Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/101764/chapman-vs-california
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 18:55:56+00:00

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Petitioners were convicted following a California state criminal trial during which the prosecutor, as then permitted by a state constitutional provision, extensively commented on their failure to testify. The trial judge also charged the jury that it could draw adverse inferences from such failure. After the trial, but before petitioners' appeal was considered, the state constitutional provision was invalidated by Griffin v. California, 380 U. S. 609 . Though admitting that petitioners had been denied a federal constitutional right, the California Supreme Court, applying the State Constitution's harmless error provision, upheld the convictions.
1. This Court has jurisdiction to formulate a harmless error rule that will protect a defendant's federal right under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to be free from state penalties for not testifying in his criminal trial. Pp. 386 U. S. 20 -21.
2. Before a constitutional error can be held to be harmless, the court must be able to declare its belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Pp. 386 U. S. 21 -24.
3. The State in this case did not demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that the prosecutor's repetitive comments to the jury, and the trial court's instruction concerning the petitioners' failure to testify did not contribute to their convictions. Pp. 386 U. S. 24 -26.
"Where there is a violation of the rule of Griffin v. California, 380 U. S. 609 , (1) can the error be held to be harmless, and (2) if so, was the error harmless in this case?"
state or federal law governs. The application of a state harmless error rule is, of course, a state question where it involves only errors of state procedure or state law. But the error from which these petitioners suffered was a denial of rights guaranteed against invasion by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments, rights rooted in the Bill of Rights, offered and championed in the Congress by James Madison, who told the Congress that the "independent" federal courts would be the "guardians of those rights." [ Footnote 4 ] Whether a conviction for crime should stand when a State has failed to accord federal constitutionally guaranteed rights is every bit as much of a federal question as what particular federal constitutional provisions themselves mean, what they guarantee, and whether they have been denied. With faithfulness to the constitutional union of the States, we cannot leave to the States the formulation of the authoritative laws, rules, and remedies designed to protect people from infractions by the States of federally guaranteed rights. We have no hesitation in saying that the right of these petitioners not to be punished for exercising their Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment right to be silent -- expressly created by the Federal Constitution itself -- is a federal right which, in the absence of appropriate congressional action, it is our responsibility to protect by fashioning the necessary rule.
as petitioners correctly point out, would require an automatic reversal of their convictions and make further discussion unnecessary. We decline to adopt any such rule. All 50 States have harmless error statutes or rules, and the United States long ago, through its Congress, established for its courts the rule that judgments shall not be reversed for "errors or defects which do not affect the substantial rights of the parties." 28 U.S.C. § 2111. [ Footnote 5 ] None of these rules, on its face, distinguishes between federal constitutional errors and errors of state law or federal statutes and rules. All of these rules, state or federal, serve a very useful purpose insofar as they block setting aside convictions for small errors or defects that have little, if any, likelihood of having changed the result of the trial. We conclude that there may be some constitutional errors which, in the setting of a particular case, are so unimportant and insignificant that they may, consistent with the Federal Constitution, be deemed harmless, not requiring the automatic reversal of the conviction.
of as harmless. Certainly error, constitutional error, in illegally admitting highly prejudicial evidence or comments, casts on someone other than the person prejudiced by it a burden to show that it was harmless. It is for that reason that the original common law harmless error rule put the burden on the beneficiary of the error either to prove that there was no injury or to suffer a reversal of his erroneously obtained judgment. [ Footnote 9 ] There is little, if any, difference between our statement in Fahy v. Connecticut about "whether there is a reasonable possibility that the evidence complained of might have contributed to the conviction" and requiring the beneficiary of a constitutional error to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the error complained of did not contribute to the verdict obtained. We therefore do no more than adhere to the meaning of our Fahy case when we hold, as we now do, that, before a federal constitutional error can be held harmless, the court must be able to declare a belief that it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. While appellate courts do not ordinarily have the original task of applying such a test, [ Footnote 10 ] it is a familiar standard to all courts, and we believe its adoption will provide a more workable standard, although achieving the same result as that aimed at in our Fahy case.
forbidden comments, honest, fair-minded jurors might very well have brought in not-guilty verdicts. Under these circumstances, it is completely impossible for us to say that the State has demonstrated, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the prosecutor's comments and the trial judge's instruction did not contribute to petitioners' convictions. Such a machine-gun repetition of a denial of constitutional rights, designed and calculated to make petitioners' version of the evidence worthless, can no more be considered harmless than the introduction against a defendant of a coerced confession. See, e.g., Payne v. Arkansas, 356 U. S. 560 . Petitioners are entitled to a trial free from the pressure of unconstitutional inferences.
Cf. Woodby v. Immigration Service, 385 U. S. 276 .
Glasser v. United States, 315 U. S. 60 , 315 U. S. 76 . That, indeed, was the whole point of Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 , overruling Betts v. Brady, 316 U. S. 455 . Even before trial, when counsel has not been provided at a critical stage, "we do not stop to determine whether prejudice resulted." Hamilton v. Alabama, 368 U. S. 52 , 368 U. S. 55 ; White v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 59 , 373 U. S. 60 .
adverse to the defendant is per se ground for reversal of his conviction; no showing need be made that the jurors were, in fact, prejudiced against him. Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333 , 384 U. S. 351 -352; cf. Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U. S. 723 , 373 U. S. 727 . See also Estes v. Texas, 381 U. S. 532 , 381 U. S. 542 -544; 381 U. S. 562 -564 (WARREN, C.J., concurring); 381 U. S. 593 -594 (HARLAN, J., concurring).
When a jury is instructed in an unconstitutional presumption, the conviction must be overturned though there was ample evidence apart from the presumption to sustain the verdict. Bollenbach v. United States, 326 U. S. 607 , 326 U. S. 614 -615. Reversal is required when a conviction may have been rested on a constitutionally impermissible ground despite the fact that there was a valid alternative ground on which the conviction could have been sustained. Stromberg v. California, 283 U. S. 359 , 283 U. S. 367 -368; Williams v. North Carolina, 317 U. S. 287 , 317 U. S. 292 . In a long line of cases leading up to and including Whitus v. Georgia, 385 U. S. 545 , it has never been suggested that reversal of convictions because of purposeful discrimination in the selection of grand and petit jurors turns on any showing of prejudice to the defendant.
But I see no reason to break with settled precedent in this case, and promulgate a novel rule of harmless error applicable to clear violations of Griffin v. California, 380 U. S. 609 . [ Footnote 2/3 ] The adoption of any harmless error rule, whether the one proposed by the Court, or by the dissent, or some other rule, commits this Court to a case-by-case examination to determine the extent to which we think unconstitutional comment on a defendant's failure to testify influenced the outcome of a particular trial. This burdensome obligation is one that we here are hardly qualified to discharge.
A rule of automatic reversal would seem best calculated to prevent clear violations of Griffin v. California. This case is one in which the trial occurred before the Griffin decision but which was not final on appeal until afterwards, so the doctrine of prospectivity announced in Tehan v. Shott, 382 U. S. 406 , does not reach it. But the number of such cases is strictly limited. Prosecutors are unlikely to indulge in clear violations of Griffin in the future, and, if they do, I see no reason why the sanction of reversal should not be the result.
None of these decisions suggests that the rejection of a harmless error rule turns on any unique evidentiary impact that confessions may have. Haynes v. Washington, 373 U. S. 503 , specifically contradicts that notion. In addition to the confession found inadmissible by this Court, the defendant in Haynes had given two prior confessions, the admissibility of which was not disputed, and "substantial independent evidence" of guilt existed. The Court accepted the prosecution's contention that the inadmissible confession played little if any role in the conviction.
For example, quite different considerations are involved when evidence is introduced which was obtained in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. The exclusionary rule in that context balances the desirability of deterring objectionable police conduct against the undesirability of excluding relevant and reliable evidence. The resolution of these values with interests of judicial economy might well dictate a harmless error rule for such violations. Cf. Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U. S. 85 , 375 U. S. 92 (dissenting opinion).
Earlier this Term, in O'Connor v. Ohio, 385 U. S. 92 , we reversed a conviction on the basis of Griffin v. California, 380 U. S. 609 , without pausing to consider whether the comment on the defendant's silence might have been harmless error under the rule the Court announces today or any other harmless error rule.
resulting from the allowance of prosecutorial comment barred by the Fourteenth Amendment, must be determined under a "necessary rule" of federal law. The Court imposes a revised version of the standard utilized in Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U. S. 85 , on state appellate courts not because the Constitution requires that particular standard, but because the Court prefers it.
upon the States, and the only constitutional limitation upon these trials is that the laws, rules, and remedies applied must meet constitutional requirements. If they do not, this Court may hold them invalid. The Court has no power, however, to declare which of many admittedly constitutional alternatives a State may choose. [ Footnote 3/2 ] To impose uniform national requirements when alternatives are constitutionally permissible would destroy that opportunity for broad experimentation which is the genius of our federal system.
at 328 U. S. 762 . None of these factors has any relation to substantive constitutional provisions, and I think the Court errs in conceiving of an application of harmless error rules as a remedy designed to safeguard particular constitutional rights. [ Footnote 3/3 ] It seems clear to me that harmless error rules concern, instead, the fundamental integrity of the judicial proceedings as a whole.
of the rule. [ Footnote 3/5 ] And individual applications of a permissible rule would still be subject to scrutiny as to the tenability of the independent and adequate state ground. See Thompson v. Louisville, 362 U. S. 199 ; Terre Haute & Indianapolis Railroad Co. v. Indiana ex rel. Ketcham, 194 U. S. 579 ; Note, The Untenable Nonfederal Ground in the Supreme Court, 74 Harv.L.Rev. 1375.
I thus see no need for this new constitutional doctrine. [ Footnote 3/6 ] Decision of this case should turn instead on the answers to two questions: is the California harmless error provision consistent with the guarantee of fundamental fairness embodied in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment? See Palko v. Connecticut, supra. Was its application in this instance by the California Supreme Court a reasonable one, or was the rule applied arbitrarily to evade the underlying constitutional mandate of fundamental fairness? These issues will now be considered.
Similarly, members of this Court have used a variety of verbal formulae in deciding questions of harmless error in federal cases, ranging from today's "reasonable doubt" standard to the ability to "say with fair assurance . . . that the jury was not substantially swayed. . . ." Fiswick v. United States, 329 U. S. 211 , 329 U. S. 218 . And the circuit courts have been equally varied in their expressions.
Cases in which lower federal courts, acting under the authority of the Fourteenth Amendment, as expanded by this Court's decision in Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U. S. 533 , have promulgated their own reapportionment plans may superficially be thought to support such a power. E.g., Reynolds v. State Election Board, 233 F.Supp. 323. But such cases are quite apart from the present one, because they arise from a situation where some positive constitutional action is a necessity, and thus require the exercise of special equity powers. Here, the ordinary remedy of striking down unconstitutional harmless error rules and applications is sufficient to deal with any problem that may arise. There is no necessity for a State to have a harmless error rule at all.
The Court indeed recognizes, as does my Brother STEWART in his concurring opinion, that errors of constitutional dimension can be harmless, a proposition supported by ample precedent. See Snyder v. Massachusetts, 291 U. S. 97 ; Motes v. United States, 178 U. S. 458 ; Haines v. United States, 188 F.2d 546; United States v. Donnelly, 179 F.2d 227. Presumably all errors in the federal courts will continue to be evaluated under the single standard of 28 U.S.C. § 2111 as interpreted today. Certainly there is nothing in the substantive provisions of the Bill of Rights which suggests any standard for assessing the impact of their violation.
Fahy v. Connecticut, 375 U. S. 85 , should not be deemed dispositive on such a far-reaching matter, which was entirely passed over in the Court's opinion in that case.
Some special limitations on harmless error have always been respected by this Court, and seem to me essential to the fundamental fairness guaranteed by the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. These limitations stem from what I perceive as two distinct considerations. The first is a recognition that particular types of error have an effect which is so devastating or inherently indeterminate that, as a matter of law, they cannot reasonably be found harmless. E.g., Payne v. Arkansas, 356 U. S. 560 (confessions); see Fahy v. Connecticut, supra, at 375 U. S. 95 (dissenting opinion of HARLAN, J.); cf. Bollenbach v. United States, 326 U. S. 607 (independently sufficient evidence). The second is a recognition that certain types of official misbehavior require reversal simply because society cannot tolerate giving final effect to a judgment tainted with such intentional misconduct. E.g., Berger v. United States, 295 U. S. 78 (prosecutorial misconduct). Although they have never been viewed in this light, I would see violations of Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335 , as falling in the first category, and violations of Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U. S. 510 , as falling in the second. However, as I understand my Brother STEWART's opinion concurring in the result, he would read all such limitations into the content of the Due Process Clause and limit the application of harmless error rules with respect to constitutional errors to an undefined category of instances. I think it preferable to resolve these special problems from an analysis of the nature of the error involved, rather than by an attempt to discover limitations in the policy underlying the substantive constitutional provisions. The latter course seems to me to blur analysis and lead to distinction by fiat among equally specific constitutional guarantees.
The decision in Griffin v. California, 380 U. S. 609 , was not announced until after the trial of the case. Hence, the trial was conducted according to what was, at the time, constitutional California law. No implication of prosecutorial misconduct can be drawn from these circumstances.

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