Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/101242/stanford-vs-texas
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 04:17:54+00:00

Document:
"books, records, pamphlets, cards, receipts, lists, memoranda, pictures, recordings and other written instruments concerning the Communist Party of Texas."
Officers conducted a search for more than four hours, seizing more than 2,000 items, including stock in trade of petitioner's business and personal books, papers, and documents, but no "records of the Communist Party" or any "party lists and dues payments." Petitioner filed a motion with the magistrate who issued the warrant to have it annulled and the property returned, but the motion was denied.
Held: the protections of the Fourth Amendment are by the Fourteenth Amendment guaranteed against invasion by the States, and the States may not constitutionally issue general warrants which do not describe with particularity the things to be seized, a requirement of the most scrupulous exactitude where the seizure also impinges upon First Amendment freedoms. Pp. 379 U. S. 480 -486.
Order vacated and cause remanded.
Antonio home for the purpose of searching it under authority of a warrant issued by a local magistrate. By the time they had finished, five hours later, they had seized some 2,000 of the petitioner's books, pamphlets, and papers. The question presented by this case is whether the search and seizure were constitutionally valid.
"for the purpose of searching for and seizing any books, records, pamphlets, cards, receipts, lists, memoranda, pictures, recordings, or any written instruments showing that a person or organization is violating or has violated any provision of this Act."
"if the premises to be searched constitute a private residence, such application for a search warrant shall be accompanied by the affidavits of two credible citizens."
concerning the Communist Party of Texas, and the operations of the Communist Party in Texas are unlawfully possessed and used in violation of Articles 6889-3 [ Footnote 1 ] and 6889-3A, Revised Civil Statutes of the State of Texas, and that such belief of this officer is founded upon the following information:"
"That this officer has received information from two credible persons that the party named above has such books and records in his possession which are books and records of the Communist Party, including party lists and dues payments, and in addition other items listed above. That such information is of recent origin, and has been confirmed by recent mailings by Stanford on the 12th of December, 1963 of pro-Communist material."
"Recent mailings by Stanford on the 12th of December, 1963, of material from his home address, such material being identified as pro-Communist material and other information received in the course of investigation that Stanford has in his possession the books and records of the Texas Communist Party."
cards, receipts, lists, memoranda, pictures, recordings and other written instruments concerning the Communist Party of Texas, and the operations of the Communist Party in Texas are unlawfully possessed and used in violation of Article 6889-3 and Article 6889-3A, Revised Civil Statutes of the State of Texas,"
"to enter immediately and search the above described premises for such items listed above unlawfully possessed in violation of Article 6889-3 and Article 6889-3A, Revised Civil Statutes, State of Texas, and to take possession of same."
The warrant was executed by the two Assistant Attorneys General who had signed the affidavit, accompanied by a number of county officers. They went to the place described in the warrant, which was where the petitioner resided and carried on a mail order book business under the trade name "All Points of View." [ Footnote 2 ] The petitioner was not at home when the officers arrived, but his wife was, and she let the officers in after one of them had read the warrant to her.
Browder, Pope John XXIII, and MR. JUSTICE HUGO L. BLACK. The officers also took possession of many of the petitioner's private documents and papers, including his marriage certificate, his insurance policies, his household bills and receipts, and files of his personal correspondence. All this material was packed into 14 cartons and hauled off to an investigator's office in the county courthouse. The officers did not find any "records of the Communist Party" or any "party lists and dues payments."
The petitioner filed a motion with the magistrate who had issued the warrant, asking him to annul the warrant and order the return of all the property which had been seized under it. The motion asserted several federal constitutional claims. After a hearing, the motion was denied without opinion. This order of denial was, as the parties agree, final and not appealable or otherwise reviewable under Texas law. See Ex parte Wolfson, 127 Tex.Cr.R. 277, 75 S.W.2d 440. Accordingly, we granted certiorari, Stanford v. Texas, 377 U.S. 989. See Thompson v. City of Louisville, 362 U. S. 199 , 362 U. S. 202 -203.
magistrate's order denying the motion to annul the warrant and return the property must nonetheless be set aside.
"no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. "
"the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most destructive of English liberty, and the fundamental principles of law, that ever was found in an English law book,"
claims of Great Britain. Then and there the child Independence was born.'"
Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616 , 116 U. S. 625 .
But while the Fourth Amendment was most immediately the product of contemporary revulsion against a regime of writs of assistance, its roots go far deeper. Its adoption in the Constitution of this new Nation reflected the culmination in England a few years earlier of a struggle against oppression which had endured for centuries. The story of that struggle has been fully chronicled in the pages of this Court's reports, [ Footnote 5 ] and it would be a needless exercise in pedantry to review again the detailed history of the use of general warrants as instruments of oppression from the time of the Tudors, through the Star Chamber, the Long Parliament, the Restoration, and beyond.
"to make strict and diligent search for the authors, printers, and publishers of a seditious and treasonable paper, entitled, The North Briton, No. 45, . . . and them, or any of them, having found, to apprehend and seize, together with their papers. [ Footnote 10 ]"
"Armed with their roving commission, they set forth in quest of unknown offenders; and unable to take evidence, listened to rumors, idle tales, and curious guesses. They held in their hands the liberty of every man whom they were pleased to suspect. [ Footnote 11 ]"
"so assumed by the secretary of state is an execution upon all the party's papers, in the first instance. His house is rifled; his most valuable secrets are taken out of his possession, before the paper for which he is charged is found to be criminal by any competent jurisdiction, and before he is convicted either of writing, publishing, or being concerned in the paper."
"[t]he use by government of the power of search and seizure as an adjunct to a system for the suppression of objectionable publications is not new."
Marcus v. Search Warrant, 367 U. S. 717 , at 367 U. S. 724 .
"This history was, of course, part of the intellectual matrix within which our own constitutional fabric was shaped. The bill of Rights was fashioned against the background of knowledge that unrestricted power of search and seizure could also be an instrument for stifling liberty of expression."
(as well as the prohibitions of the Fourth and the Fifth) reflect the teachings of Entick v. Carrington, supra. These three amendments are indeed closely related, safeguarding not only privacy and protection against self-incrimination but 'conscience and human dignity and freedom of expression as well.'"
Frank v. Maryland, 359 U. S. 360 , 359 U. S. 376 (dissenting opinion).
"books, records, pamphlets, cards, receipts, lists, memoranda, pictures, recordings and other written instruments concerning the Communist Party of Texas, and the operations of the Communist Party in Texas."
The indiscriminate sweep of that language is constitutionally intolerable. To hold otherwise would be false to the terms of the Fourth Amendment, false to its meaning, and false to its history.
Two centuries have passed since the historic decision in Entick v. Carrington, almost to the very day. The world has greatly changed, and the voice of nonconformity now sometimes speaks a tongue which Lord Camden might find hard to understand. But the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments guarantee to John Stanford that no official of the State shall ransack his home and seize his books and papers under the unbridled authority of a general warrant -- no less than the law 200 years ago shielded John Entick from the messengers of the King.
The order is vacated, and the cause remanded for further proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
Article 6889-3 of the Revised Civil Statutes of Texas, enacted in 1951 and known as the Texas Communist Control Law, provides, among other things, that various people and organizations defined by the law who fail to register with the Texas Department of Public Safety are guilty of criminal offenses punishable by imprisonment of up to 10 years.
The petitioner had obtained a certificate to transact business under this trade name in accordance with the Texas "Assumed Name Law."
See Pennsylvania v. Nelson, 350 U. S. 497 .
See Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U. S. 108 .
See Marcus v. Search Warrants, 367 U. S. 717 , 367 U. S. 724 -729; Frank v. Maryland, 359 U. S. 360 , 359 U. S. 363 -366 and 359 U. S. 376 -377 (dissenting opinion); see also Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616 .
See Siebert, Freedom of the Press in England, 1476-1776, pp. 83, 85-86, 97.
See Siebert, supra, pp. 374-376.
See Lasson, Development of the Fourth Amendment, p. 43.
II May's Constitutional History of England, 246 (Am.Ed.1864).
"As every American statesman, during our revolutionary and formative period as a nation, was undoubtedly familiar with this monument of English freedom, and considered it as the true and ultimate expression of constitutional law, it may be confidently asserted that its propositions were in the minds of those who framed the fourth amendment to the Constitution. . . ."
Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616 , at 116 U. S. 626 -627.
See XVI Hansard's Parliamentary History of England 207 et seq.
The word "books" in the context of a phrase like "books and records" has, of course, a quite different meaning. A "book" which is no more than a ledger of an unlawful enterprise thus might stand on a quite different constitutional footing from the books involved in the present case. See Marron v. United States, 275 U. S. 192 , 275 U. S. 198 -199. And, in some situations, books even of the kind seized here might, for purposes of the Fourth Amendment, be constitutionally indistinguishable from other goods -- e.g., if the books were stolen property.
See pp. 379 U. S. 479 -480, supra.
"The authority to the police officers under the warrants issued in this case . . . poses problems not raised by . . . warrants to seize 'gambling implements' and 'all intoxicating liquors. . . .' For the use of these warrants implicates questions whether the procedures leading to their issuance and surrounding their execution were adequate to avoid suppression of constitutionally protected publications."
Marcus v. Search Warrant, 367 U. S. 717 , at 367 U. S. 731 .

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