Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/365/146
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 06:22:29+00:00

Document:
UNITED STATES, Appellant, v. Roy FRUEHAUF et al.
See 365 U.S. 875, 81 S.Ct. 899.
Mr. S. Hazard Gillespie, Jr., New York City, for appellant.
Mr. Louis Nizer, New York City, for appellees.
'Despite the fact that there is the repeated use of the word 'loan' in the government's advance outline before the Court, caused by the fact that the government's case in large part is as asserted by these defendants as the trial will reflect as it proceeds, nevertheless the government's position on the loan, and I hope to make this clear as the trial progresses, is actually twofold.
'A loan, if your Honor please, is something that relates to a state of mind between the person who is receiving the money and the person who is giving the money, and again the repayment which actually occurred in this case is only one aspect of whether or not the transfer of funds between one party or from one party to another is actually a loan.
'The Court: Assuming that this case was tried and the Court was disposed to frame special interrogatories to the jury, and one of those interrogatories was, Was the transaction a loan, and the jury brought back the answer No: do you think the Court could allow that answer to stand on the basis of the facts as you have set them forth in your brief, or wouldn't the Court have to set aside the finding as being contrary to the evidence and the weight of the evidence?
'Mr. Guzzetta: Your Honor, in the context of the remarks I made after you read in open court my brief, I would say that that would not be an erroneous finding by them.
'The Court: In other words, your position is that despite the facts which you set forth this could be held to be not a loan? When I say the facts you set forth, I mean the facts in your memorandum.
'I am convinced that the language which I read into the record from the Government's brief is a judicial admission that this transaction was a loan. I have no doubt in my own mind at least, that in a trial either to the court or the jury, in a preliminary hearing where the defendants have not yet subjected themselves to jeopardy, if the Government established the facts which it recounted in its brief that it intended to prove, a finding by a jury to the contrary would have to be set aside, nor could the Court find to the contrary. Those facts, in my view, notwithstanding the qualifications attempted orally, and despite those qualifications and accepting those qualifications, those facts, in my view, establish that the transaction was a pure and simple loan.
We do not reach that question on this appeal. For we cannot but regard itabstracted as it has become, in the course of these proceedings, from the immediate considerations which should determine the disposition of appellees' motions to dismiss an indictment incontestably valid on its faceas other than a request for an advisory opinion. Such opinions, such advance expressions of legal judgment upon issues which remain unfocused because they are not pressed before the Court with that clear concreteness provided when a question emerges precisely framed and necessary for decision from a clash of adversary argument exploring every aspect of a multifaceted situation embracing conflicting and demanding interests, we have consistently refused to give. See Parker v. Los Angeles County, 338 U.S. 327, 70 S.Ct. 161, 94 L.Ed. 144; Rescue Army v. Municipal Court, 331 U.S. 549, 67 S.Ct. 1409, 91 L.Ed. 1666; United Public Workers of America (C.I.O.) v. Mitchell, 330 U.S. 75, 67 S.Ct. 556, 91 L.Ed. 754; Alabama State Federation of Labor v. McAdory, 325 U.S. 450, 65 S.Ct. 1384, 89 L.Ed. 1725; State of Arizona v. State of California, 283 U.S. 423, 51 S.Ct. 522, 75 L.Ed. 1154.
Nor does the record raise questions concerning the sufficiency of the indictment which would require, in an appropriate case, that the case be sent to the Court of Appeals, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 3731, 18 U.S.C.A. § 3731. For this is not a case in which the District Court has construed the allegations of an indictment, or limited the scope of the Government's presentation by construction of a bill of particulars or the prosecutor's opening statement. In the present case we cannot know with reference to what supposed factual circumstances the District Court attributed to the Government the admission that the Beck-Fruehauf-Seymour transaction constituted a 'loan.' Without spelling out in detail the diverse argumentative possibilities that underlie the judge's attribution of a 'loan' as an unequivocally defined concept to the Government, it suffices to say that experience in instances of similar unclarity under the Criminal Appeals Act counsels the wisdom of abstaining from reviewing construction of a criminal statute on so cloudy a record as is now before the Court. Compare United States v. Colgate & Co., 250 U.S. 300, 39 S.Ct. 465, 63 L.Ed. 992, with United States v. A. Schrader's Son, Inc., 252 U.S. 85, 40 S.Ct. 251, 64 L.Ed. 471.
The core of the difficulty in the present case is that the record does not preclude the Government from attempting to prove that the transaction in question came within the statutory ban by reason of any or all possible theories. Of course, an undertaking by counsel here, however honorable its impulse, cannot bind the Government in the future. And the District Court's ruling, insofar as it purports to close any avenues open to the Government under the indictmentnot in view of specifications made in a bill of particulars or an opening statement, but on the basis of a 'judicial admission' culled from a pretrial memorandumwas impermissible and constitutes an insufficient basis to justify the exercise of this Court's jurisdiction on direct appeal.
We do not think, however, that the purpose of Rule 15 of this Court, 28 U.S.C.A., under which the Government filed the Jurisdictional Statement which brought the case here, requires us to penalize the Government by dismissing this appeal, simpliciter. This Court has the power, expressly provided in 28 U.S.C. 2106, 28 U.S.C.A. § 2106, to 'vacate, set aside or reverse any judgment, decree, or order of a court lawfully brought before it for review, and * * * remand the cause and * * * require such further proceedings to be had as may be just under the circumstances.' The exercise of that authority is appropriate here. The ruling dismissing the indictment is set aside and the case is remanded for trial upon this valid indictment. So ordered.
Dismissal of indictment set aside and case remanded.
The dismissal of the indictment in this case was placed squarely upon the district court's construction of a criminal statute. Specifically, the court ruled that a loan of money did not fall within the prohibition of § 302 of the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 (before its amendment in 1959). In bringing the appeal directly here, the Government eliminated from the case any possible questions other than the correctness of the district court's construction of the underlying statuteto which this Court's jurisdiction is limited under the Criminal Appeals Act. 18 U.S.C. 3731, 18 U.S.C.A. § 3731. United States v. Keitel, 211 U.S. 370, 397398, 29 S.Ct. 123, 131, 53 L.Ed. 230; United States v. Patten, 226 U.S. 525, 535, 540, 33 S.Ct. 141, 142, 57 L.Ed. 333; United States v. Colgate & Co., 250 U.S. 300, 301, 306, 39 S.Ct. 465, 466, 63 L.Ed. 992; United States v. Borden Co., 308 U.S. 188, 192194, 60 S.Ct. 182, 185, 84 L.Ed. 181. '(I)n reviewing a direct appeal from a District Court under the Criminal Appeals Act, supra, our review is limited to the validity or construction of the contested statute. For 'The Government's appeal does not open the whole case." United States v. Petrillo, 332 U.S. 1, 5, 67 S.Ct. 1538, 1541, 91 L.Ed. 1877.
I think the issue whether a loan of money came within the proscriptions of the statute is before us now and should be decided. I further think this is the only issue properly before us. However, since the Court thinks otherwise, I am persuaded that an expression of my views on the subject would not be appropriate.
It appears that Roy Fruehauf is President of Fruehauf Trailer Co., that Burge Seymour is President of Associated Transport, Inc., and that Brown Equipment and Manufacturing Co. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Associated Transport, Inc.
'(1) to any representative of any of his employees who are employed in an industry affecting commerce * * *'.
Count Two of the indictment charged that 'On or about the 21st day of June, 1954, * * * Dave Beck, * * * a representative of employees who were engaged in an industry affecting commerce * * * did unlawfully, wilfully and knowingly receive and accept and agree to receive and accept from (the several appellees of the Fruehauf-Seymour group), employers of the aforesaid employees, a thing of value, to wit, money, in the amount of $200,000.' Section 302(b), as it was in effect at the time of the transaction alleged, provided: 'It shall be unlawful for any representative of any employees who are employed in an industry affecting commerce to receive or accept, or to agree to receive or accept, from the employer of such employees any money or other thing of value.' The Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959, § 505, amended the section to cause it to parallel the amended version of § 302(a), note 2, supra.
Lelia Mae SANKS et al. v. GEORGIA et al.
SOCIALIST LABOR PARTY et al., Appellants, v. John J. GILLIGAN, Governor of the State of Ohio, et al.

References: v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 3731
 v. 
 v. 
 § 2106
 § 302
 § 3731
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 505
 § 302
 v. 
 v.