Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/344/357/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 10:25:26+00:00

Document:
Certiorari to review petitioner's state court conviction under a California vagrancy statute was improvidently granted, and the writ is dismissed. Pp. 358-362.
1. The claim that his conviction violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, because the statute was vague and uncertain, is not properly before this Court when the conviction was affirmed below by default in accordance with state law. Pp. 344 U. S. 358-359.
2. The claim that his rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment were infringed by discriminatory enforcement of the vagrancy statute was disposed of on state procedural grounds, and cannot be considered here. P. 344 U. S. 359.
3. Denial of his motion to recall the remittitur and vacate the judgment of the appellate court rested on an adequate state ground, and the claim that this denial deprived him of a hearing in the appellate court contrary to the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment cannot be considered here. Pp. 344 U. S. 359-362.
"Every . . . dissolute person . . . [i]s a vagrant, and is punishable by a fine of not exceeding five hundred dollars ($500), or by imprisonment in the county jail not exceeding six months, or by both such fine and imprisonment."
The conviction was affirmed by the Appellate Department of the Los Angeles County Superior Court in an order which recited that the appeal had been submitted without argument. A motion to recall the remittitur and vacate the judgment of the appellate court was denied without opinion after a full hearing before three judges. We granted certiorari because of serious constitutional questions raised as to the validity of the vagrancy statute and its application to the petitioner. 343 U.S. 955. However, on oral argument, doubts arose as to whether the federal questions were properly presented by the record. Accordingly, it is necessary at the outset to determine whether we have jurisdiction in this case.
Petitioner contends, first, that his conviction violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because the vagrancy statute is vague, indefinite and uncertain. The record indicates that this defense was not raised on trial, but was presented for the first time as the fifth of petitioner's grounds of appeal, stated as follows: "5. Vagrancy statute is unconstitutional because vague and indefinite."
for a decision below. Aside from state law regarding the scope of review in cases such as this one, we note that California permits affirmance in criminal cases where the appellant fails to appear. [Footnote 1] It follows that the question whether the vagrancy statute is invalid under the Fourteenth Amendment is not properly before us.
"I want to show by the police records that there are thousands and thousands of individuals in this city that are walking around that have committed many more offenses than the defendant that have never been charged with vagrancy."
This offer was made in connection with a subpoena addressed to the local police records section. On motion of the city attorney, the subpoena was quashed on the ground that the accompanying affidavit did not comply with the requirements of state law. Since California law determined this action, there is no federal question preserved for review in this aspect of the case. Hedgebeth v. North Carolina, 334 U. S. 806 (1948).
"was occasion[ed] by the inadvertence, and mistake of fact of the defendant and of the clerk of the above entitled court, and on the incomplete presentation of all the facts and law by the defendant. . . ."
"jurisdiction to render the judgment complained of and it does not affirmatively appear that it was the result of fraud, imposition or misapprehension of facts."
to decide petitioner's claims on the merits, whatever may be their appeal. The writ was improvidently granted, and must be dismissed. Stembridge v. Georgia, 343 U. S. 541 (1952).
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON concurs except that he thinks it is not material whether California will grant habeas corpus in this case. True, the petitioner's original appeal to the California court sought to raise a federal question. That was not passed upon because the appeal was dismissed for default. Whether the default should be considered excusable by any court is left highly in doubt by the record. At all events, in asking relief from it, there was no claim that to take a default under such circumstances is forbidden to a state court by the Constitution of the United States, and such a claim would be frivolous if made. Hence, the petitioner is out of court for reasons of state law and practice, and the writ of certiorari should be dismissed.
See People v. Garza, 1927, 86 Cal.App. 97, 260 P. 390; Rule 8, Rules on Appeal from Municipal Courts and Inferior Courts in Criminal Cases, as amended to January 6, 1947; Deering's Cal.Penal Code, 1949, § 1253; People v. Sukovitzen, 67 Cal.App.2d 901, 155 P.2d 406 (1945). To the same effect, Dowd v. United States, 340 U. S. 206.
Apparently the statement was agreed upon some time before June 18, judging from the docket entry of November 6, 1950, "Defendant's Counsel to engross Statement on Appeal," and an affidavit dated March 7, 1951, showing service of the engrossed statement on substituted counsel.
Rule 3(b) of Revised Appellate Department Rules provides, in part, that "Failure of the clerk to mail any such notice [of hearing] shall not affect the jurisdiction of the Appellate Department."
See People v. McDermott, 97 Cal. 247, 32 P. 7 (1893), in which a motion to recall the remittitur of the State Supreme Court was denied, clearly on state grounds, under circumstances similar to those in the instant case.
MR. JUSTICE BLACK with whom MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS concurs, dissenting.
"is guaranteed by the Constitution to the prisoner, and is as sacred as the right of trial by jury. It is one of the means the law has provided to determine the question of his guilt or innocence."
Ex parte Hoge, 48 Cal. 3, 6; In re Alboria, 95 Cal.App. 42, 50-51, 272 P. 321. Under these circumstances, I agree with petitioner that refusal to give him or his counsel an opportunity to be heard in the appellate court denied him the due process of law guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. See In re Oliver, 333 U. S. 257, 333 U. S. 273; Cole v. Arkansas, 333 U. S. 196, 333 U. S. 201; Powell v. Alabama, 287 U. S. 45, 287 U. S. 68. [Footnote 2/1] Such a denial of due process cannot be justified by the state on any "adequate nonfederal ground." For this reason, I would not dismiss the certiorari, but would reverse or vacate the appellate court's judgment.
habeas corpus proceeding in the California state courts. And the Court's belief as to availability of a state remedy is buttressed by a presumption that a state will not deny a remedy for deprivation of a constitutional right such as here alleged. Mooney v. Holohan, 294 U. S. 103, 294 U. S. 113. Moreover, should California refuse to grant petitioner a remedy to test the constitutionality of the Vagrancy Act, he could then seek relief in a United States district court. See Moore v. Dempsey, 261 U. S. 86. But my doubt about the availability of an adequate state remedy leads me to conclude that the wiser course here would be to vacate the appellate court's judgment for a clarification of the bases of its action. See State Tax Commission v. Van Cott, 306 U. S. 511; cf. Herb v. Pitcairn, 324 U. S. 117. For even superficial examination of the California vagrancy statute and petitioner's trial under it will reveal the gravity of the constitutional questions which petitioner urges and which the appellate court left unconsidered and undecided.
"Vagrancy is a continuing offense. It differs from most other offenses in the fact that it is chronic, rather than acute; that it continues after it is complete, and subjects the offender to arrest at any time before he reforms. One is guilty of being a vagrant at any time and place where he is found, so long as the character remains unchanged, although then and there innocent of any act demonstrating his character. . . . His character, as I said before, is the ultimate question for you to decide."
"Now, dissolute is defined as 'loosed from restraint, unashamed, lawless, loose in morals and conduct, recklessly abandoned to sensual pleasures, profligate, wanton, lewd, debauched.' Now, the word 'dissolute,' as you see from this definition, covers many acts not necessarily confined to immorality. Other laxness and looseness and lawlessness may amount to dissoluteness."
and violence, stating that a change could not be brought about except by bullets." Other hostile witnesses testified to his use of intemperate language. A policeman swore that petitioner had prophesied that he "would not be given a fair trial" -- a prophecy which I fear this record viewed as a whole does not entirely refute. There was also evidence that petitioner had solicited funds to aid him in carrying on his publicity work, and to help pay for his defense in numerous cases that were instituted against him in the municipal court. In one of these cases, he had been charged with defacing a park bench of thick concrete by standing on it to make a speech.
"It is settled that a statute so vague and indefinite, in form and as interpreted, as to permit within the scope of its language the punishment of incidents fairly within the protection of the guarantee of free speech is void, on its face, as contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment."
Winters v. New York, 333 U. S. 507, 333 U. S. 509.
The free speech question was so obviously involved in this vagrancy prosecution that the court charged the jury at length about free speech. He even submitted to them the question whether petitioner's speech constituted "a clear and present danger. . . ."
I adhere to the view that courts should be astute to examine and strike down dragnet legislation used to abridge public discussion of "views on political, social or economic questions." Schneider v. New Jersey, 308 U. S. 147, 308 U. S. 161, 308 U. S. 163.
In Cochran v. Kansas, 316 U. S. 255, 316 U. S. 258, we held that Kansas denied Cochran equal protection of the laws in refusing him privileges of appeal it afforded to others.
A mere reading of the California vagrancy statute is sufficient to show its similarity to a New Jersey law held invalid for vagueness and ambiguity in Lanzetta v. New Jersey, 306 U. S. 451.

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