Case Title: State of Oregon v. Wojahn

Citation: 204 Or. 84, 282 P.2d 675

Docket Number: 

State: oregon

Court: Oregon Supreme Court

Date: 1955-04-13T00:00:00Z

Document:
Reversed April 13, 1955.
*86 James J. Kennedy, Deputy District Attorney, Portland, argued the cause for appellant. With him on the brief were John B. McCourt, District Attorney, Portland, and Robert Y. Thornton, Attorney General, Salem.
Howard K. Beebe, Portland, argued the cause for respondent. On the brief were Maguire, Shields, Morrison & Bailey, Portland.
REVERSED.
ROSSMAN, J.
This is an appeal by the state from a judgment of the circuit court which was entered in favor of the defendant after the court had sustained a demurrer to the indictment upon the ground that the indictment did not charge the commission of a crime.
The indictment is based upon Oregon's negligent homicide statute, ORS 163.090. The latter was amended, after the indictment was filed, by Oregon Laws 1953, ch 676, § 2. The material part of ORS 163.090 follows:
ORS 161.010 says:
The indictment charges that the defendant, on July 7, 1953, "negligently operated a motor vehicle upon Northeast Broadway Street in the City of Portland," and gives the following particulars:
The indictment avers that the defendant, while operating his car in the above manner, injured one Thomas Howell, who on the same day died "as a proximate result" of the defendant's negligence.
The defendant-respondent does not claim that the indictment fails to charge him with negligence. His challenge of the indictment is in fact a challenge of ORS 163.090. The defendant's brief makes these charges against the act (which was Oregon Laws 1941, ch 439, § 3):
The issues presented by those contentions are not unprecedented. Many states have legislation comparable to ours, and their acts have been the subject of judicial attention. Although our negligent homicide act controlled the outcome in State v. Smith, 198 Or 31, 255 P2d 1076, and State v. Coffman, 171 Or 166, 136 P2d 687, no one questioned its adherence to constitutional requirements.
Before turning to the decisions of the other jurisdictions which determined the validity of comparable legislation we will take note of the fact that penal statutes, which authorize a determination of an accused's guilt or innocence by applying to his challenged act a criterion of due care, are not strangers to this jurisdiction. One act of that kind is our involuntary manslaughter act, ORS 163.040, subsection 2; another is our act which governs the speed of motor vehicles, ORS 483.102.
ORS 163.040, subsection 2, says:
*89 The penalty for manslaughter is "imprisonment in the penitentiary for not more than 15 years and by a fine not exceeding $5,000." ORS 163.080. The first sentence of ORS 163.040, subsection 2, in substantially its present language, became a part of our laws in 1864.
It will be observed that the above section of our manslaughter act authorizes a finding that the accused is guilty if the fatal lawful act was committed "without due caution or circumspection." We have noticed that the negligent homicide act renders the accused guilty if he drove "in a negligent manner" and thereby inflicted an injury, as a proximate result of which the victim died within one year.
According to a note in 31 California Law Review 215, negligent homicide acts have been enacted "because of the difficulty of getting manslaughter convictions in automobile death cases." Since the criteria employed by the two acts as the means of determining guilt are virtually alike, the jury's reluctance to convict of manslaughter and its response to duty under the negligent homicide act must come from something other than the criteria which determine guilt.
Giving attention only to the phraseology in which the two measures are cast, we observe that the differences between manslaughter and negligent homicide are (a) the title for the new crime is less grisly in its connotation than that of the old; (b) a lesser penalty is prescribed for negligent homicide than for manslaughter; (c) the test for negligent homicide is "in a negligent manner", whereas manslaughter takes as its test "due caution or circumspection"; (d) the manslaughter act prescribes no period within which death must ensue, but the negligent homicide act fixes as the period one year.
1. In its administration of the manslaughter act, this court has regarded the term "without due caution or *90 circumspection" as the virtual equivalent of the term "negligence". For example, State v. Miller, 119 Or 409, 243 P 72 (affirmed per curiam 273 US 657, 47 S Ct 344, 71 L Ed 825; and see the comment in Cline v. Frink Dairy Co., 274 US 445, 464, 47 S Ct 681, 71 L Ed 1146, upon State v. Miller) said:
See, also, State v. Boag, 154 Or 354, 59 P2d 396; State v. Newberg, 129 Or 564, 278 P 568; and State v. Clark, 99 Or 629, 196 P 360.
The above section of the manslaughter act has been enforced many times, yet no one has ever called upon the act to sustain its validity. State v. Boag, supra; State v. Lockwood, 126 Or 118, 268 P 1016; State v. Trent, 122 Or 444, 252 P 975, 259 P 893; State v. Newberg, supra; State v. Miller, supra; State v. Clark, supra; State v. Justus, 11 Or 178. Its validity has been taken for granted.
The above indicates that ever since its enactment in 1864 the precursor of the negligent homicide statute has been treated as constitutional. Seemingly, no doubt has ever been entertained upon that score. We also see from the foregoing that the formula of "due caution or circumspection", which the manslaughter act employs as the test of an accused's conduct, has been treated as correlative of "negligence", and that no difficulty has been experienced in drafting indictments under the act, or with any other phase of the act's administration.
*91 ORS 483.102, which we mentioned in the preceding paragraph, follows:
ORS 483.990, subsection (2), says:
Subsection (3) of ORS 483.102 authorizes the imposition of a penalty somewhat greater than the one prescribed in subsection (2) if the defendant, in addition to violating the basic rule, violated other regulations which pertain to speed.
Rauw v. Huling, 199 Or 48, 259 P2d 99, declares:
*92 In State v. Anthony, 179 Or 282, 169 P2d 587, the court said:
See, also, State v. Lockwood, supra.
If the defendant's contention is correct, that criminal statutes which determine the lawfulness of an accused's conduct by the application of a test, such as reasonable speed, are vague and therefore unconstitutional, then Rauw v. Huling, supra, in holding that the basic rule of ORS 483.102 is the ultimate test and that the designated speeds are nothing more than "a rule of evidence", had the startling effect of rendering a major feature of our traffic laws unconstitutional.
Although this court has many times applied the provisions of our traffic laws which contain the basic rule, it has never manifested any misgiving concerning the validity of the statute. See, for example, in addition to Rauw v. Huling, supra, Prauss v. Adamski, 195 Or 1, 244 P2d 598, Morris v. Fitzwater, 187 Or 191, 210 P2d 104.
In State v. Magaha, 182 Md 122, 32 A2d 477, the court said:
The validity of speed regulations such as ours is generally recognized. Gallagher v. State, 193 Ind 629, 141 NE 347, 29 ALR 1059; 8 Blashfield, Cyclopedia of Automobile *93 Law and Practice, §§ 5308, 5309, 5310; Huddy, Cyclopedia of Automobile Law, § 92.
The foregoing shows that this court, through a succession of decisions, has deemed constitutional (1) ORS 163.040, which selects as the test of guilt "without due caution or circumspection", and (2) ORS 483.102, which includes this phrase, "reasonable and prudent, having due regard to the traffic, surface and width of the highway, the hazard at intersections and any other conditions then existing."
We shall now turn to the decisions of other jurisdictions which determined the validity of negligent homicide statutes. Legislation, substantially similar to ours, enacted in other states has been assailed with contentions similar to those set forth in the language which we quoted from the defendant's brief.
The pioneer negligent homicide statute was adopted in 1921 by the State of Michigan. It provided:
People v. McMurchy, 249 Mich 147, 228 NW 723, sustained the validity of the part of the Michigan statute above quoted and in so doing held adversely to virtually every contention which the respondent in the case at bar submits. The sole exception is the respondent's fourth contention. People v. McMurchy is entitled to more than ordinary weight because it was preceded by two earlier cases which, as is evident from the *94 following quotations taken from it, required the court to construe the Michigan statute and determine its validity:
It will be noticed from the excerpt which we quoted from the McMurchy decision that the court divided evenly in People v. Maki upon the validity of the act. The decision in the Maki case, which proposed to hold the act invalid, was written by Justice Potter. The latter's opinion became the keynote of the brief submitted by the respondent in the case at bar. Yet one year and ten days after Justice Potter penned his opinion and the court had divided equally, all, including Justice Potter, united in holding the act constitutional. The occasion was People v. McMurchy. In the latter, the principal opinion was written by Justice Butzel. Justice McDonald, who had concurred in the opinion which Justice Potter filed in People v. Maki, concurred in the result of the McMurchy case. Justice Fead, who, also, had concurred in Justice Potter's opinion, wrote a specially concurring opinion, in which he declared:
Justice Potter concurred with Justice Fead and, therefore, with Justice Butzel. Thus all eight members of the court agreed upon the validity of the act. A decision which was preceded by the extensive analysis which is reflected by People v. McMurchy is entitled to more than ordinary weight.
Let us now take note of the specific holding in the McMurchy decision. The Michigan statute contained the following provision, which is absent from ours:
The McMurchy decision deemed that provision invalid as an effort to divest the courts of their judicial power. All other parts of the act were upheld. Under the court's construction, the Michigan act accepted as the test for determining guilt the standard of due care. It said:
Continuing, it declared:
As will be recalled, the respondent in the instant case argues that our act is vague and indefinite. He claims that since it does not require mens rea, a motorist as he proceeds along the highway can never know when he is subjecting himself to criminal liability. Justice Butzel gave attention to a similar contention. In answering it he quoted in part from Justice Cooley in People v. W. Roby, 52 Mich 577, 579, 18 NW 365, 366, 50 Am Rep 270, as follows:
Presently Justice Butzel took note of the insuperable difficulty which a draftsman of a penal traffic act would encounter if he attempted to prohibit negligent *97 driving without employing the terms of civil negligence. Then he said:
At that point Judge Butzel reviewed decisions in which it was claimed that the standard set by the statute under attack was so vague that the statute violated the due process clause. At the conclusion of his review, he said:
The California legislature and the courts of that state have repeatedly given attention to negligent homicide legislation. In 1935 California enacted § 500, Vehicle Code of California (St. 1935, p. 173), which provided:
Apart from its second alternative, the act is substantially the same as ours. People v. Pryor, 17 Cal App2d 147, 61 P2d 773, in upholding the constitutionality of the act, placed this construction upon it:
People v. Pociask, 14 Cal2d 679, 96 P2d 788, was, likewise, an appeal by a motorist from a conviction under the California act. The appellant contended that the trial judge erred when he refused to charge the jury that the defendant's driving could not warrant a finding of negligence unless it amounted to "a flagrant and reckless disregard of the safety of others and a wilful indifference to possible injuries, or consist of the doing of a lawful act in a culpably reckless manner." As support for that contention, he depended in part upon § 20 of the California penal code, which provided: "In every crime or public offense there must exist a union, or joint operation of act and intent, or criminal negligence." In charging the jury, the trial judge read § 7 of the penal code, which contained the following:
In sustaining the conviction, the court reasoned:
In 1941 California amended its negligent homicide act by substituting for the phrase "in a negligent manner", as it appeared in the 1935 act, this expression, "with reckless disregard of, or wilful indifference to, the safety of others." Stat. 1941, ch 279, § 1. The *101 amendment was construed in People v. Young, 20 Cal 2d 832, 129 P2d 353; People v. Montes, 56 Cal App2d 30, 131 P2d 581; and People v. Murray, 58 Cal App2d 239, 136 P2d 389. In the Young decision, the court said:
California Statutes 1943, chapter 421, section 1, repealed the negligent homicide act. In 1945 the state again enacted legislation upon the subject of death caused through the operation of motor vehicles, but, in the meantime, the prosecution of death-dealing drivers was under the state's manslaughter act. People v. Ely, 71 Cal App2d 729, 163 P2d 453. Statutes 1945, chapter 1006, provided as follows:
People v. Wilson, 78 Cal App2d 108, 177 P2d 567, held that a conviction was authorized under subdivision (b) even though the accused was guilty of only ordinary negligence. The decision reasoned that negligent driving was unlawful and that, likewise, an infraction of the state's traffic laws rendered the driving unlawful within the purview of subdivision (b). The court ruled that neither wilfulness nor wantonness were essential elements of the crime defined in the 1945 act. We take the following from the decision:
The charge to the jury explained the principles of ordinary negligence. The defendant's conviction was affirmed. To life effect are People v. Mead, 126 Cal App2d 164, 271 P2d 619; People v. Flores, 83 Cal App2d 11, 187 P2d 910; People v. Lett, 77 Cal App2d 917, 177 P2d 47; and People v. Barnett, 77 Cal App2d 299, 175 P2d 237.
We see from the foregoing that under the California act of 1945 a motorist whose driving causes a death may be convicted of manslaughter if the operation of his car was unlawful or if the car was operated in an unlawful manner. Ordinary negligence, or a violation of traffic regulations suffices to establish *103 that the operation of the car constituted "an unlawful act" and likewise that the vehicle was operated "in an unlawful manner."
A recent decision which maintained the validity of another negligent homicide statute is State v. Ashton, 175 Kan 164, 262 P2d 123. The Kansas statute follows:
The appealing defendant contended that the act violated a provision of the Kansas bill of rights, which reads:
He also contended that the statute violated the due process clause of the Constitution of the United States. In construing the statute, the court reasoned:
It said:
The court disposed of the defendant's contentions in this way:
The following is taken from State v. Schaeffer, 96 Ohio St 215, 117 NE 220:
United States v. Henderson, 121 F2d 75, upheld as valid the negligent homicide act of the District of Columbia, which provided:
The lower court sustained the defendant's motion to quash the information. Upon appeal, the defendant (respondent) contended that the act was uncertain and indefinite and, therefore, unconstitutional. The decision resolved the contention against the defendant and supported its conclusion with a wealth of authority. We take the following from the decision:
The decision in Commonwealth v. Pentz, 247 Mass 500, 143 NE 322, written by Chief Justice Rugg, sustained a Massachusetts act which declared: "* * * whoever upon any way operates a motor vehicle * * * so that the lives or safety of the public might be endangered" is subject to punishment. The defendant, who had been adjudged guilty of a violation of that act, argued that the latter trenched upon the Fourteenth Amendment and provisions of the Massachusetts constitution which (1) require all crimes to be "fully and plainly, substantially and formally described to him" (the accused), and (2) guarantee the accused "the judgment of his peers, or the law of the land." The decision said:
The decision also said:
State v. Magaha, 182 Md 122, 32 A2d 477, sustained the validity of an ordinance of the city of Baltimore, which provided:
The court said:
In Pehl v. State (Tex Cr App), 223 SW2d 238, the appellant had been found guilty of the crime of negligent homicide of the first degree. The statute provided:
The appellant claimed that the statute was void for want of due process and for failure to state with reasonable certainty the elements of the offense. In rejecting the contentions, the court declared:
The decision from which we just quoted was preceded by Young v. State (Tex Cr App), 47 SW2d 320, which affirmed the defendant's conviction of the crime of aggravated assault. The conviction was based upon the defendant's act in driving his automobile down a narrow city street at a speed of about 45 miles an hour, thereby injuring a child. The defendant moved to quash the information upon the ground that the statute creating the crime was vague and indefinite. The statute required that the act must be done "wilfully, or with negligence, as is defined in this title in the chapter *110 on negligent homicide." We now quote from the decision:
The People v. Garman, 411 Ill 279, 103 NE2d 636, held valid a statute which reads as follows:
The court said:
We pause upon the decision just reviewed for the purpose of taking note of a fact to which we have already alluded; that is, that in our state the word "negligence" is expressly defined by ORS 161.010. Again, ORS 132.710 says:
Further, ORS 42.250 says:
The decisions reviewed in the preceding paragraphs were based upon statutes similar to, or closely resembling, the act under attack. In sustaining the legislation above reviewed, the courts rejected contentions which were counterparts of those made by the defendant, with the exception of the one which he predicates upon Article I, section 15, Oregon Constitution. Unless we misread the defendant's brief, his principal argument against the validity of the negligent homicide statute is that the latter's terms are vague and do not enable a motorist to know when his driving transgresses the law. He points to the fact that the challenged statute does not include any requirement of moral culpability, but that argument is intended to amplify his contention that statutes which depend upon criteria of a general nature must include an element of mens rea lest a *112 person of good purposes become enmeshed unwittingly in their violation.
We shall now review the cases concerning the operation of motor vehicles which the defendant cites.
From Ex parte Chernosky (Tex Cr App), 217 SW2d 673, we quote:
The court continued:
The Chernosky opinion did not mention Young v. State, which we reviewed in a preceding paragraph, and in which the court said:
Manifestly, the Chernosky opinion did not undertake to repudiate the assertion just quoted. In 27 Ky Law Jour 111 it is stated:
*113 State v. Lantz, 90 WVa 738, 111 SE 766, held void a part of a statute enacted in 1921 which read as follows:
The court deemed the above part vague, indefinite and invalid. It said:
The Lantz decision was distinguished in State v. Mangus, 120 WVa 415, 198 SE 872, which held a statute constitutional which made it a crime to drive "carelessly and heedlessly in wilful or wanton disregard of the rights or safety of others, or without due caution and circumspection and at a speed or in a manner so as to endanger or be likely to endanger any person or property." In sustaining the validity of that statute, the court noted: "The last thirty years have brought into daily use in the United States millions of motor vehicles." It observed that "Experience has proven that all too often those in charge of such vehicles are strangely indifferent to the welfare of others." The Lantz decision was again distinguished in State v. Hamilton, 133 WVa 394, 56 SE2d 544, where the statute construed in State v. Mangus was once more before the court. In the Hamilton decision, the court declared:
Hayes v. State, 11 Ga App 371, 75 SE 523, decided in 1912, is mentioned four times in the defendant's brief and in one place is honored by extensive quotation. The Hayes decision had as its subject matter a Georgia statute enacted in 1910 which rendered penal the operation of an automobile "at a rate of speed greater than is reasonable and proper, having regard to the traffic and use of such highway, or so as to endanger the life or limb of any person or the safety of any property." It held the provision just quoted "too uncertain and indefinite in its terms to be capable of enforcement." We quote again from the decision:
We now turn to Gaines v. The State, 80 Ga App 512, 56 SE2d 772, which was written thirty-seven years after the Hayes decision and when greater experience had been had with automobile operation and traffic laws:
Next, the defendant's brief cites and quotes from Justice Potter's opinion in People v. Maki, supra. It acknowledges that Justice Potter's views did not prevail, but describes his opinion as "scholarly and magnificently logical." A preceding paragraph of this decision gives sufficient attention to that opinion.
*117 Finally, the defendant's brief acclaims Rex v. Bateman, 19 Crim App Rep 8, a decision by the Court of Criminal Appeals. That decision arose out of a charge of manslaughter made against a medical practitioner who, according to the charge, failed to employ the requisite degree of care in the performance of professional service. The court held:
Andrews v. Director of Public Prosecutions, 26 Crim App Rep 34, decided by the House of Lords in 1937, is more recent than Rex v. Bateman. It was based upon a charge of manslaughter which was filed against the driver of a motor vehicle who, while attempting to overtake a car ahead, ran down a pedestrian. The charge to the jury spoke of recklessness and of driving "in a dangerous manner." The accused was found guilty and was sentenced to 15 months' imprisonment. Further, the sentence disqualified him for life from holding a driver's license. The instructions to the jury were the subject of attack in the House of Lords. In affirming the judgment, Lord Atkin, in referring to the earlier decisions upon manslaughter, stated:
*118 Next, he declared:
The other members of the court concurred in Lord Atkin's opinion.
Lord Atkin's conception of the law, of which we have just taken notice, created disappointment. Manslaughter and Dangerous Driving, 53 Law Quar Rev 380, which appeared shortly after the pronouncement of Lord Atkin, said:
We interrupt the quotation for the purpose of stating that by "section 11" reference was made to the English Road Traffic Act, 1934. Going on, the treatise stated:
Let us return for a moment to Rex v. Bateman, supra. In it the court stated:
Concerning that delineation of the crime of manslaughter, we now revert to the treatise from which we quoted:
The treatise showed that as a result of the decision by the House of Lords, negligence in England assumes three forms: (1) one for civil liability; (2) a higher degree for manslaughter; and (3) a different degree for "dangerous driving" under the Roard Traffic Act. The treatise closed with the observation:
It is evident that the advent of the automobile and the ever-increasing number of casualties inflicted by its operation have created problems which the English *121 courts have not been able to solve satisfactorily while attempting to display fealty  possibly faltering fealty  to the ancient rule that manslaughter requires proof of nothing less than gross negligence. In Manslaughter and Dangerous Driving, 53 Law Quar Rev 380, it is stated:
And see Mens Rea and Motorists, 5 Cambridge Law Jour 61.
We now revert to a case which had its inception in Oregon and which later received illuminating treatment in the Federal Supreme Court. State v. Miller, 119 Or 409, 243 P 72 (affirmed per curiam 273 US 657) approved a judgment of the circuit court which found the defendant guilty of involuntary manslaughter. The indictment charged the defendant with
At that point the indictment added:
The defendant demurred to the indictment and, at the close of the state's case in chief, moved for a dismissal. The opinion states:
*122 The alleged "unlawful act" was the negligent operation of the automobile. In appealing, the defendant did not challenge the validity of the statute, but contested the sufficiency of the indictment. In sustaining the latter, the decision said:
The statute provided that motorists
Thus, the indictment followed the words of the statute. The decision declared:
A memorandum opinion in 273 US 657, approved State v. Miller by saying: "Affirmed on the authority of Nash v. United States, 229 US 373." The Nash decision was based upon indictments which accused the defendant of (a) a conspiracy in restraint of trade and (b) a conspiracy to monopolize trade. A demurrer was filed to the double indictment on the ground that *123 the statute upon which the indictment was based was so vague as to be inoperative as a criminal law. In sustaining the validity of the statute, the court said:
*124 The court said that "the Sherman Act punishes the conspiracies at which it is aimed on the common law footing".
Before proceeding further with State v. Miller, it is necessary to take note of Cline v. Frink Dairy Co., 274 US 445, 47 SCt 681, 71 L Ed 1146, which held that the Colorado anti-trust law lacked a fixed standard for determining guilt and that it, therefore, required juries, in cases based upon the act, to perform legislative, not judicial, functions. In reaching its conclusion, the decision, written by Chief Justice Taft, gave attention to some of the authorities which the defendant in the case at bar commends to our attention: United States v. Cohen Grocery Co., 255 US 81, 41 SCt 298, 65 L Ed 516, 14 ALR 1045; International Harvester Co. v. Kentucky, 234 US 216, 34 SCt 853, 58 L Ed 1284; Connally v. General Construction Co., 269 US 385, 46 SCt 126, 70 L Ed 322; and Collins v. Kentucky, 234 US 634, 34 SCt 924, 58 L Ed 1510. United States v. Cohen Grocery Co. was concerned with the federal food control act, and held that the phrase of that act, "any unjust or unreasonable rate or charge in handling or dealing in or with any necessaries" set up no ascertainable standard and was repugnant to the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. International Harvester Co. v. Kentucky was based upon four items of Kentucky legislation which dealt with the subject of combinations to control prices. The legislation was held unconstitutional as violative of the Fourteenth Amendment. It offered no standard of conduct to guide a person before he acted. Connally v. General Construction Co. held invalid an Oklahoma statute which imposed penalties upon contractors with the state who paid their workmen less than the "current rate per diem wages in the locality where the work is performed." In holding the act void for uncertainty, *125 the court cited the due process clause. Collins v. Kentucky deemed invalid a Kentucky statute which authorized persons who produced commodities to form pools or combines for the purpose of obtaining better prices. The act was held violative of the Fourteenth Amendment because it prescribed no standard of conduct. Before returning to the Cline decision, we take the following from the International Harvester opinion:
Those words are significant. We have seen that a statute of this state, as well as the common law, defines the word "negligence". The fact that the definition fails to indicate the course which a prudent person would take under the circumstances of any case before a court may be deemed a deficiency in the definition. But the judicial output of several centuries has given us "a great body of precedents" which supply some of the wants and render the definition workable. That situation was not present in the International Harvester case. There, it was claimed that the defendant (Harvester Company) had combined with others for the purpose of enhancing prices. Under Kentucky law, combinations were lawful if they went no further than to restore an equilibrium that had been disturbed by a combination of buyers or by other factors. They were unlawful only if they had the effect of fixing a *126 price that was greater or less than the real value of the article. Thus, if the law was valid, a person, in the exercise of his right to combine with others, was forced to guess the real value which his article would have possessed if no adverse combination had been formed. It was for that reason that the act was struck down. We now reach the part of the Cline decision which has direct bearing upon the case before us:
It will be observed that the Oregon statute which the court quoted in the Cline decision, and which was held free from infirmity, was expressed in part in words which had gained for themselves well-established legal meanings. For example, one of the act's terms was this, "careful and prudent manner". Scores, if *127 not hundreds, of decisions illustrate the definition which has been given to that term. Thus, "a great body of precedents" aids anyone who falters upon the import of "careful and prudent manner". Upon the other hand, the statutes governing the business, economic and trade activities, which were condemned in the Supreme Court decisions cited in our review of the Cline case, were phrased in diction which neither the dictionaries nor the language of the law rendered sufficiently certain in meaning so that those who wished to engage in those activities could determine whether his contemplated course of action would constitute a violation of the law.
From the viewpoint of the issues presented by the defendant in the case at bar, the statute which received approval in State v. Miller was not materially different from the one now before us. Both, in regulating the manner in which motor vehicles may operate, employ words of long-established legal use. Judicial interpretation has hemmed in the import of the controlling terms of both statutes until the meaning of each word is in a closely confined corral; and the definitions which the courts have assigned to the controlling words are illustrated by the facts of numerous decisions.
State v. Schriber, 185 Or 615, 205 P2d 149, and State v. Anthony, 179 Or 282, 169 P2d 587, are in accord with the principles enunciated in the decisions of the Federal Supreme Court which we reviewed in preceding paragraphs, and illustrate the operation of those principles.
State v. Anthony, supra, elucidates the manner in which the meaning of a statute can be made certain by employing words of established meaning. It reiterated the rule that legislation which creates a crime *128 unknown to the common law must be expressed in clear language. It said:
Then it evinced the way in which the needed clarity can be achieved. Through resort to a text, it said:
The decision cited authorities showing that a statute's use of terms which possess established meanings may render its purpose clear and thus enable it to escape condemnation under the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
State v. Schriber, supra, illustrates well the operation of the rule that the use of terms which have an ascertainable meaning may render the statute's meaning certain. The penal statute under scrutiny in that case provided punishment for anyone who had in his possession cattle afflicted with Bang's disease, but did not define the term. Clearly, this was an instance of the creation of a new offense by a statute which did not define the meaning of an important phrase which it employed. The circuit court held the statute invalid after finding that the term Bang's disease had no established meaning. Referring to that finding, our decision declared, "We do not agree." By resort to dictionaries, legislation, encyclopedias, medical treatises, public discussion, judicial decisions and bulletins published by agricultural colleges, the decision demonstrated that the meaning of the term "Bang's disease" could be ascertained with certainty. The decision went on to show how courts may acquaint themselves with *129 the material which is necessary to unlock the meaning of technical terms employed in statutes by pointing out:
The Schriber decision was not deterred by the fact that some book or other may not give a complete definition of the term in issue or may contain an inaccurate definition, for it said:
The statute was sustained.
But, as we have seen, the defendant argues that unless a criminal statute includes as one of the elements which constitute the crime a culpable state of mind, the due process clause condemns it. We do not believe that any decision reviewed in the preceding paragraphs concerning motorists sustains the defendant's contention, with the possible exception of Andrews v. Director of Public Prosecutions, supra. However, in that case, Lord Atkin declared: "I do not myself find the connotations of mens rea helpful in distinguishing between degrees of negligence, * * *."
The position taken by the defendant finds support in State v. Prince, 52 NM 15, 189 P2d 993, which deemed repugnant to the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment a statute which read:
The court found:
Before condemning the statute, the court declared:
Then it ruled:
Thus, the effort of New Mexico to hold to strict criminal liability one who had been entrusted with the money of another failed.
In 1846 Regina v. Woodrow, 15 M & W 404, held a retail dealer guilty of having adulterated tobacco in his possession even though he had no knowledge of the *131 adulteration or cause to suspect it. The governing statute said nothing about knowledge, intent or negligence in failing to discover adulteration. In reversing the dismissal of the prosecution, Chief Baron Pollock declared:
At that point, counsel protested, "That might require a nice chemical analysis", and received the reply, "You must get someone to make that nice chemical analysis, or you must rely upon the manufacturer, or * * *." Baron Parke spoke in this vein:
Regina v. Stephens, LR 1 QB 702, another public welfare case, reached the same result as the Woodrow decision. It arose out of the pollution of a stream. The defendant's knowledge, or lack thereof, of the pollution which resulted from his operations was held immaterial.
United States v. Balint, 258 US 250, 42 SCt 301, 66 L Ed 604, held to strict criminal accountability one who was accused of violation of the federal Narcotic Act. The latter authorized as penalty a term not exceeding five years. The decision, which was unanimous and which was written by Chief Justice Taft, declared:
United States v. Behrman, 258 US 280, 42 SCt 303, 66 L Ed 619, states:
*133 State v. Prince, supra, did not mention Regina v. Woodrow, supra, Regina v. Stephens, supra, United States v. Balint, supra, or United States v. Behrman, supra.
Morissette v. United States, 342 US 246, 72 SCt 240, 96 L Ed 288, arose out of a charge based upon an embezzlement statute which read:
The defendant, while hunting game upon a tract of uninhabited land which had been used by the armed forces as a practice bombing range, encountered a quantity of spent bomb casings which he thought were abandoned and unwanted. Having found no game, he loaded three tons of the casings upon his truck and, after flattening them, derived $84 from their sale. Upon conviction he was sentenced to two months' imprisonment and to the payment of a fine of $200. The trial judge ruled:
In the decision above cited, the court held that the statute's silence upon the mental element did not indicate that Congress intended to eliminate from the crime a culpable state of mind. Although the New Mexico court depended upon the United States Constitution as the basis for condemning the New Mexico statute, the Morissette opinion did not deem the federal statute *134 unconstitutional, but held that a culpable state of mind remained an element of the crime of embezzlement even though the statute did not expressly name it. It read the element into the statute.
The Morissette decision gave express attention to United States v. Balint, supra, and United States v. Behrman, supra. It mentioned Regina v. Woodrow, supra, and Regina v. Stephens, supra, in its footnotes. After citing the Balint and Behrman decisions, it said:
After mentioning the industrial revolution and the complex mechanisms which it produced, it continued in this vein:
Shortly the decision added:
The court took note of the fact that, normally, the penalties exacted by laws of the kind just mentioned are not severe and do "no great damage to an offender's reputation". Under those conditions, so the decision held, statutes have been construed to mean that "the guilty act alone makes out the crime."
For a penetrating analysis of other decisions that have sustained the conviction of an accused without proof of a culpable state of mind in public welfare cases, see Hall, Principles of Criminal Law 281.
An article in 24 Indiana Law Journal 89 on the subject of mens rea, which contrasts the holding in State v. Prince, supra, with United States v. Balint, supra, discloses the difficulty which confronts anyone who attempts to devise a formula which will segregate the types of crimes in which mens rea is a required element from those in which it is not. In efforts to make the segregation, the distinction between crimes mala in se and mala prohibita, according to the author, is not helpful. And, since all criminal statutes are intended to serve the public welfare, he suggests that nothing is gained by saying that "public welfare statutes" do not call for an element of evil purpose, whereas others do. The Morissette opinion said:
2. It will be noticed that the Morissette opinion refrained from attempting to draw a "precise line" between *136 the kinds of crimes in which mens rea is an essential element and those in which it is not. The article in the Indiana Law Journal which we cited likewise declined to become specific. However, those two dissertations may warrant an inference that, generally, the traditional crimes which are deemed infamous and which have always included mens rea as an element, require proof of culpability even when the crime is placed in statutory form by an enactment which is silent upon the subject. Very likely the same observation is warranted concerning modern variations and revisions of those crimes. But new crimes, created by legislative enactments in the nature of police regulations, and those which have become identified generally under the name of public welfare acts, may dispense with the mental element, especially if conviction under them does not result in great damage to the reputation of the defendant or severe punishment. Legislation of that kind finds its validity, as we saw from the Morissette opinion, in this line of reasoning:
The foregoing constitutes a sufficient review of the authorities. There remains the duty, which we now attempt to perform, of deducing from them the rules which govern the issues of this case.
3-5. A statute which creates a new crime must express itself with clarity so that those who are about to engage in the conduct which it endeavors to prohibit may know by reading the statute that they will be subject to punishment if they proceed. Nothing less than that is required by the due process clause of the Fourteenth *137 Amendment. The same clause renders invalid state penal laws which fail to set forth a standard with sufficient clarity so that those affected by them may know in advance whether or not their contemplated course of conduct will be lawful. The standard must be expressed with such clarity that persons of common intelligence, after reading the statute, will not be compelled to guess as to its import or be unable to determine with reasonable certainty those to whom it is applicable. However, the standard need not be defined with such precision that those affected by it will never be required to hazard their freedom upon correctly foreseeing the manner in which a matter of degree may be resolved by a jury. Although the decisions stress the importance of framing penal laws in terms which will readily disclose the acts and conduct which are proscribed, yet the courts realize the insuperable difficulty which a legislative draftsman would encounter if he were required to describe with precision every dangerous act which people may commit in carrying on a segment of their activities, such as motoring, and which he wishes to outlaw. Therefore, he may catlog a broad category of conduct which he wishes to prohibit by referring to it as negligent driving or reckless driving.
Such, in general, are the rules which govern the issue before us. Let us now return to decisions, such as United States v. Morissette for the purpose of determining whether it was essential to include in the crime of negligent homicide an element of mens rea.
6, 7. As we indicated in a preceding paragraph, negligent homicide statutes were adopted after the manslaughter acts had proved ineffective as a means of repressing the negligence in motor vehicle operation which was causing deaths upon the public thoroughfares. Possibly the success of the new legislation, if *138 it in truth achieved any, resulted from the fact that in common understanding manslaughter acts deal with brutal killings by a debased type of individual, whereas the motorist is generally a reputable citizen, and the wrong committed by him which brought someone to his death finds its counterpart in the driving of many others. State v. Smith, 198 Or 31, 255 P2d 1076, declares:
The challenged act, as we see from the foregoing, is not a type of legislation which was known to the common law, nor is it a variant or modern adaptation of any of the traditional crimes. Since the offense is not a statutory version of any crime known to the common law, this is not an instance in which a court can infer, as was done in State v. Prince, supra, that an essential element was omitted which had been a detail of a common-law counterpart. Likewise, since this is a new crime, we cannot assume, as was done in United States v. Morissette, supra, that something was omitted from the statute with an expectation by the legislature that the courts in construing the act would read the missing part into it. The negligent homicide statute prohibits negligent driving, and the commission of the prohibited act (negligent driving) makes out the crime. The statute deems intent immaterial.
The Oregon negligent homicide statute, in selecting as its touchstone negligence, obviously, was prompted by a conviction that society can reasonably expect of motorists that they exercise due care and since that demand does not require much exertion upon the part of motorists, those who fail to meet the demand can reasonably be held to account. We shall paraphrase *139 one of the judicial utterances in Regina v. Woodrow, supra, by casting it in this form: "So you are here wilfully disobeying the act of the legislature if you do not take pains to drive carefully." The aim of the statute is not the imposition of vindictive punishment, but to save lives. Before any motorist is permitted to enter upon the public thoroughfares, he is required to apply for and receive an operator's license. ORS 482.010 through 482.990. Before a license is issued to him, the secretary of state is required to examine the applicant as to his "knowedge of the traffic laws of this state." Thus, if a licensed motorist violates a traffic law and thereby brings someone to his death, the rule that ignorance of the law is no excuse has a just foundation in the plenary demands of the licensing statute.
8. We are convinced that the negligent homicide statute is a police regulation, and that the legislature did not intend that any form of moral culpability should be an element of the offense. The crime created by the act is not one that casts great stigma upon those convicted, nor is the penalty prescribed by the act so great that its imposition upon those who had no evil purposes tends to shock the sense of natural justice.
Since ORS 161.010 defines the term "negligence", and since the judicial decisions unite in the same definition of it, as well as illustrate its application, we have unusual circumstances which lend clarity to the act's meaning. Furthermore, as we have just seen, every motorist, upon applying for a driver's license and its biennial renewal, is required to display familiarity with all traffic regulations. His familiarity with those regulations is further reason for concluding that the legislature could reasonably infer that the language in which they cast this act is clear in its import.
9. But the defendant advances other arguments *140 against the negligent homicide act which he believes show that it lacks clarity. He suggests that contributory negligence is not a defense under the statute, whereas it is a defense in a civil action based upon charges of negligence. This court has indicated that contributory negligence is not a defense against a charge of manslaughter. State v. Newberg, 129 Or 564, 278 P 568; State v. Miller, 119 Or 409, 243 P 72. However, the act, as we have seen, requires that the death of the person struck by the accused must occur "as the proximate result of injuries caused by" the accused. The defendant also points out that punitive damages in cases based upon charges of negligence cannot be awarded unless the party seeking them shows that the tort was intentional or was prompted by evil design. In actions in which punitive damages are sought, the party-plaintiff is not the state. Civil actions for damages, which are based upon charges of negligence, and criminal prosecution for negligent homicide have purposes which are materially different. The one generally seeks nothing but compensation; the other is intended to promote the public safety. Possibly the difference in the objectives of the two types of cases accounts for the distinction which the defendant mentions.
10, 11. Without further analysis, we express our belief that the negligent homicide statute does not violate the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Likewise, it does not impinge up Article I, section 11, Constitution of Oregon, nor upon Article III, section 1. Article I, section 11, gives the defendant the right "to demand the nature and cause of the accusation against him." This act does not withhold that right. Article III, section 1, is the local adaptation of Montesquieu's doctrine of the separation of powers. The act does not require the jury to determine any issue of law.
*141 12. The defendant presents an argument which was not submitted in any of the cases which we have reviewed. He bases it on Article I, section 15, Constitution of Oregon, which follows:
The defendant argues that the act is too vague in its demands to permit a motorist to know when he has violated its terms and that, accordingly, he cannot know what improvements he should make in his driving. We do not think that the act is vague. We believe that if a motorist, through negligent driving, caused a death, he would have no trouble in reasoning out for himself the course he should pursue in the future. Finally, in State v. Finch, 54 Or 482, the defendant, who was a member of the bar and who had been sentenced to the gallows after having been found guilty of first degree murder, challenged the capital punishment statute on the ground that it violated the provision of the Constitution which we quoted. The argument was rejected as without merit.
The above disposes of all contentions advanced by the parties. It does not mention all of the authorities cited in the briefs, but all have received careful attention.
The judgment of the circuit court is reversed.