both announced a new rule as defined in Teague v. Lane, 489 U. S. 288 (1989).
I
In June 1982, Ray McWilliams and his wife, Nell, were shot to death in their Jackson, Mississippi, home as part of an armed robbery. The petitioner James R. Stringer did not fire the fatal shots, but he did plan the robbery and take part in it. The killing was part of his plan from the outset. The crimes, and their gruesome aspects, are described in the opinion of the Mississippi Supreme Court on direct review of the conviction and sentence. Stringer v. State, 454 So. 2d 468, 471-473 (1984).
Under Mississippi law the death sentence may be imposed for murders designated by statute as “capital murder.” Miss. Code Ann. § 97-3-19(2) (Supp. 1991). A killing in the course of a burglary or robbery is included within that category. Following a capital murder conviction, the jury in the Mississippi system proceeds to the sentencing phase of the case. For a defendant who has been convicted of capital murder to receive the death sentence, the jury must find at least one of eight statutory aggravating factors, and then it must determine that the aggravating factor or factors are not outweighed by the mitigating circumstances, if any. §99-19-101.
The jury found petitioner guilty of capital murder in the course of a robbery. In the sentencing phase the jury found that there were three statutory aggravating factors. The aggravating factors as defined in the jury instructions, and for the most part following the statutory wording, were:
“1. The Defendant contemplated that life would be taken and/or the capital murder was intentionally committed and that the Defendant was engaged in an attempt to commit a robbery; and was committed for pecuniary gain.
“2. The capital murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing the detection and lawful arrest of James R. Stringer, the Defendant.
“3. The capital murder was especially heinous, atrocious or cruel.” Brief for Respondents 4.
The trial court in its instructions did not further define the meaning of the third factor.
On direct review the Mississippi Supreme Court affirmed. Stringer v. State, supra. With respect to the sentence, the court found it was not “imposed under the influence of passion, prejudice or any other arbitrary factor,” id., at 478; “the evidence fully supported] the jury’s finding of statutorily required aggravating circumstances,” id., at 479; and the death sentence was not disproportionate to sentences imposed in other cases, ibid. Petitioner’s conviction became final when we denied certiorari on February 19,1985. Stringer v. Mississippi, 469 U. S. 1230. Postconviction relief was denied in the state courts. Stringer v. State, 485 So. 2d 274 (1986).
This case comes to us from proceedings begun when petitioner filed his first federal habeas petition in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi. The relevant claim is petitioner’s contention that the third aggravating factor found by the jury and considered in the sentencing proceeding, the “heinous, atrocious or cruel” aggravating factor, was so vague as to render the sentence arbitrary, in violation of the Eighth Amendment’s proscription of cruel and unusual punishment. The District Court found the claim subject to a procedural bar and, in the alternative, ruled it had no merit. Stringer v. Scroggy, 675 F. Supp. 356, 366 (1987).
Without consideration of the procedural bar question, the Court of Appeals affirmed on the merits, finding no constitutional infirmity in the jury’s consideration of the third aggravating factor because two other aggravating factors were unchallenged. Stringer v. Jackson, 862 F. 2d 1108 (CA5 1988). When the Court of Appeals affirmed, we had not decided Clemons v. Mississippi, and we later vacated its opinion for further consideration. 494 U. S. 1074 (1990). On remand the Court of Appeals held that petitioner was not entitled to rely on Clemons or the related case of Maynard v. Cartwright in his habeas corpus proceeding because those decisions announced a new rule after his sentence was final. 909 F. 2d 111 (1990). The court relied upon its earlier analysis in Smith v. Black, 904 F. 2d 950 (1990), cert. pending, No. 90-1164, a case that had also presented the question whether Clemons and Maynard announced a new rule. We granted certiorari, 500 U. S. 915 (1991), and now reverse.
I — l I — i
Subject to two exceptions, a case decided after a petitioner’s conviction and sentence became final may not be the predicate for federal habeas corpus relief unless the decision was dictated by precedent existing when the judgment in question became final. Butler v. McKellar, 494 U. S. 407 (1990); Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U. S. 302 (1989); Teague v. Lane, 489 U. S. 288 (1989). As we explained in Butler, “[t]he ‘new rule’ principle ... validates reasonable, good-faith interpretations of existing precedents made by state courts even though they are shown to be contrary to later decisions.” 494 U. S., at 414. Neither one of the exceptions is at issue here, so our inquiry is confined to the question whether Clemons, Maynard, or both announced a new rule.
When a petitioner seeks federal habeas relief based upon a principle announced after a final judgment, Teague and our subsequent decisions interpreting it require a federal court to answer an initial question, and in some cases a second. First, it must be determined whether the decision relied upon announced a new rule. If the answer is yes and neither exception applies, the decision is not available to the petitioner. If, however, the decision did not announce a new rule, it is necessary to inquire whether granting the relief sought would create a new rule because the prior decision is applied in a novel setting, thereby extending the precedent. See Butler v. McKellar, supra, at 414-415. The interests in finality, predictability, and comity underlying our new rule jurisprudence may be undermined to an equal degree by the invocation of a rule that was not dictated by precedent as by the application of an old rule in a manner that was not dictated by precedent.
A
A determination whether Maynard and Clemons announced a new rule must begin with Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U. S. 420 (1980). In Godfrey we invalidated a death sentence based upon the aggravating circumstance that the killing was “outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible and inhuman.” Id., at 428-429. The formulation was deemed vague and imprecise, inviting arbitrary and capricious application of the death penalty in violation of the Eighth Amendment. We later applied the same analysis and reasoning in Maynard. In Maynard the aggravating circumstance under an Oklahoma statute applied to a killing that was “especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel.” 486 U. S., at 359. We found the language gave no more guidance than did the statute in Godfrey, and we invalidated the Oklahoma formulation. 486 U. S., at 363-364.
In the case now before us Mississippi does not argue that Maynard itself announced a new rule. To us this appears a wise concession. Godfrey and Maynard did indeed involve somewhat different language. But it would be a mistake to conclude that the vagueness ruling of Godfrey was limited to the precise language before us in that case. In applying Godfrey to the language before us in Maynard, we did not “brea[k] new ground.” Butler v. McKellar, supra, at 412. Maynard was, therefore, for purposes of Teague, controlled by Godfrey, and it did not announce a new rule.
B
Of more substance is the State’s contention that it was a new rule to apply the Godfrey and Maynard holdings to the Mississippi sentencing process. The State argues this must have been an open question when petitioner’s sentence became final, with Clemons yet undecided. We acknowledge there are differences in the use of aggravating factors under the Mississippi capital sentencing system and their use in the Georgia system in Godfrey. In our view, however, those differences could not have been considered a basis for denying relief in light of precedent existing at the time petitioner’s sentence became final. Indeed, to the extent that the differences are significant, they suggest that application of the Godfrey principle to the Mississippi sentencing process follows, a fortiori, from its application to the Georgia system.
1
The principal difference between the sentencing schemes in Georgia and Mississippi is that Mississippi is what we have termed a “weighing” State, while Georgia is not. See Clemons v. Mississippi, 494 U. S., at 745; Parker v. Dugger, 498 U. S. 308, 318 (1991). Under Mississippi law, after a jury has found a defendant guilty of capital murder and found the existence of at least one statutory aggravating factor, it must weigh the aggravating factor or factors against the mitigating evidence. By contrast, in Georgia the jury must find the existence of one aggravating factor before imposing the death penalty, but aggravating factors as such have no specific function in the jury’s decision whether a defendant who has been found to be eligible for the death penalty should receive it under all the circumstances of the case. Instead, under the Georgia scheme, “ ‘[i]n making the decision as to the penalty, the factfinder takes into consideration all circumstances before it from both the guilt-innocence and the sentence phases of the trial. These circumstances relate both to the offense and the defendant.’” Zant v. Stephens, 462 U. S. 862, 872 (1983) (quoting the response of the Georgia Supreme Court to our certified question).
That Mississippi is a weighing State only gives emphasis to the requirement that aggravating factors be defined with some degree of precision. By express language in Zant we left open the possibility that in a weighing State infection of the process with an invalid aggravating factor might require invalidation of the death sentence. Id., at 890. Although we later held in Clemons v. Mississippi that under such circumstances a state appellate court could reweigh the aggravating and mitigating circumstances or undertake harmless-error analysis, we have not suggested that the Eighth Amendment permits the state appellate court in a weighing State to affirm a death sentence without a thorough analysis of the role an invalid aggravating factor played in the sentencing process.
We require close appellate scrutiny of the import and effect of invalid aggravating factors to implement the well-established Eighth Amendment requirement of individualized sentencing determinations in death penalty cases. See Zant, supra, at 879; Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U. S. 104, 110-112 (1982); Lockett v. Ohio, 438 U. S. 586, 601-605 (1978) (plurality opinion); Roberts v. Louisiana, 431 U. S. 633, 636-637 (1977); Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U. S. 153, 197 (1976) (joint opinion of Stewart, Powell, and Stevens, JJ.); Woodson v. North Carolina, 428 U. S. 280, 303-304 (1976) (plurality opinion). In order for a state appellate court to affirm a death sentence after the sentencer was instructed to consider an invalid factor, the court must determine what the sentencer would have done absent the factor. Otherwise, the defendant is deprived of the precision that individualized consideration demands under the Godfrey and Maynard line of cases.
These principles of appellate review were illustrated by our decision in Barclay v. Florida, 463 U. S. 939 (1983). Florida, like Mississippi, is a weighing State, Parker v. Dugger, supra, at 318, and the trial judge imposes the sentence based upon a recommendation from the jury. In Barclay the sentencing judge relied on an aggravating factor that was not a legitimate one under state law. We affirmed the sentence, but only because it was clear that the Florida Supreme Court had determined that the sentence would have been the same had the sentencing judge given no weight to the invalid factor. See 463 U. S., at 958 (plurality opinion); id., at 973-974 (Stevens, J., concurring in judgment). Therefore, contrary to the dissent’s suggestion, post, at 245-247, the fact that both principal opinions in Barclay focused on the weight the sentencer gave to an invalid aggravating factor demonstrates that a reviewing court in a weighing State may not make the automatic assumption that such a factor has not infected the weighing process. In short, it may not make the automatic assumption that Stringer claims the Mississippi Supreme Court made in this case.
In view of the well-established general requirement of individualized sentencing and the more specific requirement that a sentence based on an improper factor be reassessed with care to assure that proper consideration was given, there was no arguable basis to support the view of the Court of Appeals that at the time petitioner’s sentence became final the Mississippi Supreme Court was permitted to apply a rule of automatic affirmance to any death sentence supported by multiple aggravating factors, when one is invalid.
With respect to the function of a state reviewing court in determining whether the sentence can be upheld despite the use of an improper aggravating factor, the difference between a weighing State and a nonweighing State is not one of “semantics,” as the Court of Appeals thought, Stringer v. Jackson, 862 F. 2d, at 1115, but of critical importance. In a nonweighing State, so long as the sentencing body finds at least one valid aggravating factor, the fact that it also finds an invalid aggravating factor does not infect the formal process of deciding whether death is an appropriate penalty. Assuming a determination by the state appellate court that the invalid factor would not have made a difference to the jury’s determination, there is no constitutional violation resulting from the introduction of the invalid factor in an earlier stage of the proceedings. But when the sentencing body is told to weigh an invalid factor in its decision, a reviewing court may not assume it would have made no difference if the thumb had been removed from death’s side of the scale. When the weighing process itself has been skewed, only constitutional harmless-error analysis or reweighing at the trial or appellate level suffices to guarantee that the defendant received an individualized sentence. This clear principle emerges not from any single case, as the dissent would require, post, at 243-247, but from our long line of authority setting forth the dual constitutional criteria of precise and individualized sentencing. Thus, the principal difference between the sentencing systems of Mississippi and Georgia, the different role played by aggravating factors in the two States, underscores the applicability of Godfrey and Maynard to the Mississippi system.
2
Although it made no similar argument in Clemons itself, the State contends now that before Clemons it was reasonable to believe there was no constitutional requirement to define aggravating factors with precision in the Mississippi system. It points to the fact that in order for a jury to find a defendant guilty of capital murder it must find that the crime fits within the narrow and precise statutory definition of that offense. Any additional consideration of aggravating factors during the sentencing phase, under this view, is of no constitutional significance because the requisite differentiation among defendants for death penalty purposes has taken place during the jury’s deliberation with respect to guilt. The State cites our decision in Lowenfield v. Phelps, 484 U. S. 231 (1988), in support of its analysis. But Lowenfield, arising under Louisiana law, is not applicable here and does not indicate that Clemons imposed a new rule.
In Louisiana, a person is not eligible for the death penalty unless found guilty of first-degree homicide, a category more narrow than the general category of homicide. 484 U. S., at 241. A defendant is guilty of first-degree homicide if the Louisiana jury finds that the killing fits one of five statutory criteria. See id., at 242 (quoting La. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 14:30A (West 1986)). After determining that a defendant is guilty of first-degree murder, a Louisiana jury next must decide whether there is at least one statutory aggravating circumstance and, after considering any mitigating circumstances, determine whether the death penalty is appropriate. 484 U. S., at 242. Unlike the Mississippi process, in Louisiana the jury is not required to weigh aggravating against mitigating factors.
In Lowenfield, the petitioner argued that his death sentence was invalid because the aggravating factor found by the jury duplicated the elements it already had found in determining there was a first-degree homicide. We rejected the argument that, as a consequence, the Louisiana sentencing procedures had failed to narrow the class of death-eligible defendants in a predictable manner. We observed that “[t]he use of ‘aggravating circumstances’ is not an end in itself, but a means of genuinely narrowing the class of death-eligible persons and thereby channeling the jury’s discretion. We see no reason why this narrowing function may not be performed by jury findings at either the sentencing phase of the trial or the guilt phase.” Id., at 244-246. We went on to compare the Louisiana scheme with the Texas scheme, under which the required narrowing occurs at the guilt phase. Id., at 246 (discussing Jurek v. Texas, 428 U. S. 262 (1976)). We also contrasted the Louisiana scheme with the Georgia and Florida schemes. 484 U. S., at 246.
The State’s premise that the Mississippi sentencing scheme is comparable to Louisiana’s is in error. The Mississippi Supreme Court itself has stated in no uncertain terms that, with the exception of one distinction not relevant here, its sentencing system operates in the same manner as the Florida system; and Florida, of course, is subject to the rule forbidding automatic affirmance by the state appellate court if an invalid aggravating factor is relied upon. In considering a Godfrey claim based on the same factor at issue here, the Mississippi Supreme Court considered decisions of the Florida Supreme Court to be the most appropriate source of guidance. In Gilliard v. State, 428 So. 2d 576, 586 (1983), the Mississippi Supreme Court compared the claim before it to the claim in Dobbert v. State, 375 So. 2d 1069 (Fla. 1979), cert. denied, 447 U. S. 912 (1980). The court stated:
“In Dobbert. . . the Florida Supreme Court held that even though the lower court considered two circumstances which would not pass constitutional muster and did not amount to aggravating circumstances, there was one aggravating circumstance which existed and that it was sufficient to uphold the death penalty. The only distinction between Dobbert and the present case is that in Dobbert, under Florida law, the judge determined the sentence without a jury.” Gilliard, supra, at 586.
Whether the Mississippi Supreme Court in Gilliard was adopting the kind of harmless-error rule we approved in Barclay, 463 U. S., at 958, and if so, whether it applied that same rule in Stringer’s case, are questions relating to the merits of Stringer’s claim which we need not consider here. What is dispositive is the fact that the Mississippi Supreme Court, which is the final authority on the meaning of Mississippi law, has at all times viewed the State’s sentencing scheme as one in which aggravating factors are critical in the jury’s determination whether to impose the death penalty. See also Evans v. State, 422 So. 2d 737, 743 (Miss. 1982) (applying Godfrey). It would be a strange rule of federalism that ignores the view of the highest court of a State as to the meaning of its own law. See Teague v. Lane, 489 U. S., at 310 (discussing federalism as one of the concerns underlying the nonretroactivity principle).
As a matter of federal law, moreover, the view of the Mississippi Supreme Court that Godfrey’s dictates apply to its capital sentencing procedure is correct. Indeed, it is so evident that the issue was not even mentioned in Clemons. There we took for granted, and the State did not challenge, the proposition that if a State uses aggravating factors in deciding who shall be eligible for the death penalty or who shall receive the death penalty, it cannot use factors which as a practical matter fail to guide the sentencer’s discretion. See Clemons, 494 U. S., at 756, n. 1 (opinion of Blackmun, J., joined by Brennan, Marshall, and Stevens, JJ., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (noting that the unconstitutionality of the vague aggravating factor is implicit in the Court’s opinion).
Even were we free to ignore the Mississippi Supreme Court’s understanding of the way its own law works, we would reject the suggestion that Lowenfield could form the basis for an argument that Godfrey does not apply to Mississippi. Although our precedents do not require the use of aggravating factors, they have not permitted a State in which aggravating factors are decisive to use factors of vague or imprecise content. A vague aggravating factor employed for the purpose of determining whether a defendant is eligible for the death penalty fails to channel the sen-tencer’s discretion. A vague aggravating factor used in the weighing process is in a sense worse, for it creates the risk that the jury will treat the defendant as more deserving of the death penalty than he might otherwise be by relying upon the existence of an illusory circumstance. Because the use of a vague aggravating factor in the weighing process creates the possibility not only of randomness but also of bias in favor of the death penalty, we cautioned in Zant that there might be a requirement that when the weighing process has been infected with a vague factor the death sentence must be invalidated.
Nothing in Lowenfield suggests that the proscription of vague aggravating factors does not apply to a capital sentencing system like Mississippi’s. Lowenfield did not involve a claim that a statutory aggravating factor was ambiguous, and its relevance to Godfrey, which it did not find it necessary to cite, or the line of cases following from Godfrey, is slight at best.
We also note that the State’s reliance on Lowenfield to show that it could not have anticipated Godfrey’s application to Mississippi is somewhat odd. For Lowenfield, after all, was decided when the petitioner’s conviction and sentence already were final. It is a fiction for the State to contend that in 1984 its courts relied on a 1988 decision. This is not to say that a State could not rely on a decision announced after a petitioner’s conviction and sentence became final to defeat his claim on the merits. It could. Insofar as our new rule jurisprudence “validates reasonable, good-faith interpretations of existing precedents,” Butler v. McKellar, 494 U. S., at 414, however, the State may have little cause to complain if in deciding to allow a petitioner to rely upon a decision the federal courts look only to those precedents which the state courts knew at the relevant time. In any event, we need not dwell on the anachronism inherent in the State’s Lowenfield argument because, as we have concluded, that case does not provide a basis for concluding that it was a new rule to apply Godfrey to the Mississippi system.
The State next argues that Clemons’ application of God-frey to Mississippi could not have been dictated by precedent because prior to Clemo'ns the Fifth Circuit concluded that Godfrey did not apply to Mississippi. See Evans v. Thigpen, 809 F. 2d 239, cert. denied, 483 U. S. 1033 (1987); Johnson v. Thigpen, 806 F. 2d 1243 (1986), cert. denied, 480 U. S. 951 (1987). Before addressing the merits of this argument we reiterate that the rationale of the Fifth Circuit has not been adopted by the Mississippi Supreme Court, which, ás a state court, is the primary beneficiary of the Teague doctrine. The Mississippi Supreme Court has recognized that it is bound by Godfrey. See, e. g., Mhoon v. State, 464 So. 2d 77, 85 (1985) (requiring, based on Godfrey, that a capital sentencing jury be given a narrowing construction of the “heinous, atrocious or cruel” factor).
The Fifth Circuit’s pre-Clemons views are relevant to our inquiry, see Butler, supra, at 415, but not dispositive. The purpose of the new rule doctrine is to validate reasonable interpretations of existing precedents. Reasonableness, in this as in many other contexts, is an objective standard, and the ultimate decision whether Clemons was dictated by precedent is based on an objective reading of the relevant cases. The short answer to the State’s argument is that the Fifth Circuit made a serious mistake in Evans v. Thigpen and Johnson v. Thigpen. The Fifth Circuit ignored the Mississippi Supreme Court’s own characterization of its law and accorded no significance to the fact that in Mississippi aggravating factors are central in the weighing phase of a capital sentencing proceeding. As we have explained, when these facts are accorded their proper significance, the precedents even before Maynard and Clemons yield a well-settled principle: Use of a vague or imprecise aggravating factor in the weighing process invalidates the sentence and at the very least requires constitutional harmless-error analysis or reweighing in the state judicial system.
We reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The motion for leave, to proceed in forma pauperis and the petition for writ of certiorari are granted. The judgment is vacated and the case is remanded for further consideration in light of Douglas v. California, 372 U. S. 353.
Mr. Justice Clark and Mr. Justice Harlan dissent for the reasons stated in their opinions in Douglas v. California, 372 U. S., at 358, 360.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court.
Faced with a budget shortfall, Mount Lemmon Fire District, a political subdivision in Arizona, laid off its two oldest full-time firefighters, John Guido (then 46) and Dennis Rankin (then 54). Guido and Rankin sued the Fire District, alleging that their termination violated the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA), 81 Stat. 602, as amended, 29 U.S.C. § 621 et seq. The Fire District sought dismissal of the suit on the ground that the District was too small to qualify as an "employer" within the ADEA's compass. The Act's controlling definitional provision, 29 U.S.C. § 630(b), reads:
"The term 'employer' means a person engaged in an industry affecting commerce who has twenty or more employees.... The term also means (1) any agent of such a person, and (2) a State or political subdivision of a State...."
The question presented: Does the ADEA's numerosity specification (20 or more employees), applicable to "a person engaged in an industry affecting commerce," apply as well to state entities (including state political subdivisions)? We hold, in accord with the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, that § 630(b)'s two-sentence delineation, and the expression "also means" at the start of the second sentence, combine to establish separate categories: persons engaged in an industry affecting commerce with 20 or more employees; and States or political subdivisions with no attendant numerosity limitation. "[T]wenty or more employees" is confining language, but the confinement is tied to § 630(b)'s first sentence, and does not limit the ADEA's governance of the employment practices of States and political subdivisions thereof.
I
Initially, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 78 Stat. 253, as amended, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq., which prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, and national origin, applied solely to private sector employers. The same was true of the ADEA, enacted three years later to protect workers against "arbitrary age discrimination." 29 U.S.C. § 621(b). As originally enacted, both Title VII and the ADEA imposed liability on "employer[s]," defined in both statutes to include "a person engaged in an industry affecting commerce" whose employees met a numerical threshold, but specifically to exclude governmental entities.
78 Stat. 253 (Title VII); 81 Stat. 605 (ADEA).
In 1972, Congress amended Title VII to reach state and local employers. Under the revised provision of Title VII, "[t]he term 'person' includes one or more individuals, governments, governmental agencies, [and] political subdivisions," also certain other specified entities, and "[t]he term 'employer' means a person engaged in an industry affecting commerce who has fifteen or more employees...." 42 U.S.C. § 2000e(a) - (b). For this purpose, amended Title VII defines "industry affecting commerce" to "includ[e] any governmental industry, business, or activity." § 2000e(h). The 1972 amendment to Title VII thereby extended the statute's coverage to state and local government entities by defining them as "person[s]." In turn, as "person[s]," these entities meet Title VII's definition of "employer" and are subject to liability only if they have at least 15 employees.
Two years later, in 1974, Congress amended the ADEA to cover state and local governments. Unlike in Title VII, where Congress added such entities to the definition of "person," in the ADEA, Congress added them directly to the definition of "employer." Thus, since 1974, the ADEA's key definitional provision has read:
"The term 'employer' means a person engaged in an industry affecting commerce who has twenty or more employees.... The term also means (1) any agent of such a person, and (2) a State or political subdivision of a State...." 29 U.S.C. § 630(b).
In the same 1974 enactment, Congress amended the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), on which parts of the ADEA had been modeled, to reach all government employers regardless of their size. See 88 Stat. 58, 29 U.S.C. § 203(d), (x).
The parties dispute the proper reading of the ADEA following the 1974 amendment. Does "also means" add new categories to the definition of "employer," or does it merely clarify that States and their political subdivisions are a type of "person" included in § 630(b)'s first sentence? If the former, state and local governments are covered by the ADEA regardless of whether they have as many as 20 employees. If the latter, they are covered only if they have at least 20 employees. Federal courts have divided on this question. Compare Kelly v. Wauconda Park Dist., 801 F.2d 269 (C.A.7 1986) (state and local governments are covered by the ADEA only if they have at least 20 employees); Cink v. Grant County, 635 Fed.Appx. 470 (C.A.10 2015) (same); Palmer v. Arkansas Council on Economic Educ., 154 F.3d 892 (C.A.8 1998) (same); EEOC v. Monclova, 920 F.2d 360 (C.A.6 1990) (same), with this case, 859 F.3d 1168 (C.A.9 2017) (state and local governments are covered by the ADEA regardless of their number of employees). We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict. 583 U.S. ----, 138 S.Ct. 1165, 200 L.Ed.2d 313 (2018).
II
For several reasons, we conclude that the words "also means" in § 630(b) add new categories of employers to the ADEA's reach. First and foremost, the ordinary meaning of "also means" is additive rather than clarifying. As the Ninth Circuit explained, " 'also' is a term of enhancement; it means 'in addition; besides' and 'likewise; too.' " 859 F.3d, at 1171 (quoting Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary 34 (1973)). Indeed, reading "also" additively to create a separate category of "employer" seemed to this Court altogether fitting in EEOC v. Wyoming, 460 U.S. 226, 103 S.Ct. 1054, 75 L.Ed.2d 18 (1983). There, we held that applying the ADEA to state and local governments does not encroach on States' sovereignty or Tenth Amendment immunity. Id., at 240-242, 103 S.Ct. 1054. In the course of so holding, we described the 1974 ADEA amendment as "extend[ing] the substantive prohibitions of the Act to employers having at least 20 workers [as opposed to 25 in the original version], and to the Federal and State Governments." Id., at 233, 103 S.Ct. 1054 (emphasis added). In this regard, we note, it is undisputed that the ADEA covers Federal Government entities, which our opinion in Wyoming grouped with state entities, regardless of the number of workers they employ. 29 U.S.C. § 633a.
Instructive as well, the phrase "also means" occurs dozens of times throughout the U.S. Code, typically carrying an additive meaning. See Brief for Respondents 11-13, and n. 2 (collecting citations). For example, 12 U.S.C. § 1715z-1(i)(4), provides:
"[T]he term 'elderly families' means families which consist of two or more persons the head of which (or his spouse) is sixty-two years of age or over or is handicapped. Such term also means a single person who is sixty-two years of age or over or is handicapped."
"[A] single person" plainly adds to, rather than clarifies, the preceding statutory delineation, "two or more persons." Just so with States and their political subdivisions in the ADEA's definition of "employer." Notably, in § 1715z-1(i)(4), Congress repeated the "sixty-two years of age or over or is handicapped" qualifier to render it applicable to "a single person." In the ADEA, by contrast, Congress did not repeat the "twenty or more employees" qualifier when referencing state and local government entities. This Court is not at liberty to insert the absent qualifier.
Furthermore, the text of § 630(b) pairs States and their political subdivisions with agents, a discrete category that, beyond doubt, carries no numerical limitation. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 55-56. The Fire District does not gainsay that the 20-employee restriction applies to § 630(b)'s first sentence. Its construction, however, would lift that restriction for the agent portion of the second sentence, and then reimpose it for the portion of that sentence addressing States and their political subdivisions. We resist a reading so strange.
The Fire District presses the argument that the ADEA should be interpreted in line with Title VII, which, as noted supra, at 25, applies to state and local governments only if they meet a numerosity specification. True, reading the ADEA as written to apply to States and political subdivisions regardless of size gives the ADEA, in this regard, a broader reach than Title VII. But this disparity is a consequence of the different language Congress chose to employ. See Gross v. FBL Financial Services, Inc., 557 U.S. 167, 174, 129 S.Ct. 2343, 174 L.Ed.2d 119 (2009) (differences between Title VII's and the ADEA's language should not be ignored). The better comparator is the FLSA, on which many aspects of the ADEA are based. See 29 U.S.C. § 626(b) (ADEA incorporates the "powers, remedies, and procedures" of the FLSA). Like the FLSA, the ADEA ranks States and political subdivisions as "employer [s]" regardless of the number of employees they have.
The Fire District warns that applying the ADEA to small public entities risks curtailment of vital public services such as fire protection. Experience suggests otherwise. For 30 years, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has consistently interpreted the ADEA as we do today. EEOC Compliance Manual: Threshold Issues § 2-III(B)(1)(a)(i), and n. 99. See also Kelly, 801 F.2d, at 270, n. 1. And a majority of States forbid age discrimination by political subdivisions of any size; some 15 of these States subject private sector employers to age discrimination proscriptions only if they employ at least a threshold number of workers. See Brief for Respondents 28-29, and n. 6 (collecting citations). No untoward service shrinkages have been documented.
In short, the text of the ADEA's definitional provision, also its kinship to the FLSA and differences from Title VII, leave scant room for doubt that state and local governments are "employer[s]" covered by the ADEA regardless of their size.
* * *
For the reasons stated, the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is
Affirmed.
Justice KAVANAUGH took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 defines "employer" in materially the same way as Title VII and accords "person ... the same meaning" as in Title VII. 42 U.S.C. § 12111(5), (7).
We need not linger over possible applications of the agent clause, for no question of agent liability is before us in this case.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
B
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Chief Justice Rehnquist
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1992, Congress amended the patent laws and expressly abrogated the States’ sovereign immunity from claims of patent infringement. Respondent College Savings then sued the State of Florida for patent infringement, and the Court of Appeals held that Congress had validly abrogated the State’s sovereign immunity from infringement suits pursuant to its authority under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. We hold that, under City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U. S. 507 (1997), the statute cannot be sustained as legislation enacted to enforce the guarantees of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, and accordingly reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals.
I
Since 1987, respondent College Savings Bank, a New Jersey chartered savings bank located in Princeton, New Jersey, has marketed and sold certificates of deposit known as the CollegeSure CD, which are essentially annuity contracts for financing future college expenses. College Savings obtained a patent for its financing methodology, designed to guarantee investors sufficient funds to cover the costs of tuition for colleges. Petitioner Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Education Expense Board (Florida Prepaid) is an entity created by the State of Florida that administers similar tuition prepayment contracts available to Florida residents and their children. See Fla. Stat. §240.551(1) (Supp. 1998). College Savings claims that, in the course of administering its tuition prepayment program, Florida Prepaid directly and indirectly infringed College Savings’ patent.
College Savings brought an infringement action under 35 U. S. C. § 271(a) against Florida Prepaid in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey in November 1994. By the time College Savings filed its suit, Congress had already passed the Patent and Plant Variety Protection Remedy Clarification Act (Patent Remedy Act), 35 U. S. C. §§ 271(h), 296(a). Before this legislation, the patent laws stated only that “whoever” without authority made, used, or sold a patented invention infringed the patent. 35 U. S. C. § 271(a) (1988 ed.). Applying this Court’s decision in Atas- cadero State Hosp. v. Scanlon, 473 U. S. 234, 242-243 (1985), the Federal Circuit had held that the patent laws failed to contain the requisite statement of intent to abrogate state sovereign immunity from infringement suits. See, e.g., Chew v. California, 893 F. 2d 331 (1989). In response to Chew and similar decisions, Congress enacted the Patent Remedy Act to “clarify that States, instrumentalities of States, and officers and employees of States acting in their official capacity, are subject to suit in Federal court by any person for infringement of patents and plant variety protections.” Pub. L. 102-560, preamble, 106 Stat. 4230; see also H. R. Rep. No. 101-960, pt. 1, pp. 7, 33 (1990) (hereinafter H. R. Rep.); S. Rep. No. 102-280, pp. 1, 5-6 (1992) (hereinafter S. Rep.). Section 271(h) now states: “As used in this section, the term ‘whoever’ includes any State, any instrumentality of a State, and any officer or employee of a State or instrumentality of a State acting in his official capacity.” Section 296(a) addresses the sovereign immunity issue even more specifically:
“Any State, any instrumentality of a State, and any officer or employee of a State or instrumentality of a State acting in his official capacity, shall not be immune, under the eleventh amendment of the Constitution of the United States or under any other doetrine of sovereign immunity, from suit in Federal court by any person... for infringement of a patent under section 271, or for any other violation under this title.”
Relying on these provisions, College Savings alleged that Florida Prepaid had willfully infringed its patent under §271, as well as contributed to and induced infringement. College Savings sought declaratory and injunctive relief as well as damages, attorney’s fees, and costs.
After this Court decided Seminole Tribe of Fla. v. Florida, 517 U. S. 44 (1996), Florida Prepaid moved to dismiss the action on the grounds of sovereign immunity. Florida Prepaid argued that the Patent Remedy Act was an unconstitutional attempt by Congress to use its Article I powers to abrogate state sovereign immunity. College Savings responded that Congress had properly exercised its power pursuant to §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment to enforce the guarantees of the Due Process Clause in §1 of the Amendment. The United States intervened to defend the constitutionality of the statute. Agreeing with College Savings, the District Court denied Florida Prepaid’s motion to dismiss, 948 F. Supp. 400 (N. J. 1996), and the Federal Circuit affirmed, 148 F. 3d 1348 (1998).
The Federal Circuit held that Congress had clearly expressed its intent to abrogate the States’ immunity from suit in federal court for patent infringement, and that Congress had the power under §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment to do so. Id., at 1347. The court reasoned that patents are property subject to the protections of the Due Process Clause and that Congress’ objective in enacting the Patent Remedy Act was permissible because it sought to prevent States from depriving patent owners of this property without due process. See id., at 1349-1350. The court rejected Florida Prepaid’s argument that it and other States had not deprived patent owners of their property without due process, and refused to “deny Congress the authority to subject all states to suit for patent infringement in the federal courts, regardless of the extent of procedural due process that may exist at any particular time.” Id., at 1351. Finally, the court held that the Patent Remedy Act was a proportionate response to state infringement and an appropriate measure to protect patent owners’ property under this Court’s decision in City of Boerne, 521 U. S., at 519. The court concluded that significant harm results from state infringement of patents, 148 F. 3d, at 1353-1354, and “[t]here is no sound reason to hold that Congress cannot subject a state to the same civil consequences that face a private party infringer,” id., at 1355. We granted certiorari, 525 U. S. 1064 (1999), and now reverse.
II
The Eleventh Amendment provides:
“The Judicial Power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.”
As the Court recently explained in Seminole Tribe, supra, at 54:
“Although the text of the Amendment would appear to restrict only the Article III diversity jurisdiction of the federal courts, ‘we have understood the Eleventh Amendment to stand not so much for what it says, but for the presupposition... which it confirms.’ That presupposition, first observed over a century ago in Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U. S. 1 (1890), has two parts: first, that each State is a sovereign entity in our federal system; and second, that ‘ “[i]t is inherent in the nature of sovereignty not to be amenable to the suit of an individual without its consent.’” Id., at 13 (emphasis deleted), quoting The Federalist No. 81.... For over a century we have reaffirmed that federal jurisdiction over suits against unconsenting States ‘was not contemplated by the Constitution when establishing the judicial power of the United States.’ Hans, supra, at 15.”
Here, College Savings sued the State of Florida in federal court, and it is undisputed that Florida has not expressly consented to suit. College Savings and the United States argue that Florida has impliedly waived its immunity under Parden v. Terminal R. Co. of Ala. Docks Dept., 377 U. S. 184 (1964). That argument, however, is foreclosed by our decision in the companion ease overruling the constructive waiver theory announced in Parden. See College Savings Bank v. Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Ed. Expense Bd., post, p. 666.
College Savings and the United States nonetheless contend that Congress’ enactment of the Patent Remedy Act validly abrogated the States’ sovereign immunity. To determine the merits of this proposition, we must answer two questions: “first, whether Congress has ‘unequivocally expresse[d] its intent to abrogate the immunity,’... and second, whether Congress has acted ‘pursuant to a valid exercise of power.’” Seminole Tribe, supra, at 55. We agree with the parties and the Federal Circuit that in enacting the Patent Remedy Act, Congress has made its intention to abrogate the States’ immunity “ ‘unmistakably clear in the language of the statute.’ ” Dellmuth v. Muth, 491 U. S. 223, 228 (1989). Indeed, Congress’ intent to abrogate could not have been any clearer. See 35 U. S. C. § 296(a) (“Any State... shall not be immune, under the eleventh amendment of the Constitution of the United States or under any other doctrine of sovereign immunity, from suit in Federal court... for infringement of a patent”).
Whether Congress had the power to compel States to surrender their sovereign immunity for these purposes, however, is another matter. Congress justified the Patent Remedy Act under three sources of constitutional authority: the Patent Clause, Art. I, §8, cl. 8; the Interstate Commerce Clause, Art. I, §8, cl. 3; and §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. See S. Rep., at 7-8; H. R. Rep., at 39-40. In Seminole Tribe, of course, this Court overruled the plurality opinion in Pennsylvania v. Union Gas Co., 491 U. S. 1 (1989), our only prior ease finding congressional authority to abrogate state sovereign immunity pursuant to an Article I power (the Commerce Clause). 517 U. S., at 72-73. Seminole Tribe makes clear that Congress may not abrogate state sovereign immunity pursuant to its Article I powers; hence the Patent Remedy Act cannot be sustained under either the Commerce Clause or the Patent Clause. Ibid. The Federal Circuit recognized this, and College Savings and the United States do not contend otherwise.
Instead, College Savings and the United States argue that the Federal Circuit properly concluded that Congress enacted the Patent Remedy Act to secure the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections against deprivations of property without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment provides in relevant part:
“Section 1.... No State shall... deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.
“Section 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.”
While reaffirming the view that state sovereign immunity does not yield to Congress’ Article I powers, this Court in Seminole Tribe also reaffirmed its holding in Fitzpatrick v. Bitzer, 427 U. S. 445 (1976), that Congress retains the authority to abrogate state sovereign immunity pursuant to the Fourteenth Amendment. Our opinion explained that in Fitzpatrick, “we recognized that the Fourteenth Amendment, by expanding federal power at the expense of state autonomy, had fundamentally altered the balance of state and federal power struck by the Constitution.” Seminole Tribe, supra, at 59. The Court further described Fitzpatrick as holding that “through the Fourteenth Amendment, federal power extended to intrude upon the province of the Eleventh Amendment and therefore that §5 of the Fourteenth Amendment allowed Congress to abrogate the immunity from suit guaranteed by that Amendment.” Seminole Tribe, supra, at 59.
College Savings and the United States are correct in suggesting that “appropriate” legislation pursuant to the Enforcement Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment could abrogate state sovereignty. Congress itself apparently thought the Patent Remedy Act could be so justified:
“[T]he bill is justified as an acceptable method of enforcing the provisions of the fourteenth amendment. The Court in Lemelson v. Amper Corp.[, 372 F. Supp. 708 (ND Ill. 1974),] recognized that a patent is a form of property, holding that a right to compensation exists for patent infringement. Additionally, because courts have continually recognized patent rights as property, the fourteenth amendment prohibits a State from depriving a person of property without due process of law.” S. Rep., at 8 (footnotes omitted).
We have held that “[t]he ‘provisions of this article/ to which § 5 refers, include the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.” City of Boerne v. Flores, 521 U. S., at 519.
But the legislation must nonetheless be “appropriate” under § 5 as that term was construed in City of Boerne. There, this Court held that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 (RFRA), 107 Stat. 1488, 42 U. S. C. § 2000bb et seq., exceeded Congress’ authority under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment, insofar as RFRA was made applicable to the States. RFRA was enacted “in direct response to” this Court’s decision in Employment Div., Dept. of Human Resources of Ore. v. Smith, 494 U. S. 872 (1990), which construed the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to hold that “neutral, generally applicable laws may be applied to religious practices even when not supported by a compelling governmental interest.” City of Boerne, supra, at 512, 514. Through RFRA, Congress reinstated the compelling governmental interest test eschewed by Smith by requiring that a generally applicable law placing a “substantial burden” on the free exercise of religion must be justified by a “compelling governmental interest” and must employ the “least restrictive means” of furthering that interest. 521 U. S., at 515-516.
In holding that RFRA could not be justified as “appropriate” enforcement legislation under §5, the Court emphasized that Congress’ enforcement power is “remedial” in nature. Id., at 519. We recognized that “[legislation which deters or remedies constitutional violations can fall within the sweep of Congress’ enforcement power even if in the process it prohibits conduct which is not itself unconstitutional and intrudes into 'legislative spheres of autonomy previously reserved to the States.’” Id., at 518 (citation omitted). We also noted, however, that “'[a]s broad as the congressional enforcement power is, it is not unlimited,’” ibid., and held that “Congress does not enforce a constitutional right by changing what the right is. It has been given the power ‘to enforce,’ not the power to determine what constitutes a constitutional violation,” id., at 519. Canvassing the history of the Fourteenth Amendment and case law examining the propriety of Congress’ various voting rights measures, the Court explained:
“While the line between measures that remedy or prevent unconstitutional actions and measures that make a substantive change in the governing law is not easy to discern, and Congress must have wide latitude in determining where it lies, the distinction exists and must be observed. There must be a congruence and proportionality between the injury to be prevented or remedied and the means adopted to that end. Lacking such a connection, legislation may become substantive in operation and effect.” Id., at 519-520.
We thus held that for Congress to invoke § 5, it must identify conduct transgressing the Fourteenth Amendment’s substantive provisions, and must tailor its legislative scheme to remedying or preventing such conduct.
RFRA failed to meet this test because there was little support in the record for the concerns that supposedly animated the law. Id., at 530-581. And, unlike the measures in the voting rights cases, RFRA’s provisions were “so out of proportion to a supposed remedial or preventive object” that RFRA could not be understood “as responsive to, or designed to prevent, unconstitutional behavior.” Id., at 532; see also id., at 534 (“Simply put, RFRA is not designed to identify and counteract state laws likely to be unconstitutional”).
Can the Patent Remedy Act be viewed as remedial or preventive legislation aimed at securing the protections of the Fourteenth Amendment for patent owners? Following City of Boerne, we must first identify the Fourteenth Amendment “evil” or “wrong” that Congress intended to remedy, guided by the principle that the propriety of any §5 legislation “ ‘must be judged with reference to the historical experience... it reflects.’” Id., at 525. The underlying conduct at issue here is state infringement of patents and the use of sovereign immunity to deny patent owners compensation for the invasion of their patent rights. See H. R. Rep., at 37-38 (“[Pjatent owners are effectively denied a remedy for damages resulting from infringement by a State or State entity”); S. Rep., at 6 (“[P]laintiffs in patent infringement cases against a State are foreclosed from damages, regardless of the State conduct”). It is this conduct then — unrem-edied patent infringement by the States — that must give rise to the Fourteenth Amendment violation that Congress sought to redress in the Patent Remedy Act.
In enacting the Patent Remedy Act, however, Congress identified no pattern of patent infringement by the States, let alone a pattern of constitutional violations. Unlike the undisputed record of racial discrimination confronting Congress in the voting rights cases, see City of Boerne, supra, at 525-527, Congress came up with little evidence of infringing conduct on the part of the States. The House Report acknowledged that “many states comply with patent law” and could provide only two examples of patent infringement suits against the States. See H. R. Rep., at 38. The Federal Circuit in its opinion identified only eight patent-infringement suits prosecuted against the States in the 110 years between 1880 and 1990. See 148 F. 3d, at 1353-1354.
Testimony before the House Subcommittee in favor of the bill acknowledged that “states are willing and able to respect patent rights. The fact that there are so few reported cases involving patent infringement claims against states underlies the point.” Patent Remedy Clarification Act: Hearing on H. R. 3886 before the Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Administration of Justice of the House Committee on the Judiciary, 101st Cong., 2d Sess., 56 (1990) (hereinafter House Hearings) (statement of William S. Thompson); id., at 32 (statement of Robert Merges) (“[S]tates do occasionally find themselves in patent infringement suits”). Even the bill’s sponsor conceded that “[w]e do not have any evidence of massive or widespread violation of patent laws by the States either with or without this State immunity.” Id., at 22 (statement of Rep. Kastenmeier). The Senate Report, as well, contains no evidence that unrem-edied patent infringement by States had become a problem of national import. At most, Congress heard testimony that patent infringement by States might increase in the Mure, see House Hearings 22 (statement of Jeffrey Samuels); id., at 36-37 (statement of Robert Merges); id., at 57 (statement of William Thompson), and acted to head off this speculative harm. See H. R. Rep., at 38.
College Savings argues that by infringing a patent and then pleading immunity to an infringement suit, a State not only infringes the patent, but deprives the patentee of property without due process of law and “takes” the property in the patent without paying the just compensation required by the Fifth Amendment. The United States declines to defend the Act as based on the Just Compensation Clause, but joins in College Savings’ defense of the Act as designed to prevent a State from depriving a patentee of property without due process of law. Florida Prepaid contends that Congress may not invoke §5 to protect property interests that it has created in the first place under Article I. Patents, however, have long been considered a species of property. See Brown v. Duchesne, 19 How. 183, 197 (1857) ("For, by the laws of the United States, the rights of a party under a patent are his private property”); cf., Consolidated Fruit-Jar Co. v. Wright, 94 U. S. 92, 96 (1877) ("A patent for an invention is as much property as a patent for land”). As such, they are surely included within the “property” of which no person may be deprived by a State without due process of law. And if the Due Process Clause protects patents, we know of no reason why Congress might not legislate against their deprivation without due process under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Though patents may be considered “property” for purposes of our analysis, the legislative record still provides little support for the proposition that Congress sought to remedy a Fourteenth Amendment violation in enacting the Patent Remedy Act. The Due Process Clause provides, “nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due ‘process of law.” U. S. Const., Amdt. 14, § 1 (emphasis added). This Court has accordingly held that “[i]n procedural due process claims, the deprivation by state action of a constitutionally protected interest... is not in itself unconstitutional; what is unconstitutional is the deprivation of such an interest without due process of law.” Zinermon v. Burch, 494 U.S. 113, 125 (1990) (emphasis deleted).
Thus, under the plain terms of the Clause and the clear import of our precedent, a State’s infringement of a patent, though interfering with a patent owner’s right to exclude others, does not by itself violate the Constitution. Instead, only where the State provides no remedy, or only inadequate remedies, to injured patent owners for its infringement of their patent could a deprivation of property without due process result. See Parrott v. Taylor, 451 U. S. 527, 539-541 (1981); Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U. S. 517, 532-533 (1984); id., at 539 (O’Connor, J., concurring) (“[I]n challenging a property deprivation, the claimant must either avail himself of the remedies guaranteed by state law or prove that the available remedies are inadequate.... When adequate remedies are provided and followed, no... deprivation of property without due process can result”).
Congress, however, barely considered the availability of state remedies for patent infringement and hence whether the States’ conduct might have amounted to a constitutional violation under the Fourteenth Amendment. It did hear a limited amount of testimony to the effect that the remedies available in some States were uncertain.
The primary point made by these witnesses, however, was not that state remedies were constitutionally inadequate, but rather that they were less convenient than federal remedies, and might undermine the uniformity of patent law. See, e. g., House Hearings 43 (statement of Robert Merges) (“[U]niformity again dictates that that sovereign immunity is a mistake in this field because of the variance among the State’s laws”), id., at 34, 41 (Merges); id., at 58 (statement of William Thompson).
Congress itself said nothing about the existence or adequacy of state remedies in the statute or in the Senate Report, and made only a few fleeting references to state remedies in the House Report, essentially repeating the testimony of the witnesses. See H. R. Rep., at 37, n. 158 (“[T]he availability of a State remedy is tenuous and could vary significantly State to State”); id., at 38 (“[I]f patentees turn to the State courts for alternative forms of relief from patent infringement, the result will be a patchwork of State laws, actually undermining the goal of national uniformity in our patent system”). The need for uniformity in the construction of patent law is undoubtedly important, but that is a factor which belongs to the Article I patent-power calculus, rather than to any determination of whether a state plea of sovereign immunity deprives a patentee of property without due process of law.
We have also said that a state actor’s negligent act that causes unintended injury to a person’s property does not “deprive” that person of property within the meaning of the Due Process Clause. See Daniels v. Williams, 474 U. S. 327, 328 (1986). Actions predicated on direct patent infringement, however, do not require any showing of intent to infringe; instead, knowledge and intent are considered only with respect to damages. See 35 U. S. C. § 271(a) (1994 ed., Supp. III); 5 D. Chisum, Patents § 16.02[2], p. 16-31 (rev. ed. 1998) (“ ‘It is, of course, elementary, that an infringement may be entirely inadvertent and unintentional and without knowledge of the patent’ ”). Congress did not focus on instances of intentional qr reckless infringement on the part of the States. Indeed, the evidence before Congress suggested that most state infringement was innocent or at worst negligent. See S. Rep., at 10 (“‘It is not always clear that with all the products that [government] buy[s], that anyone is really aware of the patent status of any particular invention or device or product’ ”); H. R. Rep., at 39 (“[I]t should be very rare for a court to find... willful infringement on the part of a State or State agency”). Such negligent conduct, however, does not violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The legislative record thus suggests that the Patent Remedy Act does not respond to a history of “widespread and persisting deprivation of constitutional rights” of the sort Congress has faced in enacting proper prophylactic § 5 legislation. City of Boerne, 521 U. S., at 526. Instead, Congress appears to have enacted this legislation in response to a handful of instances of state patent infringement that do not necessarily violate the Constitution. Though the lack of support in the legislative record is not determinative, see id., at 531, identifying the targeted constitutional wrong or evil is still a critical part of our §5 calculus because “[s]trong measures appropriate to address one harm may be an unwarranted response to another, lesser one,” id., at 530. Here, the record at best offers scant support for Congress’ conclusion that States were depriving patent owners of property without due process of law by pleading sovereign immunity in federal-court patent actions.
Because of this lack, the provisions of the Patent Remedy Act are “so out of proportion to a supposed remedial or preventive object that [they] cannot be understood as responsive to, or designed to prevent, unconstitutional behavior.” Id., at 532. An unlimited range of state conduct would expose a State to claims of direct, induced, or contributory patent infringement, and the House Report itself cited testimony acknowledging “‘it[’]s difficult for us to identify a patented product or process which might not be used by a state.’” H. R. Rep., at 38. Despite subjecting States to this expansive liability, Congress did nothing to limit the coverage of the Act to cases involving arguable constitutional violations, such as where a State refuses to offer any state-court remedy for patent owners whose patents it had infringed. Nor did it make any attempt to confine the reach of the Act by limiting the remedy to certain types of infringement, such as nonnegligent infringement or infringement authorized pursuant to state policy; or providing for suits only against States with questionable remedies or a high incidence of infringement.
Instead, Congress made all States immediately amenable to suit in federal court for all kinds of possible patent infringement and for an indefinite duration. Our opinion in City of Boerne discussed with approval the various limits that Congress imposed in its voting rights measures, see 521 U. S., at 532-583, and noted that where “a congressional enactment pervasively prohibits constitutional state action in an effort to remedy or to prevent unconstitutional state action, limitations of this kind tend to ensure Congress’ means are proportionate to ends legitimate under §5,” id., at 533. The Patent Remedy Act’s indiscriminate scope offends this principle, and is particularly incongruous in light of the scant support for the predicate unconstitutional conduct that Congress intended to remedy. In sum, it simply cannot be said that “many of [the acts of infringement] affected by the congressional enactment have a significant likelihood of being unconstitutional.” Id., at 532.
The historical record and the scope of coverage therefore make it clear that the Patent Remedy Act cannot be sustained under § 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. The examples of States avoiding liability for patent infringement by pleading sovereign immunity in a federal-court patent action are scarce enough, but any plausible argument that such action on the part of the State deprived patentees of property and left them without a remedy under state law is scarcer still. The statute’s apparent and more basic aims were to provide a uniform remedy for patent infringement and to place States on the same footing as private parties under that regime. These are proper Article I concerns, but that Article does not give Congress the power to enact such legislation after Seminole Tribe.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
College Savings also filed a separate action alleging that Florida Prepaid had made false claims about its own product in violation of the Trademark Act of 1946 (Lanham Act), 15 U. S. C. § 1125(a). The District Court dismissed the Lanham Act suit on Eleventh Amendment grounds, the Third Circuit affirmed, and we granted College Savings’ petition in that ease on the same day we granted the petition in this case. See 525 U. S. 1063 (1999). The Lanham Act suit is the subject of our opinion in College Savings Bank v. Florida Prepaid Postsecondary Ed. Expense Bd., post, p. 666.
Section 271 still provides in relevant part:
“(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title, whoever without authority makes, uses, offers to sell, or sells any patented invention, within the United States or imports into the United States any patented invention during the term of the patent therefor, infringes the patent.
“(b) Whoever actively induces infringement of a patent shall be liable as an infringer.
“(c) Whoever offers to sell or sells within the United States or imports into the United States a component of a patented machine, manufacture, combination or composition, or a material or apparatus for use in practicing a patented process, constituting a material part of the invention, knowing the same to be especially made or especially adapted for use in an infringement of such patent, and not a staple article or commodity of commerce suitable for substantial noninfringing use, shall be liable as a contributory infringer.” 35 U. S. C. §271 (1994 ed. and Supp. III).
The District Court concluded that, for purposes of immunity from suit, Florida Prepaid is an arm of the State of Florida, a conclusion the parties did not dispute before either the Federal Circuit or this Court.
The Patent Clause provides that "Congress shall have Power... [t]o promote the Progress of Sdence and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exdusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” Art. I, §8, d. 8. The Commerce Clause provides that “Congress shall have Power... [t]o regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the Several States, and with the Indian Tribes.” Art. I, §8, d. 3. The relevant portions of the Fourteenth Amendment are discussed below.
See South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U. S. 301 (1966); Katzenbach v. Morgan, 384 U. S. 641 (1966); Oregon v. Mitchell, 400 U. S. 112 (1970); City of Rome v. United States, 446 U. S. 156 (1980).
Representative Kastenmeier made this statement in the course of questioning Jeffrey M. Samuels, Acting Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks, U. S. Department of Commerce. The discussion continued:
“Mr. Kastenmeier....
“Accordingly, could one argue that this legislation may be premature. We really do not know whether it will have any affect [sic] or not.
“Mr. Samuels. Well, you are right, Mr. Chairman. There have not been many cases that have raised this issue. I guess our feeling is that it is a step that should be taken now because the possibility exists in light of Atascadero and in light of the Chew case that more States will get involved in infringing patents.
“I guess as a general policy statement, we believe that those engaged— those who do engage in patent infringement should be subject to all the remedies that are set forth in the Patent Act and that the rights of a patent owner should not be dependent upon the identity of the entity who is infringing, whether it be a private individual, or corporation, or State.
“So just as a general philosophical matter, we believe that this law needs to be passed.”
There is no suggestion in the language of the statute itself, or in the House or Senate Reports of the bill which became the statute, that Congress had in mind the Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Since Congress was so explicit about invoking its authority under Article I and its authority to prevent a State from depriving a person of property without due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment, we think this omission precludes consideration of the Just Compensation Clause as a basis for the Patent Remedy Act.
See, e.g., House Hearings 33 (statement of Robert Merges) (“Thus a patentee... would apparently have to draft her cause of action as a general tort claim — or perhaps one for restitution — to come within the statute. This might be impossible, or at least difficult under California law”); id., at 43 (“[I]t is true that you may have State remedies, alternative State remedies.... You could bring a deceit suit. You could try just a general unfair competition suit. A restitution is one that has occurred to me as a possible basis of recovery”); id., at 34 (“Another problem with this approach is that it assumes that such state law remedies will be available in every state in which the patentee’s product is sold. This may or may not be true”); id., at 47 (statement of William Thompson) (“In this case there is no balance, since there are no — or at least there are not very effective patent remedies at the State level”); id., at 57 (“The court in Lane [v. First Nat. Bank of Boston, 687 F. Supp. 11 (Mass. 1988),] pointed out that the appellant may be able to obtain money damages by recourse to the Massachusetts tort claims act or sue the state for deceit, conversion, or unfair competition under Massachusetts law. The court also noted a Massachusetts statute which provides that damages may be recovered from the state when private property is confiscated for a public purpose. While many states may have similar statutes, the courts' surmise that intellectual property infringement cases may be pursued in some state courts offer us little comfort”); id., at 60 (“[I]t sounds to me like it is a very difficult area to predict what would happen. There is a rich variety of potential causes of action, as the prior speaker [Merges] pointed out”).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
J
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Chief Justice Rehnquist
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case requires the Court to decide whether a defendant in a federal criminal prosecution who denies commission of the crime may nonetheless have the jury instructed, where the evidence warrants, on the affirmative defense of entrapment. The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld the ruling of the District Court, which had refused to instruct the jury as to entrapment because petitioner would not admit committing all of the elements of the crime of accepting a bribe. 803 F. 2d 325 (1986). This holding conflicts with decisions of other Courts of Appeals, which have taken a variety of approaches to the question. We granted certiorari to resolve this conflict, and we now reverse.
Petitioner was employed by the Small Business Administration (SBA) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and was responsible for the SBA’s “8A Program,” which provided aid to certain small businesses. Under the program, the SBA obtained Government contracts and subcontracted them to program participants. The SBA would then assist the participants in performing the contracts. Midwest Knitting Mills, whose president was James DeShazer, was one of the participants in the 8A Program. DeShazer’s principal contact at the SBA was petitioner.
In October 1984, DeShazer complained to a Government customer that petitioner had repeatedly asked for loans. DeShazer believed that petitioner was not providing Midwest with certain 8A Program benefits because DeShazer had not made the requested loans. In early 1985, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arranged for DeShazer to assist in the investigation resulting from his complaint. Under FBI surveillance, DeShazer offered petitioner a loan that, according to DeShazer, petitioner had previously requested. Petitioner agreed to accept the loan, and two months later, DeShazer met petitioner at a restaurant and gave him the money. Petitioner was immediately arrested and charged with accepting a gratuity in exchange for an official act. 18 U. S. C. § 201(g).
Before trial petitioner filed a motion in limine seeking to raise an entrapment defense. The District Court denied the motion, ruling that entrapment was not available to petitioner because he would not admit all of the elements (including the requisite mental state) of the offense charged. The District Court did, however, allow petitioner to argue as his first line of defense that his acts “were procurred [sic] by the overt acts of the principle [sic] witness of the Government, Mr. DeShazer.” App. 131.
At trial, the Government argued that petitioner had accepted the loan in return for cooperation in SBA matters. The Government called DeShazer, who testified both that petitioner had repeatedly asked for loans and that he and petitioner had agreed that the loan at issue would result in SBA-provided benefits for Midwest. The Government also played tape recordings of conversations between DeShazer and petitioner in which they discussed the loan. Petitioner testified in his own defense that although he had accepted the loan, he believed it was a personal loan unrelated to his duties at the SBA. Petitioner stated that he and DeShazer were friends and that he had accepted a personal loan from DeShazer previously. According to petitioner, he was in dire financial straits when DeShazer broached the possibility of providing a loan. Petitioner also testified that DeShazer had stated that he needed quickly to get rid of the money that he was offering to petitioner because he had been hiding the money from his wife and was concerned that she would be upset if she discovered this secret; DeShazer had also stated at one point that if petitioner did not take the money soon, DeShazer would be tempted to spend it.
At the close of the trial, petitioner moved for a “mistrial” because of the District Court’s refusal to instruct the jury as to entrapment. The District Court noted that the evidence of entrapment was “shaky at best,” ibid., but rather than premise its denial of petitioner’s motion on that ground, the court reaffirmed its earlier ruling that, as a matter of law, petitioner was not entitled to an entrapment instruction because he would not admit committing all elements of the crime charged. The jury subsequently found petitioner guilty.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the District Court’s refusal to allow petitioner to argue entrapment:
“When a defendant pleads entrapment, he is asserting that, although he had criminal intent, it was The Government’s deception [that implanted] the criminal design in the mind of the defendant.’ United States v. Russell, 411 U. S. 423, 436 . . . (1973); United States v. Rodgers, 755 F. 2d 533, 550 (7th Cir. 1985). We find this to be inconsistent per se with the defense that the defendant never had the requisite criminal intent. We see no reason to allow [petitioner] or any other defendant to plead these defenses simultaneously.” 803 F. 2d, at 327.
We granted certiorari, 480 U. S. 945 (1987), to consider under what circumstances a defendant is entitled to an entrapment instruction. We hold that even if the defendant denies one or more elements of the crime, he is entitled to an entrapment instruction whenever there is sufficient evidence from which a reasonable jury could find entrapment.
Because the parties agree as to the basics of the affirmative defense of entrapment as developed by this Court, there is little reason to chronicle its history in detail. Suffice it to say that the Court has consistently adhered to the view, first enunciated in Sorrells v. United States, 287 U. S. 435 (1932), that a valid entrapment defense has two related elements: government inducement of the crime, and a lack of predisposition on the part of the defendant to engage in the criminal conduct. See Sherman v. United States, 356 U. S. 369, 376-378 (1958); United States v. Russell, 411 U. S. 423, 435-436 (1973); Hampton v. United States, 425 U. S. 484, 489 (1976). Predisposition, “the principal element in the defense of entrapment,” Russell, supra, at 433, focuses upon whether the defendant was an “unwary innocent” or, instead, an “unwary criminal” who readily availed himself of the opportunity to perpetrate the crime. Sherman, supra, at 372; Russell, supra, at 436. The question of entrapment is generally one for the jury, rather than for the court. Sherman, supra, at 377.
The Government insists that a defendant should not be allowed both to deny the offense and to rely on the affirmative defense of entrapment. Because entrapment presupposes the commission of a crime, Russell, supra, at 435, a jury could not logically conclude that the defendant had both failed to commit the elements of the offense and been entrapped. According to the Government, petitioner is asking to “clai[m] the right to swear that he had no criminal intent and in the same breath to argue that he had one that did not originate with him.” United States v. Henry, 749 F. 2d 203, 214 (CA5 1984) (en banc) (Gee, J., dissenting).
As a general proposition a defendant is entitled to an instruction as to any recognized defense for which there exists evidence sufficient for a reasonable jury to find in his favor. Stevenson v. United States, 162 U. S. 313 (1896); 4 C. Torcia, Wharton’s Criminal Procedure § 538, p. 11 (12th ed. 1976) (hereinafter Wharton). A parallel rule has been applied in the context of a lesser included offense instruction, see Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 31(c); Keeble v. United States, 412 U. S. 205, 208 (1973); Sansone v. United States, 380 U. S. 343, 349 (1965). In Stevenson, this Court reversed a murder conviction arising out of a gunfight in the Indian Territory. The principal holding of the Court was that the evidence was sufficient to entitle the defendant to a manslaughter instruction, but the Court also decided that the defendant was entitled as well to have the jury instructed on self-defense. The affirmative defense of self-defense is, of course, inconsistent with the claim that the defendant killed in the heat of passion.
Federal appellate cases also permit the raising of inconsistent defenses. See Johnson v. United States, 138 U. S. App. D. C. 174, 179, 426 F. 2d 651, 656 (1970) (the defense in a rape case was permitted to argue that the act did not take place and that the victim consented), cert. dism’d, 401 U. S. 846 (1971); see also Womack v. United States, 119 U. S. App. D. C. 40, 336 F. 2d 959 (1964). And state cases support the proposition that a homicide defendant may be entitled to an instruction on both accident and self-defense, two inconsistent affirmative defenses. 4 Wharton § 545, p. 32.
The Government points out that inconsistent pleading is specifically authorized under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, but that there is no parallel authorization under the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Rule 8(e)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides in relevant part:
“A party may set forth two or more statements of a claim or defense alternately or hypothetically, either in one count or defense or in separate counts or defenses. ... A party may also state as many separate claims or defenses as he has regardless of consistency and whether based on legal, equitable or maritime grounds. All statements shall be made subject to the obligations set forth in Rule 11.” (Emphasis added.)
The absence of a cognate provision affecting criminal trials, we think, is not because the Rules intended to more severely restrict criminal defendants than civil parties, but because of the much less elaborate system of pleadings — particularly with respect to the defendant — in a criminal case. The issues of fact in a criminal trial are usually developed by the evidence adduced and the court’s instructions to the jury. A simple plea of not guilty, Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 11, puts the prosecution to its proof as to all elements of the crime charged, and raises the defense of entrapment. Sorrells, 287 U. S., at 452. The only matters required to be specially pleaded by a defendant are notice of alibi, Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 12.1, or of intent to rely on insanity as a defense, Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 12.2.
The Government argues that allowing a defendant to rely on inconsistent defenses will encourage perjury, lead to jury confusion, and subvert the truth-finding function of the trial. These same concerns are, however, present in the civil context, yet inconsistency is expressly allowed under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. We do not think that allowing inconsistency necessarily sanctions perjury. Here petitioner wished to testify that he had no intent to commit the crime, and have his attorney argue to the jury that if it concluded otherwise, then it should consider whether that intent was the result of Government inducement. The jury would have considered inconsistent defenses, but petitioner would not have necessarily testified untruthfully.
We would not go so far as to say that charges on inconsistent defenses may not on occasion increase the risk of perjury, but particularly in the case of entrapment we think the practical consequences will be less burdensome than the Government fears. The Court of Appeals in United States v. Demma, 523 F. 2d 981, 985 (CA9 1975) (en banc), observed:
“Of course, it is very unlikely that the defendant will be able to prove entrapment without testifying and, in the course of testifying, without admitting that he did the acts charged. . . . When he takes the stand, the defendant forfeits his right to remain silent, subjects himself to all the rigors of cross-examination, including impeachment, and exposes himself to prosecution for perjury. Inconsistent testimony by the defendant seriously impairs and potentially destroys his credibility. While we hold that a defendant may both deny the acts and other elements necessary to constitute the crime charged and at the same time claim entrapment, the high risks to him make it unlikely as a strategic matter that he will choose to do so.”
The Government finally contends that since the entrapment defense is not of “constitutional dimension,” Russell, 411 U. S., at 433, and that since it is “relatively limited,” id., at 435, Congress would be free to make the entrapment defense available on whatever conditions and to whatever category of defendants it believed appropriate. Congress, of course, has never spoken on the subject, and so the decision is left to the courts. We are simply not persuaded by the Government’s arguments that we should make the availability of an instruction on entrapment where the evidence justifies it subject to a requirement of consistency to which no other such defense is subject.
The Government contends as an alternative basis for affirming the judgment below that the evidence at trial was insufficient to support an instruction on the defense of entrapment. Of course evidence that Government agents merely afforded an opportunity or facilities for the commission of the crime would be insufficient to warrant such an instruction. But this question was pretermitted by the Court of Appeals, and it will be open for consideration by that court on remand.
Reversed and remanded.
Justice Kennedy took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Two other Circuits have adopted the approach taken by the Seventh Circuit. See United States v. Hill, 655 F. 2d 512, 514 (CA3 1981); United States v. Whitley, 734 F. 2d 1129, 1139 (CA6 1984). Four Circuits have ruled that a defendant may not affirmatively deny committing the elements of the crime if he desires an entrapment instruction. United States v. Annese, 631 F. 2d 1041, 1046-1047 (CA1 1980); United States v. Mayo, 705 F. 2d 62, 72-73 (CA2 1983); United States v. Dorta, 783 F. 2d 1179, 1181 (CA4), cert. denied, 477 U. S. 905 (1986); United States v. Mora, 768 F. 2d 1197, 1198-1199 (CA10 1985), cert. denied, 474 U. S. 1083 (1986). One Circuit has declared that a defendant denying the elements of the crime may rely on entrapment if the issue is raised by the Government’s evidence. United States v. Smith, 757 F. 2d 1161, 1169 (CA11 1985). Another Circuit has developed a hybrid rule allowing a testifying defendant to contest the intent element of the offense charged, but not the acts, while arguing entrapment. United States v. Henry, 749 F. 2d 203 (CA5 1984) (en banc); two Circuits have ruled that a defendant is entitled to an entrapment instruction even if he testifies and denies all elements of the offense. United States v. Demma, 523 F. 2d 981 (CA9 1975) (en banc); Hansford v. United States, 112 U. S. App. D. C. 359, 303 F. 2d 219 (1962). We note also that even within the Circuits, the decisions have been contradictory and inconsistent.
In pursuing this line of defense, petitioner apparently introduced the same evidence that he planned to adduce in support of his entrapment claim.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Powell
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case involves a two-pronged constitutional attack on a recent amendment to one part of a complex Maryland plan for ridding that State of abandoned automobiles. The three-judge District Court agreed with appellee, a Virginia scrap processor that participates in the plan, that the amendment violated the Commerce Clause and denied appellee equal protection of the laws. We disagree on both points.
I
The 1967 session of the Maryland Legislature commissioned a study to suggest some way to deal with the growing aesthetic problem of abandoned automobiles. The study concluded that the root of the problem was the existence of bottlenecks in the “scrap cycle,” the course that a vehicle follows from abandonment to processing into scrap metal for ultimate re-use by steel mills. At its 1969 session, the legislature responded by enacting a comprehensive statute designed to speed up the scrap cycle by using state money both as a carrot and as a stick. The statute is intricate, but its provisions relevant to this case may be sketched briefly.
The legislative study had found that one of the bottlenecks occurred in the junkyards of wrecking companies, which tended to accumulate vehicles for the resale value of their spare parts. The statute’s stick designed to clear this bottleneck is a requirement that a Maryland wrecker desiring to keep abandoned vehicles on its premises must obtain a license and pay a recurring fine for any vehicle of a specified age retained for more than a year. The study had identified as another cause of sluggishness in the scrap cycle the low profits earned by wreckers and others for delivering vehicles to scrap processors. The carrot written into the statute to remedy this problem is a “bounty" paid by the State for the destruction, by a processor licensed under the statute, of any vehicle formerly titled in Maryland. When a wrecker licensed under the statute to stockpile vehicles delivers one of them for scrapping it shares the bounty equally with the processor. The processor receives the entire bounty when it destroys a vehicle supplied by someone other than a licensed wrecker.
These penalty and bounty provisions work with elementary laws of economics to speed up the scrap cycle. The penalty for retention of vehicles, plus the prospect of sharing the bounty, work in tandem to encourage licensed wreckers to move vehicles to processors. The bounties to processors on vehicles from unlicensed suppliers also encourage those suppliers to deliver to the processors, because the processors are able to pay higher than normal market prices by sharing the bounties with them.
The penalty and bounty provisions, however, did not remove another impediment to the smooth functioning of the scrap cycle that was legal rather than economic in origin. This was the possibility of suits for conversion against a processor by owners who might claim that they had not abandoned their vehicles. To meet this problem the statute specified several documents with which a processor could prove clear title to a vehicle, and required that a processor obtain one of these documents from its supplier and submit it to the State as a condition of receiving the bounty. One of the documents, called a “Wrecker’s Certificate,” can be given only by a wrecker licensed under the statute. It is essentially a clear title that the wrecker secures by following statutory notice procedures at the time it first obtains a vehicle. Suppliers other than licensed wreckers must provide some other document — either a properly endorsed certificate of title, a certificate from a police department vesting title in the supplier after statutory notices, or a bill of sale from a police auction.
These documentation requirements, although vital for the protection of processors, are themselves some slight encumbrance upon the free transfer of abandoned vehicles to processors. Apparently in recognition of this fact, and the reduced potential for owners’ claims in the case of ancient automobiles, the statute placed vehicles over eight years old and inoperable (“hulks”) into a special category. Section 11-1002.2 (f) (5) of the statute, as originally enacted, provided in substance that anyone in possession of a hulk could transfer it to a scrap processor, and the processor could claim a bounty for its destruction, without delivery to the processor or subsequent submission to the State of any documentation of title.
A
The statute extends its burdens of fines, and its benefits in the form of a share in bounties, only to wreckers that maintain junkyards located in Maryland, and requires a license only of those wreckers. There is no similar residency requirement for scrap processors that wish to obtain a license and participate in the bounty program, and in fact seven of the 16 scrap processors that have participated are located in either Pennsylvania or Virginia. Appellee, a Virginia corporation with a processing plant near the Potomac River in Alexandria, was an original licensee under the Maryland statute. Presumably because of its proximity to the southern Maryland and Washington, D. C., areas, appellee attracted enough Maryland-titled vehicles to its plant to rank third among licensed processors in receipt of bounties through the summer of 1974.
As is apparently the case with most of the licensed processors, virtually all (96%) of the bounty-eligible vehicles processed by appellee during that period were hulks, upon which appellee did not have to demand title documentation from its suppliers in order later to receive the bounty. In the summer of 1974, however, Maryland changed significantly the treatment of hulks by amending § 11-1002.2 (f)(5). Under the law as amended it is no longer possible for a licensed scrap processor to receive a bounty on a hulk without submitting title documentation to the State. But the documentation required of a processor whose plant is in Maryland differs from that required of a processor, like appellee, whose plant is not in Maryland. The former need only submit a simple document in which the person who delivered the hulk certified his own right to it and agreed to indemnify the processor for any third-party claims arising from its destruction. Hulk processors long had required such “indemnity agreements” from their hulk suppliers as a matter of industry practice. The effect of the 1974 amendment is to give these agreements legal recognition and to require one when a Maryland processor applies for a bounty on a hulk. The non-Maryland processor, however, cannot submit a simple indemnity agreement. For it, receipt of a bounty on a hulk now depends upon the same documentation specified for abandoned vehicles in general: a certificate of title, a police certificate vesting title, a bill of sale from a police auction, or — in the case of licensed wreckers only — a Wrecker’s Certificate.
B
The complaint in this case was filed shortly after the effective date of the amendment to § 11-1002.2 (f) (5). Papers submitted to the three-judge District Court on summary judgment indicated that enactment of the amendment had been followed by a precipitate decline in the number of bounty-eligible hulks supplied to ap-pellee’s plant from Maryland sources. Appellee attributed the decline primarily to the effect of the amendment upon the decision of unlicensed suppliers as to where to dispose of their hulks. It is easier for an unlicensed supplier to sign an indemnity agreement upon delivering a hulk to a processor than it is for it to secure some form of title documentation. Because only a Maryland processor can use an indemnity agreement to obtain a bounty, the amendment gave Maryland processors an advantage over appellee and other non-Maryland processors in the competition for bounty-eligible hulks from unlicensed suppliers. Such hulks therefore now tend to remain in State instead of moving to licensed processors outside Maryland.
Appellee contended below that the 1974 amendment to § 11-1002.2 (f) (5) violated the Commerce Clause by interfering with, or “burdening,” the flow of bounty-eligible hulks across state lines, and denied appellee equal protection of the laws by discriminating arbitrarily between it and licensed processors located in Maryland as to the right to claim bounties on hulks by submitting indemnity agreements. The District Court granted summary judgment to appellee on both claims, and enjoined the State of Maryland from giving further effect to that part of the 1974 amendment which restricts the right to obtain bounties based on indemnity agreements to Maryland processors only. 391 F. Supp. 46. The State appealed, and we noted probable jurisdiction. 423 U. S. 819.
II
In this Court appellee relies on the Commerce Clause argument that was adopted by the District Court. The argument starts from the premise, well established by the history of the Commerce Clause, that this Nation is a common market in which state lines cannot be made barriers to the free flow of both raw materials and finished goods in response to the economic laws of supply and demand. See Great A&P Tea Co. v. Cottrell, 424 U. S. 366, 370-371 (1976). Appellee concedes that until the 1974 amendment the Maryland system operated in conformity with the common-market principle. There was free competition among licensed processors for Maryland hulks from unlicensed suppliers and an unimpeded flow of such hulks out of Maryland to appellee and other non-Maryland processors. The only effect of the bounty was to enhance the value of hulks and thus make it more likely that they would be moved to processing plants.
The practical effect of the amendment, however, was to limit the enhanced price available to unlicensed suppliers to hulks that stayed inside Maryland, thus discouraging such suppliers from taking their hulks out of State for processing. The result was that the movement of hulks in interstate commerce was reduced. Appellee contends that this effect of the 1974 amendment is a “burden” on interstate commerce, the permissibility of which must be determined under the test of Pike v. Bruce Church, Inc., 397 U. S. 137, 142 (1970). The Court there stated that “the extent of the burden that will be tolerated will... depend on the nature of the local interest involved, and on whether it could be promoted as well with a lesser impact on interstate activities.” See also Great A&P Tea Co. v. Cottrell, supra, at 371-372.
The District Court accepted appellee’s analysis, and concluded that the 1974 amendment failed the Pike test. First, the court found that the amendment did impose “substantial burdens upon the free flow of interstate commerce.” 391 F. Supp., at 62. Moreover, it considered the disadvantage suffered by out-of-state processors to be particularly suspect under previous decisions of this Court, noting that to avoid the disadvantage those processors would have to build new plants inside Maryland to carry on a business which, prior to the amendment, they had pursued efficiently outside the State. See Foster-Fountain Packing Co. v. Haydel, 278 U. S. 1 (1928); Pike v. Bruce Church, Inc., supra, at 145. Maryland’s principal argument in support of the amendment was that, by making it difficult for out-of-state processors to claim bounties on hulks delivered by unlicensed suppliers, the amendment tends to reduce the amount of state funds paid for destruction of Maryland-titled hulks abandoned in the States where those processors are located instead of in Maryland. The District Court acknowledged the validity of this interest, but considered the means employed inappropriate under Pike because the same interest could have been furthered, with less impact upon interstate commerce, by amending the statute to condition the bounty upon a hulk's abandonment in Maryland instead of its previous titling there.
This line of reasoning is not without force if its basic premise is accepted. That premise is that every action by a State that has the effect of reducing in some manner the flow of goods in interstate commerce is potentially an impermissible burden. But we are not persuaded that Maryland’s action in amending its statute was the kind of action with which the Commerce Clause is concerned.
The situation presented by this statute and the 1974 amendment is quite unlike that found in the cases upon which appellee relies. In the most recent of those cases, Pike v. Bruce Church, supra, a burden was found to be imposed by an Arizona requirement that fresh fruit grown in the State be packed there before shipment interstate. The requirement prohibited the interstate shipment of fruit in bulk, no matter what the market demand for such shipments. In H. P. Hood & Sons v. Du Mond, 336 U. S. 525 (1949), a New York official denied a license to a milk distributor who wanted to open a new plant at which to receive raw milk from New York farmers for immediate shipment to Boston. The denial blocked a potential increase in the interstate movement of raw milk. Appellee also relies upon Toomer v. Witsell, 334 U. S. 385 (1948), in which this Court found interstate commerce in raw shrimp to be burdened by a South Carolina requirement that shrimp boats fishing off its coast dock in South Carolina and pack and pay taxes on their catches before transporting them interstate. The requirement increased the cost of shipping such shrimp interstate. In Foster-Fountain Packing Co. v. Haydel, 278 U. S. 1 (1928), a Louisiana statute forbade export of Louisiana shrimp until they had been shelled and beheaded, thus impeding the natural flow of freshly caught shrimp to canners in other States. Both Shafer v. Farmers Grain Co., 268 U. S. 189 (1925), and Lemke v. Farmers Grain Co., 258 U. S. 50 (1922), involved efforts by North Dakota to regulate and thus disrupt the interstate market in grain by imposing burdensome regulations upon and controlling the profit margin of corporations that purchased grain in State for shipment and sale outside the State. And in Pennsylvania v. West Virginia, 262 U. S. 553 (1923), the Court found a burden upon the established interstate commerce in natural gas when a new West Virginia statute required domestic producers to supply all domestic needs before piping the surplus, if any, to other States.
The common thread of all these cases is that the State interfered with the natural functioning of the interstate market either through prohibition or through burdensome regulation. By contrast, Maryland has not sought to prohibit the flow of hulks, or to regulate the conditions under which it may occur. Instead, it has entered into the market itself to bid up their price. There has been an impact upon the interstate flow of hulks only because, since the 1974 amendment, Maryland effectively has made it more lucrative for unlicensed suppliers to dispose of their hulks in Maryland rather than take them outside the State.
Appellee recognizes that the situation presented by this case is without precedent in this Court. It argues that the 1974 amendment nevertheless must be subjected to the same scrutiny as the state actions in earlier cases, because “[w]bat is controlling... is not the means by which Maryland has chosen to discriminate, but the practical effect of that discrimination upon interstate commerce.” Brief for Appellee 63. In short, appellee urges that the alleged burden upon interstate commerce from the 1974 amendment “is not immunized by its novelty.” Ibid.
We believe, however, that the novelty of this case is not its presentation of a new form of “burden” upon commerce, but that appellee should characterize Maryland’s action as a burden which the Commerce Clause was intended to make suspect. The Clause was designed in part to prevent trade barriers that had undermined efforts of the fledgling States to form a cohesive whole following their victory in the Revolution. This aspect of the. Clause’s purpose was eloquently expressed by Mr. Justice Jackson:
“Our system, fostered by the Commerce Clause, is that every farmer and every craftsman shall be encouraged to produce by the certainty that he will have free access to every market in the Nation, that no home embargoes will withhold his exports, and no foreign state will by customs duties or regulations exclude them. Likewise, every consumer may look to the free competition from every producing area in the Nation to protect him from exploitation by any. Such was the vision of the Founders; such has been the doctrine of this Court which has given it reality....” H. P. Hood & Sons v. Du Mond, supra, at 539.
In realizing the Founders’ vision this Court has adhered strictly to the principle “that the right to engage in interstate commerce is not the gift of a state, and that a state cannot regulate or restrain it.” Id., at 535. But until today the Court has not been asked to hold that the entry by the State itself into the market as a purchaser, in effect, of a potential article of interstate commerce creates a burden upon that commerce if the State restricts its trade to its own citizens or businesses within the State.
We do not believe the Commerce Clause was intended to require independent justification for such action. Maryland entered the market for the purpose, agreed by all to be commendable as well as legitimate, of protecting the State's environment. As the means of furthering this purpose, it elected the payment of state funds — in the form of bounties — to encourage the removal of automobile hulks from Maryland streets and junkyards. It is true that the state money initially was made available to licensed out-of-state processors as well as those located within Maryland, and not until the 1974 amendment was the financial benefit channeled, in practical effect, to domestic processors. But this chronology does not distinguish the case, for Commerce Clause purposes, from one in which a State offered bounties only to domestic processors from the start. Regardless of when the State’s largesse is first confined to domestic processors, the effect upon the flow of hulks resting within the State is the same: they will tend to be processed inside the State rather than flowing to foreign processors. But no trade barrier of the type forbidden by the Commerce Clause, and involved in previous cases, impedes their movement out of State. They remain within Maryland in response to market forces, including that exerted by money from the State. Nothing in the purposes animating the Commerce Clause prohibits a State, in the absence of congressional action, from participating in the market and exercising the right to favor its own citizens over others.
Ill
The District Court also found the 1974 amendment to be violative of the Equal Protection Clause. Appellee supports this holding by contending that no difference between the operations of foreign and domestic processors justifies denying to the former the right to use indemnity agreements, and that this discriminatory denial furthers no legitimate state purpose. Maryland, having licensed out-of-staté processors, does not justify the amendment’s distinction on the basis of any difference in the manner of operation. But Maryland does insist that several state interests are served by it. We agree with Maryland with respect to its primary justification for the 1974 amendment, and thus find it unnecessary to consider other interests that also may be furthered.
Maryland argues that the distinction between domestic and foreign processors in the 1974 amendment is related to the basic statutory purpose of clearing Maryland’s landscape of abandoned automobiles. Underlying this argument are the complementary assumptions that hulks delivered to Maryland processors are likely to have been abandoned in Maryland, and those delivered to non-Maryland processors are likely to have been abandoned outside Maryland. Based upon those assumptions, the State contends that the 1974 amendment, by making it easy for an in-state processor to receive bounties but difficult for an out-of-state processor to do so, tends to ensure that the State’s limited resources are targeted to hulks abandoned inside Maryland as opposed to some contiguous State.
The District Court rejected this argument with the observation that Maryland had “not proffered a scintilla of factual support for [its] assumption that nonresident processors are more likely than in-state processors to claim bounties for vehicles abandoned outside of Maryland.” 391 F. Supp., at 57. The District Court demanded too much. Maryland’s underlying assumptions certainly are not irrational: in terms of likelihood, the Maryland Legislature reasonably could assume that a hulk destroyed by a non-Maryland processor is more likely to have been abandoned outside Maryland than is a hulk destroyed by a Maryland processor, and vice versa. The State is not compelled to verify logical assumptions with statistical evidence.
Appellee contends that the alleged relationship of the amendment to the statutory purpose is belied by a “loophole” in the statute that remains even after the amendment. This “loophole” results from the fact that the statute conditions the payment of bounty upon previous titling of a vehicle in Maryland, rather than upon proof of its abandonment in that State. Thus, even after the 1974 amendment an in-state processor remains free to recover bounties on hulks previously titled in Maryland but delivered to it after abandonment elsewhere. A more discriminating effort to achieve the statutory purposes, according to appellee, would have changed the statute to condition the bounty upon proof of abandonment in Maryland.
It is well established, however, that a statutory classification impinging upon no fundamental interest, and especially one dealing only with economic matters, need not be drawn so as to fit with precision the legitimate purposes animating it. Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U. S. 483, 489 (1955). That Maryland might have furthered its underlying purpose more artfully, more directly, or more completely, does not warrant a conclusion that the method it chose is unconstitutional. See Katzenbach v. Morgan, 384 U. S. 641, 657 (1966).
Moreover, the statute in its present form still allows payment of bounty on a hulk to a non-Maryland processor upon proper documentation of title. The logic in support of the 1974 amendment — that Maryland processors are more likely than out-of-state processors to destroy hulks abandoned inside the State — suggests the rationality of Maryland’s discontinuing bounties to out-of-state processors altogether. If Maryland could do that, we are not prepared to say that it is forbidden to go part of the way by an amendment that has the practical effect, through the distinction as to documentation of title, of substantially curtailing bounty payments to out-of-state processors.
Few would contend that Maryland has taken the straightest road to its goal, either in its original drafting of the statute or in the refinement introduced by the 1974 amendment. But in the area in which this bounty scheme operates the Equal Protection Clause does not demand a surveyor’s precision. The 1974 amendment bears a rational relationship to Maryland’s purpose of using its limited funds to clean up its own environment, and that is all the Constitution requires. See Dandridge v. Williams, 397 U. S. 471, 486-487 (1970); San Antonio School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 1, 44 (1973); McGinnis v. Royster, 410 U. S. 263, 270, 276-277 (1973).
We hold that the District Court erred in finding the 1974 amendment invalid under either the Commerce Clause or the Equal Protection Clause. Accordingly, its judgment is reversed.
So ordered.
1969 Md. Laws, c. 556. The law, as amended, is codified at Md. Ann. Code, Art. 66%, § 5-201 et seq. (1970 ed. and Supp. 1975).
Md. Ann. Code, Art. 66y2, §§5-202, 5-203 (d) (Supp. 1975).
Md. Ann. Code, Art. 66y2, §5-205 (Supp. 1975).
In addition to receiving vehicles from licensed wreckers, processors receive them from the owners of the vehicles themselves and, more frequently, from unlicensed wreckers who tow an abandoned or wrecked vehicle directly to a processor rather than retaining it for its spare-part value.
The bounty started at $10 per vehicle and moved up to $16 by the time of this suit. As noted in the text, supra, a licensed wrecker receives half of this sum directly from the State. A profit margin for unlicensed suppliers is assured by the willingness of processors, who need a fairly constant supply of hulks to run their expensive machinery efficiently, to “rebate” most of the bounty. Appellee, for example, regularly pays $14 of the current $16 bounty to its unlicensed suppliers.
Md. Ann. Code, Art. 66%, § 5-203 (b), (c) (1970 ed. and Supp. 1975).
Md. Ann. Code, Art. 66%, §§5-203.1, 11-1002.2 (f) (1-4), 11-1002.2 (a-d) (1970 ed. and Supp. 1975).
Maryland Ann. Code, Art. 66%, § 11-1002.2 (f) (5) (1970), as originally enacted, read as follows:
“Notwithstanding any other provisions of this section, any person, firm, corporation, or unit of government upon whose property or in whose possession any abandoned motor vehicle is found, or any person being the owner of a motor vehicle whose title certificate is faulty, or destroyed, may dispose of the motor vehicle to a wrecker or scrap processor without the title and. without notification 'procedures of subsection (c) [subsections (a) and (b)] of this section, if the motor vehicle is over eight years old and has no engine or is otherwise totally inoperable.” (Emphasis supplied.)
A participating processor must meet statutory requirements relating to its storage area for vehicles, its records and books of account, and its processing equipment. Md. Ann. Code, Art. 66%, §5-202 (Supp. 1975). An administrative regulation promulgated pursuant to the statute requires that a licensed non-Maryland processor maintain an “office” within the State approved by the State Motor Vehicle Administration. Md. A. R. R. § 11.02.05.45.
1974 Md. Laws, c. 465. The amendment did not change the wording of the original section, n. 8, supra, but added the following language:
“In those cases only, a scrap processor whose plant is physically located and operating in this State shall execute an indemnity agreement that shall be filed with the Motor Vehicle Administration. The indemnity agreement shall contain the name, address and signature of the person delivering the vehicle. The indemnity agreement and the manufacturer’s serial or identification number shall be satisfactory proof that the vehicle has been destroyed and shall be acceptable for payment of the full bounty authorized by section 5-205 if the vehicle identified in the indemnity agreement was titled in this State. Otherwise, for the purpose of administering the provisions of this section, the provisions of section 5-205 shall not apply.”
Section 5-205, mentioned in the amendment, is the only statutory provision authorizing bounty payments. See supra, at 797. Without the benefit of § 11-1002.2 (f) (5) following the 1974 amendment, out-of-state processors must depend upon other sections that authorize a § 5-205 bounty only upon more elaborate title documentation. See supra, at 798.
Appellee submitted an affidavit of its general manager containing statistics that showed the decline. During the six-month period immediately preceding the effective date of the amendment, appellee received 14,253 hulks from Maryland sources. In the six months immediately thereafter, the total was 9,723. This marked a decline of 31.8% in the number of bounty-eligible hulks, at a time when appellee’s figures showed an increase of 11.9% in the number of vehicles supplied from non-Maryland sources.
Appellee’s figures showed that the mjmber of hulks delivered by licensed wreckers, which before and after the amendment tended to use Wrecker’s Certificates almost exclusively, more than doubled in the six months following the amendment (from 1,934 vehicles in the preceding six months to a total of 4,161 vehicles). The number of hulks delivered by unlicensed suppliers, however, plummeted by 54.9%, from 12,319 during the six months before the amendment to 5,561 in the comparable period thereafter.
The amendment' did not accomplish this effect directly. After the amendment it still was possible for licensed non-Maryland processors to receive bounty-eligible hulks from unlicensed Maryland suppliers. But because it was significantly easier for those suppliers to obtain an enhanced price from Maryland processors, they tended to deliver inside the State. The practical effect was substantially the same as if Maryland had withdrawn altogether the availability of bounties on hulks delivered by unlicensed suppliers to licensed non-Maryland processors. Indeed, this is the way appellee characterized the operation of the amendment:
“Old and inoperable hulks continued to fetch an ‘artifically enhanced value’ for their suppliers, but only if delivered intrastate to ‘a scrap processor whose plant is physically located and operating’ in Maryland. Old and inoperable hulks exported for processing in contiguous states were ineligible for bounty and sold at much lower prices prevailing on the free market for scrap metal. For towing services and other unlicensed suppliers, in business for profit and attracted by high prices, transactions with licensed processors beyond Maryland’s borders now entailed financial sacrifice. Accordingly, their hulks were withdrawn from interstate commerce and delivered for processing within Maryland for the bounty-generated rebates which only Maryland-based processors could provide.” Brief for Appellee 34.
Cf. infra, Part III.
Again, we emphasize that the 1974 amendment, by its terms, does not require unlicensed suppliers to deliver hulks in State to receive enhanced prices. This is simply its effect in practice, and this is the way appellee itself views the amendment as operating. See n. 13, supra. To whatever extent unlicensed suppliers still take hulks from Maryland to appellee and other non-Maryland processors, of course, there has been no interruption of interstate commerce.
“It was... to secure freedom of trade, to break down the barriers to its free flow, that the Annapolis Convention was called, only to adjourn with a view to Philadelphia. Thus the generating source of the Constitution lay in the rising volume of restraints upon commerce which the Confederation could not check. They were the proximate cause of our national existence down to today.
“As evils are wont to do, they dictated the character and scope of their own remedy. This lay specifically in the commerce clause. No prohibition of trade barriers as among the states could have been effective of its own force or by trade agreements.... Power adequate to make and enforce the prohibition was required. Hence, the necessity for creating an entirely new scheme of government.” W. Rutledge, A Declaration of Legal Faith 25-26 (1947). See H. P. Hood & Sons v. Du Mond, 336 U. S. 525, 533-535 (1949).
The cases upon which appellee primarily relies, and which are discussed in the text, supra, at 805-806, illustrate that this principle makes suspect any attempt by a State to restrict or regulate the flow of commerce out of the State. The same principle, of course, makes equally suspect a State’s similar effort to block or to regulate the flow of commerce into the State. See, e. g., Baldwin v. G. A. F. Seelig, Inc., 294 U. S. 511 (1935); Dean Milk Co. v. Madison, 340 U. S. 349 (1951); Polar Ice Cream & Creamery Co. v. Andrews, 375 U. S. 361 (1964). See generally Great A&P Tea Co. v. Cottrell, 424 U. S. 366 (1976).
We note that the commerce affected by the 1974 amendment appears to have been created, in whole or in substantial part, by the Maryland bounty scheme. We would hesitate to hold that the Commerce Clause forbids state action reducing or eliminating a flow of commerce dependent for its existence upon state subsidy instead of private market forces. Because the record contains no details of the hulk market prior to the bounty scheme, however, this issue is not clearly presented.
We also note that appellee undertook to build no new plant nor add additional machinery in reliance upon the prospect of receiving additional hulks under the Maryland bounty scheme. Instead, appellee stipulated in the District Court that participation in the program has caused no alteration in its method of operation. We intimate no view as to the consequences, if any, in a Commerce Clause case of a different state of facts in this respect. Cf. Pennsylvania v. West Virginia, 262 U. S. 553, 587 (1923); F. Ribble, State and National Power over Commerce 219 (1937).
Our reference to the absence of congressional action implies no view on whether Congress could prohibit the type of selective participation in the market undertaken by Maryland. It is intended only to emphasize that this case involves solely the restrictions upon state power imposed by the Commerce Clause when Congress is silent.
Appellee and the other licensed non-Maryland processors are free to withdraw from the bounty program should they decide that the benefits they receive from it after the 1974 amendment do not justify the annual license fee. They are not in the position of a foreign business which enters a State in response to completely private market forces to compete with domestic businesses, only to find itself burdened with discriminatory taxes or regulations. See, e. g., Best & Co. v. Maxwell, 311 U. S. 454 (1940); Nippert v. Richmond, 327 U, S. 416 (1946); Memphis Steam Laundry v. Stone, 342 U. S. 389 (1952); West Point Grocery v. Opelika, 354 U. S. 390 (1957); Halliburton Oil Well Co. v. Reily, 373 U. S. 64 (1963,).
Maryland argued in this Court that appellee, a Virginia corporation, cannot claim the protection of the Fourteenth Amendment, which prohibits a State's denial of equal protection to persons “within its jurisdiction.” Maryland relies upon Blake v. McClung, 172 U. S. 239 (1898), where a Virginia corporation was held unprotected by the Equal Protection Clause against a Tennessee statute that subordinated its claims as a creditor to those of Tennessee corporations. But the situation here differs significantly from McClung. The Court in that case noted that the Virginia corporation was not “doing business in Tennessee under the statute here involved, or under any statute that would bring it directly under the Jurisdiction of the courts of Tennessee by service of process on its officers or agents.” Id., at 261. Appellee, however, paid a fee to become licensed under Maryland law, maintains an office in Maryland as required by Maryland regulation, and has been found by the District Court to be subject to the jurisdiction of Maryland courts under the State’s “long arm” statute. Although appellee carries on no active business inside Maryland (all vehicles are brought by others to its plant in Virginia), it is “within [Maryland’s] jurisdiction” at least for the purposes of this licensing and bounty program. We think this entitles appellee to claim Fourteenth Amendment protection with respect to that program. Cf. WHYY v. Glassboro, 393 U. S. 117, 119 (1968); Wheeling Steel Corp. v. Glander, 337 U. S. 562, 571-572 (1949).
As noted earlier, n. 12, supra, licensed wreckers use primarily Wrecker’s Certificates when delivering hulks to processors. The 1974 amendment did not affect the ability of foreign processors to claim bounties on an equal footing with domestic processors by submitting such certificates. That was consistent with Maryland’s effort to reduce the amount of bounty payments for hulks that had rested in some other State: since all licensed wreckers are inside Maryland, see supra, at 796-797, 799, hulks delivered with certificates always will have
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice White delivered the opinion of the Court.
The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana has written:
“Shrimp, whether boiled, broiled, barbecued or fried, are a gustatory delight, but they did not evolve to satisfy man’s palate. Like other crustaceans, they wear their skeletons outside their bodies in order to shield their savory pink and white flesh against predators, including man. They also carry their intestines, commonly called veins, in bags (or sand bags) that run the length of their bodies. For shrimp to be edible, it is necessary to remove their shells. In addition, if the vein is removed, shrimp become more pleasing to the fastidious as well as more palatable.”
Such “gustatory” observations are rare even in those piscatorially favored federal courts blissfully situated on the Nation’s Gulf Coast, but they are properly recited in this case. Petitioner and respondent both hold patents on machines that devein shrimp more cheaply and efficiently than competing machinery or hand labor can do the job. Extensive litigation below has established that respondent, the Laitram Corp., has the superior claim and that the distribution and use of petitioner Deepsouth’s machinery in this country should be enjoined to prevent infringement of Laitram’s patents. Laitram Corp. v. Deepsouth Packing Co., 443 F. 2d 928 (CA5 1971). We granted certiorari, 404 U. S. 1037 (1972), to consider a related question: Is Deep-"south, barred from the American market by Laitram’s patents, also foreclosed by the patent laws from exporting its deveiners, in less than fully assembled form, Aor use abroad?
I
A rudimentary understanding of the patents in dispute is a prerequisite to comprehending the legal issue presented. The District Court determined that the Laitram Corp. held two valid patents for machinery used in the process of deveining shrimp. One, granted in 1954, accorded Laitram rights over a “slitter” which exposed the veins of shrimp by using water pressure and gravity to force the shrimp down an inclined trough studded with razor blades. As the shrimp descend through the trough their backs are slit by the blades or other knife-like objects arranged in a zig-zag pattern. The second patent, granted in 1958, covers a “tumbler,” “a device to mechanically remove substantially all veins from shrimp whose backs have previously been slit,” App. 127, by the machines described in the 1954 patent. This invention uses streams of water to carry slit shrimp into and then out of a revolving drum fabricated from commercial sheet metal. As shrimp pass through the drum the hooked “lips” of the punched metal, “projecting at an acute angle from the supporting member and having a smooth rounded free edge for engaging beneath the vein of a shrimp and for wedging the vein between the lip and the supporting member,” App. 131, engage the veins and remove them.
Both the slitter and the tumbler are combination patents; that is,
“[n]one of the parts referred to are new, and none are claimed as new; nor is any portion of the combination less than the whole claimed as new, or stated to produce any given result. The end in view is proposed to be accomplished by the union of all, arranged and combined together in the manner described. And this combination, composed of all the parts mentioned in the specification, and arranged with reference to each other, and to other parts of the [machine] in the manner therein described, is stated to be the improvement, and is the thing patented.” Prouty v. Ruggles, 16 Pet. 336, 341 (1842).
The slitter’s elements as recited in Laitram’s patent claim were: an inclined trough, a “knife” (actually, knives) positioned in the trough, and a means (water sprayed from jets) to move the shrimp down the trough. The tumbler’s elements include a “lip,” a “support member,” and a “means” (water thrust from jets). As is usual in combination patents, none of the elements in either of these patents were themselves patentable at the time of the patent, nor are they now. The means in both inventions, moving water, was and is, of course, commonplace. (It is not suggested that Deepsouth infringed Laitram’s patents by its use of water jets.) The cutting instruments and inclined troughs used in slitters were and are commodities available for general use. The structure of the lip and support member in the tumbler were hardly novel: Laitram concedes that the inventors merely adapted punched metal sheets ordered from a commercial catalog in order to perfect their invention. The patents were warranted not by the novelty of their elements but by the novelty of the combination they represented. Invention was recognized because Laitram’s assignors combined ordinary elements in an extraordinary way — a novel union of old means was designed to achieve new ends. Thus, for both inventions “the whole in some way exceed [ed] the sum of its parts.” Great A. & P. Tea Co. v. Supermarket Equipment Corp., 340 U. S. 147, 152 (1950).
II
The lower court’s decision that Laitram held valid combination patents entitled the corporation to the privileges bestowed by 35 U. S. C. § 154, the keystone provision of the patent code. “[F]or the term of seventeen years” from the date of the patent, Laitram had “the right to exclude others from making, using, or selling the invention throughout the United States . . . .” The § 154 right in turn provides the basis for affording the patentee an injunction against direct, induced, and contributory infringement, 35 U. S. C. § 283, or an award of damages when such infringement has already occurred, 35 U. S. C. § 284. Infringement is defined by 35 U. S. C. § 271 in terms that follow those of § 154:
“(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title, whoever without authority makes, uses or sells any patented invention, within the United States during the term of the patent therefor, [directly] infringes the patent.
“(b) Whoever actively induces infringement of a patent shall be liable as an infringer.
“(c) Whoever sells a component of a patented machine, manufacture, combination or composition, or a material or apparatus for use in practicing a patented process, constituting a material part of the invention, knowing the same to be especially made or especially adapted for use in an infringement of such patent, and not a staple article or commodity of commerce suitable for substantial non-infringing use, shall be liable as a contributory infringer.”
As a result of these provisions the judgment of Laitram’s patent superiority forecloses Deepsouth and its customers from any future use (other than a use approved by Laitram or occurring after the Laitram patent has expired) of its deveiners “throughout the United States.” The patent provisions taken in conjunction with the judgment below also entitle Laitram to the injunction it has received prohibiting Deepsouth from continuing to “make” or, once made, to “sell” deveiners “throughout the United States.” Further, Laitram may recover damages for any past unauthorized use, sale, or making “throughout the United States.” This much is not disputed.
But Deepsouth argues that it is not liable for every type of past sale and that a portion of its future business is salvageable. Section 154 and related provisions obviously are intended to grant a patentee a monopoly only over the United States market; they are not intended to grant a patentee the bonus of a favored position as a flagship company free of American competition in international commerce. Deepsouth, itself barred from using its deveining machines, or from inducing others to use them “throughout the United States,” barred also from making and selling the machines in the United States, seeks to make the parts of deveining machines, to sell them to foreign buyers, and to have the buyers assemble the parts and use the machines abroad. Accordingly, Deepsouth seeks judicial approval, expressed through a modification or interpretation of the injunction against it, for continuing its practice of shipping deveining equipment to foreign customers in three separate boxes, each containing only parts of the 1%-ton machines, yet the whole assemblable in less than one hour. The company contends that by this means both the “making” and the “use” of the machines occur abroad and Laitram’s lawful monopoly over the making and use of the machines throughout the United States is not infringed.
Laitram counters that this course of conduct is based upon a hypertechnical reading of the patent code that, if tolerated, will deprive it of its right to the fruits of the inventive genius of its assignors. “The right to make can scarcely be made plainer by definition . . . ,” Bauer v. O’Donnell, 229 U. S. 1, 10 (1913). Deepsouth in all respects save final assembly of the parts “makes” the invention. It does so with the intent of having the foreign user effect the combination without Laitram’s permission. Deepsouth sells these components as though they were the machines themselves; the act of assembly is regarded, indeed advertised, as of no importance.
The District Court, faced with this dispute, noted that three prior circuit courts had considered the meaning of “making” in this context and that all three had resolved the question favorably to Deepsouth’s position. See Hewitt-Robins, Inc. v. Link-Belt Co., 371 F. 2d 225 (CA7 1966); Cold Metal Process Co. v. United Engineering & Foundry Co., 235 F. 2d 224 (CA3 1956); and Radio Corp. of America v. Andrea, 79 F. 2d 626 (CA2 1935). The District Court held that its injunction should not be read as prohibiting export of the elements of a combination patent even when those elements could and predictably would be combined to form the whole.
“It may be urged that. . . [this] result is not logical .... But it is founded on twin notions that underlie the patent laws. One is that a combination patent protects only the combination. The other is that monopolies — even those conferred by patents — are not viewed with favor. These are logic enough.” 310 F. Supp. 926, 929 (1970).
The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit reversed, thus departing from the established rules of the Second, Third, and Seventh Circuits. In the Fifth Circuit panel’s opinion, those courts that previously considered the question “worked themselves into ... a conceptual box” by adopting “an artificial, technical construction” of the patent laws, a construction, moreover, which in the opinion of the panel, “[subverted] the Constitutional scheme of promoting 'the Progress of Science and useful Arts’ ” by allowing an intrusion on a patentee’s rights, 443 F. 2d, at 938-939, citing U. S. Const., Art. I, § 8.
Ill
We disagree with the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Under the common law the inventor had no right to exclude others from making and using his invention. If Laitram has a right to suppress Deepsouth’s export trade it must be derived from its patent grant, and thus from the patent statute. We find that 35 U. S. C. § 271, the provision of the patent laws on which Laitram relies, does not support its claim.
Certainly if Deepsouth’s conduct were intended to lead to use of patented deveiners inside the United States its production and sales activity would be subject to injunction as an induced or contributory infringement. But it is established that there can be no contributory infringement without the fact or intention of a direct infringement. “In a word, if there is no [direct] infringement of a patent there can be no contributory infringer.” Mercoid Corp. v. Mid-Continent Co., 320 U. S. 661, 677 (1944) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting on other grounds). Aro Mfg. Co. v. Convertible Top Replacement Co., 365 U. S. 336, 341-342 (1961), succinctly articulates the law:
“It is plain that § 271 (c)- — a part of the Patent Code enacted in 1952 — made no change in the fundamental precept that there can be no contributory infringement in the absence of a direct infringement. That section defines contributory infringement in terms of direct infringement — -namely the sale of a component of a patented combination or machine for use 'in an infringement of such patent.’ ”
The statute makes it clear 'that it is not an infringement to make or use a patented product outside of the United States. 35 U. S. C. § 271. See also Dowagiac Mfg. Co. v. Minnesota Moline Plow Co., 235 U. S. 641, 650 (1915), Brown v. Duchesne, 19 How. 183 (1857). Thus, in order to secure the injunction it seeks, Laitram must show a § 271 (a) direct infringement by Deepsouth in the United States, that is, that Deepsouth “makes,” “uses,” or “sells” the patented product within the bounds of this country.
Laitram does not suggest that Deepsouth “uses” the machines. Its argument that Deepsouth sells the machines — based primarily on Deepsouth’s sales rhetoric and related indicia such as price — cannot carry the day unless it can be shown that Deepsouth is selling the “patented invention.” The sales question thus resolves itself into the question of manufacture: did Deepsouth “make” (and then sell) something cognizable under the patent law as the patented invention, or did it “make” (and then sell) something that fell short of infringement?
The Court of Appeals, believing that the word “makes” should be accorded “a construction in keeping with the ordinary meaning of that term,” 443 F. 2d, at 938, held against Deepsouth on the theory that “makes” “means what it ordinarily connotes — the substantial manufacture of the constituent parts of the machine.” Id., at 939. Passing the question of whether this definition more closely corresponds to the ordinary meaning of the term than that offered by Judge Swan in Andrea 35 years earlier (something is made when it reaches the state of final “operable” assembly), we find the Fifth Circuit’s definition unacceptable because it collides head on with a line of decisions so firmly embedded in our patent law as to be unassailable absent a congressional recasting of the statute.
We cannot endorse the view that the “substantial manufacture of the constituent parts of [a] machine” constitutes direct infringement when we have so often held that a combination patent protects only against the operable assembly of the whole and not the manufacture of its parts. “For as we pointed out in Mercoid v. Mid-Continent Investment Co., [320 U. S. 661, 676] a patent on a combination is a patent on the assembled or functioning whole, not on the separate parts.” Mercoid Corp. v. Minneapolis-Honey well Regulator Co., 320 U. S. 680, 684 (1944). See also Leeds & Catlin Co. v. Victor Talking Machine Co., 213 U. S. 301:
“A combination is a union of elements, which may be partly old and partly new, or wholly old or wholly new. But whether new or old, the combination is a means — an invention — distinct from them.” Id., at 318.
“[0]ne element is not the combination. Indeed, all of the elements are not. To. be that — to be identical with the invention of the combination — they must be united by the same operative law.” Id., at 320.
And see Brown v. Guild, 23 Wall. 181 (1874). In sum,
“[i]f anything is settled in the patent law, it is that the combination patent covers only the totality of the elements in the claim and that no element, separately viewed, is within the grant.” Aro Mfg. Co. v. Convertible Top Replacement Co., 365 U. S., at 344.
It was this basic tenet of the patent system that led Judge Swan to hold in the leading case, Radio Corp. of America v. Andrea, 79 F. 2d 626 (1935), that unassembled export of the elements of an invention did not infringe the patent.
“[The] relationship is the essence of the patent.
. . No wrong is done the patentee until the combination is formed. His monopoly does not cover the manufacture or sale of separate elements capable of being, but never actually, associated to form the invention. Only when such association is made is there a direct infringement of his monopoly, and not even then if it is done outside the territory for which the monopoly was granted.” Id., at 628.
See also Cold Metal Process Co. v. United Engineering & Foundry Co., 235 F. 2d, at 230 (“We are in full accord with the rule thus laid down in the Andrea case and we think that the master and the district court were right in applying it here”); Hewitt-Robins, Inc. v. Link Belt Co., 371 F. 2d, at 229 (to the same effect).
We reaffirm this conclusion today.
IV
It is said that this conclusion is derived from too narrow and technical an interpretation of the statute, and that this Court should focus on the constitutional mandate
“[t]o promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries . . . ,” Art. I, § 8,
and construe the statute in a manner that would, allegedly, better reflect the policy of the Framers.
We cannot accept this argument. The direction of Art. I is that Congress shall have the power to promote the progress of science and the useful arts. When, as here, the Constitution is permissive, the sign of how far Congress has chosen to go can come only from Congress. We are here construing the provisions of a statute passed in 1952. The prevailing law in this and other courts as to what is necessary to show a patentable invention when a combination of old elements is claimed was clearly evident from the cases when the Act was passed; and at that time Andrea, representing a specific application of the law of infringement with respect to the export of elements of a combination patent, was 17 years old. When Congress drafted § 271, it gave no indication that it desired to change either the law of combination patents as relevant here or the ruling of Andrea. Nor has it on any more recent occasion indicated that it wanted the patent privilege to run farther than it was understood to run for 35 years prior to the action of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Moreover, we must consider petitioner’s claim in light of this Nation’s historical antipathy to monopoly and of repeated congressional efforts to preserve and foster competition. As this Court recently said without dissent:
"[I]n rewarding useful invention, the 'rights and welfare of the community must be fairly dealt with and effectually guarded.' Kendall v. Winsor, 21 How. 322, 329 (1859). To that end the prerequisites to obtaining a patent are strictly observed, and when the patent has issued the limitations on its exercise are equally strictly enforced.” Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. Stiffel Co., 376 U. S. 225, 230 (1964).
It follows that we should not expand patent rights by overruling or modifying our prior cases construing the patent statutes, unless the argument for expansion of privilege is based on more than mere inference from ambiguous statutory language. We would require a clear and certain signal from Congress before approving the position of a litigant who, as respondent here, argues that the beachhead of privilege is wider, and the area of public use narrower, than courts had previously thought. No such signal legitimizes respondent’s position in this litigation.
In conclusion, we note that what is at stake here is the right of American companies to compete with an American patent holder in foreign markets. Our patent system makes no claim to extraterritorial effect; “these acts of Congress do not, and were not intended to, operate beyond the limits of the United States,” Brown v. Duchesne, 19 How., at 195; and we correspondingly reject the claims of others to such control over our markets. Cf. Boesch v. Graff, 133 U. S. 697, 703 (1890). To the degree that the inventor needs protection in markets other than those of this country, the wording of 35 U. S. C. §§ 154 and 271 reveals a congressional intent to have him seek it abroad through patents secured in countries where his goods are being used. Respondent holds foreign patents; it does not adequately explain why it does not avail itself of them.
y
In sum: the case and statutory law resolves this case against the respondent. When so many courts have so often held what appears so evident — a combination patent can be infringed only by combination — we are not prepared to break the mold and begin anew. And were the matter not so resolved, we would still insist on a clear congressional indication of intent to extend the patent privilege before we could recognize the monopoly here claimed. Such an indication is lacking. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit is reversed and the case is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Laitram Corp. v. Deepsouth Packing Co., 301 F. Supp. 1037, 1040 (1969).
This patent expired shortly before argument in this court and is therefore not relevant to Laitram’s claim for injunctive relief. It is described, however, because Laitram claims damages for £>eep-south’s asserted past exportation of the parts of this machine.
The machines were developed by two brothers who are now president and vice-president of the Laitram Corp. The patents are in their names, but have been assigned to the corporation.
The District Court wrote:
“Defendant urges that the [1958] patent is invalid as aggregative, anticipated by the prior art, obvious, described in functional language, overbroad, and indefinite. While it is clear that the elements in the . . . patent, especially the punch lip material, had been available for a considerable period of time, when combined they co-act in such a manner to perform a new function and produce new results.” 301 F. Supp., at 1063.
Deepsouth is entirely straightforward in indicating that its course of conduct is motivated by a desire to avoid patent infringement. Its president wrote a Brazilian customer:
“We are handicapped by a decision against us in the United States. This was a very technical decision and we can manufacture the entire machine without any complication in the United States, with the exception that there are two parts that must not be assembled in the United States, but assembled after the machine arrives in Brazil.”
Quoted in Laitram Corp. v. Deepsouth Packing Co., 443 F. 2d 928, 938 (CA5 1971).
As shipped, Deepsouth’s tumbler contains a deveining belt different from Laitram’s support member and lip. But the Laitram elements are included in a separate box and the Deepsouth tumbler is made to accommodate the Laitram elements. The record shows that many customers will use the machine with the Laitram parts.
Eor simplicity’s sake, we, like the lower courts, will discuss only Deepsouth’s claim as to permissible future conduct. It is obvious, however, that what we say as to the scope of the injunction in Lai-tram’s favor applies also to the calculation of damages that Laitram may recover.
“But the right of property which a patentee has in his invention, and his right to its exclusive use, is derived altogether from these statutory provisions; and this court [has] always held that an inventor has no right of property in his invention, upon which he can maintain a suit, unless he obtains a patent for it, according to the acts of Congress; and that his rights are to be regulated and measured by these laws, and cannot go beyond them.” Brown v. Duchesne, 19 How. 183, 195 (1857).
Deepsouth sold the less than completely assembled machine for the same price as it had sold fully assembled machines. Its advertisements, correspondence, and invoices frequently referred to a “machine,” rather than to a kit or unassembled parts. See Brief for Respondent 8-11.
When § 271 was drafted and submitted to the Senate in 1952, Senator Saltonstall asked: “Does the bill change the law in any way or only codify the present patent laws?” Senator McCarran, Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, responded: “It codifies the present patent laws.” 98 Cong. Rec. 9323.
See the discussion in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U. S. 1, 7 et seq. (1966).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Thomas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In these cases, we consider whether an incumbent provider of local telephone service must make certain transmission facilities available to competitors at cost-based rates. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC or Commission), as amicus curiae contends that its regulations require the incumbent provider to do so if the facilities are to be used for interconnection: to link the incumbent provider’s telephone network with the competitor’s network for the mutual exchange of traffic. We defer to the Commission’s views and reverse the judgment below.
I
The Telecommunications Act of 1996 (1996 Act), 110 Stat. 56, imposed a number of duties on incumbent providers of local telephone service in order to facilitate market entry by competitors. AT&T Corp. v. Iowa Utilities Bd., 525 U. S. 366, 371 (1999). The incumbent local exchange carriers (LECs) owned the local exchange networks: the physical equipment necessary to receive, properly route, and deliver phone calls among customers. Verizon Communications Inc. v. FCC, 535 U. S. 467, 490 (2002). Before the 1996 Act, a new, competitive LEC could not compete with an incumbent carrier without basically replicating the incumbent’s entire existing network. Ibid.
The 1996 Act addressed that barrier to market entry by requiring incumbent LECs to share their networks with competitive LECs in several ways, two of which are relevant here. First, 47 U. S. C. § 251(c)(3) requires incumbent LECs to lease “on an unbundled basis” — i. e., a la carte — network elements specified by the Commission. This makes it easier for a competitor to create its own network without having to build every element from scratch. In identifying which network elements must be available for unbundled lease under § 251(c)(3), the Commission is required to consider whether access is “necessary” and whether failing to provide access would “impair” a competitor’s provision of service. § 251(d)(2). Second, § 251(c)(2) mandates that incumbent LECs “provide ... interconnection” between their networks and competitive LECs’ facilities. This ensures that customers on a competitor’s network can call customers on the incumbent’s network, and vice versa. The interconnection duty is independent of the unbundling rules and not subject to impairment analysis. It is undisputed that both unbundled network elements and interconnection must be provided at cost-based rates. See § 252(d)(1); Brief for Petitioner in No. 10-313, p. 28; Brief for Petitioners in No. 10-329, p. 7; Brief for Respondent 4.
These cases concern incumbent LECs’ obligation to share existing “entrance facilities” with competitive LECs. Entrance facilities are the transmission facilities (typically wires or cables) that connect competitive LECs’ networks with incumbent LECs’ networks. The FCC recently adopted a regulation specifying that entrance facilities are not among the network elements that § 251(c)(3) requires incumbents to lease to competitors on an unbundled basis at cost-based rates. See 47 CFR §51.319(e)(2)(i) (2005). The Commission noted, however, that it “d[id] not alter the right of competitive LECs to obtain interconnection facilities pursuant to section 251(e)(2).” In re Unbundled Access to Network Elements, 20 FCC Red. 2533, 2611, ¶ 140 (2005) (Triennial Review Remand Order).
The specific issue here is whether respondent, Michigan Bell Telephone Company, d/b/a AT&T Michigan (AT&T), must lease existing entrance facilities to competitive LECs at cost-based rates. The FCC interprets its regulations to require AT&T to do so for the purpose of interconnection. We begin by reviewing the Commission’s recent actions regarding entrance facilities and then explain the particular dispute that is before us today.
A
In 2003, the FCC decided, contrary to its previous orders, that incumbent LECs were not obligated to provide cost-based unbundled access to entrance facilities under § 251(c)(3). In re Review of Section 251 Unbundling Obligations of Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers, 18 FCC Red. 16978, 17202-17205, ¶¶ 365-367 (2003) (Triennial Review Order). Explaining that its previous approach had been “misguided” and “overly broad,” id., ¶¶ 366, 365, the Commission concluded that entrance facilities were not subject to the unbundling requirement because they are not network elements at all. See id., ¶ 366 (entrance facilities “exist outside the incumbent LEC’s local network”). The Commission therefore did not conduct an impairment analysis.
The FCC emphasized, however, the limits of this ruling. Entrance facilities are used for two purposes: interconnection and baekhauling. It expressly “d[id] not alter” an incumbent LEC’s obligation under § 251(c)(2) to provide “facilities in order to ‘interconnect with the incumbent LEC’s network.’” Id., ¶366 (brackets omitted). Thus, although the Commission specified that § 251(c)(3) did not require any unbundled leasing of entrance facilities, it determined in practical effect only that “incumbent LECs [were not obligated] to unbundle [entrance facilities] for the purpose of baekhauling traffic.” Id., ¶ 365.
On direct review, the D. C. Circuit questioned the Commission’s determination that entrance facilities are not network elements under § 251(c)(3), but found the agency rulemaking record insufficient and remanded to the Commission for further consideration. See United States Telecom Assn. v. FCC, 359 F. 3d 554, 586, cert, denied, 543 U. S. 925 (2004). The court noted that if entrance facilities were in fact “ ‘network elements,’ ” then “an analysis of impairment would presumably follow.” 359 F. 3d, at 586.
In 2005, the Commission responded. See Triennial Review Remand Order ¶ ¶ 136-141. The Commission retreated from its view that entrance facilities are not network elements but adhered to its previous position that cost-based unbundled access to them need not be provided under § 251(c)(3). Id., ¶¶ 137-138. Treating entrance facilities as network elements, the Commission concluded that competitive LECs are not impaired without access to them. Ibid. The Commission again emphasized that it “d[id] not alter the right of competitive LECs to obtain interconnection facilities pursuant to section 251(c)(2).” Id., ¶ 140.
B
In the wake of the Triennial Review Remand Order, AT&T notified competitive LECs that it would no longer provide entrance facilities at cost-based rates for either back-hauling or interconnection, but would instead charge higher rates. Competitive LECs complained to the Michigan Public Service Commission (PSC) that AT&T was unlawfully abrogating their right to cost-based interconnection under § 251(c)(2). The Michigan PSC agreed with the competitive LECs and ordered AT&T to continue providing entrance facilities for interconnection at cost-based rates.
AT&T challenged the Michigan PSC’s ruling in the District Court, which, relying on the Triennial Review Remand Order, ruled in AT&T’s favor. The Michigan PSC and several competitive LECs, including petitioner Talk America, Inc., appealed.
The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed over a dissent. Michigan Bell Telephone Co. v. Covad Communications Co., 597 F. 3d 370 (2010). At the court’s invitation, the FCC filed a brief as amicus curiae, arguing that the Triennial Review Remand Order did not change incumbent LECs’ interconnection obligations, including the obligation to lease entrance facilities for interconnection. The Sixth Circuit declined to defer to the FCC’s views, 597 F. 3d, at 375, n. 6, and also expressly disagreed with the Seventh and Eighth Circuits, id., at 384-386 (discussing Illinois Bell Tel. Co. v. Box, 526 F. 3d 1069 (2008), and Southwestern Bell Tel., L. P. v. Missouri Pub. Serv. Comm’n, 530 F. 3d 676 (2008)).
We granted certiorari, 562 U. S. 1104 (2010), and now reverse.
II
Petitioners contend that AT&T must lease its existing entrance facilities for interconnection at cost-based rates. We agree.
A
No statute or regulation squarely addresses whether an incumbent LEC must provide access to entrance facilities at cost-based rates as part of its interconnection duty under § 251(e)(2). According to the statute, each incumbent LEC has:
“The duty to provide, for the facilities and equipment of any requesting telecommunications carrier, interconnection with the local exchange carrier’s network—
“(A) for the transmission and routing of telephone exchange service and exchange access;
“(B) at any technically feasible point within the carrier’s network;
“(C) that is at least equal in quality to that provided by the local exchange carrier to itself or to any subsidiary, affiliate, or any other party to which the carrier provides interconnection; and
“(D) on rates, terms, and conditions that are just, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory, in accordance with the terms and conditions of the agreement and the requirements of this section and section 252 of this title.”
Nothing in that language expressly addresses entrance facilities. Nor does any regulation do so. See Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 22, n. 6.
AT&T contends that the statute makes clear that an incumbent LEC need not provide access to any facilities— much less entrance facilities — to provide interconnection. The company points out that § 251(c)(2) does not mention incumbent LECs’ facilities, but rather mandates only that incumbent LECs provide interconnection “for the facilities and equipment of any [competing] carrier.” In contrast, AT&T notes, § 251(e)(3) requires that incumbent LECs provide unbundled “access to [their] network elements.”
We do not find the statute so clear. Although § 251(c)(2) does not expressly require that incumbent LECs lease facilities to provide interconnection, it also does not expressly excuse them from doing so. The statute says nothing about what an incumbent LEC must do to “provide . . . interconnection.” § 251(c)(2). “[T]he facilities and equipment of any [competing] carrier” identifies the equipment that an incumbent LEC must allow to interconnect, but it does not specify what the incumbent LEC must do to make the interconnection possible. Ibid.
B
In the absence of any unambiguous statute or regulation, we turn to the FCC’s interpretation of its regulations in its amicus brief. See, e. g., Chase Bank USA, N. A. v. McCoy, 562 U. S. 195, 207 (2011). As we reaffirmed earlier this Term, we defer to an agency's interpretation of its regulations, even in a legal brief, unless the interpretation is “ ‘plainly erroneous or inconsistent with the regulation[]’ ” or there is any other “ ‘reason to suspect that the interpretation does not reflect the agency’s fair and considered judgment on the matter in question.’” Id., at 208, 209 (quoting Auer v. Robbins, 519 U. S. 452, 461, 462 (1997)).
The Commission contends that its regulations require AT&T to provide access at cost-based rates to its existing entrance facilities for the purpose of interconnection. The Commission’s interpretation proceeds in three steps. First, an incumbent LEC must lease “technically feasible” facilities for interconnection. Second, entrance facilities are among the facilities that an incumbent must make available for interconnection, if technically feasible. Third, it is technically feasible to provide access to the particular entrance facilities at issue in these cases.
1
The Commission first contends that an incumbent LEC must lease, at cost-based rates, any requested facilities for obtaining interconnection with the incumbent LEC’s network, unless it is technically infeasible to do so. Section 251(c)(2) mandates that an incumbent LEC provide interconnection, at cost-based rates, “at any technically feasible point within the carrier’s network.” The FCC has long construed § 251(c)(2) to require incumbent LECs to provide, at cost-based rates, “any technically feasible method of obtaining interconnection ... at a particular point.” 47 CFR § 51.321(a) (2010).
The requirement in § 51.321(a) to provide a “method of obtaining interconnection,” the Commission argues, encompasses a duty to lease an existing facility to a competing LEC. When the Commission originally promulgated § 51.321(a), it explained that incumbent LECs would be required to “adapt their facilities to interconnection” and to “accept the novel use of, and modification to, [their] network facilities.” In re Implementation of Local Competition Provisions in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, 11 FCC Red. 15499, 15605, ¶ 202 (1996) (Local Competition Order). Since then, as AT&T and its amici concede, incumbent LECs have commonly leased certain facilities at cost-based prices to accommodate interconnection. See Brief for Respondent 28-29; Brief for United States Telecom Association et al. as Amici Curiae 33-35.
As additional support for its assertion that incumbent LECs are obligated to lease facilities, the FCC highlights the examples in § 51.321(b) of “[t]echnically feasible methods of obtaining interconnection,” which include “[m]eet point interconnection arrangements.” In a meet-point arrangement, an incumbent LEC “accommodat[es]” interconnection by building a transmission facility from its network to a designated point, where it connects with the competitor's corresponding transmission facility. Local Competition Order ¶ 553. Compared to that requirement, the Commission argues, the obligation to lease existing facilities for interconnection is quite modest.
2
Next, the Commission contends that existing entrance facilities are among the facilities that an incumbent LEC must lease for interconnection. According to the FCC, the Triennial Review Remand Order adopted a regulatory definition that reestablished that entrance facilities are part of an incumbent LEC’s network. See ¶ 137; see also 47 CFR § 51.319(e). The end of every entrance facility is therefore a “point within [an incumbent] carrier’s network” at which a competing LEC could request interconnection, 47 U. S. C. § 251(c)(2), and each entrance, facility potentially provides a “technically feasible method of obtaining interconnection,” 47 CFR § 51.321(a).
3
Finally, the FCC contends that providing access to the entrance facilities here for interconnection purposes is technically feasible. Under the Commission’s regulations, an incumbent LEC bears the burden of showing that a requested method or point of interconnection is technically infeasible. See 47 CFR §§ 51.305(e), 51.321(d); see also §§ 51.305(d), 51.321(e) (previously successful interconnection is “substantial evidence” of technical feasibility). AT&T does not dispute technical feasibility here.
C
The FCC’s interpretation is not “plainly erroneous or inconsistent with the regulation[s].” Auer, supra, at 461 (internal quotation marks omitted). First, we disagree with AT&T’s argument that entrance facilities are not a part of incumbent LECs’ networks. Indeed, the Commission’s view on this question is more than reasonable; it is certainly not plainly erroneous. The Triennial Review Remand Order responded to the D. C. Circuit’s decision questioning the Commission’s earlier finding that entrance facilities are not network elements. It revised the definition of dedicated transport — a type of network element — to include entrance facilities. Triennial Review Remand Order ¶¶ 136-137; see 47 CFR § 51.319(e)(1) (defining dedicated transport to include “incumbent LEC transmission facilities . . . between wire centers or switches owned by incumbent LECs and switches owned by [competing] carriers”). Given that revised definition, it is perfectly sensible to conclude that entrance facilities are a part of incumbent LECs’ networks.
Second, we are not persuaded by AT&T’s argument that the Commission’s views conflict with the definition of interconnection in §51.5. That regulation provides: “Interconnection is the linking of two networks for the mutual exchange of traffic. This term does not include the transport and termination of traffic.” AT&T focuses on the definition’s exclusion of “transport and termination of traffic.” An entrance facility is a transport facility, AT&T argues, and it makes no sense to require an incumbent LEC to furnish a transport facility for interconnection when the definition of interconnection expressly excludes transport.
We think AT&T reads too much into the exclusion of “transport.” The regulation cannot possibly mean that no transport can occur across an interconnection facility, as that would directly conflict with the statutory language. See § 251(c)(2) (requiring “interconnection ... for the transmission and routing of [local] telephone exchange service”). The very reason for interconnection is the “mutual exchange of traffic.” 47 CFR § 51.5; see also Competitive Telecommunications Assn. v. FCC, 117 F. 3d 1068, 1071-1072 (CA8 1997) (“[T]he transmission and routing of telephone exchange service” is “what the interconnection, the physical link, would be used for” (internal quotation marks omitted)).
The better reading of the regulation is that it merely reflects that the “transport and termination of traffic” is subject to different regulatory treatment than interconnection. Compensation for transport and termination — that is, for delivering local telephone calls placed by another carrier’s customer — is governed by separate statutory provisions and regulations. See 47 U. S. C. §§ 251(b)(5), 252(d)(2); 47 CFR § 51.701. The Commission explains that a competitive LEC typically pays one fee for interconnection — “just for having the link” — and then an additional fee for the transport and termination of telephone calls. Tr. of Oral Arg. 28; see also Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 3, n. 1. Entrance facilities, at least when used for the mutual exchange of traffic, seem to us to fall comfortably within the definition of interconnection. See 597 F. 3d, at 388 (Sutton, J., dissenting) (noting that entrance facilities are “designed for the very purpose of linking two carriers’ networks” (internal quotation marks omitted)).
In sum, the Commission’s interpretation of its regulations is neither plainly erroneous nor inconsistent with the regulatory text. Contrary to AT&T’s assertion, there is no danger that deferring to the Commission would effectively “permit the agency, under the guise of interpreting a regulation, to create defacto a new regulation.” Christensen v. Harris County, 529 U. S. 576, 588 (2000).
D
Nor is there any other “reason to suspect that the interpretation does not reflect the agency’s fair and considered judgment on the matter in question.” Auer, 519 U. S., at 462. We are not faced with a post-hoc rationalization by Commission counsel of agency action that is under judicial review. See ibid.; see also Burlington Truck Lines, Inc. v. United States, 371 U. S. 156, 168-169 (1962) (“The courts may not accept appellate counsel’s post hoc rationalizations for agency action; [SEC v.] Chenery [Corp., 332 U. S. 194 (1947),] requires that an agency’s discretionary order be upheld, if at all, on the same basis articulated in the order by the agency itself”). And although the FCC concedes that it is advancing a novel interpretation of its longstanding interconnection regulations, novelty alone is not a reason to refuse deference. The Commission explains that the issue in these eases did not arise until recently — when it initially eliminated unbundled access to entrance facilities in the Triennial Review Order. Until then, the Commission says, a competitive LEC typically would elect to lease a cost-priced entrance facility under § 251(c)(3) since entrance facilities leased under § 251(c)(3) could be used for any purpose — i. e., both interconnection and backhauling — but entrance facilities leased under § 251(c)(2) can be used only for interconnection. We see no reason to doubt this explanation.
AT&T suggests that the Commission is attempting to require under § 251(c)(2) what courts have prevented it from requiring under § 251(c)(3) and what the Commission itself said was not required in the Triennial Review Remand Order. Tr. of Oral Arg. 50 (“[T]his is a rear guard effort to preserve [cost-based] pricing for things that the [Commission has said should no longer be available ... at [such] pricing”). We do not think that AT&T is correct.
1
To begin with, AT&T’s accusation does not square with the regulatory history. The Commission was not compelled to eliminate the obligation to lease unbundled entrance facilities at cost-based rates.
It is true that, prior to the Triennial Review orders, the Commission twice unsuccessfully attempted to impose sweeping unbundling requirements on incumbent LECs. See Local Competition Order ¶ 278; In re Implementation of Local Competition Provisions of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, 15 FCC Red. 3696, 8771-3904, ¶¶ 162-464 (1999); see also 47 CFR § 51.319 (1997); § 51.319 (2000). Each time, the Commission’s efforts were rejected for taking an unreasonably broad view of “impair[ment]” under § 251(d)(2). See Iowa Utilities Bd., 525 U. S., at 392; United States Telecom Assn. v. FCC, 290 F. 3d 415, 421-428 (CADC 2002), cert, denied, 538 U. S. 940 (2003). In the Triennial Review Order, the Commission once again reinterpreted the “impair” standard and revised the list of network elements that incumbents must provide unbundled to competitors.
The Commission’s initial decision to eliminate the obligation to unbundle entrance facilities, however, was not a result of the narrower view of impairment mandated by this Court and the D. C. Circuit. Instead, the Commission determined that entrance facilities need not be provided on an unbundled basis under § 251(c)(3) on the novel ground that they are not network elements at all — something no court had ever suggested.
Moreover, since its initial decision to eliminate the un-bundling obligation for entrance facilities, the Commission has been committed to that position. When the D. C. Circuit questioned the Commission’s finding that entrance facilities are not network elements, the Commission responded by observing that the court “did not reject our conclusion that incumbent LECs need not unbundle entrance facilities, only the analysis through which we reached that conclusion.” Triennial Review Remand Order ¶ 137. The Commission then found another way to support that same conclusion.
2
More importantly, AT&T’s characterization of what the Commission has done, and is doing, is inaccurate. The Tri ennial Review orders eliminated incumbent LECs’ obligation under § 251(c)(3) to provide unbundled access to entrance facilities. But the FCC emphasized in both orders that it “d[id] not alter” the obligation on incumbent LECs under § 251(c)(2) to provide facilities for interconnection purposes. Triennial Review Order ¶366; Triennial Review Remand Order ¶ 140. Because entrance facilities are used for backhauling and interconnection purposes, the FCC effectively eliminated only unbundled access to entrance facilities for backhauling purposes — a nuance it expressly noted in the first Triennial Review order. Triennial Review Order ¶ 365. That distinction is neither unusual nor ambiguous. In these cases, the Commission is simply explaining the interconnection obligation that it left undisturbed in the Triennial Review orders. We see no conflict between the Triennial Review orders and the Commission’s views expressed here.
We are not concerned that the Triennial Review Remand Order did not expressly distinguish between backhauling and interconnection, though AT&T makes much of that fact. AT&T argues that the Commission’s holding in the Triennial Review Remand Order is broader than that in the Triennial Review Order. In AT&T’s view, the Commission concluded in the Triennial Review Remand Order that competitors are not impaired if they lack cost-based access to entrance facilities for backhauling or interconnection.
There are two flaws with AT&T’s reasoning. First, as we have discussed, the Triennial Review Remand Order reinstated the ultimate conclusion of the Triennial Review Order and changed only “the analysis through which [it] reached that conclusion.” Triennial Review Remand Order ¶ 137. Second, unlike §251(c)(3)’s unbundling obligation, § 251(c)(2)’s interconnection obligation does not require the Commission to consider impairment. As the dissent below observed, it would be surprising indeed if the FCC had taken the novel step of incorporating impairment into interconnection without comment. 597 F. 3d, at 389 (opinion of Sutton, J.).
* * *
The FCC as amicus curiae has advanced a reasonable interpretation of its regulations, and we defer to its views. The judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed.
It is so ordered.
Justice Kagan took no part in the consideration or decision of these cases.
The Solicitor General, joined by counsel for the FCC, represents that the amicus brief for the United States filed in this Court reflects the Commission’s considered interpretation of its own rules and orders. Brief for United States 31. We thus refer to the Government’s arguments in these cases as those of the agency. See, e. g., Chase Bank USA, N. A. v. McCoy, 562 U. S. 195, 203 (2011).
Although the parties and their amici disagree over the precise definition of baekhauling, they all appear to agree that baekhauling is important to competitive LECs and occurs when a competitive LEC uses an entrance facility to transport traffic from a leased portion of an incumbent network to the competitor’s own facilities. Baekhauling does not involve the exchange of traffic between incumbent and competitive networks. See, e. g., Brief for Petitioners in No. 10-329, p. 25; Brief for United States Telecom Association et al. as Amici Curiae 82. It thus differs from interconnection — “the linking of two networks for the mutual exchange of traffic.” 47 CFR §51.5 (2010).
The Ninth Circuit has since joined the Seventh and Eighth Circuits. Pacific Bell Tel. Co. v. California Pub. Util. Comm’n, 621F. 3d 836 (2010).
These eases concern only existing entrance facilities, and the Commission expressly declines to address whether it reads its regulations to require incumbent LECs to build new entrance facilities for interconnection. Brief for United States as Amicus Curiae 25, n. 7. The Commission suggests here, as it has before, that additional considerations of cost or reasonableness might be appropriate if a competitive LEC were to request that an incumbent LEC build new entrance facilities for interconnection. Ibid, (noting that the Commission’s Wireline Competition Bureau has declined to require an incumbent LEC to bear the entire cost of building new entrance facilities); see also Local Competition Order ¶ 553 (explaining with respect to meet-point arrangements that “the parties and state commissions are in a better position than the Commission to determine the appropriate distance that would constitute the required reasonable accommodation of interconnection”). We express no view on the matter.
There is no merit to AT&T’s assertion that the FCC is improperly amending the list of “[t]echnically feasible methods of obtaining interconnection” set forth in 47 CFR § 51.321(b). By its own terms, that list is nonexhaustive. See § 51.321(b) (“[technically feasible methods of obtaining interconnection . . . include, but are not limited to,” the listed examples); see also § 51.321(a) (“[A]n incumbent LEC shall provide . . . any technically feasible method of obtaining interconnection” (emphasis added)).
The Commission has long recognized that a single facility can be used for different functions and that its regulatory treatment can vary depending on its use. Unbundled network elements, for example, may not be used for the exclusive provision of mobile wireless or long-distance services. 47 CFR § 51.309(b) (2010). Similarly, interconnection arrangements may be used for local telephone service but not for long-distance services. § 51.305(b).
The parties and their amici dispute whether an incumbent LEC has any way of knowing how a competitive LEC is using an entrance facility. This technical factual dispute simply underscores the appropriateness of deferring to the FCC. So long as the Commission is acting within the scope of its delegated authority and in accordance with prescribed procedures, it has greater expertise and stands in a better position than this Court to make the technical and policy judgments necessary to administer the complex regulatory program at issue here.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Warren
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The sole question presented by this case is whether a payment is taxable as gross income when received by a corporation pursuant to the “insider profits” provisions of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and the Investment Company Act of 1940. Subject to exceptions not presently relevant, § 16 (b) of the Securities Exchange Act provides that the profit realized from certain defined securities transactions undertaken by a director or major stockholder of the issuing corporation “shall inure to and be recoverable by the issuer.” This provision is made applicable to investment companies by § 30 (f) of the Investment Company Act of 1940. Under these provisions, petitioner, a registered closed-end investment company, received payments totalling $170,038.04. This sum represented the profits accruing to one of petitioner’s directors and a stockholder through dealings covered by § 16 (b); the money was paid over to petitioner on demand and without litigation. The payments were not reported as income on petitioner’s tax returns. The Commissioner of Internal Revenue allowed a $13,000 deduction for legal expenses incurred in recovering the amounts due but asserted á deficiency for the balance on the ground that the receipts constituted taxable gains under § 22 (a) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1939. The Tax Court, 19 T. C. 581, and the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, 211 F. 2d 522, sustained the Commissioner’s determination. We granted certiorari, 348 U. S. 812, because of an apparent similarity of issues here to those involved in Commissioner v. Glenshaw Glass Co., 211 F. 2d 928 (C. A. 3d Cir.), and the possible conflict between that case and this.
We have this day decided that the recovery of punitive damages for fraud or antitrust violation is reportable as gross income within the meaning of § 22 (a). Commissioner v. Clenshaw Glass Co., ante, p. 426. The reasons which dictated that result are equally compelling here. We see no significant difference in the nature of these receipts which might make that ruling inapplicable. As in Glenshaw, the taxpayer realized the money in question free of any restrictions as to use. The payments in controversy were neither capital contributions nor gifts. Cf. Texas & Pacific R. Co. v. United States, 286 U. S. 285. There is no indication that Congress intended to exempt them from coverage. In accordance with the legislative design to reach all gain constitutionally taxable unless specifically excluded, we conclude that the petitioner is liable for the tax and the judgment is
Affirmed.
Mr. Justice Douglas concurs in the result.
Mr. Justice Harlan took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
48 Stat. 881,15 U. S. C. § 78a.
54 Stat. 789,15 U. S. C. § 80a-l.
48 Stat. 896,15 U. S. C. § 78p.
54 Stat. 837, 15 U. S. C. § 80a-29.
“SEC. 22. GROSS INCOME.
“(a) General Definition. — ‘Gross income’ includes gains, profits, and income derived from salaries, wages, or compensation for personal service ... of whatever kind and in whatever form paid, or from professions, vocations, trades, businesses, commerce, or sales, or dealings in property, whether real or personal, growing out of the ownership or use of or interest in such property; also from interest, rent, dividends, securities, or the transaction of any business carried on for gain or profit, or gains or ■profits and income derived from any source whatever. . . .” (Emphasis added.) 53 Stat. 9, 53 Stat. 574, 26 U.S. C. § 22 (a).
There was, however, no disagreement among lower courts which faced the question of the taxability of a § 16 (b) recovery of “insider profits.” See Park & Tilford Distillers Corp. v. United States, 123 Ct. Cl. 509, 107 F. Supp. 941; Noma Electric Corp., 12 T. C. M. 1 (CCH Tax Ct. Mem., Dec. 1953).
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
L
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Kennedy
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The issue presented rests upon the initial assumption, which we accept for analytic purposes, that the trial court erred in a Sentencing Guidelines determination after petitioner’s conviction of a federal offense. The legal error, petitioner alleges, increased his prison sentence by at least 6 months and perhaps by 21 months. We must decide whether this would be “prejudice” under Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668 (1984). The Government is not ready to concede error in the sentencing determination but now acknowledges that if an increased prison term did flow from an error the petitioner has established Strickland prejudice. In agreement with the Government and petitioner on this point, we reverse and remand for further proceedings.
I
In the 1980’s and early 1990’s, petitioner Paul Glover was the Vice President and General Counsel of the Chicago Truck Drivers, Helpers, and Warehouse Workers Union (Independent). The evidence showed Glover used his control over the union’s investments to enrich himself and his co-conspirators through kickbacks. When the malfeasance was discovered, he was tried in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. His first trial ended when the jury could not agree, but a second jury convicted him. The presentence investigation report prepared by the probation office recommended that the convictions for labor racketeering, money laundering, and tax evasion be grouped together under United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual §3D1.2 (Nov. 1994), which allows the grouping of “counts involving substantially the same harm.” The Government, insisting that the money laundering counts could not be grouped with the other counts, objected to that recommendation, and the District Court held a hearing on the matter. The money laundering counts, it ruled, should not be grouped with Glover’s other offenses. The ruling, as the trial court viewed it, was in conformance with decisions in those Courts of Appeals which had refused to group money laundering counts with other counts for various reasons. See, e. g., United States v. Lombardi, 5 F. 3d 568 (CA1 1993); United States v. Porter, 909 F. 2d 789 (CA4 1990); United States v. Taylor, 984 F. 2d 298 (CA9 1993); United States v. Johnson, 971 F. 2d 562 (CA10 1992); United States v. Harper, 972 F. 2d 321 (CA11 1992). In the trial court, Glover’s attorneys did not submit papers or offer extensive oral arguments contesting the no-grouping argument advanced by the Government. When the District Court decided not to group the money laundering counts with the other counts, Glover’s offense level was increased by two levels, yielding a concomitant increase in the sentencing range. Glover was sentenced to 84 months in prison, which was in the middle of the Guidelines range of 78 to 97 months.
On appeal to the Seventh Circuit, Glover’s counsel (the same attorneys who represented him in District Court) did not raise the grouping issue; instead, they concentrated on claims that certain testimony from his first trial should not have been admitted at his second trial and that he should not have been assessed a two-level increase for perjury at his first trial. A short time after argument on Glover’s appeal, a different panel of the Seventh Circuit held that, under some circumstances, grouping of money laundering offenses with other counts was proper under § 3D1.2. United States v. Wilson, 98 F. 3d 281 (1996). A month and a half later, the Seventh Circuit rejected both of Glover’s arguments and affirmed his conviction and sentence. 101 F. 3d 1183 (1996).
Glover filed a pro se motion to correct his sentence under 28 U. S. C. §2255 (1994 ed., Supp. III). The failure of his counsel to press the grouping issue, he argued, was ineffective assistance, a position confirmed, in his view, by the Court of Appeals’ decision in Wilson. The performance of counsel, he contended, fell below a reasonable standard both at sentencing, when his attorneys did not with any clarity or force contest the Government’s argument, and on appeal, when they did not present the issue in their briefs or call the Wilson decision to the panel’s attention following the oral argument. He further argued that absent the ineffective assistance, his offense level would have been two levels lower, yielding a Guidelines sentencing range of 63 to 78 months. Under this theory, the 84-month sentence he received was an unlawful increase of anywhere between 6 and 21 months.
The District Court denied Glover’s motion, determining that under Seventh Circuit precedent an increase of 6 to 21 months in a defendant’s sentence was not significant enough to amount to prejudice for purposes of Strickland v. Washington, supra. As a result, the District Court did not decide the issue whether the performance of Glover’s counsel fell below a reasonable standard of competence. On appeal to the Seventh Circuit, the Government argued only that Glover had not suffered prejudice within the meaning of Strickland. See App. to Reply Brief for Petitioner 1a-22a. Citing Durrive v. United States, 4 F. 3d 548 (CA7 1993), the Government contended that even were the performance of Glover’s counsel ineffective, the resulting additional 6 to 21 months, under the law as established in the Seventh Circuit, would not constitute prejudice. App. to Reply Brief for Petitioner 21a. The Court of Appeals affirmed, relying on that theory. 182 F. 3d 921 (1999) (table). We granted Glover’s petition for certiorari. 530 U. S. 1261 (2000).
II
The Government no longer puts forth the proposition that a 6- to 21-month prison term increase is not prejudice under Strickland. It now acknowledges that such a rule, without more, would be “inconsistent with this Court’s cases and unworkable.” Brief for United States 18.
It appears the Seventh Circuit drew the substance of its no-prejudice rule from our opinion in Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506 U. S. 864 (1998). Lockhart holds that in some circumstances a mere difference in outcome will not suffice to establish prejudice. Id., at 369. The Seventh Circuit extracted from this holding the rule at issue here, which denies relief when the increase in sentence is said to be not so significant as to render the outcome of sentencing unreliable or fundamentally unfair. See Durrive, supra, at 550-551. The Court explained last Term that our holding in Lockhart does not supplant the Strickland analysis. See Williams v. Taylor, 529 U. S. 362, 393 (2000) (“Cases such as Nix v. Whiteside, 475 U. S. 157 (1986), and Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506 U. S. 364 (1993), do not justify a departure from a straightforward application of Strickland when the ineffectiveness of counsel does deprive the defendant of a substantive or procedural right to which the law entitles him”); id., at 414 (opinion of O’Connor, J.) (“As I explained in my concurring opinion in [Lockhart], ‘in the vast majority of cases... [t]he determinative question — whether there is “a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different” — remains unchanged’”). The Seventh Circuit was incorrect to rely on Lockhart to deny relief to persons attacking their sentence who might show deficient performance in counsel’s failure to object to an error of law affecting the calculation of a sentence because the sentence increase does not meet some baseline standard of prejudice. Authority does not suggest that a minimal amount of additional time in prison cannot constitute prejudice. Quite to the contrary, our jurisprudence suggests that any amount of actual jail time has Sixth Amendment significance. Compare Argersinger v. Hamlin, 407 U. S. 25 (1972) (holding that the assistance of counsel must be provided when a defendant is tried for a crime that results in a sentence of imprisonment), with Scott v. Illinois, 440 U. S. 367 (1979) (holding that a criminal defendant has no Sixth Amendment right to counsel when his trial does not result in a sentence of imprisonment). Our decisions on the right to jury trial in a criminal ease do not suggest that there is no prejudice in the circumstances here. Those cases have limited the right to jury trial to offenses where the potential punishment was imprisonment for six months or more. See Argersinger, supra, at 29 (citing Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S. 145 (1968)). But they do not control the question whether a showing of prejudice, in the context of a claim for ineffective assistance of counsel, requires a significant increase in a term of imprisonment.
The Seventh Circuit’s rule is not well considered in any event, because there is no obvious dividing line by which to measure how much longer a sentence must be for the increase to constitute substantial prejudice. Indeed, it is not even clear if the relevant increase is to be measured in absolute terms or by some fraction of the total authorized sentence. See Martin v. United States, 109 F. 3d 1177, 1183 (CA7 1996) (Rovner, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing en banc). Although the amount by which a defendant’s sentence is increased by a particular decision may be a factor to consider in determining whether counsel’s performance in failing to argue the point constitutes ineffective assistance, under a determinate system of constrained discretion such as the Sentencing Guidelines it cannot serve as a bar to a showing of prejudice. Compare Spriggs v. Collins, 993 F. 2d 85, 88 (CA5 1993) (requiring a showing that a sentence would have been “significantly less harsh” under the Texas discretionary sentencing scheme), with United States v. Phillips, 210 F. 3d 345 (CA5 2000) (finding prejudice under the Sentencing Guidelines when an error by counsel led to an increased sentence). We hold that the Seventh Circuit erred in engrafting this additional requirement onto the prejudice branch of the Strickland test. This is not a case where trial strategies, in retrospect, might be criticized for leading to a harsher sentence. Here we consider the sentencing calculation itself, a calculation resulting from a ruling which, if it had been error, would have been correctable on appeal. We express no opinion on the ultimate merits of Glover’s claim because the question of deficient performance is not before us, but it is clear that prejudice flowed from the asserted error in sentencing.
III
The Government makes various arguments for alternative grounds to affirm the Court of Appeals. Among other contentions, the Government suggests that the failure of Glover’s counsel to argue for grouping of the money laundering counts was not deficient; that Glover’s grouping claim has no legal merit in any event; and that even if Glover had prevailed on his grouping claim, his sentence in fact would have increased as a result. Glover disputes these contentions. We need not describe the arguments in great detail, because despite the fact the parties have joined issue at least in part on these points, they were neither raised in nor passed upon by the Court of Appeals. In the ordinary course we do not decide questions neither raised nor resolved below. See Taylor v. Freeland & Kronz, 503 U. S. 638, 646 (1992). As a general rule, furthermore, we do not decide issues outside the questions presented by the petition for certiorari. This Court’s Rule 14.1(a). Whether these issues remain open, and if so whether they have merit, are questions for the Court of Appeals or the District Court to consider and determine in the first instance.
The judgment of the Seventh Circuit is reversed. The case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Reed
delivered the opinion of the Court.
This writ of certiorari was allowed to review a decree of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirming a decree of the District Court of the United States for the District of Hawaii, 329 U. S. 697. The United States began the present proceedings by a petition, filed in the District Court, to quiet title in it to a group of islets in the Pacific, long known as Palmyra Island. Palmyra was annexed to the Kingdom of Hawaii on February 26, 1862, and the United States claims that it remained a part of the governmental lands of Hawaii and passed to the United States by the Joint Resolution of Congress of July 7, 1898, which annexed Hawaii to the United States and accepted for the United States all public, Government or Crown lands and all other public property then belonging to the Republic of Hawaii. The lands and sovereignty of the Kingdom of Hawaii previously had passed directly to the Republic of Hawaii, through the intervening Provisional Government.
Palmyra Island is around one thousand miles south of the main Hawaiian group. It is the first considerable body of land in that direction and lies between the Hawaiian Islands and Samoa. The Palmyra group is a coral covered atoll of about fifty islets, some with trees, and extends — reefs, intervening water and land — 5 2/3 sea miles in an easterly and westerly direction and 1 1/3 sea miles northwardly and southwardly. The observation spot for the map in the case is Latitude 5° 52' 18" N., Longitude 162° 05' 55" W. The British islands of Washington, Fanning and Christmas lie within a 500-mile radius to the southeast of Palmyra. Use of the islands by the respondents and their predecessors in title was intermittent. The question of title became important in 1939 when Congress authorized the construction at Palmyra of naval aviation facilities and appropriated $1,100,000 for their construction. 53 Stat. 590. Negotiations with these respondents, as owners, were undertaken in 1938 by the Navy Department for a lease of the property but were not completed. This suit was filed in 1939.
There have been two trials of this case. The records of both are before us, as the record of the first trial was made a part of the second. Certain contemporaneous written evidence of the early transactions was produced.
The findings of fact in the first trial show that two Hawaiian citizens, Johnson Wilkinson and Zenas Bent, made a representation concerning Palmyra Island to the King and the Cabinet Council. The minutes of a meeting of the Council which took place at Honolulu on February 26, 1862, are extant. The “representation” has not been found. The Council minutes show the following:
“P. Kamehameha read a Representation from Z Bent & Mr Wilkinson, about the Island Palmyra, requesting that the Island should be considered a Hawaiian possession & be placed under the Hawaiian Flag
“After some discussion it pleased the King to direct the Minister of the Interior, to grant what the Petitioners apply for, following the precedent of the Resolution regarding the Island Cornwallis & without exceeding the same.”
The action of the Council was communicated to Wilkinson and Bent through a letter by the Minister of the Interior on March 1,1862. In the letter it was said that the Hawaiian Government consented to the taking possession of Palmyra “for the purpose of increasing the trade and commerce of this Kingdom as well as offering protection to the interests of its subjects.” Accompanying the letter was a commission empowering Bent “to take possession in our name of Palmyra Island.” Explicit directions were contained in the commission that Bent was to sign a declaration and leave it in a bottle buried at the foot of a pole wrapped with the Hawaiian flag. The commission was signed jointly by the King and the Minister of Interior. On June 16,1862, Bent reported that he had carried out the commission and left a paper as directed. In the same report Bent told of the trees on the island and the kind of vegetables that would grow. He said that he had erected a dwelling house on the island and a curing house for biche de mer, a kind of edible sea slug that is prized in the Orient. It also said that he had left five men on the island and proposed to return in about ten days. Thereupon the Minister of the Interior duly issued a proclamation on June 18, as follows:
“Whereas, On the 15th day of April, 1862, Palmyra Island, in latitude 5° 50' North, and longitude 161° 53' West, was taken possession of, with the usual formalities, by Captain Zenas Bent, he being duly authorized to do so, in the name of Kamehameha IV, King of the Hawaiian Islands. Therefore, This is to give notice, that the said island, so taken possession of, is henceforth to be considered and respected as part of the Domain of the King of the Hawaiian Islands.”
A finding was made that certain comments on the expedition were published in the Honolulu papers between the representation to the Council and the proclamation which was only important in the present litigation as showing a contemporaneous understanding that possession was being taken of an island as part of the Domain of the King of the Hawaiian Islands.
As shown by the minutes of the Cabinet Council, the Minister of the Interior was directed to grant the application of Bent and Wilkinson “following the precedent of the Resolution regarding the Island Cornwallis & without exceeding the same.” The meaning of these words is not made clear by the record. The United States contends that the words limit any rights of Bent in Palmyra to “a five-year right to take guano,” and that he never was “granted or intended to be granted a fee simple title.” The trial court thought that the purpose of the Council might reasonably have been to limit the authority of Bent and Wilkinson to islands that were “not in possession of any other government or any other people.” The reason for this supposition lies in the fact that the commission of May 31, 1858, to Samuel Clesson Allen, who discovered Cornwallis Island for Hawaii, to take possession of the island contained the words just quoted. On the same day that the commission was issued, a contract was made with Edward P. Adams for him to take guano for five years from any islands acquired for Hawaii by Allen in the schooner, “Kalama.” Adams’ request for the grant of a fee to a ⅞ interest in any island discovered, so far as shown by the record, was not acted upon by the Hawaiian legislative body.
Allen took possession of Cornwallis Island and submitted a report of his expedition on July 12, 1858, to the Minister of the Interior. Thereupon at a meeting of the Privy Council on July 27, 1858, the following resolution was passed:
“Resolved that Cornwallis Island in latitude 16.43 North, and longitude 169.33 west from Greenwich, and Kalama Island, in latitude 16.44 North and longitude 169.21 west, having been taken possession of, with the usual formalities, on the 14th and 19th of June 1858, by Samuel C. Allen Esquire, in the name of Kamehameha IV, the said Islands are to be considered as part of His Majesty’s Domain.”
It will be noted that this resolution is substantially in the form of the later proclamation in regard to Palmyra.
The annexation of Cornwallis Island failed because of prior discovery by the United States and later, on October 16, 1858, the Minister of the Interior cancelled the contract which had been made with Adams.
Thus it will be seen that the meaning of the minutes concerning the acquisition of Palmyra, following the precedent of Cornwallis, is uncertain. The resolution annexing Cornwallis is substantially the same as the proclamation concerning Palmyra. The commission authorizing Bent to take possession of Palmyra is substantially the same as the commission to Allen that resulted in the discovery of Cornwallis. There is no evidence of a contract with Bent and Wilkinson similar to the guano contract made with Adams. We conclude that there is nothing in the requirement that the Palmyra acquisition should follow the precedent of the Cornwallis resolution to indicate anything more than that the sovereignty over Palmyra was to be acquired for Hawaii, as stated in the proclamation of possession. There is nothing to lead us to disagree with the trial court’s finding as to Palmyra, as follows:
“The words used in the formality of annexation and proclamation need not and likely would not have been different whether it was the intention that the act of annexion should constitute the vesting of a fee simple title to the lands in the King, or merely extend sovereignty over the domain annexed.”
We find no evidence of a consistent plan or custom of the Kingdom of Hawaii relating to title to lands on islands when possession was taken for the Kingdom. The instructions to Wilkinson and Bent were:
“I am authorized to state on the part of His Majesty’s Government that they consent to the taking possession of the island of Palmyra, situated in Longitude 161° 53' west and in Latitude 6° 4 North, as described by you in said memorial; for the purpose of increasing the trade and commerce of this Kingdom as well as offering protection to the interests of its subjects.”
The trial court ended its findings of fact and conclusions of law on the first trial in these words:
“My controlling finding is, that the sovereignty of the United States was extended over Palmyra Island by Annexation, but the Republic of Hawaii did not in fact or in form assert fee simple title to this land at the time of annexation, or at any other time, and it is sufficient to say, only, as a
Conclusion
I am decidedly of opinion that petitioner [The United States] does not exhibit a title which can be sustained in the Courts of the United States, and therefore, is not entitled to any relief prayed for.”
On appeal, the Court of Appeals reversed. United States v. Fullard-Leo, 133 F. 2d 743. It concluded that the commission to Bent, heretofore referred to,
“makes it abundantly clear that Bent was merely acting as agent of the King. Under the principles of international law, the taking of possession by Bent perfected the title of the King. 1 Hyde, International Law, 167 § 100; 1 Oppenheim, International Law, 276-278, §§ 221-224; Martin v. Waddell, 16 Pet. 367, 409, 41 U. S. 367, 409, 10 L. Ed. 997. Nothing in the resolution or the letter referred to is contrary to that view.” Id., 747.
It said there was no proof of subsequent alienation by any sovereign and that the evidence would not support a finding of a lost grant.
On remand of this case on the first appeal, the trial court entered further findings of fact and conclusions of law. It held:
“I believe and so hold that the evidence in this case is not only entirely consistent with but can reasonably and logically be accounted for only upon the presumption that a grant issued to Bent and Wilkinson by which the Hawaiian government parted with its title.”
This can only mean that in the trial court’s opinion, the Kingdom of Hawaii acquired sovereignty over Palmyra and Bent and Wilkinson obtained the private ownership of the islets. This holding was affirmed on appeal. United States v. Fullard-Leo, 156 F. 2d 756. Although only one of the questions presented on certiorari, our determination that the action of the Circuit Court of Appeals is correct disposes of the entire case.
Hawaii has been a territory of the United States since the Joint Resolution of Annexation of July 7, 1898. 30 Stat. 750. Before that the islands composing the present Territory of Hawaii had existed independent from the rest of the world and sovereign as far back as history and local tradition reaches. When American Christian missionaries arrived at the Islands in 1820, the Hawaiian civilization merged with that of the rest of the known world. At that time the principal islands of the present Territory had been united a few years before into a monarchy under a strong leader, Kamehameha I. Notwithstanding his death, a short time before the coming of the missionaries, the kingdom welded by him from the several island communities continued as a recognized monarchy under his successors until its fall in 1893. A Provisional Government succeeded the monarchy and was in turn followed by the Republic of Hawaii, the foreign governmental authority mentioned in the Congressional Resolution of Annexation as ceding Hawaii to the United States. From Kamehameha I to annexation, Hawaii made steady advances in conforming its laws and economy to the manner of life of the other civilized nations of the world.
At the time of the annexation of Palmyra Island by the Kingdom of Hawaii, April 15, 1862, that monarchy possessed a system of land ownership and land laws that were adequate to establish titles and maintain a proper record thereof in accordance with the contemporaneous practices of Anglo-American law. The earlier nineteenth century laws of the Kingdom had been codified into a Civil Code in 1859. In this code the Minister of the Interior was given supervision of the public lands with power to dispose of them with the authority of the King in Cabinet Council. Civil Code of the Hawaiian Islands, 1859, c. VII, Art. I. By c. XXVI, Art. LI, a Bureau of Conveyances with books of registry was required and by c. XXV, Art. L, §§ 1241-48, provision was made for probate and administration. Under treaties with foreign nations, Hawaii permitted the sale of local lands of deceased aliens and the withdrawal of the proceeds by their heirs. Id,., pp. 461 and 471.
Kamehameha I, as King and Conqueror, was recognized by Hawaiian law as the sole owner of all the soil of the Islands. Through a system of feudal tenures, not too clearly defined, large portions of the royal domains were divided among the chiefs by Kamehameha I and his successors and this process of infeudation continued to the lowest class of tenants. This system of tenures created dissatisfaction among the chiefs and people because of the burdens of service and produce that the inferior owed to the superior. Consequently by a series of royal and legislative steps, the King and the House of Nobles and Representatives provided for a land system which finally resulted in a separation of the lands into lands of the Government, the Crown and the People. This purpose finally was manifested by the Act of June 7, 1848. By this act, much of the land of Hawaii was allocated between the Crown and the Government. This division of lands became known as “The Great Mahele.” Nothing has been called to our attention limiting the power of the King to grant Crown Lands prior to the Act of January 3, 1865. Compare Jover v. Insular Government, 221 U. S. 623, 633. The requirement that the Minister of the Interior maintain a record of all royal grants refers only to those for government land. Civil Code, 1859, § 44. By enactment of the King and the Legislative Assembly in 1865, the Crown Lands became inalienable except by future legislative action. See “Crown Lands,” Revised Laws of Hawaii, 1905, pp. 1226-30. The private lands of the King or Crown Lands, confirmed to him by the Act of June 7, 1848, were taken over by the Government in 1895 and thus became government lands, also.
In order to establish private title to lands in the former tenants, a Board of Commissioners to Quiet Land Titles was created in 1846. This Commission adopted “Principles” for adjudication of claims. These were approved by the Legislative Council the same year and throw strong light on the Hawaiian land system shortly before the annexation of Palmyra. This Commission dealt not only with lands included in the Great Mahele but also with lands that were not mentioned in that act and established titles for such lands. It apparently continued until March 31,1855. After the end of the Commission’s work, the Minister of the Interior and the King in Cabinet Council were charged May 17, 1859, with responsibility for government lands and the maintenance of records for all royal conveyances. This summary of the Hawaiian land laws at the time of the annexation of Palmyra brings before us the pattern of land ownership and the system of recor-dation of titles, both those stemming from royal grants of government lands and from private transactions. The claim of respondents to Palmyra must be adjudicated with this situation in mind. We are not dealing with an explorer’s claim of title to lands of a savage tribe or that of a discoverer of a hitherto unknown islet.
Whether we distinguish between Crown and Government lands, however, seems immaterial. No record appears of any conveyance from King or Minister to any land on Palmyra. We assume the law required a public record for any such conveyance from either from the time possession was taken for Hawaii. It is clear that both the King and the Minister of the Interior with the authority of the King in the Cabinet Council had power to convey the lands to private citizens. Civil Code, 1859, §§ 39-48; Act of January 3, 1865, Rev. Laws, Hawaii, 1905, p. 1226, § 3. We assume further that the formal claim to Palmyra for the Hawaiian Kingdom made by Bent, pursuant to his commission, gave Hawaii not only sovereignty over Palmyra but also the power to grant the lands of the newly annexed islets as part of its public lands to private owners.
In the circumstances heretofore described, were the district and circuit courts justified in quieting title to Palmyra in respondents on the theory of a lost grant? We take judicial notice of the laws of Hawaii prior to its annexation as a part of our domestic laws. The rules under which the Hawaiian people lived under the monarchy or republic define, for the sovereign of today, the rights acquired during those periods. While in matters of local law the federal courts defer to the decisions of the territorial courts, we are dealing here with a problem of federal law — the United States seeks to quiet its title to land now claimed by virtue of Hawaiian cession. The federal rights are partly dependent upon the Hawaiian law prior to annexation. Therefore while the Hawaiian law, as it existed before the annexation of the Territory, is controlling on rights in land that are claimed to have had their beginnings then the federal courts construe that law for themselves. The federal courts cannot be foreclosed by determinations of the Hawaiian law by the Hawaiian courts. They will lean heavily upon the Hawaiian decisions as to the Hawaiian law but they are not bound to follow those decisions where a claimed title to public lands of the United States is involved. The roots of respondents’ claim spring from Hawaiian law. As their claim to Palmyra continued after the United States acquired in 1898 whatever rights Hawaii then had, the validity of respondents’ claim must be judged, also, in the light of the public land law of the United States.
The presumption of a lost grant to land has received recognition as an appropriate means to quiet long possession. It recognizes that lapse of time may cure the neglect or failure to secure the proper muniments of title, even though the lost grant may not have been in fact executed. The doctrine first appeared in the field of incorporeal hereditaments but has been extended to realty. The rule applies to claims to land held adversely to the sovereign. The case from this Court most often cited is United States v. Chaves, 159 U. S. 452. In that case, there was evidence of the prior existence of the lost grant. The title of the claimants was upheld but this Court then stated, at p. 464, conformably to Fletcher v. Fuller, supra:
“Without going at length into the subject, it may be safely said that by the weight of authority, as well as the preponderance of opinion, it is the general rule of American law that a grant will be presumed upon proof of an adverse, exclusive, and uninterrupted possession for twenty years, and that such rule will be applied as a presumptio juris et de jure, wherever, by possibility, a right may be acquired in any manner known to the law.”
See United States v. Pendell, 185 U. S. 189, 200-201.
A few years later, in United States v. Chavez, 175 U. S. 509, the problem of the lost grant again arose. In this case, as to one tract, case No. 38 at 516, the existence of the grant to Joaquin Sedillo was not shown except by a statement of January 11, 1734, that the tract conveyed “was acquired by his [affiant’s] father in part by grant in the name of His Majesty [The King of Spain]...” P. 514. In referring to the recognition of title in the private owners, this Court said, at 520:
“Succeeding to the power and obligations of those Governments, must the United States do so? This is insisted by their counsel, and yet they have felt and expressed the equities which arise from the circumstances of the case. Whence arise those equities? That which establishes them may establish title. Upon a long and uninterrupted possession, the law bases presumptions as sufficient for legal judgment, in the absence of rebutting circumstances, as formal instruments, or records, or articulate testimony. Not that formal instruments or records are unnecessary, but it will be presumed that they once existed and have been lost. The inquiry then recurs, do such presumptions arise in this case and do they solve its questions?”
Thereafter the Court, 524, referred to the long possession and sustained the claimants in their title.
Cariño v. Insular Government, 212 U. S. 449, was decided on a writ of error to the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands. An Igorot chieftain sought to register his land in Benguet Province, long held by his family. Under claim of succession to the Spanish rights by the Treaty of Paris and an exception in the Act of July 1,1902, providing for temporary administration of civil government in the Philippines, the land had been taken for public purposes by the United States and the Philippine Government. Objection was made by the two governments and sustained by the Supreme Court of' the Philippines on the ground that the applicant did not show a grant from any sovereign. This Court thought it unjust, in the circumstances, to require a native to have a paper title.
“It might, perhaps, be proper and sufficient to say that when, as far back as testimony or memory goes, the land has been held by individuals under a claim of private ownership, it will be presumed to have been held in the same way from before the Spanish conquest, and never to have been public land.” 212 U. S. at 460.
The Philippine judgment was reversed.
The law of the Territory of Hawaii recognizes and has applied the doctrine of the lost grant in controversies between a claimant to Government land and the Territory. In re Title of Kioloku (1920), 25 Haw. 357. The tract involved in that litigation had been held in “actual, open, continuous and uninterrupted possession” since 1870. No record or evidence of a grant by any governmental authority was produced. After a discussion of several of the cases just referred to and others, it was held that the doctrine of the lost grant, in claims to land against the state, was the “law of the land” in Hawaii. On appeal the holding was affirmed by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. That court said:
“Under the rule of law applicable to the case, as we find it, it was not necessary that the appellee should prove the probability that a grant did in fact issue to one of its predecessors in interest. It was enough to show, as we think it was shown, that there was a legal possibility of a grant.” Territory of Hawaii v. Hutchinson Sugar Plantation Co., 272 F. 856, 860.
We are therefore of the opinion that where, as here, there was power in the King or the officials of the Kingdom of Hawaii to convey a title to Palmyra during the years immediately following its annexation to the Kingdom of Hawaii and prior to many of the private conveyances hereinafter referred to, the doctrine of a lost grant may be applied, in suitable circumstances, and its existence presumed in favor of the predecessors in title of these respondents. In order for the doctrine of a lost grant to be applicable, the possession must be under a claim of right, actual, open and exclusive. A chain of conveyances is important. So is the payment of taxes. A claim for government lands stands upon no different principle in theory so long as authority exists in government officials to execute the patent, grant or conveyance. As a practical matter it requires a higher degree of proof because of the difficulty for a state to protect its lands from use by those without right. We turn then to the circumstances relied upon by the lower courts as sustaining respondents’ contentions in respect to their claim to and occupation of Palmyra.
In the earlier part of this opinion, we have set out in detail the existing governmental record of the proceedings leading up to the annexation of Palmyra by the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1862. No positive evidence was produced as to any grant of Palmyra by Hawaii prior to the latter’s annexation by the United States in 1898. Nor does the record show the exercise of any direct governmental authority over Palmyra. In 1905, upon a request of the Governor for an opinion concerning the jurisdiction of Hawaii over islands to the northwest of Kauai, the Attorney General answered that Hawaii had power to lease them. It will be noted from the short opinion in the margin that Palmyra, though over 1000 miles to the southeast of Kauai, was included. Nothing appears as to any former or subsequent exercise by Hawaii of a power to lease Palmyra. No taxes were collected from those who claimed to be owners prior to 1885 when the Pacific Navigation Company paid taxes to Hawaii on Palmyra for three years. Assessments have been made annually since 1911 and taxes have been paid regularly since then by the claimants to the property. At the time of annexation by the United States, provision was made for commissioners to recommend to Congress legislation concerning the Hawaiian Islands. 30 Stat. 750. A full report was made which was transmitted to Congress by the Pesident on December 6, 1898. U. S. Senate Document No. 16, 55th Cong., 3d Sess. It dealt with the Public Domain and shows that the Crown Lands had been taken over by the Hawaiian Government in 1894, p. 4 et seq. In 1894, the Crown Lands were in area 971,463 acres. There were no Crown Lands shown on the smaller islands. P. 102. An appendix shows the Government lands as of September 30, 1897, and lists in acres and values those of the principal islands of the group. Pp. 47-51. They amounted, in acres, to 1,744,713. In the recapitulation, though not included in the lists of public lands, there is an item that may include Palmyra. It reads, “Laysan, etc., islands, Acres-, Value $40,000.” At another point, p. 4, under “Area and Population” appears the only reference to Palmyra. The reference in its setting appears in the margin.
Respondents’ claim of title exists in a consistent series of transactions beginning in 1862 with a deed to Wilkinson from Bent. The deed was recorded in the Registry of Conveyances of Hawaii in 1885. It conveyed all Bent’s “right, title and interest in and to all the property of whatever description now lying or situated on Palmyra Island in the Pacific Ocean which Island by a proclamation of His Majesty Kamehameha IV at present belongs to the Hawaiian Kingdom. And also all my right, title and interest in and to any partnership property that I may have an interest in as co-partner with the said Johnson Wilkinson.” The language, we think, is consistent with an intention to convey a claimed interest in the realty “lying or situated on Palmyra Island” as well as any partnership personal property. Thereafter Wilkinson died in New Zealand in 1866 and left a will devising to his -wife, Kalama:
“And also all my landed freehold and leasehold Estates in the Province of Auckland aforesaid, at Honolulu in the Sandwich Islands in the Island of Palmyra in the South Sea Islands and wheresoever the same may be situated and whether in the said Colony of New Zealand or elsewhere To hold suach real and personal estate unto the said Kalama absolutely and forever.”
The will was proven and registered in New Zealand and was later admitted to probate in Hawaii in 1898. In 1885, after the death of Kalama, two of her heirs transferred all their “right, title and interest as heirs at law of the said Kalama or otherwise, in and to the Island of Palmyra” to one Wilcox, who conveyed to the Pacific Navigation Company. By a series of some four mesne conveyances between 1888 and 1911 the interest of Pacific Navigation Company in the island was eventually transferred to one Henry Cooper. A third heir of Kalama’s transferred his rights in the island to one Ringer, whose children transferred their rights in the Island to Henry Cooper in 1912. Ringer’s widow in 1912 sold all her right, title, and interest in the island to Maui and Clarke.
In 1912 Cooper petitioned the Land Court of Hawaii to confirm title in him. Maui and Clarke contested the petition, claiming to own a dower interest in an “undivided one-third of the Island.” Through its Attorney General, the Territory of Hawaii answered the petition and disclaimed “any interest in, to or concerning” Palmyra. The court decreed that Cooper was the owner in fee simple of the island subject to the dower interest of Annie Ringer held by Maui and Clarke. In 1920, Cooper leased the Island to Meng and White who assigned the lease to the Palmyra Copra Company. In 1922 Cooper sold for $15,000.00 all but two of the islets to Mr. and Mrs. Fullard-Leo, respondents here, who had taken over the lease. From the foregoing, it will be apparent that from 1862 to the breakdown of negotiations a paper title existed in respondents and their predecessors in title, except for the grant from the Kingdom, and that there has been a record of the conveyances in Hawaii since 1885. There was, during these years, a claim of right to exclusive possession.
That claim of right was manifested not only by transfers of paper title but also by actual user of the property. The sufficiency of actual and open possession of property is to be judged in the light of its character and location. It is hard to conceive of a more isolated piece of land than Palmyra, one of which possession need be less continuous to form the basis of a claim. This tiny atoll in the Pacific, however, far removed from any other lands and claimed by no sovereignty until 1862 was not wholly valueless, commercially, prior to the establishment of airways over the ocean.
From time to time, men thought there might be something gained from its exploitation. Bent’s "representation” in 1862 for annexation was preceded by an acquaintance with the locality for a number of years. When he went to take possession he planted vegetables and melons, built a house and sought sea products. The Pacific Navigation Company had men on the island during 1885 and 1886. Cooper visited the island in 1913 and 1914. He was then the owner of record. In 1912, at Cooper’s suggestion, the then Governor of Hawaii requested the Secretary of the Interior of the United States to send an American vessel to Palmyra to confirm American sovereignty. The Governor stated that Mr. Cooper was then the owner and that the private title to Palmyra had been in citizens of Hawaii since 1862. In 1920 and 1921 the Palmyra Copra Company was actively engaged on the island under a lease from Cooper. The Fullard-Leos, who acquired title to all but two of the islands from Cooper, visited the island in 1924 and again in 1935. On many occasions during the interim, they gave permission to various persons to visit the island.
From these evidences of claim of title and possession were the District Court and the Circuit Court of Appeals justified in entering a decree that the fee simple title to Palmyra is vested in respondents? The dissent in the Circuit Court of Appeals points out that our cases applying the lost grant doctrine required “uninterrupted and long continuing possession of a kind indicating the ownership of the fee.” This is the rule. But, as we have indicated above, uninterrupted and long-continued possession does not require a constant, actual occupancy where the character of the property does not lend itself to such use. No other private owner claims any rights in Palmyra. From the evidence of title and possession shown in this record, we cannot say that the decrees below are incorrect.
Judgment affirmed.
Hawaii v. Mankichi, 190 U. S. 197.
Hawaii v. Mankichi, 190 U. S. 197, 216.
Declaration of Rights, 1839.
Act to Organize Executive Departments and Joint Resolution, April 27, 1846, Hawaii, Statute Laws, 1845-46, vol. I, pp. 99, 277.
Revised Laws of Hawaii, 1905, p. 1197 et seq.
Thurston v. Bishop, 7 Haw. 421, dissent, n. at 454.
The domain covered by the term seems to be not only the lands declared to be the private lands of the King by the Act of June 7, 1848, but also other unassigned lands later declared by legislative authority to be Crown Lands. Rev. Laws, Hawaii, 1905, p. 1227; Act of November 14, 1890, Laws, Hawaii, 1890, c. 75; Rev. Laws, Hawaii, 1905, p. 1229.
Hawaii, Statute Laws, 1845-46, vol. I, p. 107.
Hawaii, Statute Laws, 1847, vol. II, pp. 81-94; Revised Laws, Hawaii, 1905, p. 1164 et seq.
Thurston v. Bishop, 7 Haw. 421, 429, 437.
“The. Commission was authorized to consider possession of land acquired by oral gift of Kamehameha I., or one of his high chiefs, as sufficient evidence of title to authorize an award therefor to the claimant. This we must consider as the foundation of all titles to land in this Kingdom, except such as come from the King, to any part of his reserved lands, and excepting also the lists of Government and Fort lands reserved. The land in dispute in this case is not one of those specifically reserved by the King, Kamehameha III., to himself and his successors, and not being in the lists of lands specially set apart as Government or Fort lands, must be one of those over which the Land Commission had jurisdiction to award to the claimant.” P.429.
Haw. Civil Code, 1859, p. 14 et seq.
United States v. Perot, 98 U. S. 428, 430; United States v. Chaves, 159 U. S. 452, 459.
De Castro
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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J
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The motion of respondent for leave to proceed in forma pauperis and the petition for a writ of certiorari are granted. The judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit is reversed, Spencer v. Texas, 385 U. S. 554, and the case is remanded to that court for consideration of the unresolved issues.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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A
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
Petitioner sought a writ of habeas corpus in the Circuit Court of Winnebago County, Illinois, alleging that his conviction in 1925 on a charge of murder was the result of a denial of his rights under the Federal Constitution. That court, after a hearing, quashed the writ; and as its order cannot be reviewed by any higher Illinois court under Illinois practice, this petition for a writ of certiorari is properly addressed to this Court. See Woods v. Nierstheimer, 328 U. S. 211; 15 U. of Chic. L. Rev. 118, 122.
The facts conceded by respondent are as follows:
The common-law record recites that petitioner was arraigned in open court and advised through interpreters of the meaning and effect of a plea of guilty and that petitioner signed a statement waiving jury trial and pleading guilty. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. It does not appear, however, that an attorney was appointed to represent him. The waiver was not in fact signed by him, and no plea of guilty was entered at the trial. He was 18 years old at that time and had been in this country only two years. He did not understand the English language and it is doubtful that he understood American trial court procedure. The arresting officer served as an interpreter for petitioner at the original trial.
The State of Illinois speaking through the Attorney General admits the foregoing facts, confesses error, and consents to a reversal of the judgment below. He states that the writ of habeas corpus is a proper remedy in Illinois in this case because the facts, which he concedes to be a denial of due process of law under the decisions of this Court, were known to the court at the time of the original trial, though they were not a matter of record at the trial. Whether or not on this showing habeas corpus is an appropriate remedy in the court to correct a denial of due process is a question of state law as to which we accept the concession of the State’s Attorney General.
In light of the confession of error (see Young v. United States, 315 U. S. 257; Bozza v. United States, 330 U. S. 160; cf. Baltzer v. United States, 248 U. S. 593) and the undisputed facts, we conclude that petitioner was denied the due process of law which the Fourteenth Amendment requires.
Permission to proceed in forma pauperis is granted. The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted and the judgment below is vacated and remanded to the Circuit Court.
So ordered.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Stevens
delivered the opinion of the Court.
In Chisom v. Roemer, ante, p. 380, we held that judicial elections, and, more specifically, elections of justices of the Supreme Court of Louisiana, are covered by § 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 79 Stat. 437, as amended in 1982, 42 U. S. C. § 1973. In these cases we consider whether the statute also applies to the election of trial judges in Texas. We hold that it does.
I
Petitioners in No. 90-974 are local chapters of the League of United Latin American Citizens, a statewide organization composed of both Mexican-American and African-American residents of the State of Texas, and various individuals. They brought this action against the attorney general of Texas and other officials (respondents) to challenge the existing at-large, countywide method of electing state district judges. Although the original challenge encompassed the entire State and relied on both constitutional and statutory grounds, the issues were later narrowed to include only a statutory challenge to the voting methods in just 10 counties. Petitioners in No. 90-813 are the Houston Lawyers’ Association, an organization of African-American attorneys who are registered voters in Harris County, and certain individuals; they are intervenors, supporting the position of the original plaintiffs. Because all of the petitioners have the same interest in the threshold issue of statutory construction that is now before us, we shall refer to them collectively as “petitioners.”
Texas district courts are the State’s trial courts of general jurisdiction. Electoral districts for Texas district judges consist of one or more entire counties. Eight of the districts included in these cases include a single county; the other district includes two counties. The number of district judges in each district at issue varies from the 59 that sit in the Harris County district to the 3 that sit in the Midland County district. Each judge is elected by the voters in the district in which he or she sits pursuant to an at-large, district-wide electoral scheme, and must be a resident of that district. Although several judicial candidates in the same district may be running in the same election, each runs for a separately numbered position. Thus, for example, if there are 25 vacancies in the Harris County district in a particular year, there are 25 district-wide races for 25 separately numbered positions. In the primary elections, the winner must receive a majority of votes, but in the general election, the candidate with the highest number of votes for a particular numbered position is elected.
Petitioners challenged the at-large, district-wide electoral scheme as diluting the voting strength of African-American and Hispanic voters. They cited the example of Harris County, which has a population that is 20% African-American but has only 3 of 59 district judges that are African-American. The petitioners alleged that alternative electoral schemes using electoral subdistricts or modified at-large structures could remedy the dilution of minority votes in district judge elections.
Following a 1-week trial, the District Court ruled in favor of petitioners on their statutory vote dilution claim. It concluded that petitioners had sustained their burden of proving that under the totality of the circumstances “as a result of the challenged at large system [they] do not have an equal opportunity to participate in the political processes and to elect candidates of their choice,” App. to Pet. for Cert. 290a-291a (footnote omitted); id., at 300a-301a. Although the District Court made no findings about the appropriate remedy for the proven violation, it urged the state legislature to select and approve an alternative district judge election scheme. The District Court also announced that it would entertain motions to enjoin future district judge elections pending the remedy phase of the litigation, should the legislature fail to adopt an alternative election scheme. When the state legislature failed to act, the District Court granted interim relief (to be used solely for the 1990 election of district judges in the nine districts) that included the creation of electoral subdistricts and a prohibition against the use of partisan elections for district judges. Respondents appealed.
A three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit reversed the judgment of the District Court, 902 F. 2d 293 (1990), and petitioners’ motion for rehearing en banc was granted, 902 F. 2d 322 (1990). The en banc majority held that the results test in § 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, as amended in 1982, is inapplicable to judicial elections. See 914 F. 2d 620 (1990). In essence, the majority concluded that Congress’ reference to the voters’ opportunity to elect “representatives” of their choice evidenced a deliberate decision to exclude the election of judges from scrutiny under the newly enacted test. For reasons stated in our opinion in Chisom, ante, at 391-403, we reject that conclusion.
In a separate opinion, portions of which were joined by other judges, Judge Higginbotham expressed his disagreement with the majority’s conclusion that judges are not “representatives” within the meaning of the Act, but concurred in the judgment of reversal. His opinion relied on a distinction between state appellate judges and trial judges. Whereas the justices of the Louisiana Supreme Court have statewide jurisdiction, even though they are elected by voters in separate districts, and act as members of a collegial body, the Texas trial judge has jurisdiction that is coextensive with the geographic area from which he or she is elected and has the sole authority to render final decisions. Judge Higgin-botham’s opinion characterized trial judges “as single-office holders instead of members of a multi-member body,” 914 F. 2d, at 649 (opinion concurring in judgment), because each exercises his or her authority independently of the other judges serving in the same area or on the same court. Given the State’s “compelling interest in linking jurisdiction and elective base for judges acting alone,” id., at 651, and the risk that “attempting to break the linkage of jurisdiction and elective base . . . may well lessen minority influence instead of increase it,” id., at 649, by making only a few district court judges principally accountable to the minority electorate rather than making all of the district’s judges partly accountable to minority voters, he concluded that elections for single-member offices, including elections for Texas district court judgeships, are exempt from vote dilution challenges under § 2.
Chief Judge Clark, while agreeing with the judgment of reversal on grounds “expressly limited to the facts of the present case,” id., at 631 (opinion concurring specially), disagreed with the analysis in both the majority and the opinion concurring in the judgment. He expressed the opinion that “it is equally wrong to say that section 2 covers all judicial elections as it is to say it covers none,” id., at 633 (emphasis in original). Characterizing Judge Higginbotham’s “function-of-the-office analysis” as “identical in concept to the majority view,” ibid., Chief Judge Clark would have held that whenever an officeholder’s jurisdiction and the area of residence of his or her electorate coincide, no vote dilution claims may be brought against at-large schemes for electing the officeholder, regardless of whether the “function” of the officeholder is to act alone or as a member of a collegial body.
In a dissenting opinion, Judge Johnson argued that the Act applies to all judicial elections:
“Several truths are self-evident from the clear language of the statute that had heretofore opened the electoral process to people of all colors. The Voting Rights Act focuses on the voter, not the elected official. The Act was intended to prohibit racial discrimination in all voting, the sole inquiry being whether the political processes are equally open to all persons, no matter their race or color. The Act is concerned only with the intent of persons of ‘race or color’ in casting a ballot; it has no interest in the function of the person holding the office.” Id., at 652 (emphasis in original).
I — i I — i
We granted certiorari in these cases, 498 U. S. 1060 (1991), and in Chisom v. Roemer, ante, p. 380, for the limited purpose of considering the scope of the coverage of § 2. As we have held in Chisom, the Act does not categorically exclude judicial elections from its coverage. The term “representatives” is not a word of limitation. Nor can the protection of minority voters’ unitary right to an equal opportunity “to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of their choice” be bifurcated into two kinds of claims in judicial elections, one covered and the other beyond the reach of the Act. Ante, at 398. It is equally clear, in our opinion, that the coverage of the Act encompasses the election of executive officers and trial judges whose responsibilities are exercised independently in an area coextensive with the districts from which they are elected. If a State decides to elect its trial judges, as Texas did in 1861, those elections must be conducted in compliance with the Voting Rights Act.
We deliberately avoid any evaluation of the merits of the concerns expressed in Judge Higginbotham’s opinion concurring in the judgment because we believe they are matters that are relevant either to an analysis of the totality of the circumstances that must be considered in an application of the results test embodied in § 2, as amended, or to a consideration of possible remedies in the event a violation is proved, but not to the threshold question of the Act’s coverage. Even if we assume, arguendo, that the State’s interest in electing judges on a district-wide basis may preclude a remedy that involves redrawing boundaries or subdividing districts, or may even preclude a finding that vote dilution has occurred under the “totality of the circumstances” in a particular case, that interest does not justify excluding elections for single-member offices from the coverage of the § 2 results test. Rather, such a state interest is a factor to be considered by the court in evaluating whether the evidence in a particular case supports a finding of a vote dilution violation in an election for a single-member office.
Thus we disagree with respondents that the “single-member office” theory automatically exempts certain elections from the coverage of § 2. Rather, we believe that the State’s interest in maintaining an electoral system — in these cases, Texas’ interest in maintaining the link between a district judge’s jurisdiction and the area of residency of his or her voters — is a legitimate factor to be considered by courts among the “totality of circumstances” in determining whether a § 2 violation has occurred. A State’s justification for its electoral system is a proper factor for the courts to assess in a racial vote dilution inquiry, and the Fifth Circuit has expressly approved the use of this particular factor in the balance of considerations. See Zimmer v. McKeithen, 485 F. 2d 1297, 1305 (1973), aff’d sub nom. East Carroll Parish School Bd. v. Marshall, 424 U. S. 636 (1976). Because the State’s interest in maintaining an at-large, district-wide electoral scheme for single-member offices is merely one factor to be considered in evaluating the “totality of circumstances,” that interest does not automatically, and in every case, outweigh proof of racial vote dilution.
Two examples will explain why the “single-member office” theory, even if accepted, cannot suffice to place an election for a single-member-office holder entirely beyond the coverage of § 2 of the Act. First, if a particular practice or procedure, such as closing the polls at noon, results in an abridgment of a racial minority’s opportunity to vote and to elect representatives of their choice, the Act would unquestionably apply to restrict such practices, regardless of whether the election was for a single-member-office holder or not. Exempting elections for single-member offices from the reach of § 2 altogether can therefore not be supported. As we stated earlier, this statute does not separate vote dilution challenges from other challenges brought under the amended § 2. See supra, at 425-426.
Second, if the boundaries of the electoral district — and perhaps of its neighboring district as well — were shaped in “an uncouth twenty-eight-sided figure” such as that found in Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 364 U. S. 339, 340 (1960), and if the effect of the configuration were to produce an unnatural distribution of the voting power of different racial groups, an inquiry into the totality of circumstances would at least arguably be required to determine whether or not the results test was violated. Placing elections for single-member offices entirely beyond the scope of coverage of § 2 would preclude such an inquiry, even if the State’s interest in maintaining the “uncouth” electoral system was trivial or illusory and even if any resulting impairment of a minority group’s voting strength could be remedied without significantly impairing the State’s interest in electing judges on a district-wide basis.
Because the results test in §2 of the Voting Rights Act applies to claims of vote dilution in judicial elections, see Chisom, ante, at 404, and because the concerns expressed by Judge Higginbotham in distinguishing elections of Texas district court judges from elections of supreme court justices relate to the question whether a vote dilution violation may be found or remedied rather than whether such a challenge may be brought, we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand these cases for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
The counties at issue are: Harris, Dallas, Tarrant, Bexar, Travis, Jefferson, Lubbock, Crosby, Ector, and Midland.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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B
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sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
The State of New Jersey imposes on each domestic corporation “an annual franchise tax ... for the privilege of having or exercising its corporate franchise” in the State. This tax, as applied to appellant, is measured by the corporation's “net worth,” which is defined as the sum of the corporation’s issued and outstanding capital stock, paid-in or capital surplus, earned surplus and undivided profits, other surplus accounts which will accrue to the shareholders (not including depreciation reserves), and debts owed to shareholders owning 10 percent or more of the corporation’s stock. Appellant is a corporation organized under the laws of New Jersey, and is therefore subject to the tax. In assessing appellant’s tax for 1952, the Tax Commissioner included in appellant’s net worth the value of certain federal bonds held by appellant, thereby increasing the amount due by $320.07. Appellant protested, claiming that under R. S. § 3701, 31 U. S. C. § 742, these bonds were immune from state taxation. The New Jersey courts upheld the Commissioner’s assessment, and this appeal contests the validity of the state statute as so applied.
Appellant contends that this tax is not in reality a franchise tax, but is rather in the nature of a direct property tax on the immune federal obligations. Corporate franchises granted by a State create a relationship which may legitimately be made the subject of taxation, Home Ins. Co. v. New York, 134 U. S. 594, 599-600; Flint v. Stone Tracy Co., 220 U. S. 107, 162; Educational Films Corp. v. Ward, 282 U. S. 379, 388; and the statute expressly declares this to be a franchise tax. Moreover, the Supreme Court of New Jersey has, on independent examination, found this to be “a bona fide franchise tax.” While this is, of course, not conclusive here, Society for Savings v. Bowers, 349 U. S. 143, we find no basis in this instance for not accepting the state court’s conclusion that this tax is not imposed directly on the property held by the corporation. Cf. Pacific Co. v. Johnson, 285 U. S. 480, 495-496.
Appellant argues further that even if this is a franchise tax, it must fall because its effect is the same as if it had been imposed directly on the tax-exempt federal securities. Since the tax remains the same whatever the character of the corporate assets may be, no claim can be sustained that this taxing statute discriminates against the federal obligations. And since this is a tax on the corporate franchise, it is valid despite the inclusion of federal bonds in the determination of net worth. This Court has consistently upheld franchise taxes measured by a yardstick which includes tax-exempt income or property, even though a part of the economic impact of the tax may be said to bear indirectly upon such income or property. See, e. g., Society for Savings v. Coite, 6 Wall. 594; Provident Institution v. Massachusetts, 6 Wall. 611; Hamilton Co. v. Massachusetts, 6 Wall. 632; Home Ins. Co. v. New York, supra; Educational Films Corp. v. Ward, supra; Pacific Co. v. Johnson, supra. We have only recently adhered to this principle in another aspect of this field of taxation. See Society for Savings v. Bowers, supra, at 147-148. New Jersey Realty Title Ins. Co. v. Division of Tax Appeals, 338 U. S. 665, on which appellant relies, is distinguishable, in that it did not involve a franchise tax, but rather a tax whose legal incidence this Court found to be upon the intangible assets of the corporation.
Since as applied here this is a permissible tax on the corporate franchise, the decision below must be
Affirmed.
N. J. Laws 1945, c. 162, N. J. S. A. §§ 54:10A-1 et seq.
Id., §§ 54:10A-4 (d)(5).
Werner Machine Co. v. Director of Division of Taxation, 17 N. J. 121, 125, 110 A. 2d 89, 91.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Brennan
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Section 7 (b) of the Natural Gas Act, 52 Stat. 824, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 717f (b), provides that “[n]o natural-gas company shall abandon all or any portion of its facilities subject to the jurisdiction of the [Federal Power] Commission, or any service rendered by means of such facilities, without the permission and approval of the Commission first had and obtained, after due hearing, and a finding by the Commission . . . that the present or future public convenience or necessity permit such abandonment.” The question presented in this case is whether the FPC may, upon a proper finding of public convenience or necessity, simultaneously authorize both the sale of natural gas in interstate commerce by a producer and the abandonment of the sale at a future date certain. The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit construed § 7 (b) to empower the FPC to authorize abandonment only when and if proposed at the end of the contract term, thus precluding power to authorize abandonment simultaneously with certificating new producer sales. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals set aside the FPC order involved in this case insofar as it permits the Commission, at the time it issues a certificate of public convenience and necessity, to authorize the producer to terminate the sale at the end of the contract term. 164 U. S. App. D. C. 1, 502 F. 2d 461 (1974). We granted certiorari. 422 U. S. 1006 (1975). We reverse.
I
FPC Order No. 455, 48 F. P. C. 218, issued August 3, 1972, is the order involved. The order was promulgated under FPC rulemaking authority pursuant to a notice of April 6, 1972, 37 Fed. Reg. 7345, as an addition to the FPC’s general rules of practice and procedure, 18 CFR §2.75 (1975). Order No. 455 established an “optional procedure for certificating new producer sales of natural gas.” 48 F. P. C., at 218. The new procedure did not displace area pricing, but instead provided an alternative to “stimulate and accelerate domestic exploration and development of natural gas reserves.” Id., at 225. The procedure was necessary, the Commission found, because natural gas producers were frequently unable, due to hazards of area price revisions in lengthy appellate review proceedings, to rely upon rates established by the FPC in its area rate orders, and thus were discouraged from exploring for new gas and committing it to the interstate market. For “there is no assurance at the present time that a producer may not ultimately have to refund some of an initial rate ... upon which the producer relied when it dedicated a new gas supply to the interstate market.” Id., at 222-223. “[T]he producer does not know ... how much it will get if it develops and sells new gas to the interstate market. The producer knows for sure only that once it sells in interstate commerce it cannot stop deliveries.” Id., at 223. “This uncertainty,” the Commission found, “has impeded domestic exploration and development.” Ibid.
The optional procedure introduced by Order No. 455 was designed to “lessen rate uncertainty which has prevailed since the early 1960’s.” Id., at 219. The procedure has several features. First, it permits producers to tender for FPC approval contracts for the sale of new natural gas at rates that may exceed the maximum authorized by the applicable rate order. Second, the FPC will determine in a single proceeding whether the “public convenience and necessity” under § 7 (c) of the Act, 15 U. S. C. § 717f (c), warrants the issuance of a certificate authorizing the sale and whether the rates called for by the contract are “just and reasonable” under §4 (a), 15 U. S. C. § 717c (a). Third, a permanent certificate issued by the Commission and accepted by the producer is not subject to change in later proceedings under § 4 of the Act, 15 U. S. C. § 717c, and the rates may be collected without risk of refund obligations. 48 F. P. C., at 226. See 18 CFR § 2.75(d) (1975). Fourth, Order No. 455 authorizes inclusion in the permanent certificate of the abandonment assurance — or “pregranted abandonment” — called in question in this case. 18 CFR § 2.75 (e) (1975). The authority to include assurance that the producer may abandon the sale at the end of the contract term is, however, to be exercised only upon appropriate findings by the FPC of public convenience or necessity, as required by § 7 (b). Order No. 455-A, 48 F. P. C. 477, 481 (1972).
The importance to the producer of the pregranted abandonment provision is obvious. Pregranted abandonment gives the producer assurance that his present sale will not indefinitely commit the gas to what may be a lower priced interstate market: he will be free on the. contract expiration date to discontinue deliveries to the purchaser without having to demonstrate again that abandonment is consistent with the public convenience or necessity.
II
The entire optional procedure of Order No. 455 was attacked in petitions for review before the Court of Appeals, which upheld the order in all respects save the pregranted abandonment authority. In holding that § 7 (b) requires a public-convenience-or-necessity finding by the FPC at the time of the proposed abandonment, thus precluding such finding at the time of certification, the Court of Appeals stated, 164 U. S. App. D. C., at 12, 502 F. 2d, at 472:
“Pregranted abandonment would leave a producer free to discontinue service to the interstate market, perhaps years after the original certification, with no contemporaneous obligation on the producer to justify withdrawal of service as consistent with the public convenience and necessity. We think Section 7 (b) does not contemplate or authorize such procedure.
“... It appears to us . .. that pregranted abandonment requires more clairvoyance than even the Commission's expertise reasonably encompasses.”
We find nothing on the face of § 7 (b) to support the holding that the section “does not contemplate or authorize such procedure.” There is no express provision prescribing the timing of the finding of public convenience or necessity that is prerequisite to FPC authority to allow the producer to abandon a sale. In the absence of an explicit direction, the inference may reasonably be made that Congress left the timing of the finding within the general discretionary power granted the FPC “to regulate the abandonment of service,” S. Rep. No. 1162, 76th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1937); H. R. Rep. No. 709, 75th Cong., 1st Sess., 2 (1937). “[T]he Commission's broad responsibilities . . . demand a generous construction of its statutory authority,” Permian Basin Area Rate Cases, 390 U. S. 747, 776 (1968) (footnote omitted), and that inference is plainly consistent with Congress’ regulatory goals.
The reasoning of the Court of Appeals that pregranted abandonment requires “clairvoyance” overlooks the express power granted to the FPC in § 7 (b) to allow abandonment upon a proper finding that the “present or future” public convenience or necessity warrants permission to abandon. The power to authorize an abandonment upon finding that it is justified by future public convenience or necessity clearly encompasses advance authorization warranted by consideration of future circumstances and the necessary estimation of tomorrow’s needs. That has been our conclusion when FPC authority to make forecasts of future events has been challenged in other contexts. For example, in rejecting the contention that the FPC could not consider forecasts of the future under the nearly identical standard of § 7 (e), FPC v. Transcontinental Gas Corp., 365 U. S. 1, 29 (1961), stated that “a forecast of the direction in which future pub-lie interest lies necessarily involves deductions based on the expert knowledge of the agency.” Similarly, as to another agency, we have stated our unwillingness to let “uncertainties as to the future ... paralyze the [Interstate Commerce] Commission into inaction.” United States v. Detroit & Cleveland Nav. Co., 326 U. S. 236, 241 (1945). Thus, to the extent that exercising the pregranted abandonment authority entails forecasting future developments affecting supply and demand, we cannot say that requiring this degree of “clairvoyance” renders the provision beyond FPC authority.
Furthermore, the FPC may determine that present supply and demand conditions require that pregranted abandonment be authorized in appropriate cases to encourage exploration for new gas and its dedication to the interstate market, since the unwillingness of producers to make indefinite commitments has made potentially available supplies inaccessible to the interstate market. We conclude therefore that an optional procedure encompassing pregranted authority intended to draw new gas supplies to the interstate market is clearly within FPC authority to permit abandonments justified by either present or future public convenience or necessity.
Order No. 455 does not authorize specific abandon-ments. It merely establishes an optional procedure under which pregranted abandonment may be authorized in appropriate cases. Any pregranted abandonments approved under this procedure are subject to judicial review under the Act. See § 19 (b), 15 U. S. C. § 717r (b). We should not presume, as the Court of Appeals did, that the Commission is not competent to make proper findings supported by substantial evidence and consistent with § 7 (b) in approving pregranted abandonment. Rather, the question whether particular pre-granted abandonment authorization's are beyond the Commission’s expertise should await resolution in concrete cases. See FPC v. Texaco, Inc., 417 U. S. 380, 392 (1974). It suffices for the purposes of this case that we read § 7 (b) as leaving the timing of approval of abandonments to FPC discretion.
Ill
The Court of Appeals stated that its construction of § 7 (b) as denying FPC authority to authorize abandonment on a future date certain at the time of certification was “fortified” by Sunray Mid-Continent Oil Co. v. FPC, 364 U. S. 137 (1960) (Sunray II). Sunray II held that the FPC had authority to tender a certificate of public convenience and necessity without time limitation to a producer who applied for a certificate authorizing sales for 20 years only. The Court reasoned, id., at 142:
“If petitioners’ contentions, as to the want of authority in the Commission to grant a permanent certificate where one of limited duration has been sought for, were to be sustained, the way would be clear for every independent producer of natural gas to seek certification only for the limited period of its initial contract with the transmission company, and thus automatically be free at a future date, untrammeled by Commission regulation, to reassess whether it desired to continue serving the interstate market.”
We understand the Court of Appeals to read this passage as implying that a limited-term certificate would be barred by the Act, and that a permanent certificate with pregranted abandonment would also be barred since such a certificate, as the FPC concedes, Brief for FPC 22, is legally and functionally indistinguishable from a limited-term certificate. But the Court of Appeals’ reading of Sunray II was patently erroneous. Sunray II in fact indicated that the FPC is authorized to issue limited-term certificates. The Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit had addressed that question at an earlier stage of the litigation and had held that the FPC was authorized to issue such certificates. Sunray Mid-Continent Oil Co. v. FPC, 239 F. 2d 97 (1956), rev’d on other grounds, 353 U. S. 944 (1957) (Sunray I). Sunray II implicitly approved this holding in stating, 364 U. S., at 157: “There is no contention that the Commission was again indulging in the erroneous notion that it had no power to issue a limited certificate.”
Thus, rather than imply that the Act forbids the issuance of a limited-term certificate, Sunray II approved the holding of the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit that the Act permits the issuance of such a certificate. Sunray II therefore supports the conclusion we have reached and does not fortify the Court of Appeals’ construction of § 7 (b). In both the case of the limited-term certificate and the case of the permanent certificate with pregranted abandonment, the FPC determines at the time of certification that the present or future public convenience or necessity justifies the issuance of a certificate that allows discontinuance of service at a future date certain without need for further proceedings.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed insofar as it set aside the pregranted abandonment provision of Order No. 455, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Mr. Justice Stewart, Mr. Justice Powell, and Mr. Justice Stevens took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Section 7 (b) of the Act provides in full text:
“No natural-gas company shall abandon all or any portion of its facilities subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission, or any service rendered by means of such facilities, without the permission and approval of the Commission first had and obtained, after due hearing, and a finding by the Commission that the available supply of natural gas is depleted to the extent that the continuance of service is unwarranted, or that the present or future public convenience or necessity permit such abandonment.”
The optional procedure is available for sales of gas produced from wells commenced after April 6, 1972, and gas that has not previously been sold in the interstate market. 18 CFR § 2.75 (b)(5) (1975).
After adoption of the optional procedure, the FPC established a national ceiling rate for some sales of natural gas. Opinion No. 699, 51 F. P. C. 2212 (1974). The optional procedure was then amended to permit producers to tender contracts for certification including rates exceeding the national ceiling, as well as area rates. Order No. 455-B, 52 F. P. C. 1416 (1974).
The procedure does not, however, limit the applicability of § 5, 15 U. S. C. § 717d. See 18 CFR § 2.75 (d) (1975). The Commission noted in Order No. 455 that it was unable to “bind a future Commission not to invoke the prospective operation of Section 5”; the Commissioners further stated that “[t]o the extent that this Commission can grant certainty of rates, we do so.” 48 F. P. C. 218, 223 (1972).
This provision reads as follows:
“Applications presented hereunder will be considered for permanent certification, either with or without pregranted abandonment, notwithstanding that the contract rate may be in excess of an area ceiling rate established in a prior opinion or order of this Commission.”
Respondents’ cross-petition seeking review of the Court of Appeals’ decision to the extent that it adversely resolved their contentions was denied. 422 U. S. 1020 (1975).
The FPC has disclaimed any reliance on the ground, permitted under § 7 (b), that "the available supply of natural gas is depleted to the extent that the continuance of service is unwarranted.” We therefore have no occasion to address the question whether pregranted abandonment on that ground would exceed FPC authority.
Paradoxically, similar considerations led the Court of Appeals to reject respondents’ challenge to a provision of the optional procedure requiring the Commission to determine the reasonableness of future rate escalations included in contracts submitted purr suant to the procedure. Yet no attempt was made to distinguish the case of future rate escalations from that of pregranted abandonment in this respect. The Court said:
“We cannot say as an abstract proposition of law that it is impossible for the Commission to make an advance determination of ‘reasonableness’ in proceedings under Section 4. Although as a practical matter one may be skeptical about the ability of the Commission to succeed in this endeavor, we think it may make the attempt. Whether it succeeds will depend upon the evidentiary basis for the escalations proposed in a given contract and the reasonableness of Commission findings and projections supporting and approving such escalations. The question is one of proof which can be answered only on a record setting out a particular proposal and the evidence supporting it.” 164 U. S. App. D. C., at 8, 502 F. 2d, at 468.
Respondents claim that the pregranted abandonment provision amounts to deregulation akin to that condemned in FPC v. Texaco, Inc., 417 U. S. 380, 400 (1974). But, unlike the small-producer exemption involved there, the FPC in the optional procedure retains full control over its regulatory jurisdiction.
The Court of Appeals found that pregranted abandonment has “the same potentiality of prejudice to consumers” that this Court was concerned about in Sunray II. 164 U. S. App. D. C., at 12, 502 F. 2d, at 472. In that case, however, Sunray’s position would .have removed FPC discretion not to issue limited-term certificates whenever a producer sought a limited certificate. Both Sunray II and today’s decision maintain FPC discretion in this regard, while the Court of Appeals’ conclusion reduces the FPC’s ability to exercise its regulatory responsibility.
The first decision of the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit was reversed in Sunray I on the ground that the Court had itself decided whether the FPC should have issued a limited-term certificate, rather than remanding to the Commission to resolve this question in the first instance, 353 U. S. 944. Sunray II sustained the Court of Appeals’ later affirmance of the FPC’s issuance of an unlimited certificate, 267 F. 2d 471 (1959).
Moreover, if issuance of limited-term certificates were barred by the Act, there would have been no need to decide Sunray II. In that circumstance the producer could hardly have complained that the FPC failed to recognize its request for only a limited certificate, since such a reading of the Act requires the FPC in all cases to issue unlimited-term certificates.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice White
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The issue presented in this case is whether an assignment of certain unearned insurance premiums created a “security-interest” that should have been disclosed pursuant to the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), 82 Stat. 146, as amended, 15 U. S. C. § 1601 et seq.
I
In September 1977, respondents purchased an automobile from petitioner Anderson Bros. Ford. They signed the dealer’s standard automobile retail installment contract. This contract was assigned for value to petitioner Ford Motor Credit Co. A provision on the face of the contract disclosed that the seller retained a security interest in the automobile. A provision on the back of the contract stated that the buyer was required to purchase and maintain physical damage insurance on the automobile, “protecting the interests of Buyer and Seller,” and further stated:
“Buyer hereby assigns to Seller any monies payable under such insurance, by whomever obtained, including returned or unearned premiums, and Seller hereby is authorized on behalf of both Buyer and Seller to receive or collect same, to endorse checks or drafts in payment thereof, to cancel such insurance or to release or settle any claim with respect thereto. The proceeds from such insurance, by whomever obtained, shall be applied toward replacement of the Property or payment of the indebtedness hereunder in the sole discretion of Seller.”
If the insurance policy on the automobile were canceled for any reason prior to the expiration of the term of the policy, this provision would permit the creditor to apply any unearned insurance premiums toward payment of the remaining debt.
In October 1977, before making any payments on the installment contract or on the insurance policy, respondents returned the automobile to Anderson Bros. Ford. They subsequently brought this action in federal court, alleging, inter alia, that the sales contract violated the TILA because it did not disclose on the face of the contract that the seller had acquired a “security interest” in unearned insurance premiums.
This claim was based on § 128 (a) (10) of the TILA, which provides in pertinent part:
“In connection with each consumer credit sale not under an open end credit plan, the creditor shall disclose each of the following items which is applicable:
“A description of any security interest held or to be retained or acquired by the creditor in connection with the extension of credit, and a clear identification of the property to which the security interest relates.” 82 Stat. 155, 15 U. S. C. § 1638 (a) (10).
This disclosure requirement is essentially repeated in § 226.8 (b)(5) of Regulation Z, a Federal Reserve Board regulation promulgated pursuant to the Board’s authority under § 105 of the TILA. Under the regulation, a creditor must disclose:
“A description or identification of the type of any security interest held or to be retained or acquired by the creditor in connection with the extension of credit, and a clear identification of the property to which the security interest relates... 12 CFR § 226.8 (b)(5) (1980).
Respondents sought statutory damages, attorney’s fees, and costs.
The District Court granted summary judgment for respondents, holding that an assignment of unearned insurance premiums creates a “security interest” within the meaning of § 128 (a) (10). App. 33-35. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed. 617 F. 2d 1278 (1980). Recognizing that the TILA does not define the term “security interest,” the Court of Appeals relied on the definition contained in Regulation Z:
“ ‘Security interest’ and ‘security’ mean any interest in property which secures payment or performance of an obligation. The terms include, but are not limited to, security interests under the Uniform Commercial Code, real property mortgages, deeds of trust, and other consensual or confessed liens whether or not recorded, mechanic’s, materialmen’s, artisan’s, and other similar liens, vendor’s liens in both real and personal property, the interest of a seller in a contract for the sale of real property, any lien on property arising by operation of law, and any interest in a lease when used to secure payment or performance of an obligation.” 12 CFR § 226.2 (gg) (1980).
The Court of Appeals concluded that the assignment of unearned insurance premiums created an “interest in property which secure [d] payment or performance of an obligation” within the meaning of Regulation Z, and thus created a “security interest” that must be disclosed under § 128 (a) (10). The Court of Appeals accordingly affirmed the judgment below.
We granted certiorari to settle whether such an assignment of unearned insurance premiums must be disclosed as a “security interest” under the TILA. 449 U. S. 981 (1980). We reverse.
II
Although the Court of Appeals’ construction of the Act and of Regulation Z is shared by three of the four other Courts of Appeals that have ruled on the question, this view, which is essentially a claim that the plain language of the statute and the regulation requires the result reached by the court below, has recently been challenged on several fronts. First, based in part on the legislative history of the 1980 amendments to the TILA, see infra, at 218-219, the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit has concluded that the meaning of the term “security interest” as used in the TILA is not so plain and has held that the creditor’s interest in unearned insurance premiums need not be disclosed as a security interest under either the statute or Regulation Z. James v. Ford Motor Credit Co., 638 F. 2d 147 (1980).
Second, in September 1980, the Board, the agency that issued Regulation Z, published for comment Official Staff Interpretation FC-0173, regarding security interest disclosures in closed-end consumer credit transactions. 45 Fed. Reg. 63295. Although the staff recognized that several courts held a contrary view, its clearly expressed position was that neither § 226.2 (gg) nor § 226.8 (b) (5) requires a creditor to disclose as a security interest its right to receive insurance proceeds or unearned premiums from a property insurance policy:
“The staff believes that a creditor is not required by [§ 226.8 (b)(5)] to disclose its right to receive insurance proceeds or unearned insurance premiums nor to disclose that it is named as loss payee or beneficiary on an insurance policy. Truth in Lending disclosures are meant to provide useful information to consumers to enhance credit shopping. Consumers do need to know that they risk the loss of certain property if they default. The disclosures under § 226.8 (b)(5) inform consumers of which property is subject to that risk at the time the credit decision is being made. We believe that information regarding the creditor’s interest in insurance proceeds and unearned premiums would not be used in comparison shopping. Although a technical reading of the security interest definition might cover a creditor’s interest in insurance proceeds and unearned premiums, it is our opinion that such incidental interests are not the type of interests meant to be covered by § 226.8 (b) (5).” Ibid.
This construction of Regulation Z, the staff concluded, “better serves the purpose of the statute and the regulation to convey in a meaningful way information that can be used by consumers in shopping for credit.” Ibid.
We are aware that after we granted certiorari in this case, the Board deferred final action on FC-0173; but we cannot agree that the staff’s views expressed in the proposed ruling are wholly without significance. The comment period on the proposed interpretation expired on October 24, 1980, the proposal has not been withdrawn or revised, and it appears from the Board’s public statement that final action was deferred only because it was “inappropriate” to do otherwise in the light of our intervening grant of certiorari. Id., at 84074.
We need not, however, rest on FC-0173 for the Board’s construction of the statute or of Regulation Z with respect to the scope of.the security interest disclosure requirement. On March 31, 1980, the President approved the Truth in Lending Simplification and Reform Act (1980 Act) as Title VI of the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act of 1980. 94 Stat. 168. The 1980 Act, which will be fully effective on April 1, 1982, will amend the TILA in many respects but will leave substantial portions of the TILA unchanged. It will amend § 128 (a) (10) of the TILA to require a creditor to make the following disclosure with respect to any “security interest” acquired by the creditor in a closed-end consumer credit transaction:
“Where the credit is secured, a statement that a security interest has been taken in (A) the property which is purchased as part of the credit transaction, or (B) property not purchased as part of the credit transaction identified by item or type.” § 614 (a) (9), 94 Stat. 179.
Like the TILA, however, the 1980 Act does not define the term “security interest.”
The 1980 Act provides that all implementing regulations must be promulgated at least one year prior to the effective date of the Act and that any creditor may comply with the revised regulations prior to the effective date of the Act. § 625, 94 Stat. 185-186. The Board accordingly revised Regulation Z, effective April 1, 1981, but with compliance being optional until April 1, 1982. 46 Fed. Reg. 20848 (1981). Section 226.18 (m) of revised Regulation Z requires the creditor to disclose in connection with closed-end consumer credit transactions
“[t]he fact that the creditor has or will acquire a security interest in the property purchased as part of the transaction, or in other property identified by item or type.” Id., at 20903.
Section 226.2 (a) (25) defines the term “security interest” as follows:
“ ‘Security interest’ means an interest in property that secures performance of a consumer credit obligation and that is recognized by state or federal law. It does not include incidental interests such as interests in proceeds, accessions, additions, fixtures, insurance proceeds (whether or not the creditor is a loss payee or beneficiary), premium rebates, or interests in after-acquired property.. For purposes of disclosure under §§ 226.6 and 226.18, the term does not include an interest that arises solely by operation of law. However, for purposes of the right of rescission under §§226.15 and 226.23, the term does include interests that arise solely by operation of law.” Id., at 20894.
Although the new regulation changes the Board’s prior definition of a “security interest” in some respects, there is no indication that the definition was being changed with respect to unearned premiums. When the Board issued revised Regulation Z, the Board explained that it distinguishes an incidental interest in unearned insurance premiums from a “security interest” that must be disclosed:
“[T]here is a difference between an incidental interest and an interest that is the essence of the transaction. For example, when an automobile is financed, the insurance proceeds are incidental to the primary security interest, the automobile. The creditor’s interest in such insurance would not be a security interest under the regulation. On the other hand, when the credit transaction is the financing of an insurance policy, the creditor’s interest in that policy is just like a purchase money security interest and would be disclosed as a security interest.”
Since this reasoning applies to the TILA as well as to the 1980 Act, we do not understand the Board to have revised Regulation Z with respect to whether an incidental interest in unearned insurance premiums must be disclosed. The Board’s revised regulation construes the statutory term “security interest” which appears, undefined, in both the TILA and the 1980 Act; it also defines the term “security interest” appearing in the revised-regulation. The same term had been used in the original Regulation Z, and it seems to us that the Board’s definition of “security interest” in the revised regulation is persuasive authority as to whether an interest in unearned insurance premiums should be disclosed as a “security interest” under the unrevised regulation. As we see it, the term “security interest” as used in both the revised and unrevised versions of Regulation Z does not include an interest in unearned insurance premiums in a transaction such as this.
Under the TILA and the 1980 Act, the Board is authorized to prescribe regulations, which “may contain such classifications, differentiations, or other provisions, and may provide for such adjustments and exceptions for any class of transactions, as in the judgment of the Board are necessary or proper” to carry out the purposes of the statute. In light of this statutory authority, we should not expressly or by implication invalidate as contrary to the statute the Board’s revised regulation concerning disclosure of security interests, which with respect to the disclosure of interests in unearned premiums did not purport to change the original Regulation Z and reiterates the view expressed in FC-0173 that an interest in unearned premiums is not a “security interest” for purposes of the disclosure provision.
The legislative history of the 1980 Act fully supports the Board’s revised regulation regarding disclosure of a creditor’s interest in unearned insurance premiums and its proposed interpretation of the unrevised regulation. The Report of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs on the 1980 Act explained:
“When a security interest is being taken in property purchased as part of the credit transaction, this section requires a statement that a security interest has been or will be taken in the property purchased. When a security interest is being taken in property not purchased as part of the credit transaction, the Committee intends this provision to require a listing by item or type of the property securing the transaction, but not a listing of related or incidental interests in the property. For example, a loan secured by an automobile (not being purchased with the proceeds of the loan) would require a statement indicating that the loan is secured by an automobile but would not require a listing of incidental or related rights which the creditor may have such as insurance proceeds or unearned insurance premiums, rights arising under, or waived in accord with state law, accessions, accessories, or proceeds.” S. Rep. No. 96-368, p. 30 (1979).
Furthermore, on the floor of the Senate a member of the responsible Committee observed:
“Many cases have resulted from the complex security interest disclosure requirements under the law. An illustrative case is Gennuso v. Commercial Bank and Trust Co., 455 F. Supp. 461 (W. D. Pa. 1976); 566 F. 2d 437, (3rd Cir. 1977), which required the creditor’s right in property insurance proceeds and unearned property insurance premiums, to be disclosed as a ‘security interest.’ Although as presently written the law does not require that result, S. 108 should prevent such ludicrous interpretations by requiring merely a positive indication if a security interest is being taken in the property purchased and if it is in property not being purchased in the transaction, simply a general listing of the type of property without a listing of incidental related interests.” 125 Cong. Rec. 9160 (1979).
With one exception, not pertinent here, the Committee Chairman, Senator Proxmire, who was the sponsor of the TILA, agreed with these remarks. Id., at 9159, 9972. In light of these indications from the 1980 Act’s history, it is unlikely that the courts would invalidate as contrary to the 1980 Act or the TILA either the security interest disclosure provisions with respect to unearned insurance premiums in revised Regulation Z or the interpretation of the unrevised regulation contained in FC-0173.
Ill
Of course, neither the legislative history of the 1980 Act nor the Board’s construction of the term “security interest” under either the TILA or the 1980 Act conclusively establishes the meaning of these words in the TILA. But as we so plainly recognized in Ford Motor Credit Co. v. Milhollin, 444 U. S. 555 (1980), absent some obvious repugnance to the statute, the Board’s regulation implementing this legislation should be accepted by the courts, as should the Board’s interpretation of its own regulation. We discern no such repugnance with any provision in the TILA.
The purpose of the TILA is to promote the “informed use of credit” by consumers. 15 U. S. C. § 1601. See Ford Motor Credit Co. v. Milhollin, supra, at 559, 568; Mourning v. Family Publications Service, Inc., 411 U. S. 356, 363-368 (1973). Congress sought to assure “a meaningful disclosure of credit terms so that the consumer will be able to compare more readily the various credit terms available to him.” 15 U. S. C. § 1601.
The TILA was enacted in May 1968. As originally drafted, the House and Senate truth-in-lending bills focused primarily on the cost of credit. Neither bill required disclosure of security interests acquired by a creditor in connection with a consumer credit transaction. In January 1968, while the legislation was under consideration in the House, Representative Cahill, who was not a member of the Committee that had reported out the bill, offered several amendments designed “to improve the truth-in-lending provisions with respect to mortgage transactions.” 114 Cong. Rec. 1611 (1968). One of the amendments, which was adopted without debate, required the following disclosure in closed-end consumer credit transactions:
“[A] description of any security interest held or to be retained or acquired by the creditor in connection with the extension of credit, and a clear identification of the property to which the security interest relates.” Id., at 1610.
This provision became § 128 (a) (10) of the TILA.
The Cahill amendments were principally designed to prevent homeowners from being victimized by “vicious secondary mortgage schemes.” Id., at 1611'. It was explained that “in many cases [a homeowner entering into a consumer credit transaction] is never informed nor aware that his home is being made subject to a mortgage.” Ibid. The amendment would require the creditor to disclose that he was acquiring a security interest in the borrower’s residence. Insofar as pertinent here, the Cahill amendments were accepted by the Senate and became part of the TILA as finally adopted. Despite the focus on the second mortgage problem, Congress did not limit § 128 (a) (10) to security interests in real property. The statutory language requires disclosure of “any security interest held or to be retained or acquired by the creditor.” It is thus uncontested that § 128 (a) (10) requires a creditor to disclose to a consumer purchasing an automobile or other property on credit that the creditor retains a security interest in the property purchased.
Unaided by an administrative construction of the TILA and Regulation Z, a court could easily conclude, based on the language of the statute and of Regulation Z, that the interest in unearned insurance premiums acquired by the creditor in this case should be characterized as a “security interest” that must be disclosed. But, in light of the proposed official staff interpretation of Regulation Z, the revised regulation defining a “security interest,” and the Board’s commentary on the difference between an “incidental interest” in unearned insurance premiums and a “security interest,” it is evident that the Board does not consider the creditor’s interest in unearned insurance premiums in a transaction such as this one to be a “security interest” that must be disclosed under the TILA. The Board’s position is supported by the legislative history of both the TILA and the 1980 Act, and we hold that it is a permissible interpretation of the term “security interest” as used in the TILA. Although designed to provide meaningful guidance to consumers in shopping for credit, the TILA as originally drafted did not require disclosure of or otherwise deal with security interests; and the security interest disclosure provision was added to the TILA because of Congress’ particular concern about the need to warn consumers of the creditor’s acquisition of a particular type of security interest — a second mortgage on the borrower’s home. The Board’s view that disclosure of a creditor’s incidental interest in unearned insurance premiums would not measurably further the TILA’s purpose of aiding consumers to shop for credit, and that the term “security interest” as used in the TILA, the 1980 Act, and in Regulation Z should not be construed as including such an interest, is consistent with the underlying purpose of the TILA. This interpretation of the term “security interest” strikes a balance between “meaningful disclosure” and “informational overload.” As we emphasized in Milhollin, the task of striking the proper balance is “an empirical process that entails investigation into consumer psychology and that presupposes broad experience with credit practices.” Administrative agencies are “better suited than [the] courts to engage in such a process.” 444 U. S., at 568-569.
Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
So ordered.
The Truth in Lending Act was enacted as Title I of the Consumer Credit Protection Act, 82 Stat. 146.
The provision stated:
“Security Interest: Seller shall have a security interest under the Uniform Commercial Code in the Property (described above) and in the proceeds thereof to secure the payment in cash of the Total of Payments and all other amounts due or to become due hereunder.”
The “Property” was defined as the automobile.
Respondents contend that under the contract provision quoted above, unearned insurance premiums could only be used to replace the automobile or to make payments on the buyer’s debt. Petitioners assert that “[u]nder the assignment provision... any unearned [insurance] premiums will be used to provide replacement insurance coverage or applied to the debt.” Brief for Petitioners 4. The Court of Appeals stated that the unearned premiums “may be used to purchase replacement insurance coverage,” citing petitioners’ brief on appeal. 617 F. 2d 1278, 1281 (CA7 1980). We need not resolve the proper interpretation of this contract provision to decide the issue before us.
The TILA authorizes suits against original creditors and their assignees. 15 U. S. C. §§ 1614 and 1640.
The TILA does not state that the disclosure required by the statute must be made on the face of the contract. It simply provides:
“Each creditor shall disclose clearly and conspicuously, in accordance with the regulations of the Board, to each person to whom consumer credit is extended, the information required under this part or part D of this subchapter.” 15 U. S. C. § 1631 (a).
However, the applicable Federal Reserve Board regulations provide:
“All of the [required] disclosures shall be made together on either:
“(1) The note or other instrument evidencing the obligation on the same side of the page and above the place for the customer’s signature; or
“(2) One side of a separate statement which identifies the transaction.” 12 CFR §226.8 (a) (1980).
See also 12 CFR §226.8 (b)(5) (1980). Petitioners do not challenge the validity or applicability of this regulation.
Section 105 of the TILA, as set forth in 15 U. S. C. § 1604, provides:
“The Board shall prescribe regulations to carry out the purposes of this subchapter. These regulations may contain such classifications, differentiations, or other provisions, and may provide for such adjustments and exceptions for any class of transactions, as in the judgment of the Board are necessary or proper to effectuate the purposes of this subchapter, to prevent circumvention or evasion thereof, or to facilitate compliance therewith.”
A consumer who files an individual action against a creditor for failure to make the disclosures required by the TILA may recover twice the amount of the finance charge, with a minimum recovery of $100 and a maximum recovery of $1,000, or may recover any actual damages sustained as a result of the failure to disclose. 15 U. S. C. § 1640 (a). Respondents did not contend that they had suffered any actual damages as a result of the alleged TILA violation.
Two judges filed separate concurring opinions, joining in the opinion for the panel but expressing concern that by requiring the prominent disclosure of an “incidental” security interest, the court was increasing the complexity of the disclosures required by the TILA without furthering the purposes of the statute.
Judge Cudahy stated in his concurring opinion:
“I do not read [the opinion for the panel] as seriously suggesting that the result we reach furthers the underlying purposes of the Truth in Lending Act. Among these meritorious purposes are the disclosure to buyers of the costs of credit and the alerting of customers to the possibility that their property may be reached to satisfy the obligation which they have incurred.
“Here we require the prominent disclosure of a rather esoteric right to unearned premiums for physical damage insurance (protecting both the seller’s and the buyer’s interest in the property), which may be used to provide replacement insurance coverage or applied against the buyer’s debt in the event of cancellation of the insurance. This'security interest’ is normal in the circumstances but is entirely incidental to the principal consumer credit transaction....
“To disclose this ‘security interest’ on the face of the contract (which is the point here) is merely to add virtually inconsequential information — ■ lengthening, complicating and trivializing the disclosure for no apparent benefit.” 617 F. 2d, at 1293.
We also granted certiorari to consider petitioners’ contention that if we were to hold that disclosure of an assignment of unearned insurance premiums is'' required under the TILA, our ruling should be made prospective only. Since we hold that such disclosure is not required, we need not address that issue.
See Murphy v. Ford Motor Credit Co., 629 F. 2d 556 (CA8 1980); Edmondson v. Allen-Russell Ford, Inc., 577 F. 2d 291 (CA5 1978); Gennuso v. Commercial Bank & Trust Co., 566 F. 2d 437 (CA3 1977).
For example, the revised regulation excludes a creditor’s interest in after-acquired property from the definition of a “security interest.” The regulations implementing the TILA, however, expressly require disclosure of a creditor’s interest in after-acquired property. See 12 CFR §226.8 (b)(5) (1980).
46 Fed. Reg. 20853 (1981).
The Board’s analysis demonstrates that the staff’s proposed official interpretation of Regulation Z does not conflict with FRB Public Information Letter No. 377, cited by respondents. FRB Public Information Letter No. 377 is an informal staff interpretation of Regulation Z that was issued in 1970. The interpretation was requested by a loan company whose customers purchased single premium lifetime accidental death and dismemberment policies with the proceeds of their loans. The loan company was designated as the owner of the policy and retained the right to cancel the policy and apply any premium refund to the unpaid balance of the loan if the customer defaulted on the loan. The staff responded: “Under the circumstances, we think it would be appropriate to disclose the loan company’s ownership of the policy as a type of ‘security interest’....” CCH [1969-1974 Transfer Binder] Cons. Cred. Guide ¶ 30,555.
Petitioners contend that the loan company’s interest in the policy differs from petitioners’ interest in the unearned insurance premiums in this ease. The loan company’s interest “was not merely incidental or subordinate to some far more significant interest securing payment of the loan.” Reply Brief for Petitioners 9, n. 12. We agree with petitioners that the situation described in the letter is distinguishable from this case.
One other informal staff interpretation of Regulation Z referred to disclosure of unearned insurance premiums. In FRB Public Information Letter No. 1263, the staff responded to an inquiry regarding how an interest in unearned insurance premiums should be identified. The letter pointed out that “a more fundamental matter [is] whether a security interest exists at all” and then suggested that the creditor determine whether as a matter of state law he had acquired an interest in property securing payment of the debt. CCH [1974-1977 Transfer Binder] Cons. Cred. Guide ¶31,736. “[A]ssuming this is a security interest for purposes of Regulátion Z, the determination of what type of security interest it is should be made in accordance with State law.” Ibid. This informal interpretation did not resolve whether disclosure of a creditor’s interest in unearned insurance premiums is required under the TILA. Although this letter focused on state law, revised Regulation Z defines a “security interest” as an “interest in property that secures performance of a consumer credit obligation and that is recognized by state or federal law.” 46 Fed. Reg. 20894 (1981).
When the Board issued proposed regulations implementing the 1980 Act, it stated that the 1980 Act had clarified “certain complex legal questions” regarding the proper interpretation of the TILA, including questions about adequate disclosure of security interests. 45 Fed. Reg. 80731, 80733 (1980).
In its commentary accompanying the revised regulations, 46 Fed. Reg. 20853 (1981), the Board noted that its definition of “security interest” was considerably narrower than § 226.2 (gg) of the unrevised regulation, in that it excluded a number of interests that would have been considered security interests under the unrevised regulation. Some of these interests were identified. The Board went on to observe that “there is a difference between an incidental interest and an interest that is the essence of the transaction.” Ibid. Only the latter must be disclosed as a “security interest.” We do not understand the Board’s commentary to indicate in any way that the revised regulation altered the meaning of Regulation Z with respect to whether a creditor must disclose an interest in unearned insurance premiums in a transaction such as is involved in this case.
15 U. S. C. § 1604. This section will be renumbered § 1604 (a) under the 1980 Act. 94 Stat. 170.
Because we do not understand the exclusion of unearned insurance premiums from the definition of “security interest” to have changed the administrative construction of the statute, we need not consider whether if the revised regulation had worked such a change, the case should be decided under the revised regulation which was effective as of April 1, 1981. See Bradley v. Richmond School Board, 416 U. S. 696, 711 (1974); Thorpe v. Housing Authority, 393 U. S. 268, 281-283 (1969); United States v. Schooner Peggy, 1 Cranch 103, 110 (1801).
Although the Committee Report states that the creditor is not required to disclose his “incidental interest” in unearned insurance premiums if the loan is secured by an automobile that is not purchased with the proceeds of the loan, there is no sensible reason for applying a different rule if the loan is secured by an automobile that is purchased with the proceeds of the loan. In either situation the 1980 Act requires the creditor to disclose any “security interest” he has acquired.
The 1967 Committee Reports explained that “by requiring all creditors to disclose credit information in a uniform manner, and by requiring all additional mandatory charges imposed by the creditor as an incident to credit [to] be included in the computation of the applicable percentage rate, the American consumer will be given the information he needs to compare the cost of credit and to make the best informed decision on the use of credit.” H. R. Rep. No. 1040, 90th Cong., 1st Sess., 13; S. Rep. No. 392, 90th Cong., 1st Sess., 3 (virtually identical language).
Representative Cahill proposed that this language be added to § 203 (b) of H. R. 11601, governing disclosures for consumer credit sales other than sales under an open-end credit plan. Section 203 (b) later became § 128 of the TILA, 15 U. S. C. § 1638. He proposed that the same language be added to §203 (c) of H. R. Í1601, governing disclosures for extensions of credit other than sales under an open-end credit plan. Section 203 (c) later became § 129 of the TILA, 15 U. S. C. § 1639.
In drawing the Senate’s attention to Representative Cahill’s amendments, the sponsor of the Senate truth-in-lending bill, stated:
“Congressman Cahill, of New Jersey, has offered an important amendment to the truth-in-lending bill which tightens up on the second mortgage racket. First, it would require a 3-day waiting period before a second mortgage transaction can be completed. Second, it would require a disclosure of the fact that credit is being secured by a mortgage on the homeowner’s property. Third, the amendment increases the legal rights of consumers with respect to those who purchase mortgages from the original home improvement contractor.” 114 Cong. Rec. 5024 (1968).
In presenting the Conference Report on the TILA to the House, Representative Sullivan explained that the House conferees had succeeded in retaining the protections created by the Cahill amendments. She described those amendments as “a series of amendments in the House, to strike at home improvement racketeers who trick homeowners, particularly the poor, into signing contracts at exorbitant rates, which turn out to be liens on the family residences. Any credit transaction which involves a security interest in property must be clearly explained to the consumer as involving a mortgage or lien; any such transaction involving the consumer’s residence — other than in a purchase-money first mortgage for the acquisition of the home — carries a 3-day cancellation right.” Id., at 14388.
Similarly, Senator Proxmire, presenting the Conference Report on the truth-in-lending bill to the Senate, described the Cahill amendments as providing “additional safeguards in the second mortgage area” and explained that the security interest disclosure provisions would require creditors to “describe any security interest in real property — such as a second mortgage — arising from the credit transaction.” Id., at 14488.
This Court has frequently relied* on the principle that “a thing may be within the letter of the statute and yet not within the statute, because not within its spirit, nor within the intention of its makers.” Holy Trinity Church v. United States, 143 U. S. 457, 459 (1892). See, e. g., Steelworkers v. Weber, 443 U. S. 193, 201 (1979); United Housing Foundation, Inc. v. Forman, 421 U. S. 837, 849 (1975). “When aid to construction of the meaning of words, as used in the statute [or regulation], is available, there certainly can be no ‘rule of law’ which forbids its use, however clear the words may appear on ‘superficial examination.’ ” United States v. American Trucking Assns., 310 U. S. 534, 543-544 (1940) (footnote omitted).
In Ford Motor Credit Co. v. Milhollin, 444 U. S. 555 (1980), we stressed that the TILA seeks to provide “meaningful disclosure” of credit terms:
“Meaningful disclosure does not mean more disclosure. Rather, it describes a balance between 'competing considerations of complete disclosure... and the need to avoid... [informational overload].’ ” Id., at 568, quoting S. Rep. No. 96-73, p. 3 (1979) (accompanying the
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice White
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We have before us the recurring question of the validity of a State’s attempt to regulate the supply and distribution of milk and milk products. Challenged in this case is Florida’s system of regulation of the dealings between milk distributors and local producers.
The appellant, Polar Ice Cream & Creamery Company, located in Pensacola, Florida, 16 miles from the Florida-Alabama state line, is a processor and distributor of fluid milk and milk products. It sells fluid milk and milk products for human consumption to consumers and dealers within the State of Florida in competition with nearby Alabama distributors. Pursuant to contracts let after competitive bidding, it also supplies large quantities of milk to military installations, both within and without the State of Florida. It purchases, processes and sells as fluid milk or milk products approximately 5,000,000 gallons of milk each year.
Prior to the regulations challenged here, Polar purchased approximately 30% of its milk requirements from dairy farm producers located within the State of Florida. The remaining 70% was procured from producers, producer pools or brokers in other States, such as Alabama, Mississippi, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Missouri, Virginia, and Illinois. Its customary arrangement with Florida producers was to pay 61 cents per gallon for a specified quantity of milk from each producer and approximately 35.5 cents per gallon for all milk over that quantity. The price Polar paid its out-of-state sources varied; some milk was purchased for as low as 30-35 cents per gallon from Alabama, Virginia, and Arkansas sources. Polar’s Florida producers could at no time supply all of Polar’s milk requirements, but at times produced and sold to Polar amounts equal to or greater than Polar’s sales of fluid milk for human consumption to consumers and dealers in Florida, excluding sales to the military, -sales on reservations, and sales to local schools.
The statute and the orders of the Florida Milk Commission challenged by Polar regulate the dealings between milk distributors and milk producers located within the Pensacola Milk Marketing Area. First, they require that a Pensacola milk distributor pay a minimum price of 61 cents per gallon for all milk purchased from Pensacola producers and sold in Florida as Class I milk, defined as fluid milk or milk products sold in fluid form with exceptions, and substantially lower minimum prices for milk sold as Class II, III, and IV milk, consisting chiefly of nonbeverage milk such as cream, sour cream and other dairy products.
Second, the Commission has established a method by which a proportion of a distributor’s monthly sales in various classes is allocated to designated Pensacola producers. Each Pensacola producer with whom Polar does business between September 1 and November 30 of each year, called the base-fixing period, is assigned an earned base, representing the ratio of milk delivered by such producer to the total milk delivered by all of Polar’s Pensacola producers during the base-fixing period. The resultant percentage is then applied to the number of gallons of milk Polar sells in Class I, II, III, and IV channels monthly, in that order, to determine the number of gallons for which each earned-base producer must be paid the minimum prices assigned to each class or utilization. The allocation of a producer’s deliveries must first be to Class I utilization, with allocation continued thereafter in descending order through the lower classifications. Only deliveries by Pensacola producers are considered in calculating the ratio of each producer’s deliveries to total deliveries to Polar during the base-fixing period and therefore the percentage assigned to these producers totals 100%. The result is that all óf Polar’s Class I sales must be attributed to its Pensacola earned-base producers. Only then may their milk be used for the less remunerative utilizations, and only if these producers do not fulfill Polar’s need for Class I milk may other milk be used for this purpose and thus command a premium price. Moreover, the formula requires that all the milk Polar sells in Florida be first attributed to the purchases that it makes from Pensacola producers. The earned-base percentages remain the same until the next base-fixing period.
Third, the statute forbids termination of the business relationship between a distributor and producer with whom the distributor has had a continuous course of dealings without just cause and provides that rejection or refusal to accept any milk tendered or offered for delivery by a producer in ordinary continuance of a previous course of dealings is a ground for revocation of the distributor’s license. These statutory provisions have been construed to mean that a Florida distributor in a regulated marketing area must accept from his earned-base producers all the milk tendered by such producers, including milk in excess of Class I needs. A distributor is relieved of the obligation to purchase milk from earned-base producers only upon a showing of just cause, which is not met by a demonstration that the Commission’s minimum prices are burdensome or that milk is available elsewhere at a lower price.
It is this three-pronged regulatory structure, requiring Polar to accept its total supply of Class I milk, military milk aside, from designated Pensacola producers at a fixed price, and obligating it to take all milk which these producers offer, which Polar argues imposes an undue burden on interstate commerce.
The Florida Milk Commission also proposed special provisions dealing with milk that is sold to military installations of the United States — military milk. Although challenged by Polar at the outset of this litigation, this plan was not voted into effect. While the present status of military milk under Florida law is not entirely clear from the record or arguments of the parties, we read the testimony of the Commission to mean that Polar is not required to purchase military milk from its Pensacola producers, as it is Class I milk. However, if Polar does utilize milk obtained from its earned-base producers for military sales, it must pay the minimum price applicable to Class I sales. Polar challenges this producer price requirement as inconsistent with the federal procurement policy of competitive bidding, and the Federal Government's exclusive jurisdiction over the installations on which this milk is consumed.
To finance the activities of the Milk Commission, Florida imposes a tax or regulatory fee of 15/100 of 1 cent per gallon of all milk handled by Florida distributors regardless of where purchased or to whom it is sold, including milk that Polar sells to military installations. This tax abates if at any time the revenue exceeds by 25% the total amount of Commission expenditures as budgeted for that fiscal year. Polar, which clearly is obliged to pay this fee, contends that the State is without jurisdiction to include milk sold and delivered to military reservations, exclusive jurisdiction to which has been ceded to the United States, in calculating the amount of the tax.
Since Polar’s objections to the Florida Milk Control Act posed substantial federal questions, a three-judge District Court was convened, 28 U. S. C. § 2281, and testimony was taken and arguments heard in respect to the above questions. This court found that the Florida Milk Control Act was a reasonable exercise of the State’s police power and accordingly rejected Polar’s claims that the Act, in fixing producer prices without assuring Polar any rate of return and in compelling Polar to take all the milk of its earned-base producers, denied it due process of law and equal protection. The District Court also found that Florida’s fee on milk distributed by Polar to military installations was a regulatory fee based on the privilege of doing business in Florida and not a tax and concluded that this measure therefore did not unduly burden interstate commerce or infringe upon the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States over the military installations Polar serves. The Florida producer price controls were said not to conflict with the Federal Procurement Statutes, 10 U. S. C. § 2301 et seq., since they did not impose any restriction on the price paid by the Federal Government for its purchases from Polar. Although finding that the Florida regulations were intended to protect and favor Florida milk producers, the court upheld these regulations over Commerce Clause objections because there was no showing that the alleged discrimination against out-of-state producers burdened or restricted interstate commerce. The decision in Baldwin v. Seelig, 294 U. S. 511, invalidating a state restriction imposed on a milk distributor to shield local milk producers from the effects of out-of-state competition, was deemed inapplicable to Florida’s regulations. Because of the serious questions raised under the Commerce Clause and previous decisions here dealing with milk regulations, we noted probable jurisdiction. 372 U. S. 939. We have determined that under prior cases in this Court dealing with state regulation of the milk industry the Florida law as applied in this case cannot withstand attack based upon the Commerce Clause and that the judgment below must be reversed.
I.
The controlling cases are Baldwin v. Seelig, 294 U. S. 511; Hood & Sons v. Du Mond, 336 U. S. 525; and Dean Milk Co. v. Madison, 340 U. S. 349.
In Baldwin, the Metropolitan Milk District in the State of New York obtained about 70% of its supplies from New York sources, the remaining 30% from other States. The New York law forbade the sale in New York of milk obtained by a distributor from other States unless the distributor had paid a price which would be lawful under the New York price regulations. This provision was attacked by a New York milk distributor, all of whose milk supply was purchased in Vermont for less than the established New York price. Remarking that the New York law aimed at keeping “the system unimpaired by competition from afar,” 294 U. S., at 519, the Court struck down this provision as an impermissible burden upon interstate commerce. New York could not outlaw Vermont milk purchased at below New York prices, for to do so would “set a barrier to traffic between one state and another as effective as if customs duties, equal to the price differential, had been laid upon, the thing transported,” 294 U. S., at 521 — which is forbidden to the States by the Constitution, Art. I, § 10, cl. 2, and reserved to Congress by Art. I, § 8, cl. 3. Nice distinctions between direct and indirect burdens were said to be irrelevant
“when the avowed purpose of the obstruction, as well as its necessary tendency, is to suppress or mitigate the consequences of competition between the states.... [A] chief occasion of the commerce clauses was ‘the mutual jealousies and aggressions of the States, taking form in customs barriers and other economic retaliation.’ Farrand, Records of the Federal Convention, vol. II, p. 308; vol. Ill, pp. 478, 547, 548; The Federalist, No. XLII; Curtis, History of the Constitution, vol. 1, p. 502; Story on the Constitution, § 259. If New York, in order to promote the economic welfare of her farmers, may guard them against competition with the cheaper prices of Vermont, the door has been opened to rivalries and reprisals that were meant to be averted by subjecting commerce between the states to the power of the nation.” 294 U. S., at 522.
To the argument that the law was in reality a health measure, since farmers must be protected from competition if they are to provide the reliable supply of healthful milk which the locality is entitled to have, the Court said,
“Let such an exception be admitted, and all that a state will have to do in times of stress and strain is to say that its farmers and merchants and workmen must be protected against competition from without, lest they go upon the poor relief lists or perish altogether. To give entrance to that excuse would be to invite a speedy end of our national solidarity. The Constitution was framed under the dominion of a political philosophy less parochial in range. It was framed upon the theory that the peoples of the several states must sink or swim together, and that in the long run prosperity and salvation are in union and not division.” 294 U. S., at 523.
Baldioin was heavily relied upon in both Du Mond and Dean, supra. In Du Mond, New York was found to have no power under the Commerce Clause to forbid an out-of-state distributor from establishing additional processing plants and additional sources of milk within the State. In Dean, the City of Madison was prevented from reserving the Madison market to producers and distributors located within a specified distance of the city, although purported considerations of public health were advanced as justifying the restriction.
The principles of Baldwin are as sound today as they were when announced. They justify, indeed require, invalidation as a burden on interstate commerce of that part of the Florida regulatory scheme which reserves to its local producers a substantial share of the Florida milk market.
II.
Under the controls challenged here, Polar must buy from its Florida producers, and pay 61 cents per gallon for it, an amount of raw milk equal to its Class I sales if it is available from these producers. If more than this amount is offered, Polar must also take the surplus at the lower established prices. And these obligations continue to bind Polar even though both its Class I needs and the surplus obtainable from Florida producers may steadily increase. Polar obviously will not and cannot use outside milk for those uses for which it is required to use Florida milk. Polar may turn to out-of-state sources only after exhausting the supply offered by its Pensacola producers. Under the challenged regulations, an Alabama dairy farmer could not become one of Polar's regular producers and sell all of his milk to that company. Since he could not share in the Class I market — Pensacola producers are probably able to supply that market — his milk could command only the lower prices applicable to the less remunerative uses, prices which would not cover his cost of production.
The consequences for interstate commerce are clear. In Baldwin New York’s price control removed any economic incentive for a local distributor to purchase out-of-state milk and thereby encouraged its distributors first to consume the local supply of milk before turning to out-of-state sources. Out-of-state milk was denied an equal opportunity to compete with New York-produced milk to the extent that the out-of-state supply bore additional transportation charges. The Florida controls preempt for the Florida producers a large share of the Florida market, especially the most lucrative fluid milk market. Out-of-state milk may not participate in this part of the Florida market, unless local production is inadequate, and given the exclusive domain of the Florida producers over Class I sales, out-of-state milk may not profitably serve the remainder of the Florida market, since it is relegated to the surplus market alone. These barriers are precisely the kind of hindrance to the introduction of milk from other States which Baldwin condemned as an “unreasonable clog upon the mobility of commerce. They set up what is equivalent to a rampart of customs duties designed to neutralize advantages belonging to the place of origin. They are thus hostile in conception as well as burdensome in result.” 294 U. S., at 527.
The exclusion of foreign milk from a major portion of the Florida market cannot be justified as an economic measure to protect the welfare of Florida dairy farmers or as a health measure designed to insure the existence of a wholesome supply of milk. This much Baldwin and Dean made clear. Nor is it an escape from Baldwin to say that Polar has no interest in providing a satisfactory blend price as a basis for ongoing relationships with any out-of-state producer and that its only interest is in buying surplus milk at distress prices from out-of-state sources and selling it at Class I prices in the Florida market, all to the detriment of Florida producers and an orderly market. For this is but another assertion that a State may preempt its market for its own producers to the exclusion of production from other areas. Florida has no power “to prohibit the introduction within her territory of milk of wholesome quality acquired [in another State], whether at high prices or at low ones,” 294 U. S. 521; the State may not, in the sole interest of promoting the economic welfare of its dairy farmers, insulate the Florida milk industry from competition from other States.
Florida, it is true, does not prevent distributors located in other States from selling wholesome fluid milk in the Florida market. But allowing competition on the distributor level is no justification for barring interstate milk from the most lucrative segment of Florida’s raw milk market. Given such distributor competition as there is, there is still milk, in other States which Polar can and wants to acquire and which it will not acquire in the face of the Florida regulations. The burden on commerce and the embargo on out-of-state milk remain.
The cases relied upon by the Commission do not save the regulatory scheme challenged here. Nebbia v. New York, 291 U. S. 502, established that minimum retail and wholesale prices for milk purchased and sold within the State do not offend the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses. Nor is such price regulation an impermissible burden upon commerce, Highland Farms Dairy v. Agnew, 300 U. S. 608, even as applied to a distributor who purchases and cools milk within the State and then transports it to another State for processing and sale, since the burden on commerce is indirect and only incidental to the regulation of an essentially local activity. Milk Control Board v. Eisenberg Farm Products, 306 U. S. 346. In none of these cases was there any attempt to reserve a local market for local producers or to protect local producers from out-of-state competition by means of purchase and allocation requirements imposed upon milk distributors.
The power which we deny to Florida is reserved to Congress under the Commerce Clause, and we are offered nothing indicating either congressional consent to, or acquiescence in, a regulatory scheme such as Florida has employed. On the contrary, under the present Act authorizing federal marketing orders in the milk industry, such an order may not “prohibit or in any manner limit, in the case of the products of milk, the marketing... of any milk or product thereof produced in any production area in the United States.” This provision, as the Court explained in Lehigh Valley Coop. v. United States, 370 U. S. 76, was intended to prevent the Secretary of Agriculture from setting up trade barriers to the importation of milk from other production areas in the United States. We seriously doubt that Congress, in denying the power to the Secretary, thereby granted it to the States.
III.
We turn to the matter of Polar’s sales to United States military reservations. Florida does not purport to regulate the price which Polar must charge for milk sold to the Government on or off military bases. Florida regulates only the price which Polar must pay for its milk, not what it must sell it for. Since the holding in Paul v. United States, 371 U. S. 245, dealt only with the conflict between federal procurement regulations and a State’s attempt to prescribe the prices which a distributor must charge for milk sold to the United States, it is not applicable here. Likewise, because Florida regulates only producer prices applicable to sales made by producers to the distributor, none of which occur on military bases, its law is not vulnerable as an attempt to legislate with regard to transactions occurring within federal enclaves subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. Cf. Standard Oil v. California, 291 U. S. 242, and James v. Dravo Contracting Co., 302 U. S. 134.
However, in the Paul case the United States initially attacked California’s producer prices, along with its distributor prices, as in conflict with federal procurement regulations, an issue which was abandoned in this Court and which was expressly saved in the Court’s opinion. It is that issue which Polar now presents to us.
For good reason we again put off decision of this question to another day. At the outset of this litigation, the trial court temporarily enjoined the application to Polar of a Milk Commission order establishing prices to be paid Florida producers for milk to be sold to military installations and requiring purchases of such milk from designated producers. That order, however, was voted down by the Pensacola producers, leaving considerable confusion, amply demonstrated by the record before us, concerning the status of so-called military milk under the outstanding orders of the Commission. It would seem— although we are not sure, and there were no findings below about these matters — that military milk is Class I milk but that Polar nevertheless need not use Pensacola milk for military sales and is free to purchase out-oUstate milk for this purpose, although if it does use milk purchased from its earned-base producers, it must pay 61 cents per gallon for it. It was apparent from the oral argument that Polar and the Commission were in dispute as to the impact of the existing regulations upon military sales, and we would hesitate to adjudicate the issue tendered in the absence of more helpful testimony and additional consideration of the matter in the court below, particularly since it is not at all clear that Polar has been using Pensacola milk for its military sales, or even that it wants to in the future. If it is free to utilize outside milk, acquired at whatever price, it may not want to pursue the matter at all. Besides, Polar is obtaining a substantial percentage of its total needs from outside the State and the production of Polar’s Pensacola producers may be wholly exhausted by other, nonmilitary, uses to which it may be put.
Moreover, consideration of the possible impact of producer-pricing systems upon federal procurement regulations may be premature at this time, in view of our invalidation of other provisions of the Florida law, provisions not entirely unrelated to the issue of military milk. The whole problem of military sales may take on a different aspect upon remand of this case.
IV.
Polar challenges that provision of the Florida Milk Control Act which imposes a tax in the amount of 15/100 of 1 cent upon each gallon of milk distributed by a Florida distributor. To the extent the computation of the tax includes milk which it sells to Fort Benning, Tyndall Air Force Base, and the Pensacola Naval Air Station, all being federal enclaves over which the United States exercises exclusive jurisdiction, Polar argues that the taxing measure is invalid as beyond the jurisdiction of the State to impose. We do not agree.
Polar’s reliance on James v. Dravo Contracting Co., 302 U. S. 134, and Standard Oil v. California, 291 U. S. 242, is misplaced. The James case dealt with a 2% gross receipts tax levied upon every person engaging in the business of contracting within the State, as applied to a contractor undertaking construction of locks and dams for the United States in certain navigable streams. The Court denied West Virginia’s jurisdiction to assess a gross-receipts tax with respect to work done by the contractor at its plants in Pennsylvania, as well as to work done within the exterior limits of West Virginia on property over which the United States had acquired exclusive jurisdiction. In Standard Oil v. California, California undertook to lay an excise tax upon every gasoline distributor for each gallon of motor vehicle fuel “sold and delivered by him in this State.” The Court found the tax invalid where both sale and delivery occurred within the boundaries of the Pre-sidio of San Francisco, a federal enclave over which the United States exercised exclusive jurisdiction.
In these cases the tax was deemed to fall upon the facilities of the United States or upon activities conducted within these facilities, the principle of both cases being that there was nothing occurring within the State, beyond the borders of the federal enclave, to which the tax could attach. Contrariwise, the Florida tax is on the privilege of engaging in the business of distributing milk or acting as a distributor; a distributor is defined as “any milk dealer who operates a milk gathering station or processing plant where milk is collected and bottled or otherwise processed and prepared for sale.” Fla. Stat. § 501.02. The incidence of the tax appears to be upon the activity of processing or bottling milk in a plant located within Florida, and not upon work performed on a federal enclave or upon the sale and delivery of milk occurring within the boundaries of federal property. Standard Oil and Dravo do not reach this case, for the activity Florida taxes — the processing or bottling of milk — occurs at Polar’s plant prior to the sale and delivery of milk to the Government.
It may be urged that a distributor is a dealer and that a dealer is one who sells milk, including one who sells to and upon federal enclaves. But even so, distributing has, by definition, its processing dimension, a substantial activity occurring within Florida. This is enough to sustain the tax. Besides, 4 U. S. C. § 105; enacted subsequent to James and Standard Oil, supra, confers upon the States jurisdiction to levy and collect a sales or use tax “in any Federal area,” and a sales or use tax is defined as “any tax levied on, with respect to, or measured by, sales... of tangible personal property....” 4 U. S. C. § 110. We think this provision provides ample basis for Florida to levy a tax measured by the amount of milk Polar distributes monthly, including milk sold to the United States for use on federal enclaves in Florida.
The judgment is reversed and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Chapter 501 of the Florida Statutes establishes a comprehensive scheme for regulation of the milk industry and establishes the Florida Milk Commission. The Act empowers the Commission, inter alia, to supervise and regulate the entire milk industry, including the production, transportation, manufacture, storage, distribution and sale of milk, to establish milk markets within the State, to fix prices to be paid producers within a regulated marketing area by distributors, milk dealers and producer-distributors, and generally to adopt and enforce all rules, regulations, and orders necessary to carry out the purposes of the Act. Fla. Stat. § 501.04. In addition the Commission is authorized to revoke or suspend the license of a milk distributor or dealer when satisfied that the dealer or distributor has rejected or refused milk delivered by a producer in ordinary continuance of a previous course of dealings or when satisfied that the dealer or distributor has committed any act injurious to the public health or public welfare in demoralization of the price structure of pure milk to such an extent as to interfere with an ample supply. Fla. Stat. §§ 501.09 (3) (a), (e). Before the Commission may exercise its supervisory and regulatory powers in any marketing area, however, at least 10% of the producers in that area must petition the Commission for such regulation and a majority of the producers in that area must vote in favor of regulation. Fla. Stat. § 501.20 (1).
In November 1961, the dairy farmers producing milk in the four westernmost Florida counties, Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa and Walton, voted to place that area under the control of the Florida Milk Commission and thereby subject to the provisions of the Florida Milk Control Act and the orders issued pursuant thereto. Thereupon in January 1962, the Commission issued a series of orders covering the four-county area, termed the Pensacola Milk Marketing Area, and a letter to Polar Ice Cream & Creamery Co. specifying its obligations under the newly imposed regulatory structure. In August 1962, the Commission issued other orders and rules further implementing and defining the earned-base allocation plan challenged herein.
The minimum price established in Official Order PEN-4, January 18, 1962, for the Pensacola area for Class II milk was 1 cent per gallon less than the minimum price established for this class milk in the Miami, Florida, Federal Milk Marketing Order, No. 118, and for Class III milk was 26 cents per gallon. There was no price set for Class IV utilization in this order. Official Order No. 20-29, covering all regulated marketing areas in Florida, effective March 4, 1962, retained the 61 cents per gallon minimum on Class I milk, and adopted the monthly prices in the Miami, Florida, Federal Milk Marketing Order, less 1 cent per gallon, for Class II, III and IV milk. All of the above prices are subject to minor adjustments for variations from the 4% average butterfat content of the milk distributed in each class.
Classes of milk are defined as follows in Official Order No. 20-28: “It Is Hereby Ordered That:
“1. Class I Milk is hereby defined as all fluid milk or milk products sold in fluid form with the exception of buttermilk, chocolate drink and cream.
“2. Class II Milk shall be all skim milk and butterfat:
“(a) Used to produce acidophilus milk, buttermilk, chocolate drink, half and half, light cream, heavy cream and sour cream, and
“(b) Contained in inventories in the form of milk products designated as Class I milk pursuant to paragraph (1) of this section on hand at the end of each month and accounting period; provided, that Class II classification of shrinkage prorated to skim and butterfat, respectively, in producer milk shall not exceed two per cent (2%) of skim and butterfat in producer milk.
“3. Class III Milk shall be all skim milk and butterfat:
“(a) Used to produce any product other than those specified in paragraphs (1) and (2) of this section;
“(b) That portion of fortified milk or skim milk not classified as Class I milk pursuant to subparagraph (l)(a) of this section, and
“(c) In total shrinkage of skim milk and butterfat, respectively, such shrinkage to be prorated to producer milk and other source milk received in the form of fluid milk or skim milk.
“4. Class IV Milk shall be all milk the skim portion of which is:
“(a) Disposed of for fertilizer or livestock feed, and
"(b) Dumped after such prior notification as the Commission administrator may require.”
Milk utilized by the consumer in fluid form, beverage milk, commands a substantially higher price than milk of the identical quality which is used to make manufactured milk products, such as butter, cheese, ice cream and so forth. Accordingly the processor or distributor of milk is able to pay the producer a higher price for milk which is sold in fluid form for human consumption, and most milk-pricing systems require milk to be classified according to use. See Lehigh Valley Coop. v. United States, 370 U. S. 76, 79. The milk industry generally maintains a reserve to meet the changing demands for beverage milk. Since the supply of milk is greater than the demands of the fluid milk market, the excess, referred to as surplus milk, must be channeled to the less-desirable, lower-priced outlets. This explains how Polar is able to purchase milk in Alabama and other States for as low as 30 and 35 cents per gallon and how Polar was able to pay its producers, prior to regulation, as high as 61 cents per gallon for a specified quantity of milk.
Where a distributor sells milk in both fluid and manufactured forms, problems of allocation arise. Under Federal Milk Marketing Orders establishing marketwide pools, the total proceeds received from the sale of milk by regulated handlers or distributors are pooled. A “blend” or average price is calculated by multiplying the “pool” milk disposed of in each class by the established minimum prices for each class, with some further adjustments not pertinent here. See Lehigh Valley Coop., supra, at 80. The “blend” price is then divided among the producers according to the amount of milk each producer sells, regardless of the use to which his milk is actually put. The blend price thus represents an average based upon the combined use of all regulated milk within a marketing area.
Until the Florida Milk Commission’s Rule 220-1.05 was promulgated on August 24, 1962, the applicability of the allocation provision to milk utilized in less than Class I channels was unclear. The Commission’s letter of January 25, 1962, to Polar’s earned-base producers, assigning them bases for 1962, specified that the bases entitled them to that percentage of Polar’s Class I milk sales each month, without referring to Class II, III or IV utilizations. The total of the percentages assigned to these 26 producers was 100%, thus entitling them collectively to all of Polar’s Class I sales for 1962.
Rule 220-1.05 (6) provides:
“Base Percentage; Computation and Application.
“(a) During the base fixing period, a base percentage shall be determined for each producer by calculating the ratio of the milk delivered by each producer to the total milk delivered by all producers for the entire base fixing period, which percentage is referred to herein as 'earned base.’ This computation shall be made immediately following the close of the base fixing period, and within thirty (30) days thereafter, each producer shall be notified by mail of his base percentage and the base percentage of all other producers participating in that particular base. During this period, each plant shall supply the local Deputy Administrator with a summary of its base computations. The producer notification must illustrate how the base percentage for the producer concerned has been determined.
“1. The base percentage earned by each producer shall be applied to the total number of gallons of milk utilized in Class I channels by each distributor and producer-distributor to determine the number of gallons of milk for which the producer must be paid at the Class I price fixed by the Commission. In case a producer fails to produce the amount of milk that his 'earned base’ entitles him to, in Class I channels, such deficit must be reallocated to the other 'earned base’ producers in proportion to their ‘earned bases,’ and the Class I price paid for the milk so reallocated.
“2. The method outlined above for computing allocations to Class I utilization shall be followed in computing allocations for all other classes.
“3. First allocation of a producer’s deliveries shall be to Class I utilization, with allocation continued thereafter in descending order of price through Class IV classification. The balance of any producer’s production after the above allocations may then be placed in the lowest price classification.
“4. In computing Class I sales to be allocated to producers, no adjustment shall be made for milk received by distributors and/or producer-distributors from sources other than ‘earned base’ producers.”
Section 501.05 (3) provides:
“The relationship between a producer and a distributor, under which milk produced by the producer is regularly delivered to and accepted by the distributor, when once established, shall not be terminated either by the producer or by the distributor without just cause therefor, and the approval of the commission. Just cause will be considered by the commission as any cause deemed just by a prudent and reasonable man.”
Section 501.09 (3) provides: “The commission may decline to grant any license... or revoke a license... when satisfied of the existence of any of the following...
“(a) That a milk dealer has rejected, without reasonable cause, any milk delivered to and accepted by the milk dealer from a producer delivered by or on behalf of the producer in ordinary continuance of a previous course of dealing, or that a milk dealer has rejected without reasonable cause, or has rejected without reasonable advance notice, any milk_ tendered or offered for delivery to the milk dealer by or on behalf of a producer in ordinary continuance of a previous course of dealing. It is intended hereby to provide and require that a milk dealer shall not reject or refuse to accept any milk tendered or offered for delivery by or on behalf of a producer in ordinary continuance of a previous course of dealing unless there exists reasonable cause for the rejection or refusal to accept such milk and unless the milk dealer has also given... advance notice....”
In Borden Co. v. Odham, 121 So. 2d 625, the Florida Supreme Court upheld the Commission’s power to apply the percentage allocation provisions to Class II and III as well as Class I milk and to require a distributor to accept milk in excess of Class I requirements, so long as the Commission acted reasonably. However, since the statute at that time only required reasonable notice for a refusal of milk delivered in the ordinary course of dealings between a distributor and producer, the court held that the Commission’s additional requirement of just cause was beyond its authority. The statute, note 5, supra, has subsequently been amended to require both just cause and reasonable notice before refusal or rejection of milk delivered by an earned-base producer is permissible.
In Florida Dairy, Inc., v. Florida Milk Comm’n, 149 So. 2d 867, a milk distributor sought to terminate its relationship with producers on the ground that it could produce its own milk at a lower price than that paid to producers and that the required prices rendered the distributor unable to meet the competition from producer-distributors in its area. The Commission’s finding that just cause was
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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H
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Per Curiam.
An Illinois statute, Ill. Rev. Stat, ch. 9554, ¶ 11-501.1 (1981), provides that any person who drives an automobile in that State consents to take ’ a breath-analysis test when requested to do so by an officer as incident to an arrest for driving while intoxicated. The statute also prescribes the manner in which the test is to be administered and provides a nine-point list of matters of which the arresting officer is to inform the arrestee, including the right to refuse to submit to a breath analysis and the fact that such a refusal may be admitted in evidence against him “in any hearing concerning the suspension, revocation or denial of his license or permit.” ¶ 11-501.1(a)(4). Finally relevant for our purposes is subsection (d) of ¶ 11-501.1, which provides in pertinent part:
“The arresting officer shall file with the Clerk of the Circuit Court for the county in which the arrest was made, a sworn statement naming the person refusing to take and complete the test requested under the provisions of this Section. . . . Such sworn statement shall include a statement that the arresting officer had reasonable cause to believe the person was driving the motor vehicle within this State while under the influence of intoxicating liquor ....
“The Clerk shall thereupon notify such person in writing that his privilege to operate a motor vehicle will be suspended unless, within 28 days from the date of mailing of the notice, he shall request in writing a hearing thereon. . . .
. . Such hearing shall proceed in the Court in the same manner as other civil proceedings, except that the scope of such proceedings shall cover only the issues of whether the person was placed under arrest for [driving while intoxicated], whether the arresting officer had reasonable grounds to believe that such person was driving while under the influence of intoxicating liquor, whether the person was informed orally and in writing as provided in paragraph (a) that his privilege to operate a motor vehicle would be suspended if he refused to submit to and complete the test and whether, after being so advised, he refused to submit to and complete the test upon request of the officer.”
Respondent Milton D. Batchelder was stopped while driving his automobile by an officer of the Peoria, Illinois, Police Department after the officer observed respondent driving in a reckless and erratic manner. After completing the stop, the officer approached respondent, determined that he was intoxicated, and arrested him on the charge of driving under the influence of intoxicating liquor. The officer thereafter requested that respondent take a breath-analysis test. Respondent refused. The officer then executed and filed a sworn statement that read in pertinent part:
“I hereby certify that I have placed the above-named person under arrest, and that I had at the time of arrest reasonable grounds to believe that said person was driving a motor vehicle in this State while under the influence of intoxicating liquor in that: Traveling Too Fast In Alley With Pedestrians Around, Crossed Walnut W/O Slowing, Maintained Speed Behind Slipper Club Then Parked Abruptly Behind 519 S. W. Adams. I further certify that said person did willfully refuse to submit to the breath analyses when requested to do so in accordance with Section 11-501.1 of the Illinois Vehicle Code, after being informed of the possible consequences of his or her refusal.” Pet. for Cert. 5-6.
To avoid having his license automatically suspended, respondent exercised his statutory right to request a hearing pursuant to ¶ 11-501.1(d).
Prior to taking evidence, the judge presiding at the hearing asked if there were any motions. Respondent’s counsel moved to dismiss the officer’s affidavit, quoted above, on the ground that it did not state any facts showing that respondent was under the influence of intoxicating liquor at the time of his arrest. The judge found that the affidavit did not comply with ¶ 11-501.1(d) because it failed to state facts showing that respondent was under the influence of intoxicating liquor at the time of his arrest. An order was entered denying the State’s request for suspension of respondent’s license.
The State appealed and the Appellate Court of Illinois, Third Judicial District, agreed with the trial court that the facts stated in the affidavit were insufficient to support the conclusion that respondent was intoxicated at the time he was arrested. 107 Ill. App. 3d 81, 437 N. E. 2d 364 (1982). The Appellate Court, however, held that the affidavit literally complied with the requirements of ¶ 11-501.1(d); that subsection requires only that the officer’s affidavit state that he “had reasonable cause to believe the person was driving . . . while under the influence of intoxicating liquor.” The affidavit nonetheless was deemed “insufficient. . . due to its failure to comport with the United States Constitution, specifically, the fourth and fourteenth amendments thereof.” Id., at 83, 437 N. E. 2d, at 366.
Relying on our decision in Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U. S. 648 (1979), the Appellate Court opined that “[t]he fourth and fourteenth amendments to the United States Constitution pertain to this situation because stopping an automobile and detaining its occupants constitute a ‘seizure’ within the meaning of those amendments . . . .” 107 Ill. App. 3d, at 84, 437 N. E. 2d, at 367. The court also relied on Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1 (1968), for the proposition that “[t]he permissibility of a particular law enforcement practice is judged by balancing its intrusion on the individual’s fourth amendment interests against its promotion of legitimate governmental interests.” 107 Ill. App. 3d, at 84, 437 N. E. 2d, at 367. Applying this standard here, the Appellate Court held that ¶ 11-501.1(d) is constitutional only if it requires an arresting officer to set out, in his affidavit prepared pursuant to ¶ 11-501.1(d), “the underlying circumstances which provided him with a reasonable belief that the arrested person was driving under the influence of intoxicating liquor.” Ibid.
In its application of the Federal Constitution to the Illinois implied-consent statute, the Appellate Court inexplicably failed to look to how this Court undertook a similar task in Mackey v. Montrym, 443 U. S. 1 (1979). In Mackey, we held that the Massachusetts statute mandating suspension of a driver’s license because of his refusal to take a breath-analysis test upon arrest for driving under the influence of intoxicating liquor did not violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The procedures provided for in the Illinois implied-consent statute are, if anything, even more solicitous of due process values than those we upheld in Mackey.
We noted in Mackey that “suspension of a driver’s license for statutorily defined cause implicates a protectible property interest.” Id., at 10. There, as here, the only question presented was “what process is due to protect against an erroneous deprivation of that interest.” Ibid. We held that this question should be resolved by considering the following three factors:
“ ‘First, the private interest that will be affected by the official action; second, the risk of an erroneous deprivation of such interest through the procedures used, and the probable value, if any, of additional or substitute procedural safeguards; and finally, the Government’s interest, including the function involved and the fiscal and administrative burdens that the additional or substitute procedural requirement would entail.’” Ibid., quoting Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319, 335 (1976).
The analysis utilized in Mackey is equally applicable to and dispositive of this case.
First, the driver’s interest in the continued possession and use of his license was recognized in Mackey. However, in undertaking the first step of the Eldridge balancing process in Mackey, our concern centered on “[t]he duration of any potentially wrongful deprivation of a property interest,” 443 U. S., at 12. Under the Massachusetts statute, the license of a driver who refused to submit to a breath-analysis test was suspended pending the outcome of a hearing that he was entitled to demand. There is no concern or risk under the Illinois statute that a driver will be deprived of his license prior to a hearing. Paragraph 11-501.1(d) clearly grants a driver the right to have a hearing before his license is suspended. Thus, respondent can seek no solace in the first step of the Eldridge analysis.
“[T]he second stage of the Eldridge inquiry requires consideration of the likelihood of an erroneous deprivation of the private interest involved as a consequence of the procedures used.” Mackey v. Montrym, 443 U. S., at 13. In Mackey, we noted that “‘something less than an evidentiary hearing is sufficient prior to adverse administrative action.’” Ibid., quoting Dixon v. Love, 431 U. S. 105, 113 (1977). Clearly, then, the fact that ¶ 11-501.1(d) provides for a predepri-vation hearing abundantly weights this second part of the Eldridge analysis in favor of the constitutionality of the Illinois implied-consent scheme.
“The third leg of the Eldridge balancing test requires us to identify the governmental function involved; also, to weigh in the balance the state interests served by the summary procedures used, as well as the administrative and fiscal burdens, if any, that would result from the substitute procedures sought.” Mackey v. Montrym, supra, at 17. The interest of the States in depriving the drunk driver of permission to continue operating an automobile is particularly strong. We recently commented on “[t]he carnage caused by drunk drivers” in South Dakota v. Neville, 459 U. S. 553, 558 (1983). See also Mackey v. Montrym, supra, at 17-18; Perez v. Campbell, 402 U. S. 637, 657 and 672 (1971) (Blackmun, J., concurring); Tate v. Short, 401 U. S. 395, 401 (1971) (Black-mun, J., concurring); Breithaupt v. Abram, 352 U. S. 432, 439 (1957). Indeed, it is the effect of the Appellate Court’s opinion on the Illinois effort to halt this “carnage” that has prompted our summary action in this case. That interest is substantially served by the procedures outlined in ¶ 11-501.1(d). Again, the fact that we upheld a more summary procedure in Mackey refutes the suggestion that the Illinois scheme runs afoul of the Eldridge test.
Accordingly, we conclude that the Constitution does not require arresting officers in Illinois, in enforcing that State’s implied-consent statute, to recite in an affidavit the specific and concrete evidentiary matters constituting “the underlying circumstances which provided him with a reasonable belief that the arrested person was driving under the influence of intoxicating liquor.” 107 Ill. App., at 84,437 N. E. 2d, at 367. The driver’s right to a hearing before he may be deprived of his license for failing to submit to a breath-analysis test accords him all of, and probably more than, the process that the Federal Constitution assures. The petition for certiorari is granted, the judgment of the Appellate Court of Illinois, Third Judicial District, is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Illinois Rev. Stat., eh. 9514, ¶ 11-501.1 (1981), provides in pertinent part:
“Suspension of license — Implied consent, (a) Any person who ... drives a motor vehicle anywhere within this State thereby consents, under the terms of this Section, to take and complete a test or chemical analysis of his breath to determine the alcoholic content of his blood when made as an incident to and following his lawful arrest, evidenced by the issuance of a Uniform Traffic Ticket, for an offense defined in Section 11-501 of this Act [proscribing driving while intoxicated] or a similar provision of a municipal ordinance.”
Two implied-consent statutes labeled ch. 9554, ¶ 11-501.1, were passed by the Illinois General Assembly on the same day. The Appellate Court of Illinois in this case relied on the version we have quoted in text and in n. 1, supra. In any event, the differences in language between the two statutes do not affect our analysis in this case. See Ill. Rev. Stat., ch. 1, ¶ 1105 (1981).
The Appellate Court purported to rely on the Fourth, as well as the Fourteenth, Amendment. To the extent that there are Fourth Amendment interests at stake here, see Delaware v. Prouse, 440 U. S. 648, 662-663 (1979), they are amply protected so long as the officer who arrested respondent had “at least articulable and reasonable suspicion that . . . [respondent was] subject to seizure for violation of law . . . .” Id., at 663. That fact would be determined at the hearing provided for under ¶ 11-501.1(d). The logical thrust of the Appellate Court’s opinion is that respondent was somehow denied due process because the arresting officer’s affidavit did not specify the grounds which led him to believe that respondent was driving under the influence of alcohol. We thus treat the Appellate Court’s opinion as resting exclusively on due process grounds.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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D
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Warren
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioner was convicted of contempt of Congress under 2 U. S. C. § 192 in the District Court for the District of Columbia. Section 192 provides for the punishment of any witness before a congressional committee “who . . . refuses to answer any question pertinent to the question under inquiry . ...” On appeal, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed the conviction and remanded the case for a new trial. Claiming that the Court of Appeals should have directed an acquittal, petitioner applied to this Court for certiorari. We granted the writ because of the fundamental and recurrent character of the questions presented.
Pursuant to subpoena, petitioner appeared on August 10, 1949, before a subcommittee of the Committee on Un-American Activities of the House of Representatives. Petitioner was then a member and field representative of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America. Also subpoenaed to appear on that day were Thomas J. Fitzpatrick and Frank Panzino, two officers of the same union. At the outset of the hearings, counsel for the committee announced that the purpose of the investigation was to inquire into “the question of Communist affiliation or association of certain members” of the union and “the advisability of tightening present security requirements in industrial plants working on certain Government contracts.” All three witnesses were asked questions concerning alleged membership in the Communist Party. All three declined to answer.
Fitzpatrick was the first to be called to testify. He based his refusal to answer on “the first and fifth amendments” as well as “the first amendment to the
Constitution, supplemented by the fifth amendment.” Immediately following Fitzpatrick’s testimony, Panzino was called to the stand. In response to the identical questions put to Fitzpatrick, Panzino specifically adopted as his own the grounds relied upon by Fitzpatrick. In addition, at one point in his testimony, Panzino stated that “I think again, Mr. Chairman, under the fifth amendment, that is my own personal belief.” On the following day, petitioner, unaccompanied by counsel, was called to the stand and was also asked whether he had ever been a member of the Communist Party. Like Panzino before him, he declined to answer, specifically adopting as his own the grounds relied upon by Fitzpatrick.
On November 20, 1950, all three witnesses were indicted under § 192 for their refusals to answer. The three cases were tried before different judges, each sitting without a jury. Fitzpatrick and Panzino were acquitted. In Fitzpatrick’s case, it was held that his references to “the first and fifth amendments” and “the first amendment to the Constitution, supplemented by the fifth amendment” constituted an adequate means of invoking the Self-Incrimination Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Similarly, in Panzino’s case, it was held that his reference to “the fifth amendment” was sufficient to plead the privilege. In petitioner’s case, however, the District Court held that a witness may not incorporate the position of another witness and rejected petitioner’s defense based on the Self-Incrimination Clause. Petitioner was accordingly convicted and sentenced to a term of six months in jail and a fine of $500.
In reversing this conviction, the Court of Appeals, sitting en banc, held that “No formula or specific term or expression is required” in order to plead the privilege and that a witness may adopt as his own a plea made by a previous witness. Thus the Court of Appeals viewed the principal issue in the case as “whether Fitzpatrick did or did not claim the privilege.” On this issue, a majority of the Court of Appeals expressed no view. They agreed that a reversal without more would be in order if they “were of clear opinion that Fitzpatrick, and therefore Quinn, did claim the privilege.” But they were “not of that clear opinion.” The Court of Appeals therefore ordered a new trial for determination of the issue by the District Court. The Court of Appeals also directed the District Court on retrial to determine whether petitioner “was aware of the intention of his inquirer that answers were required despite his objections.” In that regard, however, it rejected petitioner’s contention that a witness cannot be convicted under § 192 for a refusal to answer unless the committee overruled his objections and specifically directed him to answer.
It is from that decision that this Court granted certiorari.
I.
There can be no doubt as to the power of Congress, by itself or through its committees, to investigate matters and conditions relating to contemplated legislation. This power, deeply rooted in American and English institutions, is indeed co-extensive with the power to legislate. Without the power to investigate — including of course the authority to compel testimony, either through its own processes or through judicial trial — Congress could be seriously handicapped in its efforts to exercise its constitutional function wisely and effectively.
But the power to investigate, broad as it may be, is J also subject to recognized limitations. It cannot be used to inquire into private affairs unrelated to a valid legislative purpose. Nor does it extend to an area in which Congress is forbidden to legislate. Similarly, the power to investigate must not be confused with any of the powers of law enforcement; those powers are assigned under our Constitution to the Executive and the Judiciary. Still further limitations on the power to investigate are found in the specific individual guarantees of the Bill of Rights, such as the Fifth Amendment’s privilege against self-incrimination which is in issue here.
The privilege against self-incrimination is a right that was hard-earned by our forefathers. The reasons for its inclusion in the Constitution — and the necessities for its preservation — are to be found in the lessons of history. As early as 1650, remembrance of the horror of Star Chamber proceedings a decade before had firmly established the privilege in the common law of England. Transplanted to this country as part of our legal heritage, it soon made its way into various state constitutions and ultimately in 1791 into the federal Bill of Rights. The privilege, this Court has stated, “was generally regarded then, as now, as a privilege of great value, a protection to the innocent though a shelter to the guilty, and a safeguard against heedless, unfounded or tyrannical prosecutions.” Coequally with our other constitutional guarantees, the Self-Incrimination Clause “must be accorded liberal construction in favor of the right it was intended to secure.” Such liberal construction is particularly warranted in a prosecution of a witness for a refusal to answer, since the respect normally accorded the privilege is then buttressed by the presumption of innocence accorded a defendant in a criminal trial. To apply the privilege narrowly or begrudgingly — to treat it as an historical relic, at most merely to be tolerated — is to ignore its development and purpose.
In the instant case petitioner was convicted for refusing to answer the committee’s question as to his alleged membership in the Communist Party. Clearly an answer to the question might have tended to incriminate him. As a consequence, petitioner was entitled to claim the privilege. The principal issue here is whether or not he did.
It is agreed by all that a claim of the privilege does not require any special combination of words. Plainly a witness need not have the skill of a lawyer to invoke the protection of the Self-Incrimination Clause. If an objection to a question is made in any language that a committee may reasonably be expected to understand as an attempt to invoke the privilege, it must be respected both by the committee and by a court in a prosecution under § 192.
Here petitioner, by adopting the grounds relied upon by Fitzpatrick, based his refusal to answer on “the first and fifth amendments” and “the first amendment to the Constitution, supplemented by the fifth amendment.” The Government concedes — as we think it must — that a witness may invoke the privilege by stating “I refuse to testify on the ground of the Fifth Amendment.” Surely, in popular parlance and even in legal literature, the term “Fifth Amendment” in the context of our time is commonly regarded as being synonymous with the privilege against self-incrimination. The Government argues, however, that the references to the Fifth Amendment in the instant case were inadequate to invoke the privilege because Fitzpatrick’s statements are more reasonably understood as invoking rights under the First Amendment. We find the Government’s argument untenable. The mere fact that Fitzpatrick and petitioner also relied on the First Amendment does not preclude their reliance on the Fifth Amendment as well. If a witness urges two constitutional objections to a committee’s line of questioning, he is not bound at his peril to choose between them. By pressing both objections, he does not lose a privilege which would have been valid if he had only relied on one.
The Government, moreover, apparently concedes that petitioner intended to invoke the privilege. In its brief the Government points out “the probability that petitioner’s ambiguous references to the Fifth Amendment . . . were phrased deliberately in such vague terms so as to enable petitioner ... to obtain the benefit of the privilege without incurring the popular opprobrium which often attaches to its exercise.” But the fact that a witness expresses his intention in vague terms is immaterial so long as the claim is sufficiently definite to apprise the committee of his intention. As everyone agrees, no ritualistic formula is necessary in order to invoke the privilege. In the instant case, Quinn’s references to the Fifth Amendment were clearly sufficient to put the committee on notice of an apparent claim of the privilege. It then became incumbent on the committee either to accept the claim or to ask petitioner whether he was in fact invoking the privilege. Particularly is this so if it is true, as the Government contends, that petitioner feared the stigma that might result from a forthright claim of his constitutional right to refuse to testify. It is precisely at such times — when the privilege is under attack by those who wrongly conceive of it as merely a shield for the guilty — that governmental bodies must be most scrupulous in protecting its exercise.
This ruling by no means leaves a congressional committee defenseless at the hands of a scheming witness intent on deception. When a witness declines to answer a question because of constitutional objections and the language used is not free from doubt, the way is always open for the committee to inquire into the nature of the claim before making a ruling. If the witness unequivocally and intelligently waives any objection based on the Self-Incrimination Clause, or if the witness refuses a committee request to state whether he relies on the Self-Incrimination Clause, he cannot later invoke its protection in a prosecution for contempt for refusing to answer that question. Here the committee made no attempt to have petitioner particularize his objection. Under these circumstances, we must hold that petitioner’s references to the Fifth Amendment were sufficient to invoke the privilege and that the court below erred in failing to direct a judgment of acquittal.
II.
There is yet a second ground for our decision.
Section 192, like the ordinary federal criminal statute, requires a criminal intent — in this instance, a deliberate, intentional refusal to answer. This element of the offense, like any other, must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Petitioner contends that such proof was not, and cannot be, made in this case.
Clearly not every refusal to answer a question propounded by a congressional committee subjects a witness to prosecution under § 192. Thus if he raises an objection to a certain question — for example, lack of perti-nency or the privilege against self-incrimination — the committee may sustain the objection and abandon the question, even though the objection might actually be without merit. In such an instance, the witness’ refusal to answer is not contumacious, for there is lacking the requisite criminal intent. Or the committee may disallow the objection and thus give the witness the choice of answering or not. Given such a choice, the witness may recede from his position and answer the question. And if he does not then answer, it may fairly be said that the foundation has been laid for a finding of criminal intent to violate § 192. In short, unless the witness is clearly apprised that the committee demands his answer notwithstanding his objections, there can be no conviction under § 192 for refusal to answer that question.
Was petitioner so apprised here? At no time did the committee specifically overrule his objection based on the Fifth Amendment; nor did the committee indicate its overruling of the objection by specifically directing petitioner to answer. In the absence of such committee action, petitioner was never confronted with a clear-cut choice between compliance and noncompliance, between answering the question and risking prosecution for contempt. At best he was left to guess whether or not the committee had accepted his objection.
This ambiguity in the committee’s position is apparent from the transcript of the hearing. Immediately after petitioner stated that he was adopting Fitzpatrick’s objection, the committee chairman asked petitioner: “. . . will you now answer the question whether you are now or ever have been a member of the Communist Party, or do you decline to answer?” In response to this, petitioner stated for the first time that he would not answer. He said: “I decline to discuss with the committee questions of that nature.” Committee counsel thereupon stated that further questioning “relating to those matters” was “not necessary” and proceeded upon a new line of inquiry. There is nothing in this colloquy from which petitioner could have determined with a reasonable degree of certainty that the committee demanded his answer despite his objection. Rather, the colloquy is wholly consistent with the hypothesis that the committee had in fact acquiesced in his objection.
Our view that a clear disposition of the witness’ objection is a prerequisite to prosecution for contempt is supported by long-standing tradition here and in other English-speaking nations. In this country the tradition has been uniformly recognized in the procedure of both state and federal courts. It is further reflected in the practice of congressional committees prior to the enactment of § 192 in 1857; a specific direction to answer was the means then used to apprise a witness of the overruling of his objection. Against this background § 192 became law. No relaxation of the safeguards afforded a witness was contemplated by its sponsors. In explaining the bill in the House, Congressman Davis expressly stated that committee powers were not increased, that no added burden was placed upon the witness, and that a “mere substitution” of a judicial proceeding for punishment at the bar of Congress was intended. The reason for enacting § 192 went to the punishment and not the offense. It was recognized that the power of Congress to-deal with a contemnor by its own processes did not extend beyond the life of any session. By making contempt of Congress a crime, a fixed term of imprisonment was substituted for variable periods of congressional custody dependent upon the fortuity of whether the contemnor had been called to testify near the beginning or the end of a session. But there is nothing to indicate that this change in the mode of punishment affected in any way the well-established elements of contempt of Congress. Since the enactment of § 192, the practice of specifically directing a recalcitrant witness to answer has continued to prevail. In fact, the very committee involved here, the House Un-American Activities Committee, originally followed this practice and recently resumed it.
Giving a witness a fair apprisal of the committee’s ruling on an objection recognizes the legitimate interests of both the witness and the committee. Just as the witness need not use any particular form of words to present his objection, so also the committee is not required to resort to any fixed verbal formula to indicate its disposition of the objection. So long as the witness is not forced to guess the committee’s ruling, he has no cause to complain. And adherence to this traditional practice can neither inflict hardship upon the committee nor abridge the proper scope of legislative investigation.
III
Petitioner also attacks his conviction on grounds involving novel constitutional issues. He contends that the House Resolution authorizing the committee’s operations is invalid under the First Amendment. In addition, petitioner contends that the trial court erred in denying a hearing on the alleged bias of the indicting grand jury. Our disposition of the case makes it unnecessary to pass on these issues.
The judgment below is reversed and the case remanded to the District Court with directions to enter a judgment of acquittal.
Reversed.
The section provides in full:
“Every person who having been summoned as a witness by the authority of either House of Congress to give testimony or to produce papers upon any matter under inquiry before either House, or any joint committee established by a joint or concurrent resolution of the two Houses of Congress, or any committee of either House of Congress, willfully makes default, or who, having appeared, refuses to answer any question pertinent to the question under inquiry, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not more than $1,000 nor less than $100 and imprisonment in a common jail for not less than one month nor more than twelve months.”
91 U. S. App. D. C. 344, 203 F. 2d 20.
347 U. S. 1008.
Hearings before House Committee on Un-American Activities Regarding Communist Infiltration of Labor Unions, 81st Cong., 1st Sess., Part I, 541-542.
Id., at 602, 604.
Id., at 608.
Id., at 609.
Id., at 634-635:
“Mr. Quinn. I would like to make a statement along the lines that Mr. Fitzpatrick made yesterday in regard to a question of that nature. I feel that the political beliefs, opinions, and associations of the American people can be held secret if they so desire.
“Mr. Wood. And for those reasons do you decline to answer that question ?
“Mr. Quinn. I didn’t say I was declining to answer the question. Before I do answer the question I should like to say that I support the position taken by Brother Fitzpatrick yesterday.
“Mr. Wood. Did you hear his statement yesterday?
“Mr. Quinn. Yes; I did.
“Mr. Wood. Do you support it in'its entirety?
“Mr. Quinn. In its entirety.
“Mr. Wood. Is there anything else you want to add to it?
“Mr. Quinn. No; I don’t.
“Mr. Wood. Will you accept it as the expression of your views, then?
“Mr. Quinn. You may. I may add I feel I have no other choice in this matter, because the defense of the Constitution, I hold sacred. I don't feel I am hiding behind the Constitution, but in this case I am’ standing before it, defending it, as small as I am.
“Mr. Wood. Having made that statement and subscribed to the sentiments expressed by the witness yesterday to whom you referred, will you now answer the question whether you are now or have ever been a member of the Communist Party?
“Mr. QuiNN. I hold that the Constitution holds sacred the rights of people-
“Mr. Wood. You have stated your position. Having enunciated your sentiments and your position, will you now answer the question whether you are now or ever have been a member of the Communist Party, or do you decline to answer?
“Mr. QuinN. I decline to discuss with the committee questions of that nature.
“Mr. Wood. Proceed, Mr. Tavenner.
“Mr. TavenNER. I believe in the light of that answer it is not necessary to ask you any further questions relating to those matters, so I will ask you this: Do you know Mr. James J. Matles?
“Mr. QuinN. Yes.”
Petitioner’s motions to dismiss the indictment were denied sub nom. United States v. Emspak, 95 F. Supp. 1010, 1012 (D. D. C.).
United States v. Fitzpatrick, 96 F. Supp. 491 (D. D. C.).
United States v. Panzino, unreported, Criminal No. 1747-50 (D.D.C.).
United States v. Quinn, unreported, Criminal No. 1744-50 (D. D. C.).
91 U. S. App. D. C. 344, 347, 203 F. 2d 20, 23.
Id., at 347, 203 F. 2d, at 23.
Id., at 348, 203 F. 2d, at 24.
Ibid.
Id., at 349, 203 F. 2d, at 25.
Ibid.
Cf. Anderson v. Dunn, 6 Wheat. 204.
In re Chapman, 166 U. S. 661.
See McGrain v. Daugherty, 273 U. S. 135, 175.
Id., at 173-174; Kilbourn v. Thompson, 103 U. S. 168, 190.
Compare United States v. Rumely, 345 U. S. 41, 46.
Kilbourn v. Thompson, 103 U. S. 168, 192-193.
The Amendment provides in pertinent part that “No person . . . shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself . . . .”
See Griswold, The Fifth Amendment Today, 2-7.
Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U. S. 78, 91. See also Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616, 631-632.
Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, 486. Cf. Counselman v. Hitchcock, 142 U. S. 547, 562.
Blau v. United States, 340 U. S. 159, specifically holding that such a question is protected by the privilege; Brunner v. United States, 343 U. S. 918, reversing 190 F. 2d 167 (C. A. 9th Cir.). See also Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479.
Compare Smith v. United States, 337 U. S. 137, where the Court characterized a witness’ statement “I want to claim privilege as to anything that I say” (p. 142) as a “definite claim of general privilege against self-incrimination” (p. 151).
As to the close relationship between the First Amendment and the privilege against self-incrimination, see Griswold, supra, note 26, at 8-9.
Brief for United States, p. 33. The Government makes the same contention as to the petitioner in No. 9, Emspak v. United States, post, p. 190.
Sinclair v. United States, 279 U. S. 263, 299. See also In re Chapman, 166 U. S. 661, 672, in which the Court, while upholding-the constitutionality of the statute, recognized deliberateness as an element of the offense.
See United States v. Kamp, 102 F. Supp. 757, 759 (D. D. C.): “Committees of Congress must conduct examinations in such a manner that it is clear to the witness that the Committee recognizes him as being in default, and anything short of a clear cut default on the part of the witness will not sustain a conviction for contempt of Congress. The transcript of the defendant Kamp’s testimony fails to disclose such a clear cut default. The witness is not required to enter into a guessing game when called upon to appear before a committee. The burden is upon the presiding member to make clear the directions of the committee, to consider any reasonable explanations given by the witness, and then to rule on the witness’ response.” The defendant was accordingly acquitted.
On similar grounds, an acquittal was directed in United States v. Browder, unreported, Criminal No. 1784-50 (D. D. C.).
See note 8, supra.
While of course not binding on Congress or its committees, the practice in the States and other English-speaking jurisdictions is at least worthy of note.
For examples relating to recalcitrant witnesses before state legislative committees, see Ex parte McCarthy, 29 Cal. 395, 398; People v. Keeler, 99 N. Y. 463, 471, 2 N. E. 615, 617; Lowe v. Summers, 69 Mo. App. 637, 645.
Recalcitrant witnesses before investigating committees of the British House of Commons have traditionally been apprised of the disposition of their objections and given subsequent opportunity to respond before being subjected to the contempt power of the legislature. The practice has been as follows: The committee reports the failure to answer to the House. The witness is questioned about the cause of the refusal to answer before the Bar of the House. The House then votes on the validity of the objection. If the claim is rejected, the witness is specifically directed to answer. Only after a subsequent refusal is punishment imposed. See 88 Journals of the House of Commons 212, 218 (Case of Elizabeth Robinson before Select Committee on Liverpool Bribery, 1833); 90 Journals of the House of Commons 501, 504, and 29 Hans. Deb., 3d Ser., 1249, 1279-1288 (Case of William Prentice before Select Committee on Great Yar-mouth Bribery, 1835); 90 Journals of the House of Commons, 564, 571, 575 (Case of Lieutenant Colonel Fairman before Select Committee on the Orange Lodges, 1835); 152 Journals of the House of Commons 361, 365 (Case of John Kirkwood before Select Committee on Money Lending, 1897).
For Canadian practice, see the case of W. T. R. Preston before the Committee on Public Accounts, the Committee on Agriculture and Colonization, and the House of Commons. 41 Journals of the House of Commons, Canada, 298, 316, 323; 41 id., Appendix No. 2, 324-327; 41 id., Appendix No. 3, 250-251; 76 Debates, House of Commons, Canada, Session 1906, Vol. III, 4451-4535.
See Hoffman v. United States, 341 U. S. 479, 486: “It is for the court to say whether his silence is justified . . . and to require him to answer if ‘it clearly appears to the court that he is mistaken.’ ” See also Chief Justice Marshall in United States v. Burr, 25 Fed. Cas. 38, at 40, No. 14,692e: “When a question is propounded, it belongs to the court to consider and to decide whether any direct answer to it can implicate the witness.” The cases, both federal and state, are collected in Wigmore, Evidence, § 2271. See, e. g., Carlson v. United States, 209 F. 2d 209, 214 (C. A. 1st Cir.), and Gendron v. Burnham, 146 Me. 387, 405-406, 82 A. 2d 773, 784-785.
See, e. g., the resolution introduced by Congressman Orr proposing that one J. W. Simonton be haled before the bar of the House of Representatives for refusing to answer a question put to him by a duly-authorized committee of that body. Cong. Globe, 34th Cong., 3d Sess. 403-404 (1857). The resolution states in part:
“The committee were impressed with the materiality of the testimony withheld by the witness, as it embraced the letter and spirit of the inquiry directed by the House to be made, but were anxious to avoid any controversy with the witness. They consequently waived the interrogatory that day, to give the witness time for reflection on the consequences of his refusal, and to afford him an opportunity to look into the law and the practice of the House in such cases, notifying him that he would, on some subsequent day, be recalled. This was the 15th of January instant. On Tuesday, the 20th instant, the said J. W. Simonton was recalled, and the identical question first referred to was again propounded, after due notice to him that if he declined the committee would feel constrained to report his declination to the House, and ask that body to enforce all its powers in the premises to compel a full and complete response.” Id., at 403. See also id., 31st Cong., 1st Sess. 1716 (1850).
Act of Jan. 24, 1857, c. 19, § 1, 11 Stat. 155.
Cong. Globe, 34th Cong., 3d Sess. 427.
Anderson v. Dunn, 6 Wheat. 204, 230-231.
Cong. Globe, supra, note 40, at 405 et seq.
See, e. g., Cong. Globe, 40th Cong., 3d Sess. 771-772 (1869); id., 42d Cong., 3d Sess. 952 (1873); 4 Cong. Rec. 1705 et seq. (1876) (citation of Hallet Kilbourn, involved in Kilbourn v. Thompson, supra, note 22); 26 Cong. Rec. 6143 et seq. (1894) (citation of Elverton R. Chapman, involved in In re Chapman, supra, note 20); 65 Cong. Rec. 4785 et seq. (1924) (citation of Harry F. Sinclair, involved in Sinclair v. United States, supra, note 33); 69 Cong. Rec. 2439, 5286, 5353, 7239 (1928); 78 Cong. Rec. 1902, 1911-1914 (1934); 86 Cong. Rec. 3856 (1940); 90 Cong. Rec. 8163 (1944); 97 Cong. Rec. 499 et seq. (1951).
See, e. g., the contempt citation of George Powers at 86 Cong. Rec. 3856-3857. See also the citation of James H. Dolsen, id., at 3694-3695.
See contempt citation of Saul Grossman, 98 Cong. Rec. 8634-8637.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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A
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Justice Douglas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioner, United Brotherhood, entered into a contract with Mechanical Handling Systems, Inc. (which we will call the Company), whereby the Company agreed to work the hours, pay the wages, abide by the rules and regulations of the union applicable to the locality where the work is done, and employ members of the union.
The Company, undertaking work at Indianapolis, agreed to hire workers on referral from a local union, one of the petitioners in this case. Two applicants from another local union were denied employment by the Company because they could not get referral from petitioner local union.
The Board found that petitioners had violated §8 (b)(1)(A) and §8 (b)(2) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended by the Taft-Hartley Act, 61 Stat. 136, 141, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 158, in maintaining and enforcing an agreement which established closed-shop preferential hiring conditions and in causing the Company to refuse to hire the two applicants. 122 N. L. R. B. 396.
After granting other relief the Board said:
“[A]s we find that dues, nonmembership dues, assessments, and work permit fees, were collected under the illegal contract as the price employees paid in order to obtain or retain their jobs, we do not believe it would effectuate the policies of the Act to permit the retention of the payments which have been unlawfully exacted from the employees.”
It added that the remedial provisions “are appropriate and necessary to expunge the coercive effect” of petitioners’ unfair labor practices.
On application of the Board, the Court of Appeals enforced the order. 273 F. 2d 699. The case is here on a writ of certiorari, 363 U. S. 837, in which petitioners challenge no part of the Board’s order except the refund provision.
The provision for refund in this case is the product of a rule announced by the Board in the Brown-Olds case, 115 N. L. R. B. 594, which involved the use of a closed-shop agreement despite the ban in the Taft-Hartley Act. In that case a panel of three members of the five-member Board found a violation of the closed-shop provision of the Act. Two of the three agreed to an order of reimbursement to all employees for any assessments collected by the union within the period starting from six months prior to the date of the filing of the charge. One member, Ivar H. Peterson, dissented, saying that the reimbursement was inappropriate since there was an absence of “specific evidence of coercion and evidence that payments were required as a condition of employment.” Id., 606. Later that remedy was extended to hiring arrangements, which though not operating in connection with a closed shop, were felt by the Board to have a coercive influence on applicants for work to join the union. Los Angeles-Seattle Motor Express, Inc., 121 N. L. R. B. 1629.
In neither of those cases nor in the present case was there any evidence that the union membership, fees, or dues were coerced. The Board as well as the Court of Appeals held that fact to be immaterial. Both said that the case was governed by Virginia Electric Co. v. Labor Board, 319 U. S. 533; and the Court of Appeals added that coercion was to be inferred as “there was present an implicit threat of loss of job if those fees were not paid.” 273 F. 2d, at 703. The Board argues, in support of that position, that reimbursement of dues where hiring arrangements have been abused is protective of rights vindicated by the Act and authorized by § 10 (c).
We do not think this case is governed by Virginia Electric Co. v. Labor Board, supra. That case involved a company union whose very existence was unlawful. There were, indeed, findings that the union “was not the result of the employees’ free choice” (319 U. S., at 537), and that the employees had to remain members of the union to retain their jobs. Id., 540. Return of dues was one of the means for disestablishing an unlawful union. Id., 541. Cf. Labor Board v. Mine Workers, 355 U. S. 453, 458-459.
The unions in the present case were not unlawfully created. On the record before us they have engaged in prohibited activity. But there is no evidence that any of them coerced a single employee to join the union ranks or to remain as members. All of the employees affected by the present order were union members when employed on the job in question. So far as we know, they may have been members for years on end. No evidence was offered to show that even a single person joined the union with the view of obtaining work on this project. Nor was there any evidence that any who had voluntarily joined the union was kept from resigning for fear of retaliatory measures against him. This case is therefore quite different from Radio Officers v. Labor Board, 347 U. S. 17, 48, where, discrimination having been shown, the inferences to be drawn were left largely to the Board.
The Board has broad discretion to adapt its remedies to the needs of particular situations so that “the victims of discrimination” may be treated fairly. See Phelps Dodge Corp. v. Labor Board, 313 U. S. 177, 194. But the power of the Board “to command affirmative action is remedial, not punitive, and is to be exercised in aid of the Board's authority to restrain violations and as a means of removing or avoiding the consequences of violation where those consequences are of a kind to thwart the purposes of the Act.” Consolidated Edison Co. v. Labor Board, 305 U. S. 197, 236. Where no membership in the union was shown to be influenced or compelled by reason of any unfair practice, no “consequences of violation” are removed by the order compelling the union to return all dues and fees collected from the members; and no “dissipation” of the effects of the prohibited action is achieved. Labor Board v. Mine Workers, supra, 463. The order in those circumstances becomes punitive and beyond the power of the Board. Cf. Republic Steel Corp. v. Labor Board, 311 U. S. 7, 10. As Judge Pope said in Morrison-Knudsen Co. v. Labor Board, 276 F. 2d 63, 76, “reimbursing a lot of old-time union men” by refunding their dues is not a remedial measure in the competence of the Board to impose, unless there is support in the evidence that their membership was induced, obtained, or retained in violation of the Act. It would be difficult, even with hostile eyes, to read the history of trade unionism except in terms of voluntary associations formed to meet pressing needs in a complex society.
Reversed.
Mr. Justice Frankfurter took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
The monthly dues payable to the local union were $3.50 and the initiation fee $125. Dues and fees in lesser amounts were payable by apprentices. A member who is working within the jurisdiction of a district council who has not transferred his membership to a local union of the council pays for a working permit that is not less than 75 cents a month nor more than the local monthly dues.
Section 10 (c) provides in relevant part:
“. ■ - If upon the preponderance of the testimony taken the Board shall be of the opinion that any person named in the complaint has engaged in or is engaging in any such unfair labor practice, then the Board shall state its findings of fact and shall issue and cause to be served on such person an order requiring such person to cease and desist from such unfair labor practice, and to take such affirmative action including reinstatement of employees with or without back pay, as will effectuate the policies of this Act: . . .”
Accord: Morrison-Knudsen Co. v. Labor Board, 275 F. 2d 914 (C. A. 2d Cir.); Labor Board v. United States Steel Corp., 278 F. 2d 896 (C. A. 3d Cir.); Labor Board v. Local Union No. 85, 274 F. 2d 344 (C. A. 5th Cir.); Labor Board v. International Union, 279 F. 2d 951 (C. A. 8th Cir.); Morrison-Knudsen Co. v. Labor Board, 276 F. 2d 63 (C. A. 9th Cir.); Local 357 v. Labor Board, 107 U. S. App. D. C. 188, 275 F. 2d 646. Cf. Labor Board v. Carpenters Local, 276 F. 2d 583 (C. A. 1st Cir.); Perry Coal Co. v. Labor Board, 284 F. 2d 910 (C. A. 7th Cir.).
See Millis and Montgomery, Organized Labor, Vol. Ill (1945), c. VIII.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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G
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sc_issuearea
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What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Mr. Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The questions presented in this case are (a) whether the Endangered Species Act of 1973 requires a court to enjoin the operation of a virtually completed federal dam — which had been authorized prior to 1973 — when, pursuant to authority vested in him by Congress, the Secretary of the Interior has determined that operation of the dam would eradicate an endangered species; and (b) whether continued congressional appropriations for the dam after 1973 constituted an implied repeal of the Endangered Species Act, at least as to the particular dam.
I
The Little Tennessee River originates in the mountains of northern Georgia and flows through the national forest lands of North Carolina into Tennessee, where it converges with the Big Tennessee River near Knoxville. The lower 33 miles of the Little Tennessee takes the river’s clear, free-flowing waters through an area of great natural beauty. Among other environmental amenities, this stretch of river is said to contain abundant trout. Considerable historical importance attaches to the areas immediately adjacent to this portion of the Little Tennessee’s banks. To the south of the river’s edge lies Fort Loudon, established in 1756 as England’s southwestern outpost in the French and Indian War. Nearby are also the ancient sites of several native American villages, the archeological stores of which are to a large extent unexplored. These include the Cherokee towns of Echota and Tennase, the former being the sacred capital of the Cherokee Nation as early as the 16th century and the latter providing the linguistic basis from which the State of Tennessee derives its name.
In this area of the Little Tennessee River the Tennessee Valley Authority, a wholly owned public corporation of the United States, began constructing the Tellico Dam and Reservoir Project in 1967, shortly after Congress appropriated initial funds for its development. Tellico is a multipurpose regional development project designed principally to stimulate shoreline development, generate sufficient electric current to heat 20,000 homes, and provide flatwater recreation and flood control, as well as improve economic conditions in “an area characterized by underutilization of human resources and outmigration of young people.” Hearings on Public Works for Power and Energy Research Appropriation Bill, 1977, before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations, 94th Cong., 2d Sess., pt. 5, p. 261 (1976). Of particular relevance to this case is one aspect of the project, a dam which TVA determined to place on the Little Tennessee, a short distance from where the river’s waters meet with the Big Tennessee. When fully operational, the dam would impound water covering some 16,500 acres — much of which represents valuable and productive farmland — thereby converting the river’s shallow, fast-flowing waters into a deep reservoir over 30 miles in length.
The Tellico Dam has never opened, however, despite the fact that construction has been virtually completed and the dam is essentially ready for operation. Although Congress has appropriated monies for Tellico every year since 1967, progress was delayed, and ultimately stopped, by a tangle of lawsuits and administrative proceedings. After unsuccessfully urging TYA to consider alternatives to damming the Little Tennessee, local citizens and national conservation groups brought suit in the District Court, claiming that the project did not conform to the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA), 83 Stat. 852, 42 U. S. C. §4321 et seg. After finding TVA to be in violation of NEPA, the District Court enjoined the dam’s completion pending the filing of an appropriate environmental impact statement. Environmental Defense Fund v. TV A, 339 F. Supp. 806 (ED Tenn.), aff’d, 468 F. 2d 1164 (CA6 1972). The injunction remained in effect until late 1973, when the District Court concluded that TYA’s final environmental impact statement for Tellico was in compliance with the law. Environmental Defense Fund v. TV A, 371 F. Supp. 1004 (ED Tenn. 1973), aff’d, 492 F. 2d 466 (CA6 1974).
A few months prior to the District Court’s decision dissolving the NEPA injunction, a discovery was made in the waters of the Little Tennessee which would profoundly affect the Tellico Project. Exploring the area around Coytee Springs, which is about seven miles from the mouth of the river, a University of Tennessee ichthyologist, Dr. David A. Etnier, found a previously unknown species of perch, the snail darter, or Percina (.Imostoma) tanasi. This three-inch, tannish-colored fish, whose numbers are estimated to be in the range of 10,000 to 15,000, would soon engage the attention of environmentalists, the TVA, the Department of the Interior, the Congress of the United States, and ultimately the federal courts, as a new and additional basis to halt construction of the dam.
Until recently the finding of a new species of animal life would hardly generate a cause célebre. This is particularly so in the case of darters, of which there are approximately 130 known species, 8 to 10 of these having been identified only in the last five years. The moving force behind the snail darter’s sudden fame came some four months after its discovery, when the Congress passed the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (Act), 87 Stat. 884, 16 U. S. C. § 1531 et seq. (1976 ed.). This legislation, among other things, authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to declare species of animal life “endangered” and to identify the “critical habitat” of these creatures. When a species or its habitat is so listed, the following portion of the Act — relevant here — becomes effective:
“The Secretary [of the Interior] shall review other programs administered by him and utilize such programs in furtherance of the purposes of this chapter. All other Federal departments and agencies shall, in consultation with and with the assistance of the Secretary, utilize their authorities in furtherance of the purposes of this chapter by carrying out programs for the conservation of endangered species and threatened species listed pursuant to section 1533 of this title and by taking such action necessary to insure that actions authorized, funded, or carried out by them do not jeopardize the continued existence of such endangered species and threatened species or result in the destruction or modification of habitat of such species which is determined by the Secretary, after consultation as appropriate with the affected States, to be critical.” 16 U. S. C. § 1536 (1976 ed.) (emphasis added).
In January 1975, the respondents in this case and others petitioned the Secretary of the Interior to list the snail darter as an endangered species. After receiving comments from various interested parties, including TVA and the State of Tennessee, the Secretary formally listed the snail darter as an endangered species on October 8, 1975. 40 Fed. Reg. 47505-47506; see 50 CFR § 17.11 (i) (1976). In so acting, it was noted that “the snail darter is a living entity which is genetically distinct and reproductively isolated from other fishes.” 40 Fed. Reg. 47505. More important for the purposes of this case, the Secretary determined that the snail darter apparently lives only in that portion of the Little Tennessee River which would be completely inundated by the reservoir created as a consequence of the Tellico Dam’s completion. Id., at 47506. The Secretary went on to explain the significance of the dam to the habitat of the snail darter:
“[T]he snail darter occurs only in the swifter portions of shoals over clean gravel substrate in cool, low-turbidity water. Food of the snail darter is almost exclusively snails which require a clean gravel substrate for their survival. The proposed impoundment of water behind the proposed Tellico Dam would result in total destruction of the snail darter’s habitat.” Ibid, (emphasis added).
Subsequent to this determination, the Secretary declared the area of the Little Tennessee which would be affected by the Tellico Dam to be the “critical habitat” of the snail darter. 41 Fed. Reg. 13926-13928 (1976) (to be codified as 50 CFR § 17.81). Using these determinations as a predicate, and notwithstanding the near completion of the dam, the Secretary declared that pursuant to § 7 of the Act, “all Federal agencies must take such action as is necessary to insure that actions authorized, funded, or carried out by them do not result in the destruction or modification of this critical habitat area.” 41 Fed. Reg. 13928 (1976) (to be codified as 50 CFR § 17.81 (b)). This notice, of course, was pointedly directed at TYA and clearly aimed at halting completion or operation of the dam.
During the pendency of these administrative actions, other developments of relevance to the snail darter issue were transpiring. Communication was occurring between the Department of the Interior’s Fish and Wildlife Service and TVA with a view toward settling the issue informally. These negotiations were to no avail, however, since TVA consistently took the position that the only available alternative was to attempt relocating the snail darter population to another suitable location. To this end, TVA conducted a search of alternative sites which might sustain the fish, culminating in the experimental transplantation of a number of snail darters to the nearby Hiwassee River. However, the Secretary of the Interior was not satisfied with the results of these efforts, finding that TVA had presented “little evidence that they have carefully studied the Hiwassee to determine whether or not” there were “biological and other factors in this river that [would] negate a successful transplant.” 40 Fed. Reg. 47506 (1975).
Meanwhile, Congress had also become involved in the fate of the snail darter. Appearing before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations in April 1975 — some seven months before the snail darter was listed as endangered — TVA representatives described the discovery of the fish and the relevance of the Endangered Species Act to the Tellico Project. Hearings on Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriation Bill, 1976, before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations, 94th Cong., 1st Sess., pt. 7, pp. 466-467 (1975); Hearings on H. R. 8122, Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriations for Fiscal Year 1976, before a Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, 94th Cong., 1st Sess., pt. 4, pp. 3775-3777 (1975). At that time TVA presented a position which it would advance in successive forums thereafter, namely, that the Act did not prohibit the completion of a project authorized, funded, and substantially constructed before the Act was passed. TVA also described its efforts to transplant the snail darter, but contended that the dam should be finished regardless of the experiment's success. Thereafter, the House Committee on Appropriations, in its June 20, 1975, Report, stated the following in the course of recommending that an additional $29 million be appropriated for Tellico:
“The Committee directs that the project, for which an environmental impact statement has been completed and provided the Committee, should be completed as promptly as possible... H. R. Rep. No. 94-319, p. 76 (1975). (Emphasis added.)
Congress then approved the TYA general budget, which contained funds for continued construction of the Tellico Project. In December 1975, one month after the snail darter was declared an endangered species, the President signed the bill into law. Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriation Act, 1976, 89 Stat. 1035, 1047.
In February 1976, pursuant to § 11 (g) of the Endangered Species Act, 87 Stat. 900, 16 U. S. C. § 1540 (g) (1976 ed.), respondents filed the case now under review, seeking to enjoin completion of the dam and impoundment of the reservoir on the ground that those actions would violate the Act by directly causing the extinction of the species Percina (Imostoma) tanasi. The District Court denied respondents’ request for a preliminary injunction and set the matter for trial. Shortly thereafter the House and Senate held appropriations hearings which would include discussions of the Tellico budget.
At these hearings, TVA Chairman Wagner reiterated the agency’s position that the Act did not apply to a project which was over 50% finished by the time the Act became effective and some 70% to 80% complete when the snail darter was officially listed as endangered. It also notified the Committees of the recently filed lawsuit’s status and reported that TYA’s efforts to transplant the snail darter had “been very encouraging.” Hearings on Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriation Bill, 1977, before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations, 94th Cong., 2d Sess., pt. 5, pp. 261-262 (1976) ; Hearings on Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriations for Fiscal Year 1977, before a Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, 94th Cong., 2d Sess., pt. 4, pp. 3096-3099 (1976).
Trial was held in the District Court on April 29 and 30,1976, and on May 25, 1976, the court entered its memorandum opinion and order denying respondents their requested relief and dismissing the complaint. The District Court found that closure of the dam and the consequent impoundment of the reservoir would “result in the adverse modification, if not complete destruction, of the snail darter’s critical habitat,” making it “highly probable” that “the continued existence of the snail darter” would be “jeopardize^].” 419 F. Supp. 753, 757 (ED Tenn.). Despite these findings, the District Court declined to embrace the plaintiffs’ position on the merits: that once a federal project was shown to jeopardize an endangered species, a court of equity is compelled to issue an injunction restraining violation of the Endangered Species Act.
In reaching this result, the District Court stressed that the entire project was then about 80% complete and, based on available evidence, “there [were] no alternatives to impoundment of the reservoir, short of scrapping the entire project.” Id., at 758. The District Court also found that if the Tellico' Project was permanently enjoined, “some $53 million would be lost in nonrecoverable obligations,” id., at 759, meaning that a large portion of the $78 million already expended would be wasted. The court also noted that the Endangered Species Act of 1973 was passed some seven years after construction on the dam commenced and that Congress had continued appropriations for Tellico, with full awareness of the snail darter problem. Assessing these various factors, the District Court concluded:
“At some point in time a federal project becomes so near completion and so incapable of modification that a court of equity should not apply a statute enacted long after inception of the project to produce an unreasonable result.... Where there has been an irreversible and irretrievable commitment of resources by Congress to a project over a span of almost a decade, the Court should proceed with a great deal of circumspection.” Id., at 760.
To accept the plaintiffs’ position, the District Court argued, would inexorably lead to what it characterized as the absurd result of requiring “a court to halt impoundment of water behind a fully completed dam if an endangered species were discovered in the river on the day before such impoundment was scheduled to take place. We cannot conceive that Congress intended such a result.” Id., at 763.
Less than a month after the District Court decision, the Senate and House Appropriations Cominittees recommended the full budget request of $9 million fo,r continued work on Tellico. See S. Rep. No. &Y960, p, 96 (1976); H. R. Rep. No. 94-1223, p. 83 (1976). In its Report accompanying the appropriations bill, the Senate Committee stated:
“During subcommittee hearings, TVA was questioned about the relationship between the Tellico project’s completion and the November 1975 listing of the snail darter (a small 3-inch fish which was discovered in 1973) as an endangered species under the Endangered Species Act. TVA informed the Committee that it was continuing its efforts to preserve the darter, while working towards the scheduled 1977 completion date. TYA repeated its view that the Endangered Species Act did not prevent the completion of the Tellico project, which has been under construction for nearly a decade. The subcommittee brought this matter, as well as the recent U. S. District Court’s decision upholding TYA’s decision to complete the project, to the attention of the full Committee. The Committee does not view the Endangered Species Act as prohibiting the completion of the Tellico project at its advanced stage and directs that this project be completed as promptly as possible in the public interest.” S. Rep. No. 94-960, supra, at 96. (Emphasis added.)
On June 29, 1976, both Houses of Congress passed TVA’s general budget, which included funds for Tellico; the President signed the bill on July 12, 1976. Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriation Act, 1977, 90 Stat. 889, 899.
Thereafter, in the Court of Appeals, respondents argued that the District Court had abused its discretion by not issuing an injunction in the face of “a blatant statutory violation.” 549 F. 2d 1064, 1069 (CA6 1977). The Court of Appeals agreed, and on January 31, 1977, it reversed, remanding “with instructions that a permanent injunction issue halting all activities incident to the Tellico Project which may destroy or modify the critical habitat of the snail darter.” Id., at 1075. The Court of Appeals directed that the injunction “remain in effect until Congress, by appropriate legislation, exempts Tellico from compliance with the Act or the snail darter has been deleted from the list of endangered species or its critical habitat materially redefined.” Ibid.
The Court of Appeals accepted the District Court’s finding that closure of the dam would result in the known population of snail darters being “significantly reduced if not completely extirpated.” Id., at 1069. TVA, in fact, had conceded as much in the Court of Appeals, but argued that “closure of the Tellico Dam, as the last stage of a ten-year project, falls outside the legitimate purview of the Act if it is rationally construed.” Id., at 1070. Disagreeing, the Court of Appeals held that the record revealed a prima facie violation of § 7 of the Act, namely that TVA had failed to take “such action... necessary to insure” that its “actions” did not jeopardize the snail darter or its critical habitat.
The reviewing court thus rejected TVA’s contention that the word “actions” in § 7 of the Act was not intended by Congress to encompass the terminal phases of ongoing projects. Not only could the court find no “positive reinforcement” for TVA’s argument in the Act’s legislative history, but also such an interpretation was seen as being “inimical to... its objectives.” 549 F. 2d, at 1070. By way of illustration, that court pointed out that “the detrimental impact of a project upon an endangered species may not always be clearly perceived before construction is' well underway.” Id., at 1071. Given such a likelihood, the Court of Appeals was of the opinion that TVA’s position would require the District Court, sitting as a chancellor, to balance the worth of an endangered species against the value of an ongoing public works measure, a result which the appellate court was not willing to accept. Emphasizing the limits on judicial power in this setting, the court stated:
“Current project status cannot be translated into a workable standard of judicial review. Whether a dam is 50% or 90% completed is irrelevant in calculating the social and scientific costs attributable to the disappearance of a unique form of life. Courts are ill-equipped to calculate how many dollars must be invested before the value of a dam exceeds that of the endangered species. Our responsibility under § 1540 (g)(1)(A) is merely to preserve the status quo where endangered species are threatened, thereby guaranteeing the legislative or executive branches sufficient opportunity to grapple with the alternatives.” Ibid.
As far as the Court of Appeals was concerned, it made no difference that Congress had repeatedly approved appropriations for Tellico, referring to such legislative approval as an “advisory opinio [n]” concerning the proper application of an existing statute. In that court’s view, the only relevant legislation was the Act itself, “[t]he meaning and spirit” of which was “clear on its face.” Id., at 1072.
Turning to the question of an appropriate remedy, the Court of Appeals ruled that the District Court had erred by not issuing an injunction. While recognizing the irretrievable loss of millions of dollars of public funds which would accompany injunctive relief, the court nonetheless decided that the Act explicitly commanded precisely that result:
“It is conceivable that the welfare of an endangered species may weigh more heavily upon the public conscience, as expressed by the final will of Congress, than the writeoff of those millions of dollars already expended for Tellico in excess of its present salvageable value.” Id., at 1074.
Following the issuance of the permanent injunction, members of TVA’s Board of Directors appeared before Subcommittees of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to testify in support of continued appropriations for Tellico. The Subcommittees were apprised of all aspects of Tellico’s status, including the Court of Appeals’ decision. TVA reported that the dam stood “ready for the gates to be closed and the reservoir filled,” Hearings on Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriation Bill, 1978, before a Subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations, 95th Cong., 1st Sess., pt. 4, p. 234 (1977), and requested funds for completion of certain ancillary parts of the project, such as public use areas, roads, and bridges. As to the snail darter itself, TVA commented optimistically on its transplantation efforts, expressing the opinion that the relocated fish were “doing well and ha[d] reproduced.” Id., at 235, 261-262.
Both Appropriations Committees subsequently recommended the full amount requested for completion of the Tellico Project. In its June 2, 1977, Report, the House Appropriations Committee stated:
“It is the Committee’s view that the Endangered Species Act was not intended to halt projects such as these in their advanced stage of completion, and [the Committee] strongly recommends that these projects not be stopped because of misuse of the Act.” H. R. Rep. No. 95-379, p. 104. (Emphasis added.)
As a solution to the problem, the House Committee advised that TVA should cooperate with the Department of the Interior “to relocate the endangered species to another suitable habitat so as to permit the project to proceed as rapidly as possible.” Id., at 11. Toward this end, the Committee recommended a special appropriation of $2 million to facilitate relocation of the snail darter and other endangered species which threatened to delay or stop TVA projects. Much the same occurred on the Senate side, with its Appropriations Committee recommending both the amount requested to complete Tellieo and the special appropriation for transplantation of endangered species. Reporting to the Senate on these measures, the Appropriations Committee took a particularly strong stand on the snail darter issue:
“This committee has not viewed the Endangered Species Act as preventing the completion and use of these projects which were well under way at the time the affected species were listed as endangered. If the act' has such an effect, which is contrary to the Committee’s understanding of the intent of Congress in enacting the Endangered Species Act, funds should be appropriated to allow these projects to be completed and their benefits realized in the public interest, the Endangered Species Act notwithstanding.” S. Rep. No. 95-301, p. 99 (1977). (Emphasis added.)
TVA’s budget, including funds for completion of Tellieo and relocation of the snail darter, passed both Houses of Congress and was signed into law on August 7, 1977. Public Works for Water and Power Development and Energy Research Appropriation Act, 1978, 91 Stat. 797.
We granted certiorari, 434 U. S. 954 (1977), to review the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
1 — 1 h-1
We begin with the premise that operation of the Tellieo Dam will either eradicate the known population of snail darters or destroy their critical habitat. Petitioner does not now seriously dispute this fact. In any event, under § 4 (a)(1) of the Act, 87 Stat. 886, 16 U. S. C. § 1533 (a)(1) (1976 ed.), the Secretary of the Interior is vested with exclusive authority to determine whether a species such as the snail darter is “endangered” or “threatened” and to ascertain the factors which have led to such a precarious existence. By § 4 (d) Congress has authorized — indeed commanded — the Secretary to “issue such regulations as he deems necessary and advisable to provide for the conservation of such species.” 16 U. S. C. § 1533 (d) (1976 ed.). As we have seen, the Secretary promulgated regulations which declared the snail darter an endangered species whose critical habitat would be destroyed by creation of the Tellico Reservoir. Doubtless petitioner would prefer not to have these regulations on the books, but there is no suggestion that the Secretary exceeded his authority or abused his discretion in issuing the regulations. Indeed, no judicial review of the Secretary’s determinations has ever been sought and hence the validity of his actions are not open to review in this Court.
Starting from the above premise, two questions are presented: (a) would TVA be in violation of the Act if it completed and operated the Tellico Dam as planned? (b) if TVA’s actions would offend the Act, is an injunction the appropriate remedy for the violation? For the reasons stated hereinafter, we hold that both questions must be answered in the affirmative.
(A)
It may seem curious to some that the survival of a relatively small number of three-inch fish among all the countless millions of species extant would require the permanent halting of a virtually completed dam for which Congress has expended more than $100 million. The paradox is not minimized by the fact that Congress continued to appropriate large sums of public money for the project, even after congressional Appropriations Committees were apprised of its apparent impact upon the survival of the snail darter. We conclude, however, that the explicit provisions of the Endangered Species Act require precisely that result.
One would be hard pressed to find a statutory provision whose terms were any plainer than those in § 7 of the Endangered Species Act. Its very words affirmatively command all federal agencies “to insure that actions authorized, funded, or carried out by them do not jeopardize the continued existence” of an endangered species or “result in the destruction or modification of habitat of such species....” 16 U. S. C. § 1536 (1976 ed.). (Emphasis added.) This language admits of no exception. Nonetheless, petitioner urges, as do the dissenters, that the Act cannot reasonably be interpreted as applying to a federal project which was well under way when Congress passed the Endangered Species Act of 1973. To sustain that position, however, we would be forced to ignore the ordinary meaning of plain language. It has not been shown, for example, how TVA can close the gates of the Tellico Dam without “carrying out” an action that has been “authorized” and “funded” by a federal agency. Nor can we understand how such action will “insure” that the snail darter’s habitat is not disrupted. Accepting the Secretary’s determinations, as we must, it is clear that TVA’s proposed operation of the dam will have precisely the opposite effect, namely the eradication of an endangered species.
Concededly, this view of the Act will produce results requiring the sacrifice of the anticipated benefits of the project and of many millions of dollars in public funds. But examination of the language, history, and structure of the legislation under review here indicates beyond doubt that Congress intended endangered species to be afforded the highest of priorities.
When Congress passed the Act in 1973, it was not legislating on a clean slate. The first major congressional concern for the preservation of the endangered species had come with passage of the Endangered Species Act of 1966, 80 Stat. 926, repealed, 87 Stat. 903. In that legislation Congress gave the Secretary power to identify “the names of the species of native fish and wildlife found to be threatened with extinction,” § 1 (c), 80 Stat. 926, as well as authorization to purchase land for the conservation, protection, restoration, and propagation of “selected species” of “native fish and wildlife” threatened with extinction. §§2(a)-(c), 80 Stat. 926-927. Declaring the preservation of endangered species a national policy, the 1966 Act directed all federal agencies both to protect these species and “insofar as is practicable and consistent with the [ir] primary purposes,” § 1 (b), 80 Stat. 926, “preserve the habitats of such threatened species on lands under their jurisdiction.” Ibid. (Emphasis added.) The 1966 statute was not a sweeping prohibition on the taking of endangered species, however, except on federal lands, § 4 (c), 80 Stat. 928, and even in those federal areas the Secretary was authorized to allow the hunting and fishing of endangered species. § 4 (d) (1), 80 Stat. 928.
In 1969 Congress enacted the Endangered Species Conservation Act, 83 Stat. 275, repealed, 87 Stat. 903, which continued the provisions of the 1966 Act while at the same time broadening federal involvement in the preservation of endangered species. Under the 1969 legislation, the Secretary was empowered to list species “threatened with worldwide extinction,” §3 (a), 83 Stat. 275; in addition, the importation of any species so recognized into the United States was prohibited. § 2, 83 Stat. 275. An indirect approach to the taking of endangered species was also adopted in the Conservation Act by way of a ban on the transportation and sale of wildlife taken in violation of any federal, state, or foreign law. §§ 7 (a)-(b), 83 Stat. 279.
Despite the fact that the 1966 and 1969 legislation represented “the most comprehensive of its type to be enacted by any nation” up to that time, Congress was soon persuaded that a more expansive approach was needed if the newly declared national policy of preserving endangered species was to be realized. By 1973, when Congress held hearings on what would later become the Endangered Species Act of 1973, it was informed that species were still being lost at the rate of about one per year, 1973 House Hearings 306 (statement of Stephen R. Seater, for Defenders of Wildlife), and “the pace of disappearance of species” appeared to be “accelerating.” H. R. Rep. No. 93-412, p. 4 (1973). Moreover, Congress was also told that the primary cause of this trend was something other than the normal process of natural selection:
“[M]an and his technology has [sic] continued at an ever-increasing rate to disrupt the natural ecosystem. This has resulted in a dramatic rise in the number and severity of the threats faced by the world's wildlife. The truth in this is apparent when one realizes that half of the recorded extinctions of mammals over the past 2,000 years have occurred in the most recent 50-year period.” 1973 House Hearings 202 (statement of Assistant Secretary of the Interior).
That Congress did not view these developments lightly was stressed by one commentator:
“The dominant theme pervading all Congressional discussion of the proposed [Endangered Species Act of 1973] was the overriding need to devote whatever effort and resources were necessary to avoid further diminution of national and worldwide wildlife resources. Much of the testimony at the hearings and much debate was devoted to the biological problem of extinction. Senators and Congressmen uniformly deplored the irreplaceable loss to aesthetics, science, ecology, and the national heritage should more species disappear.” Coggins, Conserving Wildlife Resources: An Overview of the Endangered Species Act of 1973, 51 N. D. L. Rev. 315, 321 (1975). (Emphasis added.)
The legislative proceedings in 1973 are, in fact, replete with expressions of concern over the risk that might lie in the loss of any endangered species. Typifying these sentiments is the Report of the House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries on H. R. 37, a bill which contained the essential features of the subsequently enacted Act of 1973; in explaining the need for the legislation, the Report stated:
“As we homogenize the habitats in which these plants and animals evolved, and as we increase the pressure for products that they are in a position to supply (usually unwillingly) we threaten their — and our own — genetic heritage.
“The value of this genetic heritage is, quite literally, incalculable.
“From the most narrow possible point of view, it is in the best interests of mankind to minimize the losses of genetic variations. The reason is simple: they are potential resources. They are keys to puzzles which we cannot solve, and may provide answers to questions which we have not yet learned to ask.
“To take a homely, but apt, example: one of the critical chemicals in the regulation of ovulations in humans was- found in a common plant. Once discovered, and analyzed, humans could duplicate it synthetically, but had it never existed — or had it been driven out of existence before we knew its potentialities — we would never have tried to synthesize it in the first place.
“Who knows, or can say, what potential cures for cancer or other scourges, present or future, may lie locked up in the structures of plants which may yet be undiscovered, much less analyzed?... Sheer self-interest impels us to be cautious.
“The institutionalization of that caution lies at the heart of H. R. 37....” H. R. Rep. No. 93-412, pp. (1973). (Emphasis added.)
As the examples cited here demonstrate, Congress was concerned about the unknown uses that endangered species might have and about the unforeseeable place such creatures may-have in the chain of life on this planet.
In shaping legislation to deal with the problem thus presented, Congress started from the finding that “[t]he two major causes of extinction are hunting and destruction of natural habitat.” S. Rep. No. 93-307, p. 2 (1973). Of these twin threats, Congress was informed that the greatest was destruction of natural habitats; see 1973 House Hearings 236 (statement of Associate Deputy Chief for National Forest System, Dept, of Agriculture); id
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice ALITO delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents the question whether the First Amendment permits a State to compel personal care providers to subsidize speech on matters of public concern by a union that they do not wish to join or support. We hold that it does not, and we therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals.
I
A
Millions of Americans, due to age, illness, or injury, are unable to live in their own homes without assistance and are unable to afford the expense of in-home care. In order to prevent these individuals from having to enter a nursing home or other facility, the federal Medicaid program funds state-run programs that provide in-home services to individuals whose conditions would otherwise require institutionalization. See 42 U.S.C. § 1396n(c)(1). A State that adopts such a program receives federal funds to compensate persons who attend to the daily needs of individuals needing in-home care. Ibid.; see also 42 CFR §§ 440.180, 441.300-441.310 (2013). Almost every State has established such a program. See Dept. of Health and Human Services, Understanding Medicaid Home and Community Services: A Primer (2010).
One of those States is Illinois, which has created the Illinois Department of Human Services Home Services Program, known colloquially as the state "Rehabilitation Program." Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 20, § 2405/3(f) (West 2012); 89 Ill. Admin. Code § 676.10 (2007). "[D]esigned to prevent the unnecessary institutionalization of individuals who may instead be satisfactorily maintained at home at a lesser cost to the State," § 676.10(a), the Rehabilitation Program allows participants to hire a "personal assistant" who provides homecare services tailored to the individual's needs. Many of these personal assistants are relatives of the person receiving care, and some of them provide care in their own homes. See App. 16-18.
Illinois law establishes an employer-employee relationship between the person receiving the care and the person providing it. The law states explicitly that the person receiving home care-the "customer"-"shall be the employer of the [personal assistant]." 89 Ill. Admin. Code § 676.30(b) (emphasis added). A "personal assistant" is defined as "an individual employed by the customer to provide... varied services that have been approved by the customer's physician," § 676.30(p) (emphasis added), and the law makes clear that Illinois "shall not have control or input in the employment relationship between the customer and the personal assistants." § 676.10(c).
Other provisions of the law emphasize the customer's employer status. The customer "is responsible for controlling all aspects of the employment relationship between the customer and the [personal assistant (or PA) ], including, without limitation, locating and hiring the PA, training the PA, directing, evaluating and otherwise supervising the work performed by the personal assistant, imposing... disciplinary action against the PA, and terminating the employment relationship between the customer and the PA." § 676.30(b).1 In general, the customer "has complete discretion in which Personal Assistant he/she wishes to hire." § 684.20(b).
A customer also controls the contents of the document, the Service Plan, that lists the services that the customer will receive. § 684.10(a). No Service Plan may take effect without the approval of both the customer and the customer's physician. See § 684.10, 684.40, 684.50, 684.75. Service Plans are highly individualized. The Illinois State Labor Relations Board noted in 1985 that "[t]here is no typical employment arrangement here, public or otherwise; rather, there simply exists an arrangement whereby the state of Illinois pays individuals... to work under the direction and control of private third parties." Illinois Dept. of Central Management Serv., No. S-RC-115, 2 PERI ¶ 2007, p. VIII-30, (1985), superseded, 2003 Ill. Laws p. 1929.
While customers exercise predominant control over their employment relationship with personal assistants, the State, subsidized by the federal Medicaid program, pays the personal assistants' salaries. The amount paid varies depending on the services provided, but as a general matter, it "corresponds to the amount the State would expect to pay for the nursing care component of institutionalization if the individual chose institutionalization." 89 Ill. Admin. Code § 679.50(a).
Other than providing compensation, the State's role is comparatively small. The State sets some basic threshold qualifications for employment. See §§ 686.10(h)(1)-(10).2 (For example, a personal assistant must have a Social Security number, must possess basic communication skills, and must complete an employment agreement with the customer. §§ 686.10, 686.20, 686.40.) The State mandates an annual performance review by the customer, helps the customer conduct that review, and mediates disagreements between customers and their personal assistants. § 686.30. The State suggests certain duties that personal assistants should assume, such as performing "household tasks," "shopping," providing "personal care," performing "incidental health care tasks," and "monitoring to ensure the health and safety of the customer." § 686.20. In addition, a state employee must "identify the appropriate level of service provider" " based on the customer's approval of the initial Service Plan," § 684.20(a) (emphasis added), and must sign each customer's Service Plan. § 684.10.
B
Section 6 of the Illinois Public Labor Relations Act (PLRA) authorizes state employees to join labor unions and to bargain collectively on the terms and conditions of employment. Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 5, § 315/6(a). This law applies to "[e]mployees of the State and any political subdivision of the State," subject to certain exceptions, and it provides for a union to be recognized if it is "designated by the [Public Labor Relations] Board as the representative of the majority of public employees in an appropriate unit...." §§ 315/6(a), (c).
The PLRA contains an agency-fee provision, i.e., a provision under which members of a bargaining unit who do not wish to join the union are nevertheless required to pay a fee to the union. See Workers v. Mobil Oil Corp., 426 U.S. 407, 409, n. 1, 96 S.Ct. 2140, 48 L.Ed.2d 736 (1976). Labeled a "fair share" provision, this section of the PLRA provides: "When a collective bargaining agreement is entered into with an exclusive representative, it may include in the agreement a provision requiring employees covered by the agreement who are not members of the organization to pay their proportionate share of the costs of the collective-bargaining process, contract administration and pursuing matters affecting wages, hours and conditions of employment." § 315/6(e). This payment is "deducted by the employer from the earnings of the nonmember employees and paid to the employee organization." Ibid.
In the 1980's, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) petitioned the Illinois Labor Relations Board for permission to represent personal assistants employed by customers in the Rehabilitation Program, but the board rebuffed this effort. Illinois Dept. of Central Management Servs., supra, at VIII-30. The board concluded that "it is clear... that [Illinois] does not exercise the type of control over the petitioned-for employees necessary to be considered, in the collective bargaining context envisioned by the [PLRA], their 'employer' or, at least, their sole employer." Ibid.
In March 2003, however, Illinois' newly elected Governor, Rod Blagojevich, circumvented this decision by issuing Executive Order 2003-08. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 45a-47a. The order noted the Illinois Labor Relations Board decision but nevertheless called for state recognition of a union as the personal assistants' exclusive representative for the purpose of collective bargaining with the State. This was necessary, Gov. Blagojevich declared, so that the State could "receive feedback from the personal assistants in order to effectively and efficiently deliver home services." Id., at 46a. Without such representation, the Governor proclaimed, personal assistants "cannot effectively voice their concerns about the organization of the Home Services program, their role in the program, or the terms and conditions of their employment under the Program." Ibid.
Several months later, the Illinois Legislature codified that executive order by amending the PLRA. Pub. Act no. 93-204, § 5, 2003 Ill. Laws p. 1930. While acknowledging "the right of the persons receiving services... to hire and fire personal assistants or supervise them," the Act declared personal assistants to be "public employees" of the State of Illinois-but "[s]olely for the purposes of coverage under the Illinois Public Labor Relations Act." Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 20, § 2405/3(f). The statute emphasized that personal assistants are not state employees for any other purpose, "including but not limited to, purposes of vicarious liability in tort and purposes of statutory retirement or health insurance benefits." Ibid.
Following a vote, SEIU Healthcare Illinois & Indiana (SEIU-HII) was designated as the personal assistants' exclusive representative for purposes of collective bargaining. See App. 23. The union and the State subsequently entered into collective-bargaining agreements that require all personal assistants who are not union members to pay a "fair share" of the union dues. Id., at 24-25. These payments are deducted directly from the personal assistants' Medicaid payments. Ibid. The record in this case shows that each year, personal assistants in Illinois pay SEIU-HII more than $3.6 million in fees. Id., at 25.
C
Three of the petitioners in the case now before us-Theresa Riffey, Susan Watts, and Stephanie Yencer-Price-are personal assistants under the Rehabilitation Program. They all provide in-home services to family members or other individuals suffering from disabilities.3 Susan Watts, for example, serves as personal assistant for her daughter, who requires constant care due to quadriplegic cerebral palsy and other conditions. See App. 18.
In 2010, these petitioners filed a putative class action on behalf of all Rehabilitation Program personal assistants in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. See 656 F.3d 692, 696 (C.A.7 2011). Their complaint, which named the Governor and the union as defendants, sought an injunction against enforcement of the fair-share provision and a declaration that the Illinois PLRA violates the First Amendment insofar as it requires personal assistants to pay a fee to a union that they do not wish to support. Ibid.
The District Court dismissed their claims with prejudice, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed in relevant part, concluding that the case was controlled by this Court's decision in Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Ed. 431 U.S. 209, 97 S.Ct. 1782, 52 L.Ed.2d 261 (1977). 656 F.3d, at 698. The Seventh Circuit held that Illinois and the customers who receive in-home care are "joint employers" of the personal assistants, and the court stated that it had "no difficulty concluding that the State employs personal assistants within the meaning of Abood." Ibid.
Petitioners sought certiorari. Their petition pointed out that other States were following Illinois' lead by enacting laws or issuing executive orders that deem personal assistants to be state employees for the purpose of unionization and the assessment of fair-share fees. See App. to Pet. for Cert. 22a. Petitioners also noted that Illinois has enacted a law that deems "individual maintenance home health workers"-a category that includes registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, and certain therapists who work in private homes-to be "public employees" for similar purposes. Ill. Pub. Act no. 97-1158, 2012 Ill. Laws p. 7823.
In light of the important First Amendment questions these laws raise, we granted certiorari. 570 U.S. ----, 134 S.Ct. 48, 186 L.Ed.2d 962 (2013).
II
In upholding the constitutionality of the Illinois law, the Seventh Circuit relied on this Court's decision in Abood supra, which held that state employees who choose not to join a public-sector union may nevertheless be compelled to pay an agency fee to support union work that is related to the collective-bargaining process. Id., at 235-236, 97 S.Ct. 1782. Two Terms ago, in Knox v. Service Employees, 567 U.S. ----, 132 S.Ct. 2277, 183 L.Ed.2d 281 (2012), we pointed out that Abood is "something of an anomaly." Id., at ----, 132 S.Ct., at 2290. " 'The primary purpose' of permitting unions to collect fees from nonmembers," we noted, "is 'to prevent nonmembers from free-riding on the union's efforts, sharing the employment benefits obtained by the union's collective bargaining without sharing the costs incurred.' " Id., at ----, 132 S.Ct., at 2289 (quoting Davenport v. Washington Ed. Assn., 551 U.S. 177, 181, 127 S.Ct. 2372, 168 L.Ed.2d 71 (2007)). But "[s]uch free-rider arguments... are generally insufficient to overcome First Amendment objections." 567 U.S., at ----, 132 S.Ct., at 2289.
For this reason, Abood stands out, but the State of Illinois now asks us to sanction what amounts to a very significant expansion of Abood-so that it applies, not just to full-fledged public employees, but also to others who are deemed to be public employees solely for the purpose of unionization and the collection of an agency fee. Faced with this argument, we begin by examining the path that led to this Court's decision in Abood.
A
The starting point was Railway Employes' v. Hanson, 351 U.S. 225, 76 S.Ct. 714, 100 L.Ed. 1112 (1956), a case in which the First Amendment was barely mentioned. The dispute in Hanson resulted from an amendment to the Railway Labor Act (RLA). Id., at 229, 232, 76 S.Ct. 714. As originally enacted in 1926, the Act did not permit a collective-bargaining agreement to require employees to join or make any payments to a union. See Machinists v. Street, 367 U.S. 740, 750, 81 S.Ct. 1784, 6 L.Ed.2d 1141 (1961). At that time and for many years thereafter, there was "a strong and long-standing tradition of voluntary unionism on the part of the standard rail unions." Ibid.
Eventually, however, the view of the unions changed. See id., at 760-761, 81 S.Ct. 1784. The RLA's framework for resolving labor disputes "is more complex than that of any other industry," id., at 755, 81 S.Ct. 1784, and amendments enacted in 1934 increased the financial burden on unions by creating the 36-member National Railroad Adjustment Board, one-half of whose members were appointed and paid by the unions. Id., at 759-760, 81 S.Ct. 1784. In seeking authorization to enter into union-shop agreements, i.e., agreements requiring all employees to join a union and thus pay union dues, see Oil Workers, 426 U.S., at 409, n. 1, 96 S.Ct. 2140, the unions' principal argument "was based on their role in this regulatory framework." Street, 367 U.S., at 761, 81 S.Ct. 1784. A union spokesman argued that the financial burdens resulting from the Act's unique and complex scheme justified union-shop provisions in order to provide the unions with needed dues. Ibid.
These arguments were successful, and the Act was amended in 1951 to permit a railroad and a union to enter into an agreement containing a union-shop provision. This amendment brought the Act into conflict with the laws of States that guaranteed the "right to work" and thereby outlawed the union shop. Nebraska, the setting of Hanson, was one such State. 351 U.S., at 228, 76 S.Ct. 714.
In Hanson, the Union Pacific Railroad Company and its unionized workers entered into a collective-bargaining agreement that contained a provision requiring employees, "as a condition of their continued employment," to join and remain members of the union. Id., at 227, 76 S.Ct. 714. Employees who did not want to join the union brought suit in state court, contending that the union-shop provision violated a provision of the Nebraska Constitution banning adverse employment actions " 'because of refusal to join or affiliate with a labor organization.' " Id., at 228, 76 S.Ct. 714 (quoting Neb. Const., Art. XV, § 13). The employer countered that the RLA trumped the Nebraska provision, but the Nebraska courts agreed with the employees and struck down the union-shop agreement.
When the case reached this Court, the primary issue was whether the provision of the RLA that authorized union-shop agreements was "germane to the exercise of power under the Commerce Clause." 351 U.S., at 234-235, 76 S.Ct. 714. In an opinion by Justice Douglas, the Court held that this provision represented a permissible regulation of commerce. The Court reasoned that the challenged provision "'stabilized labor-management relations' " and thus furthered " 'industrial peace.' " Id., at 233-234, 76 S.Ct. 714.
The employees also raised what amounted to a facial constitutional challenge to the same provision of the RLA. The employees claimed that a "union shop agreement forces men into ideological and political associations which violate their right to freedom of conscience, freedom of association, and freedom of thought protected by the Bill of Rights." Id., at 236, 76 S.Ct. 714. But because the lawsuit had been filed shortly after the collective-bargaining agreement was approved, the record contained no evidence that the union had actually engaged in political or ideological activities.4
The Hanson Court dismissed the objecting employees' First Amendment argument with a single sentence. The Court wrote: "On the present record, there is no more an infringement or impairment of First Amendment rights than there would be in the case of a lawyer who by state law is required to be a member of an integrated bar." Id., at 238, 76 S.Ct. 714.
This explanation was remarkable for two reasons. First, the Court had never previously held that compulsory membership in and the payment of dues to an integrated bar was constitutional, and the constitutionality of such a requirement was hardly a foregone conclusion. Indeed, that issue did not reach the Court until five years later, and it produced a plurality opinion and four separate writings. See Lathrop v. Donohue, 367 U.S. 820, 81 S.Ct. 1826, 6 L.Ed.2d 1191 (1961) (plurality opinion).5
Second, in his Lathrop dissent, Justice Douglas, the author of Hanson, came to the conclusion that the First Amendment did not permit compulsory membership in an integrated bar. See 367 U.S., at 878-880, 81 S.Ct. 1826. The analogy drawn in Hanson, he wrote, fails. "Once we approve this measure," he warned, "we sanction a device where men and women in almost any profession or calling can be at least partially regimented behind causes which they oppose." 367 U.S., at 884, 81 S.Ct. 1826. He continued:
"I look on the Hanson case as a narrow exception to be closely confined. Unless we so treat it, we practically give carte blanche to any legislature to put at least professional people into goose-stepping brigades. Those brigades are not compatible with the First Amendment." Id., at 884-885, 81 S.Ct. 1826 (footnote omitted).
The First Amendment analysis in Hanson was thin, and the Court's resulting First Amendment holding was narrow. As the Court later noted, "all that was held in Hanson was that [the RLA] was constitutional in its bare authorization of union-shop contracts requiring workers to give 'financial support' to unions legally authorized to act as their collective bargaining agents." Street, 367 U.S., at 749, 81 S.Ct. 1784 (emphasis added). The Court did not suggest that "industrial peace" could justify a law that "forces men into ideological and political associations which violate their right to freedom of conscience, freedom of association, and freedom of thought," or a law that forces a person to "conform to [a union's] ideology." Hanson, supra, at 236-237, 76 S.Ct. 714. The RLA did not compel such results, and the record in Hanson did not show that this had occurred.
B
Five years later, in Street,supra, the Court considered another case in which workers objected to a union shop. Employees of the Southern Railway System raised a First Amendment challenge, contending that a substantial part of the money that they were required to pay to the union was used to support political candidates and causes with which they disagreed. A Georgia court enjoined the enforcement of the union-shop provision and entered judgment for the dissenting employees in the amount of the payments that they had been forced to make to the union. The Georgia Supreme Court affirmed. Id., at 742-745, 81 S.Ct. 1784.
Reviewing the State Supreme Court's decision, this Court recognized that the case presented constitutional questions "of the utmost gravity," id., at 749, 81 S.Ct. 1784, but the Court found it unnecessary to reach those questions. Instead, the Court construed the RLA "as not vesting the unions with unlimited power to spend exacted money." Id., at 768, 81 S.Ct. 1784. Specifically, the Court held, the Act "is to be construed to deny the unions, over an employee's objection, the power to use his exacted funds to support political causes which he opposes." Id., at 768-769, 81 S.Ct. 1784.
Having construed the RLA to contain this restriction, the Street Court then went on to discuss the remedies available for employees who objected to the use of union funds for political causes. The Court suggested two: The dissenting employees could be given a refund of the portion of their dues spent by the union for political or ideological purposes, or they could be given a refund of the portion spent on those political purposes that they had advised the union they disapproved.6Id., at 774-775, 81 S.Ct. 1784.
Justice Black, writing in dissent, objected to the Court's suggested remedies, and he accurately predicted that the Court's approach would lead to serious practical problems. Id., at 796-797, 81 S.Ct. 1784. That approach, he wrote, while "very lucrative to special masters, accountants and lawyers," would do little for "the individual workers whose First Amendment freedoms have been flagrantly violated." Id., at 796, 81 S.Ct. 1784. He concluded:
"Unions composed of a voluntary membership, like all other voluntary groups, should be free in this country to fight in the public forum to advance their own causes, to promote their choice of candidates and parties and to work for the doctrines or the laws they favor. But to the extent that Government steps in to force people to help espouse the particular causes of a group, that group-whether composed of railroad workers or lawyers-loses its status as a voluntary group." Ibid.
Justice Frankfurter, joined by Justice Harlan, also dissented, arguing that the Court's remedy was conceptually flawed because a union may further the objectives of members by political means. See id., at 813-815, 81 S.Ct. 1784. He noted, for example, that reports from the AFL-CIO Executive Council "emphasize that labor's participation in urging legislation and candidacies is a major one." Id., at 813, 81 S.Ct. 1784. In light of "the detailed list of national and international problems on which the AFL-CIO speaks," he opined, "it seems rather naive" to believe "that economic and political concerns are separable." Id., at 814, 81 S.Ct. 1784.
C
This brings us to Abood, which, unlike Hanson and Street, involved a public-sector collective-bargaining agreement. The Detroit Federation of Teachers served "as the exclusive representative of teachers employed by the Detroit Board of Education." 431 U.S., at 211-212, 97 S.Ct. 1782. The collective-bargaining agreement between the union and the board contained an agency-shop clause requiring every teacher to "pay the Union a service charge equal to the regular dues required of Union members." Id., at 212, 97 S.Ct. 1782. A putative class of teachers sued to invalidate this clause. Asserting that "they opposed collective bargaining in the public sector," the plaintiffs argued that " 'a substantial part' " of their dues would be used to fund union " 'activities and programs which are economic, political, professional, scientific and religious in nature of which Plaintiffs do not approve, and in which they will have no voice.' " Id., at 212-213, 97 S.Ct. 1782.
This Court treated the First Amendment issue as largely settled by Hanson and Street.431 U.S., at 217, 223, 97 S.Ct. 1782. The Court acknowledged that Street was resolved as a matter of statutory construction without reaching any constitutional issues, 431 U.S., at 220, 97 S.Ct. 1782, and the Court recognized that forced membership and forced contributions impinge on free speech and associational rights, id., at 223, 97 S.Ct. 1782. But the Court dismissed the objecting teachers' constitutional arguments with this observation: "[T]he judgment clearly made in Hanson and Street is that such interference as exists is constitutionally justified by the legislative assessment of the important contribution of the union shop to the system of labor relations established by Congress." Id., at 222, 97 S.Ct. 1782.
The Abood Court understood Hanson and Street to have upheld union-shop agreements in the private sector based on two primary considerations: the desirability of "labor peace" and the problem of " 'free riders[hip].' " 431 U.S., at 220-222, 224, 97 S.Ct. 1782.
The Court thought that agency-shop provisions promote labor peace because the Court saw a close link between such provisions and the "principle of exclusive union representation." Id., at 220, 97 S.Ct. 1782. This principle, the Court explained, "prevents inter-union rivalries from creating dissension within the work force and eliminating the advantages to the employee of collectivization." Id., at 220-221, 97 S.Ct. 1782. In addition, the Court noted, the "designation of a single representative avoids the confusion that would result from attempting to enforce two or more agreements specifying different terms and conditions of employment." Id., at 220, 97 S.Ct. 1782. And the Court pointed out that exclusive representation "frees the employer from the possibility of facing conflicting demands from different unions, and permits the employer and a single union to reach agreements and settlements that are not subject to attack from rival labor organizations." Id., at 221, 97 S.Ct. 1782.
Turning to the problem of free ridership, Abood noted that a union must " 'fairly and equitably... represent all employees' " regardless of union membership, and the Court wrote as follows: The "union-shop arrangement has been thought to distribute fairly the cost of these activities among those who benefit, and it counteracts the incentive that employees might otherwise have to become 'free riders' to refuse to contribute to the union while obtaining benefits of union representation." Id., at 221-222, 97 S.Ct. 1782.
The plaintiffs in Abood argued that Hanson and Street should not be given much weight because they did not arise in the public sector, and the Court acknowledged that public-sector bargaining is different from private-sector bargaining in some notable respects. 431 U.S., at 227-228, 97 S.Ct. 1782. For example, although public and private employers both desire to keep costs down, the Court recognized that a public employer "lacks an important discipline against agreeing to increases in labor costs that in a market system would require price increases." Id., at 228, 97 S.Ct. 1782. The Court also noted that "decisionmaking by a public employer is above all a political process" undertaken by people "ultimately responsible to the electorate." Ibid. Thus, whether a public employer accedes to a union's demands, the Court wrote, "will depend upon a blend of political ingredients," thereby giving public employees "more influence in the decisionmaking process that is possessed by employees similarly organized in the private sector." Ibid. But despite these acknowledged differences between private- and public-sector bargaining, the Court treated Hanson and Street as essentially controlling.
Instead of drawing a line between the private and public sectors, the Abood Court drew a line between, on the one hand, a union's expenditures for "collective-bargaining, contract administration, and grievance-adjustment purposes," 431 U.S., at 232, 97 S.Ct. 1782, and, on the other, expenditures for political or ideological purposes. Id., at 236, 97 S.Ct. 1782.
D
The Abood Court's analysis is questionable on several grounds. Some of these were noted or apparent at or before the time of the decision, but several have become more evident and troubling in the years since then.
The Abood Court seriously erred in treating Hanson and Street as having all but decided the constitutionality of compulsory payments to a public-sector union. As we have explained, Street was not a constitutional decision at all, and Hanson disposed of the critical question in a single, unsupported sentence that its author essentially abandoned a few years later. Surely a First Amendment issue of this importance deserved better treatment.
The Abood Court fundamentally misunderstood the holding in Hanson, which was really quite narrow. As the Court made clear in Street, "all that was held in Hanson was that [the RLA] was constitutional in its bare authorization of union-shop contracts requiring workers to give 'financial support' to unions legally authorized to act as their collective bargaining agents." 367 U.S., at 749, 81 S.Ct. 1784 (emphasis added). In Abood, on the other hand, the State of Michigan did more than simply authorize the imposition of an agency fee. A state instrumentality, the Detroit Board of Education, actually imposed that fee. This presented a very different question.
Abood failed to appreciate the difference between the core union speech involuntarily subsidized by dissenting public-sector employees and the core union speech involuntarily funded by their counterparts in the private sector. In the public sector, core issues such as wages, pensions, and benefits are important political issues, but that is generally not so in the private sector. In the years since Abood, as state and local expenditures on employee wages and benefits have mushroomed, the importance of the difference between bargaining in the public and private sectors has been driven home.7
Abood failed to appreciate the conceptual difficulty of distinguishing in public-sector cases between union expenditures that are made for collective-bargaining purposes and those that are made to achieve political ends. In the private sector, the line is easier to see. Collective bargaining concerns the union's dealings with the employer; political advocacy and lobbying are directed at the government. But in the public sector, both collective-bargaining and political advocacy and lobbying are directed at the government.
Abood does not seem to have anticipated the magnitude of the practical administrative problems that would result in attempting to classify public-sector union expenditures as either "chargeable" (in Abood's terms, expenditures for "collective-bargaining, contract administration, and grievance-adjustment purposes," id., at 232, 97 S.Ct. 1782) or nonchargeable ( i.e., expenditures for political or ideological purposes, id., at 236, 97 S.Ct. 1782). In the years since Abood, the Court has struggled repeatedly with this issue. See Ellis v. Railway Clerks, 466 U.S. 435, 104 S.Ct. 1883, 80 L.Ed.2d 428 (1984); Teachers v. Hudson, 475 U.S. 292, 106 S.Ct. 1066, 89 L.Ed.2d 232 (1986); Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Assn., 500 U.S. 507, 111 S.Ct. 1950, 114 L.Ed.2d 572 (1991); Locke v. Karass, 555 U.S. 207, 129 S.Ct. 798, 172 L.Ed.2d 552 (2009). In Lehnert, the Court held that "chargeable activities must (1) be 'germane' to collective-bargaining activity; (2) be justified by the government's vital policy interest in labor peace and avoiding 'free riders'; and (3) not significantly add to the burdening of free speech that is inherent in the allowance of an agency or union shop." 500 U.S., at 519, 111 S.Ct. 1950. But as noted in Justice SCALIA's dissent in that case, "each one of the three 'prongs' of the test involves a substantial judgment call (What is 'germane'? What is 'justified'? What is a'significant' additional burden)." Id., at 551, 111 S.Ct. 1950 (opinion concurring in judgment in part and dissenting in part).
Abood likewise did not foresee the practical problems that would face objecting nonmembers. Employees who suspect that a union has improperly put certain expenses in the "germane" category must bear a heavy burden if they wish to challenge the union's actions. "[T]he onus is on the employees to come up with the resources to mount the legal challenge in a timely fashion," Knox, 567 U.S., at ----, 132 S.Ct., at 2294 (citing Lehnert,supra, at 513, 111 S.Ct. 1950), and litigating such cases is expensive. Because of the open-ended nature of the Lehnert test, classifying particular categories of expenses may not be straightforward. See Jibson v. Michigan Ed. Assn.-NEA, 30 F.3d 723, 730 (C.A.6 1994). And although Hudson required that a union's books be audited, auditors do not themselves review the correctness of a union's categorization. See Knox, supra, at ----, 132 S.Ct., at 2294 (citing Andrews v. Education Assn. of Cheshire, 829 F.2d 335, 340 (C.A.2 1987)). See also American Federation of Television and Recording Artists, Portland Local, 327 N.L.R.B. 474, 477 (1999) ("It is settled that determinations concerning whether particular expenditures are chargeable are legal
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
G
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Thomas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act of 1976 (FSIA), 28 U. S. C. § 1602 et seq., governs federal courts’ jurisdiction in lawsuits against foreign sovereigns. Today, we must decide whether the FSIA provides immunity to a foreign sovereign from a lawsuit to declare the validity of tax liens on property held by the sovereign for the purpose of housing its employees. We hold that the FSIA does not immunize a foreign sovereign from such a suit.
I
The Permanent Mission of India to the United Nations is located in a 26-floor building in New York City that is owned by the Government of India. Several floors are used for diplomatic offices, but approximately 20 floors contain residential units for diplomatic employees of the mission and their families. The employees — all of whom are below the rank of Head of Mission or Ambassador — are Indian citizens who receive housing from the mission rent free.
Similarly, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of Mongolia is housed in a six-story building in New York City that is owned by the Mongolian Government. Like the Permanent Mission of India, certain floors of the Ministry Building include residences for lower level employees of the Ministry and their families.
Under New York law, real property owned by a foreign government is exempt from taxation if it is “used exclusively” for diplomatic offices or for the quarters of a diplomat “with the rank of ambassador or minister plenipotentiary” to the United Nations. N. Y. Real Prop: Tax Law Ann. § 418 (West 2000). But “[i]f a portion only of any lot or building ... is used exclusively for the purposes herein described, then such portion only shall be exempt and the remainder shall be subject to taxation ....” Ibid.
For several years, the city of New York (City) has levied property taxes against petitioners for the portions of their buildings used to house lower level employees. Petitioners, however, refused to pay the taxes. By operation of New York law, the unpaid taxes eventually converted into tax liens held by the City against the two properties. As of February 1, 2003, the Indian Mission owed about $16.4 million in unpaid property taxes and interest, and the Mongolian Ministry owed about $2.1 million.
On April 2, 2003, the City filed complaints in state court seeking declaratory judgments to establish the validity of the tax liens. Petitioners removed their cases to federal court, pursuant to 28 U. S. C. § 1441(d), which provides for removal by a foreign state or its instrumentality. Once there, petitioners argued that they were immune from the suits under the FSIA’s general rule of immunity for foreign governments. § 1604. The District Court disagreed, relying on the FSIA’s “immovable property” exception, which provides that a foreign state shall not be immune from jurisdiction in any case in which “rights in immovable property situated in the United States are in issue.” § 1605(a)(4).
Reviewing the District Court’s decision under the collateral order doctrine, a unanimous panel of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed. 446 F. 3d 365 (2006). The Court of Appeals held that the text and purpose of the FSIA’s immovable property exception confirmed that petitioners’ personal property tax obligations, involved “rights in immovable property.” It therefore held that the District Court had jurisdiction to consider the City’s suits. We granted certiorari, 549 U. S. 1177 (2007), and now affirm.
II
“[T]he FSIA provides the sole basis for obtaining jurisdiction over a foreign state in federal court.” Argentine Republic v. Amerada Hess Shipping Corp., 488 U. S. 428, 439 (1989). Under the FSIA, a foreign state is presumptively immune from suit unless a specific exception applies. § 1604; Saudi Arabia v. Nelson, 507 U. S. 349, 355 (1993). At issue here is the scope of the exception where “rights in immovable property situated in the United States are in issue.” § 1605(a)(4). Petitioners contend that the language “rights in immovable property” limits the reach of the exception to actions contesting ownership or possession. The City argues that the exception encompasses additional rights in immovable property, including tax liens. Each party claims international practice at the time of the FSIA’s adoption supports its view. We agree with the City.
A
We begin, as always, with the text of the statute. Limtiaco v. Camacho, 549 U. S. 483, 488 (2007). The FSIA provides: “A foreign state shall not be immune from the jurisdiction of courts of the United States ... in any case ... in which . . . rights in immovable property situated in the United States are in issue.” 28 U. S. C. § 1605(a)(4). Contrary to petitioners’ position, § 1605(a)(4) does not expressly limit itself to cases in which the specific right at issue is title, ownership, or possession. Neither does it specifically exclude cases in which the validity of a lien is at issue. Rather, the exception focuses more broadly on “rights in” property. Accordingly, we must determine whether an action seeking a declaration of the validity of a tax lien places “rights in immovable property ... in issue.”
At the time of the FSIA’s adoption in 1976, a “lien” was defined as “[a] charge or security or incumbrance upon property.” Black’s Law Dictionary 1072 (4th ed. 1951). “Incumbrance,” in turn, was defined as “[a]ny right to, or interest in, land which may subsist in another to the diminution of its value . . . .” Id., at 908; see also id., at 941 (8th ed. 2004) (defining “lien” as a “legal right or interest that a creditor has in another’s property”). New York law defines “tax lien” in accordance with these general definitions. See N. Y. Real Prop. Tax Law Ann. § 102(21) (West Supp. 2007) (“ Tax lien’ means an unpaid tax . . . which is an encumbrance of real property . . . ”). This Court, interpreting the Bankruptcy Code, has also recognized that a lienholder has a property interest, albeit a “nonpossessory” interest. United States v. Security Industrial Bank, 459 U. S. 70, 76 (1982).
The practical effects of a lien bear out these definitions of liens as interests in property. A lien on real property runs with the land and is enforceable against subsequent purchasers. See 5 Restatement of Property §540 (1944). As such, “a lien has an immediate adverse effect upon the amount which [could be] receive[d] on a sale, . . . constituting] a direct interference with the property . . . .” Republic of Argentina v. New York, 25 N. Y. 2d 252, 262, 250 N. E. 2d 698, 702 (1969). A tax lien thus inhibits one of the quintessential rights of property ownership — the right to convey. It is therefore plain that a suit to establish the validity of a lien implicates “rights in immovable property.”
B
Our reading of the text is supported by two well-recognized and related purposes of the FSIA: adoption of the restrictive view of sovereign immunity and codification of international law at the time of the FSIA’s enactment. Until the middle of the last century, the United States followed “the classical or virtually absolute theory of sovereign immunity,” under which “a sovereign cannot, without his consent, be made a respondent in the courts of another sovereign.” Letter from Jack B. Tate, Acting Legal Adviser, U. S. Dept, of State, to Acting U. S. Attorney General Phillip B. Perlman (May 19, 1952) (Tate Letter), reprinted in 26 Dept, of State Bull. 984 (1952), and in Alfred Dunhill of London, Inc. v. Republic of Cuba, 425 U. S. 682, 711, 712 (1976) (Appendix 2 to opinion of the Court). The Tate Letter announced the United States’ decision to join the majority of other countries by adopting the “restrictive theory” of sovereign immunity, under which “the immunity of the sovereign is recognized with regard to sovereign or public acts (jure imperii) of a state, but not with respect to private acts (jure gestionis).” Id., at 711. In enacting the FSIA, Congress intended to codify the restrictive theory’s limitation of immunity to sovereign acts. Republic of Argentina v. Weltover, Inc., 504 U. S. 607, 612 (1992); Asociacion de Reclamantes v. United Mexican States, 735 F. 2d 1517, 1520 (CADC 1984) (Scalia, J.).
As a threshold matter, property ownership is not an inherently sovereign function. See Schooner Exchange v. McFaddon, 7 Cranch 116, 145 (1812) (“A prince, by acquiring private property in a foreign country, may possibly be considered as subjecting that property to the territorial jurisdiction; he may be considered as so far laying down the prince, and assuming the character of a private individual”). In addition, the FSIA was also meant “to codify ... the pre-existing real property exception to sovereign immunity recognized by international practice.” Reclamantes, supra, at 1521 (Scalia, J.). Therefore, it is useful to note that international practice at the time of the FSIA’s enactment also supports the City’s view that these sovereigns are not immune. The most recent restatement of foreign relations law at the time of the FSIA’s enactment states that a foreign sovereign’s immunity does not extend to “an action to obtain possession of or establish a property interest in immovable property located in the territory of the state exercising jurisdiction.” Restatement (Second) of Foreign Relations Law of the United States § 68(b), p. 205 (1965). As stated above, because an action seeking the declaration of the validity of a tax lien on property is a suit to establish an interest in such property, such an action would be allowed under this rule.
Petitioners respond to this conclusion by citing the second sentence of Comment d to §68, which states that the rule “does not preclude immunity with respect to a claim arising out of a foreign state’s ownership or possession of immovable property but not contesting such ownership or the right to possession.” Id., at 207. According to petitioners, that sentence limits the exception to cases contesting ownership or possession. When read in context, however, the comment supports the City. Petitioners ignore the first sentence of the comment, which reemphasizes that immunity does not extend to cases involving the possession of or “interest in” the property. Ibid. And the illustrations following the comment make clear that it refers only to claims incidental to property ownership, such as actions involving an “injury suffered in a fall” on the property, for which immunity would apply. Id., at 208. By contrast, for an eminent-domain proceeding, the foreign sovereign could not claim immunity. Ibid. Like the eminent-domain proceeding, the City’s lawsuits here directly implicate rights in property.
In addition, both parties rely on various international agreements, primarily the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, Apr. 18, 1961, 23 U. S. T. 3227, T. I. A. S. No. 7502, to identify pre-FSIA international practice. Petitioners point to the Vienna Convention’s analogous withholding of immunity for “a real action relating to private immovable property situated in the territory of the receiving State, unless [the diplomatic agent] holds it on behalf of the sending State for the purposes of the mission.” Id., at 3240, Art. 31(l)(a). Petitioners contend that this language indicates they are entitled to immunity for two reasons. First, petitioners argue that “‘real actionfs]’” do not include actions for performance of obligations “ ‘deriving from ownership or possession of immovable property.’” Brief for Petitioners 28 (quoting E. Denza, Diplomatic Law: A Commentary on the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations 238 (2d ed. 1998); emphasis deleted). Second, petitioners assert that the property here is held “ ‘on behalf of the sending State for purposes of the Mission.’ ” Brief for Petitioners 28.
But as the City shows, it is far from apparent that the term “real action” — a term derived from the civil law — is as limited as petitioners suggest. See Chateau Lafayette Apartments, Inc. v. Meadow Brook Nat. Bank, 416 F. 2d 301, 304, n. 7 (CA5 1969). Moreover, the exception for property held “on behalf of the sending State” concerns only the case — not at issue here — where local law requires an agent to hold in his own name property used for the purposes of a mission. 1957 Y. B. Int’l L. Comm’n 94-95 (402d Meeting, May 22, 1957); see also Deputy Registrar Case, 94 I. L. R. 308, 313 (D. Ct. The Hague 1980). Other tribunals construing Article 31 have also held that it does not extend immunity to staff housing. See id., at 312; cf. Intpro Properties (U. K.) Ltd. v. Sauvel, [1983] 1 Q. B. 1019, 1032-1033.
In sum, the Vienna Convention does not unambiguously support either party on the jurisdictional question. In any event, nothing in the Vienna Convention deters us from our interpretation of the FSIA. Under the language of the FSIA’s exception for immovable property, petitioners are not immune from the City’s suits.
Ill
Because the statutory text and the acknowledged purposes of the FSIA make it clear that a suit to establish the validity of a tax lien places “rights in immovable property ... in issue,” we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
The City concedes that even if a court of competent jurisdiction declares the liens valid, petitioners are immune from foreclosure proceedings. See Brief for Respondent 40 (noting that there is no FSIA immunity exception for enforcement actions). The City claims, however, that the declarations of validity are necessary for three reasons. First, once a court has declared property tax liens valid, foreign sovereigns traditionally concede and pay. Second, if the foreign sovereign fails to pay in the face of a valid court judgment, that country’s foreign aid may be reduced by the United States by 110% of the outstanding debt. See Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 2006, § 543(a), 119 Stat. 2214; Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2005, § 543(a), 118 Stat. 3011. Third, the liens would be enforceable against subsequent purchasers. 5 Restatement of Property § 540 (1944).
The City offers several other arguments against immunity based on the Vienna Convention, but those arguments ultimately go to the merits of the case, i. e., whether petitioners are actually responsible for paying the taxes. Because the only question before us is one of jurisdiction, and because the text and historical context of the FSIA demonstrate that petitioners are not immune from the City’s suits, we leave these merits-related arguments to the lower courts.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
H
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Me. Chief Justice Vinson
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Respondent Fleischman is a member of the executive board of an organization known as the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee (hereinafter referred to as the association), which, during 1945 and 1946, was under investigation by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. In furtherance of its investigation, the Committee issued subpoenas on March 29, 1946, to each of the members of the executive board and to Helen R. Bryan, the executive secretary of the association, demanding that they produce certain of the association’s records in the Committee’s chamber on April 4, 1946. Fleischman and the other members of the board appeared on that date in response to the subpoenas but did not produce the records. The Committee thereupon reported to the House that the members of the executive board were in contempt of that body. After debate, the House voted to direct the Speaker to certify the Committee’s report to the United States District Attorney for legal action.
Respondent and the other members of the executive board were jointly indicted for wilful default under R. S. § 102, but Fleischman was tried separately from the others. Her defense, like that of Bryan, consisted in part in the contention that she could not be guilty of wilful default because a quorum of the Committee had not been present when she appeared in response to the subpoena. The trial court withdrew that issue from the jury, holding “as a matter of law, that the Committee on Un-American Activities of the House of Representatives was a validly constituted committee of Congress, and was at the time of the defendant’s appearance.” The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia reversed, one judge dissenting, 84 U. S. App. D. C. 388, 174 F. 2d 519, on the ground that presence of a quorum of the Committee at the time of respondent’s appearance was a material question of fact for the jury. The court also divided on the question of whether there was sufficient evidence to support the conviction, a majority holding the evidence sufficient. We granted a writ of certiorari, 338 U. S. 846, to consider these important questions arising under R. S. § 102.
The quorum question is governed by our decision this day in United States v. Bryan, ante, p. 323. Like Bryan, respondent testified before the Committee on the return day of the subpoena without making any suggestion of lack of a quorum. That issue was raised for the first time at the trial, two years after her appearance before the Committee, where she had given other reasons for her failure to produce the documents. Under the circumstances disclosed by this record, we think the defense of lack of quorum was not available to her.
The question of the admissibility of her testimony before the House Committee at her trial for wilful default is likewise governed by our decision in the Bryan case, where we held that R. S. § 859, 18 U. S. C. § 3486, cannot be read to prevent the introduction of testimony of this kind at a trial for wilful default under R. S. § 102.
There remains the question of the sufficiency of the evidence to support the verdict of guilt in this case. That evidence consisted in part of the record of the Committee’s unsuccessful efforts over a period of four months to obtain the books and papers of the association from its chairman and executive secretary, of which there is evidence of respondent’s knowledge. Other evidence introduced may reasonably be taken to establish the following facts: Following its unsuccessful attempts to obtain the records from the chairman and executive secretary, the Committee issued subpoenas to all sixteen members of the executive board of the association, commanding them to appear on April 4, 1946, in the Committee’s chamber, there to produce the records. The subpoena served on respondent was addressed to her as “a member of the Executive Board of the Joint AntiFascist Refugee Committee.” The board had power, its members acting jointly, to direct Miss Bryan to produce the records, to transfer custody of the documents to some other person, or to remove her from office. But during the interval between March 29, when the subpoenas were issued, and April 4, when its members appeared before the Committee, no meeting of the executive board was held to discuss compliance. A number of members of the board met in an attorney’s office in New York on April 2, when he gave to each a typewritten statement to read to the Committee.
All of the members who had been subpoenaed appeared at the time and place specified in the subpoenas. No one produced the records. Each of the sixteen members of the board, including respondent, read or handed to the Committee the identically worded statements prepared by the association’s attorney. These statements read:
“I individually do not have possession, custody, or control over any of the material requested in the subpena which was served upon me. The books, records, and correspondence of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee are in the possession, custody, and control of Miss Helen R. Bryan, the executive secretary of our organization, and she is the legal custodian of this material. Since I do not have either in my possession, custody, or control the books, records, and documents described in the subpena, I am unable to comply with your order' to produce them.”
Upon being questioned by the Committee as to whether she, individually, would give her consent to production of the books, respondent’s answer was that that question was “not pertinent”; that she would decide only at a meeting of the board.
Respondent and the other members of the board were jointly indicted on a charge that they “appeared before the Congressional Committee in the City of Washington, District of Columbia, on April 4, 1946, but failed to produce the records called for in the subpoenas, as they had power to do, and thereby wilfully made default.” As we have pointed out, there is evidence to support the charge that the records were under the joint control of the members of the executive board and that the individual members, acting together, had power to produce them. It is contended, however, that respondent (in this respect no different from any other member) had no individual control over the records, and that there is thus no evidence that the nonproduction of the records resulted from anything she personally did or omitted to do.
It seems elementary that the only manner by which a duty requiring the joint participation of several persons may be performed is by a combination of individual performances. And conversely, the failure to perform such a duty is the result of a failure by some or all of the persons who have been ordered to act together to discharge their responsibilities. This failure is not necessarily the result of a conspiracy, which premises an agreement of some kind. One may, either alone or in concert with others, fail to perform his individual part of a task requiring joint participation.
When one accepts an office of joint responsibility, whether on a board of directors of a corporation, the governing board of a municipality, or any other position in which compliance with lawful orders requires joint action by a responsible body of which he is a member, he necessarily assumes an individual responsibility to act, within the limits of his power to do so, to bring about compliance with the order. It may be that the efforts of one member of the board will avail nothing. If he does all he can, he will not be punished because of the recalcitrance of others. Commissioners v. Sellew, 99 U. S. 624, 627 (1879). But to hold that, because compliance with an order directed to the directors of a corporation or other organization requires common action by several persons, no one of them is individually responsible for the failure of the organization to comply, is effectually to remove such organizations beyond the reach of legislative and judicial commands. This Court and the state courts which have considered the matter have adopted a contrary view. In Wilson v. United States, 221 U. S. 361 (1911), Mr. Justice Hughes stated the proposition thus:
“A command to the corporation is in effect a command to those who are officially responsible for the conduct of its affairs. If they, apprised of the writ directed to the corporation, prevent compliance or fail to take appropriate action within their power for the performance of the corporate duty, they, no less than the corporation itself, are guilty of disobedience and may be punished for contempt.” Id. at 376. (Emphasis supplied.) See also Commissioners v. Sellew, supra.
Nor is a distinction to be drawn on the ground that a corporation was there involved while the Joint AntiFascist Refugee Committee is an unincorporated association. Brown v. United States, 276 U. S. 134, 141-142 (1928), makes it clear that a subpoena directed to an unincorporated association and its officers is equally valid. If the legislative committee had a right to demand the records, the directing officers of the association are quite as responsible for their production as if they were corporate officers. Cf. United States v. White, 322 U. S. 694 (1944).
The question that remains is whether, after introducing evidence that the board had power to produce the records, that it had not done so, and that each member of the board had read the identical statements quoted above as his reason for noncompliance, the Government has the further burden of proving that each individual member had not done that which was within his power to bring about compliance with the Committee’s order. It may well be that respondent’s prepared statement before the Committee and her answers to the Committee’s questions are sufficient in themselves to satisfy that requirement. For they indicate clearly that respondent had assumed no personal duty to do anything. The prepared statement was, of course, a patent evasion of the Committee’s demands. While stating that each member of the executive board individually did not have control over the records, it does not deny, as it could not, that the members had power jointly to comply with the subpoenas. Since the subpoenas required that they act jointly — the previous demands on the chairman and the executive secretary individually having been of no avail— the statement that the members individually had no power to comply is completely irrelevant.
And when the Committee asked respondent whether she, personally, would permit the Committee to have access to the books, her answer again was an evasion. She said: “I don’t think it is pertinent to say what I should do a week from now.”
The difficulty with that position is that it is not for her nor any other member of the board to say that she would make up her mind next week. The return day of the subpoena had arrived. No one so much as hinted that there had been no time to act. The members had gathered in an attorney’s office on April 2, when they received their statements. There was evidence that some members had gathered informally elsewhere to discuss the question of compliance. In fact all were present in the anteroom of the Committee’s chamber on the morning of April 4. If there had been the slightest bent toward compliance, the opportunities were there. When respondent appeared before the Committee, she was asked in effect, as of that time, whether she was a party to the joint refusal to produce the records: “Would you now, right here now, give your consent to this committee to [see the books and records]?” As one of the members of the Committee stated to respondent: “That is the main thing, the whole case.” Her answer was no answer.
It may be argued, however, that respondent may have adopted the position of the other members of the board only after she had tried in good faith to bring about compliance with the subpoena. Or perhaps she had been ill or necessarily out of town immediately prior to April 4. Granting that these or other excuses for nonaction may exist, must the Government negative each, or was the burden on respondent to advance them as defensive matter?
We think that the circumstances of this case fairly bring into play the familiar doctrine in criminal cases that “it is not incumbent on the prosecution to adduce positive evidence to support a negative averment the truth of which is fairly indicated by established circumstances and which if untrue could be readily disproved by the production of documents or other evidence probably within the defendant’s possession or control.” Rossi v. United States, 289 U. S. 89, 91-92 (1933), and authorities cited. The considerations that govern this question have been well stated by Mr. Justice Cardozo in discussing a similar question — the constitutionality of a statute which shifted the burden of proof in a criminal prosecution to the defendant. He said:
“The decisions are manifold that within limits of reason and fairness the burden of proof may be lifted from the state in criminal prosecutions and cast on a defendant. The limits are in substance these, that the state shall have proved enough to make it just for the defendant to be required to repel what has been proved with excuse or explanation, or at least that upon a balancing of convenience or of the opportunities for knowledge the shifting of the burden will be found to be an aid to the accuser without subjecting the accused to hardship or oppression.
“... For a transfer of the burden, experience must teach that the evidence held to be inculpatory has at least a sinister significance..., or if this at times be lacking, there must be in any event a manifest disparity in convenience of proof and opportunity for knowledge, as, for instance, where a general prohibition is applicable to every one who is unable to bring himself within the range of an exception. Greenleaf, Evidence, Vol. 1, § 79. The list is not exhaustive. Other instances may have arisen or may develop in the future where the balance of convenience can be redressed without oppression to the defendant through the same procedural expedient. The decisive considerations are too variable, too much distinctions of degree, too dependent in last analysis upon a common sense estimate of fairness or of facilities of proof, to be crowded into a formula. One can do no more than adumbrate them; sharper definition must await the specific case as it arises.” Morrison v. California, 291 U. S. 82, 88-91 (1934)
In this situation, manifestly, the prosecution is under a serious practical handicap if it must prove the negative proposition — that respondent did not or had no good reason for failing to try to comply with the subpoena insofar as she was able. The possibilities of time and circumstance are of such wide range as to defy inclusive rebuttal. On the other hand, the burden of the affirmative was not an oppressive one for respondent to undertake; the relevant facts are peculiarly within her knowledge. She was called upon merely to introduce evidence as to what steps she took after receiving the subpoena, or, if she took no action, any evidence tending to excuse her omission. Respondent does not lose the presumption of innocence that surrounds the defendant in a criminal prosecution. That presumption continues to operate until overcome by proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and is not to be confused with burden of proof, which is a rule affecting merely the time and manner of proof. See 1 Wharton, Criminal Evidence (11th ed.) §§ 199-204.
Even though we assume, therefore, contrary to the reasonable inferences to be drawn from respondent’s statements before the Committee, that she may have made some effort to bring about compliance with the subpoena, or had some excuse for failing to do so, we think that under the circumstances here presented the burden was upon her to present evidence to sustain such a defense. And, in the absence of such evidence, we conclude that the evidence adduced by the Government amply sustains the conviction. Respondent is no more or less guilty than any other member of the board. If she can escape prosecution by remaining quiescent, so can all the others. If hers is a valid defense, then all that the directors of a corporation need do when they and the corporation are served with subpoenas is to refrain from discussing compliance with the order. No one need make any attempt to comply, for none of them “individually” has control over the action — or nonaction — of the corporation. A stratagem so transparent does not cast a shadow of substance.
It should be emphasized that we are not dealing with the duties of witnesses summoned by one committee but with the obligations owed by persons summoned by authority of the Senate or House, of Representatives to appear before any person or group designated by that authority. Reforms in the practices and procedures of certain committees are vigorously demanded by persons both within and without Congress. We would not be understood in this case as expressing either approval or disapproval of those practices. But the remedy, if any is needed, is certainly not to destroy the effective operation of all committees, which is the necessary result if they cannot compel the disclosure of facts. A subpoena is a sterile document if its orders may be flouted with impunity.
Respondent advances a number of contentions which were not passed upon by the Court of Appeals. We do not decide them at this time. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is
Reversed.
Mr. Justice Douglas and Mr. Justice Clark took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
Mr. Justice Black,
with whom
Mr. Justice Frankfurter concurs, dissenting.
The Court holds that there is sufficient evidence in this record to support the conviction of respondent Fleischman under R. S. § 102. I cannot agree. Whether the evidence is sufficient depends primarily on what conduct is made criminal by R. S. § 102 and what action is required by a subpoena duces tecum. My views on these questions differ so drastically from those of the Court that I shall present them, and the conclusions which they dictate, before turning to the Court’s opinion.
I.
R. S. § 102 provides: “Every person who having been summoned as a witness by the authority of either House of Congress, to give testimony or to produce papers... willfully makes default,... shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor....” This criminal statute is limited by its terms to just two types of congressional orders: (1) a subpoena to give testimony, and (2) a subpoena to produce papers. The latter type of order is involved here.
Refusal to comply with a subpoena to produce papers can be punished only if the witness has power to produce. It is a complete defense for him to show that the papers are not in his possession or under his control. For a subpoena duces tecum does not require a witness “to sue and labor in order to obtain the possession of any instrument from another for the purpose of its production after-wards by himself....” Munroe v. United States, 216 F. 107, 111-112, quoting Lord Ellenborough’s opinion in Amey v. Long, 9 East 473, 483; see the general discussion in Notes, 1915B L. R. A. 980-985; 32 Am. St. Rep. 648. A command to produce is not a command to get others to produce or assist in producing. Of course Congress, like a court, has broad powers to supplement its subpoena with other commands requiring the witness to take specific affirmative steps reasonably calculated to remove obstacles to production. But even though disobedience of such supplementary orders can be punished at the bar of Congress as contempt, Jurney v. MacCracken, 294 U. S. 125, it does not come within the limited scope of R. S. § 102. Only by importing the broad contempt powers of Congress into this criminal statute can this Court say that it does. I cannot agree to such cavalier expansion of any criminal provision.
Prosecution under R. S. § 102 is thus limited to a range far narrower than is a proceeding for contempt, either in court or at the bar of Congress. And even under the notoriously broad contempt power, punishment is justifiable only when a person has failed to comply with an order specifying precisely what he must do, and when he has power himself to do what is ordered. Certainly no less precise standard should be established in prosecutions for violation of a criminal statute. Cf. Pierce v. United States, 314 U. S. 306, 310-311.
Viewed in this light, the evidence in this case unmistakably falls short of proving that Fleischman disobeyed the subpoena or violated the statute. The Government did succeed in establishing that she had received the subpoena, knew approximately what documents she was required tó produce, and yet failed to produce them. But an essential ingredient of the offense — that she had power to produce those records on April 4 — remains completely unsubstantiated. The Government does not contend that Fleischman had power to produce except by acting jointly with other members of the board. And, for the reasons stated above, the subpoena addressed to Fleischman as an individual board member imposed on her no duty to prod others to produce, or to initiate joint action aimed at production.
Because of the limited scope of R. S. § 102 and the complete absence of proof that Fleischman had power to produce the subpoenaed documents, her conviction of the crime created by that statute should be set aside.
II.
The Court does not dispute that the evidence is insufficient to uphold Fleischman’s conviction under the established principles outlined above. Rather it constructs a novel legal theory which, however plausible on the surface, will not stand detailed analysis.
The chain of reasoning on which its legal theory hangs appears to be this: Fleischman and other members of the executive board were served with separate subpoenas ordering each to produce papers of the association on April 4; Bryan, the executive secretary, had possession of the papers; the individual subpoenas imposed on each board member a personal duty to do all each could to bring about joint action that would cause production; had Fleischman performed her individual part of this joint task, she might have prevailed on the board to pass a resolution which might have forced Bryan to produce; Fleischman failed to show that she had done all she could to bring about that result; therefore Fleischman was properly convicted of the crime of wilfully disobeying the subpoena addressed to her as an individual member of the board.
In this intricate chain, certain crucial links are entirely missing and others are far too weak to sustain a criminal conviction:
A. The foundation of the Court’s theory is that a subpoena duces tecum addressed to an individual board member includes the command that he do “all he can” to bring about joint board action to produce the subpoenaed papers. This doctrine expands the scope of the subpoena duces tecum far beyond its traditional boundaries, which are outlined in Part I supra. No precedent for such an expansion can be found in the two cases relied on by the Court.
Commissioners v. Sellew, 99 U. S. 624, merely approved issuance of a writ of mandamus to a county commission ordering specific action on a specific date as specifically required by Kansas statutes. Such is the traditional function of mandamus. Seldom has a judicial order been more explicit. In sharp contrast to Fleischman, the commissioners were not required to hazard the least guess as to what action would satisfy the judicial mandate. Both that mandate and the applicable state statutes told them precisely what to do.
Nor does the opinion in Wilson v. United States, 221 U. S. 361, support today's holding that an order to produce papers requires a person, without further orders, to take action getting others to produce. The Court relies on a dictum that corporate officials can be required to take “appropriate action” to secure performance of a corporate duty. Even the dictum, however, must be read in the context of that case. Wilson, the president of a corporation to which a subpoena was addressed, had actual custody of the subpoenaed records. Appearing before the grand jury with several corporation directors, he refused to produce. The directors denied power to make him do so. In the resulting contempt proceedings, the prosecuting attorney complained that the Government had been after the records “in one way or another before this same Grand Jury for nearly a month.” He emphasized that many of the directors had frequently appeared before the grand jury, and indeed had spent the entire preceding day there. In view of the frequent and prolonged appearances of the directors before the grand jury, even a passing acquaintance with how a grand jury operates would make it inconceivable that “one way or another” did not include oral orders to take action aimed at forcing Wilson to turn over the records. Whether such orders were specific enough to justify holding the directors in contempt, or whether failure to take any action would justify punishment for violation of the subpoena itself without first ordering the directors to take specific steps, became immaterial when the directors passed a resolution ordering Wilson to produce. The directors were found innocent, and the only issues before this Court involved Wilson’s guilt. Read in this context, the dictum on which the Court relies affords no support whatever for its conclusion here that a subpoena, of itself, imposes the amorphous duty of “appropriate action” to get others to produce. Moreover, citation of the Sellew case as authority for the dictum clearly indicates that the “appropriate action” would have to be designated and commanded by specific orders. Nothing in the Wilson opinion can fairly be interpreted as supplanting, or even casting doubt on, the traditional rule that failure to take action required by an order can be punished only if the action is clearly, specifically, and unequivocally commanded by that order.
Apparently the only reason given for discarding this rule is the Court’s statement that failure to construe an individual subpoena as requiring joint action by members of a board would “remove such organizations beyond the reach of legislative and judicial commands.” That fear is without foundation. A custodian wilfully failing to produce records can be prosecuted under R. S. § 102. And under 18 U. S. C. § 3, anyone “aiding or abetting” her also becomes a principal in that offense and is similarly subject to R. S. § 102. Moreover, a conspiracy to prevent production would certainly provide grounds for conviction. Thus there is no question that Fleischman’s conviction could be sustained if there had been sufficient evidence that she actually aided or encouraged the custodian’s refusal to produce, or conspired to accomplish that result. And in the rare instance where these sanctions seem unlikely to secure compliance, Congress can always fall back upon its arsenal of supplementary orders enforced by congressional contempt proceedings: officers with authority to call a board meeting can be ordered to do so, and board members can be ordered to vote for resolutions calculated to foster production. It can be safely presumed that any organization capable of escaping this barrage would not be brought into line by today’s expansion of R. S. § 102. A subpoena is not made “sterile” by holding that it commands only what it says it commands.
In fact, the Court’s new doctrine creates a danger far more genuine than what it allegedly avoids. While in contempt proceedings a witness in doubt as to just what action is demanded can be given more precise orders before a tribunal decides to punish him for noncompliance, no such flexibility exists in criminal prosecutions under R. S. § 102. As applied to such prosecutions, the sweeping requirement that a witness not having custody or control of subpoenaed documents must do “all he can” to secure their production places him in an unfair dilemma. Caution dictates that he “sue and labor” to obtain the papers, however great and however useless the effort and expense. On the other hand, common sense counsels that he make such practical efforts as would satisfy a reasonable jury — and not until the jury has spoken will he know whether he guessed right.
Not even after today’s opinion can Eleischman — or, for that matter, anyone else — know precisely what steps were required of her to encourage production of documents which she herself could not produce.
B. Even if the theory on which this Court upholds Fleischman’s conviction were tenable, it is, as might be expected from its novelty, completely different from the theory on which the case was tried. An essential element in the trial judge’s charge was his instruction that the jury could find Fleischman guilty only if it found that she had “acted in concert with other members of the executive board” to prevent production. But the Court, without even attempting to support her conviction on this theory, substitutes a theory involving completely different problems of proof and evidence. The issue of whether Fleischman had failed to attempt to persuade others to produce was not being tried, and there was no reason for her to introduce evidence concerning it. The question on review is not whether the record as a whole exudes a general impression of guilt, but whether the evidence supports a finding of guilt on the issues presented to the jury by the trial judge’s charge. Bollenbach v. United States, 326 U. S. 607, 614. This Court should heed its mandates forbidding state appellate courts to uphold convictions on any theory materially different from that on which the case was presented to the jury. See Cole v. Arkansas, 333 U. S. 196, 201-202.
C. The Court relies heavily on statements made by Fleischman before the congressional committee. But these statements are expressly made inadmissible by 18 TJ. S. C. § 3486, which provides that no testimony given by a witness before any committee of either house “shall be used as evidence in any criminal proceeding against him in any court, except in a prosecution for perjury committed in giving such testimony.” See United States v. Bryan, ante, pp. 323, 346.
Nor does Fleischman’s testimony, even if admissible, support the inferences drawn from it by this Court. Weighty significance is attached to her refusal to say how she would vote on the question of production if a board meeting were held. Suffice it to say that no meeting had been held following her receipt of the subpoena, no future meeting had any relevance whatever to the past offense with which she was charged, and the subpoena did not order her to take action at a board meeting anyway. See Part I supra.
Equally unwarranted is the inference drawn by the Court from the fact that Fleischman and other board members read the same statement denying individual possession or control over the subpoenaed documents. The Court refers to this statement, prepared by a lawyer, as a “patent evasion” of the committee’s order. On the contrary, I regard the denial of individual power to produce as a complete and adequate response to the individual subpoenas. And surely, although the Committee would not permit counsel for witnesses to enter the committee room, witnesses have always been entitled to get advice from a qualified lawyer and present a statement prepared by him without having inferences of guilt drawn from that fact.
D. Power to produce is an essential ingredient of any offense under R. S. § 102, and the indictment necessarily alleged that “each and all” of the board members had such power. Thus proof of Fleischman’s power to produce the subpoenaed papers is undeniably vital to the Court’s theory of the case.
The only evidence tending to show power in the board itself to produce is that it had authority over the policies and activities of the association, and had power to suspend Bryan at any regular board meeting. Assuming that the board could have ordered Bryan to produce under threat of suspension, the Wilson case demonstrates that prospective obedience to such a potential board order cannot accurately be inferred merely from the supremacy of a board. And this record is barren of any evidence to support a finding that Bryan would have complied on April 4th with a board order.
Equally important under the Court’s theory is the question of Fleischman’s own power to bring about production. The Court holds that membership on the board gave her one-eighteenth of the board’s official “power,” which it considers enough to support conviction. But her fraction of official “power” could be exercised only at an official meeting. There is no showing that any meeting was held between March 29 and April 4, or that Fleischman had power to call such a meeting. And I do not understand the Court to say that the “power to produce” which Fleischman criminally failed to exercise was solely some imagined personal ability, unconnected with her official capacity, to attempt to cajole the chairman into calling a meeting or ordering production.
Upon a showing merely that the board controlled the “policies and activities” of the association and that she was a board member, the Court imposes on Fleischman the burden of disproving the crucial allegation of “power to produce” by establishing that she had done “all she could” to bring about production. In effect it has set up a presumption that every board member automatically has such power, and has saddled Fleischman with the burden of proving her innocence by showing that the presumption should not apply to her. In the absence of some showing that she had authority to call or an opportunity to vote at an official board meeting, or at least had substantial influence over other board members, this is every bit as arbitrary as the presumption rejected in Tot v. United, States, 319 U. S. 463. That case directly bars use of such a device to shift the burden of proof, however convenient it would be for the prosecutor. And without that device, the Government’s case was clearly insufficient to support the verdict.
The time-honored rule, that the Government is required to prove every essential ingredient of an offense it charges, provides a safeguard essential to preservation of individual liberty against governmental oppression. It should not be sacrificed in order to sustain the conviction of a single defendant whose guilt the Government has plainly failed to prove.
If the Court’s theory merely had any one of the above flaws, its chain of reasoning would break. With all four, it collapses. The judgment of the Court of Appeals should be affirmed.
11 Stat. 155, as amended, R. S. § 102,2 U. S. C. § 192:
“Every person who having been summoned as a witness by the authority of either House of Congress to give testimony or to produce papers upon any matter under inquiry before either House, or any joint committee established by a joint or concurrent resolution of the two Houses of Congress, or any committee of either House of Congress, willfully makes default, or who, having appeared, refuses to answer any question pertinent to the question under inquiry, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not more than $1,000 nor less than $100 and imprisonment in a common jail for not less than one month nor more than twelve months.”
See United States v. Bryan, ante, p. 323.
This evidence consisted of a resolution passed by the executive board on December 14, 1945, condemning the Committee’s investigation and directing Miss Bryan to consult with an attorney with a view toward protecting the records from the Committee, and the minutes of a meeting of February 11, 1946, at which the executive board voted to instruct Dr. Barsky not to produce the records before the Committee, as he had been ordered to do. While respondent did not participate in either of these actions, her knowledge of the Committee’s efforts to obtain the records and the board’s previous actions with respect thereto was shown by evidence of her attendance of a board meeting in March, 1946, when Dr. Barsky reported concerning his appearance before the Committee on February 13, and the association’s attorney was present and talked to the board about its legal position in the matter.
The subpoena served on Mrs. Fleischman read as follows:
“BY AUTHORITY OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
“To the Sergeant at Arms, or his Special Messenger:
“You are hereby commanded to summon Mrs. Ernestina G. Fleischman, ‘Voice of Fighting Spain’, 1 Columbus Avenue, New York City, a member of the Executive Board of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee to be and appear before the Un-American Activities Committee of the House of Representatives of the United States, of which the Hon. John S. Wood is chairman, and to bring with you all books, ledgers, records and papers relating to the receipt and disbursement of money by or on account of the Joint AntiFascist Refugee Committee or any subsidiary or sub-committee thereof, together with all correspondence and memoranda of communications by any means whatsoever with persons in foreign countries. The said books, papers and records demanded herein are for the period from January 1, 1945 up
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
|
A
|
sc_issuearea
|
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the issue area of the Court's decision. Determine the issue area on the basis of the Court's own statements as to what the case is about. Focus on the subject matter of the controversy rather than its legal basis. In specifying the issue in a legacy case, choose the one that best accords with what today's Court would consider it to be. Choose among the following issue areas: "Criminal Procedure" encompasses the rights of persons accused of crime, except for the due process rights of prisoners. "Civil rights" includes non-First Amendment freedom cases which pertain to classifications based on race (including American Indians), age, indigency, voting, residency, military or handicapped status, gender, and alienage. "First Amendment encompasses the scope of this constitutional provision, but do note that it need not involve the interpretation and application of a provision of the First Amendment. For example, if the case only construe a precedent, or the reviewability of a claim based on the First Amendment, or the scope of an administrative rule or regulation that impacts the exercise of First Amendment freedoms. "Due process" is limited to non-criminal guarantees. "Privacy" concerns libel, comity, abortion, contraceptives, right to die, and Freedom of Information Act and related federal or state statutes or regulations. "Attorneys" includes attorneys' compensation and licenses, along with trhose of governmental officials and employees. "Unions" encompass those issues involving labor union activity. "Economic activity" is largely commercial and business related; it includes tort actions and employee actions vis-a-vis employers. "Judicial power" concerns the exercise of the judiciary's own power. "Federalism" pertains to conflicts and other relationships between the federal government and the states, except for those between the federal and state courts. "Federal taxation" concerns the Internal Revenue Code and related statutes. "Private law" relates to disputes between private persons involving real and personal property, contracts, evidence, civil procedure, torts, wills and trusts, and commercial transactions. Prior to the passage of the Judges' Bill of 1925 much of the Court's cases concerned such issues. Use "Miscellaneous" for legislative veto and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states.
Justice Thomas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
At the time of the framing, the common law of search and seizure recognized a law enforcement officer’s authority to break open the doors of a dwelling, but generally indicated that he first ought to announce his presence and authority. In this case, we hold that this common-law “knock and announce” principle forms a part of the reasonableness inquiry under the Fourth Amendment.
I
During November and December 1992, petitioner Sharlene Wilson made a series of narcotics sales to an informant acting at the direction of the Arkansas State Police. In late November, the informant purchased marijuana and methamphetamine at the home that petitioner shared with Bryson Jacobs. On December 30, the informant telephoned petitioner at her home and arranged to meet her at a local store to buy some marijuana. According to testimony presented below, petitioner produced a semiautomatic pistol at this meeting and waved it in the informant’s face, threatening to kill her if she turned out to be working for the police. Petitioner then sold the informant a bag of marijuana.
The next day, police officers applied for and obtained warrants to search petitioner’s home and to arrest both petitioner and Jacobs. Affidavits filed in support of the warrants set forth the details of the narcotics transactions and stated that Jacobs had previously been convicted of arson and firebombing. The search was conducted later that afternoon. Police officers found the main door to petitioner’s home open. While opening an unlocked screen door and entering the residence, they identified themselves as police officers and stated that they had a warrant. Once inside the home, the officers seized marijuana, methamphetamine, valium, narcotics paraphernalia, a gun, and ammunition. They also found petitioner in the bathroom, flushing marijuana down the toilet. Petitioner and Jacobs were arrested and charged with delivery of marijuana, delivery of methamphetamine, possession of drug paraphernalia, and possession of marijuana.
Before trial, petitioner filed a motion to suppress the evidence seized during the search. Petitioner asserted that the search was invalid on various grounds, including that the officers had failed to “knock and announce” before entering her home. The trial court summarily denied the suppression motion. After a jury trial, petitioner was convicted of all charges and sentenced to 32 years in prison.
The Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed petitioner’s conviction on appeal. 317 Ark. 548, 878 S. W. 2d 755 (1994). The court noted that “the officers entered the home while they were identifying themselves,” but it rejected petitioner’s argument that “the Fourth Amendment requires officers to knock and announce prior to entering the residence.” Id., at 553, 878 S. W. 2d, at 758 (emphasis added). Finding “no authority for [petitioner’s] theory that the knock and announce principle is required by the Fourth Amendment,” the court concluded that neither Arkansas law nor the Fourth Amendment required suppression of the evidence. Ibid.
We granted certiorari to resolve the conflict among the lower courts as to whether the common-law knock and announce principle forms a part of the Fourth Amendment reasonableness inquiry. 513 U. S. 1014 (1995). We hold that it does, and accordingly reverse and remand.
II
The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution protects “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.” In evaluating the scope of this right, we have looked to the traditional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures afforded by the common law at the time of the framing. See California v. Hodari D., 499 U. S. 621, 624 (1991); United States v. Watson, 423 U. S. 411, 418-420 (1976); Carroll v. United States, 267 U. S. 132, 149 (1925). “Although the underlying command of the Fourth Amendment is always that searches and seizures be reasonable,” New Jersey v. T. L. Q, 469 U. S. 325, 337 (1985), our effort to give content to this term may be guided by the meaning ascribed to it by the Framers of the Amendment. An examination of the common law of search and seizure leaves no doubt that the reasonableness of a search of a dwelling may depend in part on whether law enforcement officers announced their presence and authority prior to entering.
Although the common law generally protected a man’s house as-“his castle of defence and asylum,” 3 W. Blackstone, Commentaries *288 (hereinafter Blackstone), common-law courts long have held that “when the King is party, the sheriff (if the doors be not open) may break the party’s house, either to arrest him, or to do other execution of the K[ing]’s process, if otherwise he cannot enter.” Semayne’s Case, 5 Co. Rep. 91a, 91b, 77 Eng. Rep. 194, 195 (K. B. 1603). To this rule, however, common-law courts appended an important qualification:
“But before he breaks it, he ought to signify the cause of his coming, and to make request to open doors . . . , for the law without a default in the owner abhors the destruction or breaking of any house (which is for the habitation and safety of man) by which great damage and inconvenience might ensue to the party, when no default is in him; for perhaps he did not know of the process, of which, if he had notice, it is to be presumed that he would obey it . . . Ibid., 77 Eng. Rep., at 195-196.
See also Case of Richard Curtis, Fost. 135, 137, 168 Eng. Rep. 67, 68 (Crown 1757) (“[N]o precise form of words is required in a case of this kind. It is sufficient that the party hath notice, that the officer cometh not as a mere trespasser, but claiming to act under a proper authority . . .”); Lee v. Gansell, Lofft 374, 381-382, 98 Eng. Rep. 700, 705 (K. B. 1774) (“[A]s to the outer door, the law is now clearly taken” that it is privileged; but the door may be broken “when the due notification and demand has been made and refused”).
Several prominent founding-era commentators agreed on this basic principle. According to Sir Matthew Hale, the “constant practice” at common law was that “the officer may break open the door, if he be sure the offender is there, if after acquainting them of the business, and demanding the prisoner, he refuses to open the door.” See 1 M. Hale, Pleas of the Crown *582. William Hawkins propounded a similar principle: “the law doth never allow” an officer to break open the door of a dwelling “but in cases of necessity,” that is, unless he “first signify to those in the house the cause of his coming, and request them to give him admittance.” 2 W. Hawkins, Pleas of the Crown, ch. 14, § 1, p. 138 (6th ed. 1787). Sir William Blackstone stated simply that the sheriff may “justify breaking open doors, if the possession be not quietly delivered.” 3 Blackstone *412.
The common-law knock and announce principle was woven quickly into the fabric of early American law. Most of the States that ratified the Fourth Amendment had enacted constitutional provisions or statutes generally incorporating English common law, see, e. g., N. J. Const. of 1776, §22, in 5 Federal and State Constitutions 2598 (F. Thorpe ed. 1909) (“[T]he common law of England... shall still remain in force, until [it] shall be altered by a future law of the Legislature”); N. Y. Const. of 1777, Art. 35, in id., at 2635 (“[S]uch parts of the common law of England ... as ... did form the law of [New York on April 19, 1775] shall be and continue the law of this State, subject to such alterations and provisions as the legislature of this State shall, from time to time, make concerning the same”); Ordinances of May 1776, ch. 5, § 6, in 9 Statutes at Large of Virginia 127 (W. Hening ed. 1821) (“[T]he common law of England ... shall be the rule of decision, and shall be considered as in full force, until the same shall be altered by the legislative power of this colony”), and a few States had enacted statutes specifically embracing the common-law view that the breaking of the door of a dwelling was permitted once admittance was refused, see, e. g., Act of Nov. 8, 1782, ch. 15, ¶ 6, in Acts and Laws of Massachusetts 193 (1782); Act of Apr. 13, 1782, ch. 39, §3, in 1 Laws of the State of New York 480 (1886); Act of June 24, 1782, ch. 317, § 18, in Acts of the General Assembly of New-Jersey (1784) (reprinted in The First Laws of the State of New Jersey 293-294 (J. Cushing comp. 1981)); Act of Dec. 23, 1780, ch. 925, § 5, in 10 Statutes at Large of Pennsylvania 255 (J. Mitchell & H. Flanders comp. 1904). Early American courts similarly embraced the common-law knock and announce principle. See, e. g., Walker v. Fox, 32 Ky. 404, 405 (1834); Burton v. Wilkinson, 18 Vt. 186, 189 (1846); Howe v. Butterfield, 58 Mass. 302, 305 (1849). See generally Blakey, The Rule of Announcement and Unlawful Entry, 112 U. Pa. L. Rev. 499, 504-508 (1964) (collecting cases).
Our own cases have acknowledged that the common-law principle of announcement is “embedded in Anglo-American law,” Miller v. United States, 357 U. S. 301, 313 (1958), but we have never squarely held that this principle is an element of the reasonableness inquiry under the Fourth Amendment. We now so hold. Given the longstanding common-law endorsement of the practice of announcement, we have little doubt that the Framers of the Fourth Amendment thought that the method of an officer’s entry into a dwelling was among the factors to be considered in assessing the reasonableness of a search or seizure. Contrary to the decision below, we hold that in some circumstances an officer’s unannounced entry into a home might be unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
This is not to say, of course, that every entry must be preceded by an announcement. The Fourth Amendment’s flexible requirement of reasonableness should not be read to mandate a rigid rule of announcement that ignores countervailing law enforcement interests. As even petitioner concedes, the common-law principle of announcement was never stated as an inflexible rule requiring announcement under all circumstances. See Ker v. California, 374 U. S. 23, 38 (1963) (plurality opinion) (“[I]t has been recognized from the early common law that... breaking is permissible in executing an arrest under certain circumstances”); see also, e. g., White & Wiltsheire, 2 Rolle 137, 138, 81 Eng. Rep. 709, 710 (K. B. 1619) (upholding the sheriff’s breaking of the door of the plaintiff’s dwelling after the sheriff’s bailiffs had been imprisoned in plaintiff’s dwelling while they attempted an earlier execution of the seizure); Pugh v. Griffith, 7 Ad. & E. 827, 840-841, 112 Eng. Rep. 681, 686 (K. B. 1838) (holding that “the necessity of a demand ... is obviated, because there was nobody on whom a demand could be made” and noting that White & Wiltsheire leaves open the possibility that there may be “other occasions where the outer door may be broken” without prior demand).
Indeed, at the time of the framing, the common-law admonition that an officer “ought to signify the cause of his coming,” Semayne’s Case, 5 Co. Rep., at 91b, 77 Eng. Rep., at 195, had not been extended conclusively to the context of felony arrests. See Blakey, supra, at 503 (“The full scope of the application of the rule in criminal cases . . . was never judicially settled”); Launock v. Brown, 2 B. & Ald. 592, 593, 106 Eng. Rep. 482, 483 (K. B. 1819) (“It is not at present necessary for us to decide how far, in the case of a person charged with felony, it would be necessary , to make a previous demand of admittance before you could justify breaking open the outer door of his house”); W. Murfree, Law of Sheriffs and Other Ministerial Officers § 1163, p. 631 (1st ed. 1884) (“[Although there has been some doubt on the question, the better opinion seems to be that, in cases of felony, no demand of admittance is necessary, especially as, in many cases, the delay incident to it would enable the prisoner to escape”). The common-law principle gradually was applied to cases involving felonies, but at the same time the courts continued to recognize that under certain circumstances the presumption in favor of announcement necessarily would give way to contrary considerations.
Thus, because the common-law rule was justified in part by the belief that announcement generally would avoid “the destruction or breaking of any house ... by which great damage and inconvenience might ensue,” Semayne’s Case, supra, at 91b, 77 Eng. Rep., at 196, courts acknowledged that the presumption in favor of announcement would yield under circumstances presenting a threat of physical violence. See, e. g., Read v. Case, 4 Conn. 166, 170 (1822) (plaintiff who “had resolved ... to resist even to the shedding of blood .. . was not within the reason and spirit of the rule requiring notice”); Mahomed v. The Queen, 4 Moore 289, 247, 13 Eng. Rep. 293, 296 (P. C. 1843) (“While he was firing pistols at them, were they to knock at the door, and to ask him to be pleased to open it for them? The law in its wisdom only requires this ceremony to be observed when it possibly may be attended with some advantage, and may render the breaking open of the outer door unnecessary”). Similarly, courts held that an officer may dispense with announcement in cases where a prisoner escapes from him and retreats to his dwelling. See, e. g., ibid.; Allen v. Martin, 10 Wend. 300, 304 (N. Y. Sup. Ct. 1833). Proof of “demand and refusal” was deemed unnecessary in such cases because it would be a “senseless ceremony” to require an officer in pursuit of a recently escaped arrestee to make an announcement prior to breaking the door to retake him. Id., at 304. Finally, courts have indicated that unannounced entry may be justified where police officers have reason to believe that evidence would likely be destroyed if advance notice were given. See Ker, supra, at 40-41 (plurality opinion); People v. Maddox, 46 Cal. 2d 301, 305-306, 294 P. 2d 6, 9 (1956).
We need not attempt a comprehensive catalog of the relevant countervailing factors here. For now, we leave to the lower courts the task of determining the circumstances under which an unannounced entry is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. We simply hold that although a search or seizure of a dwelling might be constitutionally defective if police officers enter without prior announcement, law enforcement interests may also establish the reasonableness of an unannounced entry.
III
Respondent contends that the judgment below should be affirmed because the unannounced entry in this case was justified for two reasons. First, respondent argues that police officers reasonably believed that a prior announcement would have placed them in peril, given their knowledge that petitioner had threatened a government informant with a semiautomatic weapon and that Mr. Jacobs had previously been convicted of arson and firebombing. Second, respondent suggests that prior announcement would have produced an unreasonable risk that petitioner would destroy easily disposable narcotics evidence.
These considerations may well provide the necessary justification for the unannounced entry in this case. Because the Arkansas Supreme Court did not address their sufficiency, however, we remand to allow the state courts to make any necessary findings of fact and to make the determination of reasonableness in the first instance. The judgment of the Arkansas Supreme Court is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
See, e.g., People v. Gonzalez, 211 Cal. App. 3d 1043, 1048, 259 Cal. Rptr. 846, 848 (1989) (“Announcement and demand for entry at the time of service of a search warrant [are] part of Fourth Amendment reasonableness”); People v. Saeckao, 129 Ill. 2d 522, 531, 544 N. E. 2d 745, 749 (1989) (“[T]he presence or absence of such an announcement is an important consideration in determining whether subsequent entry to arrest or search is constitutionally reasonable”) (internal quotation marks omitted); Commonwealth v. Goggin, 412 Mass. 200, 202, 587 N. E. 2d 785, 787 (1992) (“Our knock and announce rule is one of common law which is not constitutionally compelled”).
This “knock and announce” principle appears to predate even Semayne’s Case, which is usually cited as the judicial source of the common-law standard. Semayne’s Case itself indicates that the doctrine may be traced to a statute enacted in 1275, and that at that time the statute was “but an affirmance of the common law.” 5 Co. Rep., at 91b, 77 Eng. Rep., at 196 (referring to 3 Edw. I, ch. 17, in 1 Statutes at Large from Magna Carta to Hen. 6 (O. Ruffhead ed. 1769) (providing that if any person takes the beasts of another and causes them “to be driven into a Castle or Fortress,” if the sheriff makes “solem[n] deman[d]” for deliverance of the beasts, and if the person “did not cause the Beasts to be delivered incontinent,” the King “shall cause the said Castle or Fortress to be beaten down without Recovery”)).
In Miller, our discussion focused on the statutory requirement of announcement found in 18 U. S. C. § 3109 (1958 ed.), not on the constitutional requirement of reasonableness. See 357 U. S., at 306, 308, 313. See also Sabbath v. United States, 391 U. S. 585, 591, n. 8 (1968) (suggesting that both the “common law” rule of announcement and entry and its “exceptions” were codified in § 3109); Ker v. California, 374 U. S. 23,40-41 (1963) (plurality opinion) (reasoning that an unannounced entry was reasonable under the “exigent circumstances” of that case, without addressing the antecedent question whether the lack of announcement might render a search unreasonable under other circumstances).
Respondent and its amici also ask us to affirm the denial of petitioner’s suppression motion on an alternative ground: that exclusion is not a constitutionally compelled remedy where the unreasonableness of a search stems from the failure of announcement. Analogizing to the “independent source” doctrine applied in Segura v. United States, 468 U. S. 796, 805, 813-816 (1984), and the “inevitable discovery” rule adopted in Nix v. Williams, 467 U. S. 431, 440-448 (1984), respondent and its amici argue that any evidence seized after an unreasonable, unannounced entry is causally disconnected from the constitutional violation and that exclusion goes beyond the goal of precluding any benefit to the government flowing from the constitutional violation. Because this remedial issue was not addressed by the court below and is not within the narrow question on which we granted certiorari, we decline to address these arguments.
Question: What is the issue area of the decision?
A. Criminal Procedure
B. Civil Rights
C. First Amendment
D. Due Process
E. Privacy
F. Attorneys
G. Unions
H. Economic Activity
I. Judicial Power
J. Federalism
K. Interstate Relations
L. Federal Taxation
M. Miscellaneous
N. Private Action
Answer:
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A
|
sc_issuearea
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