Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/407/297
Timestamp: 2019-04-26 14:12:10+00:00

Document:
gather[ing] intelligence information deemed necessary to protect the nation from attempts of domestic organizations to attack and subvert the existing structure of the Government.
2. The Fourth Amendment (which shields private speech from unreasonable surveillance) requires prior judicial approval for the type of domestic security surveillance involved in this case. Pp. 314-321; 323-324.
(a) The Government's duty to safeguard domestic security must be weighed against the potential danger that unreasonable surveillances pose to individual privacy and free expression. Pp. 314-315.
(b) The freedoms of the Fourth Amendment cannot properly be guaranteed if domestic security suveillances are conducted solely within the discretion of the Executive Branch, without the detached judgment of a neutral magistrate. Pp. 316-318.
(c) Resort to appropriate warrant procedure would not frustrate the legitimate purposes of domestic security searches. Pp. 318-321.
The issue before us is an important one for the people of our country and their Government. It involves the delicate question of the President's power, acting through the Attorney General, to authorize electronic surveillance in internal security matters without prior judicial approval. Successive Presidents for more than one-quarter of a century have authorized such surveillance in varying degrees, [n1] without guidance from the Congress or a definitive decision of this Court. This case brings the issue here for the first time. Its resolution is a matter of national concern, requiring sensitivity both to the Government's right to protect itself from unlawful subversion and attack and to the citizen's right to be secure in his privacy against unreasonable Government intrusion.
The logs of the surveillance [p301] were filed in a sealed exhibit for in camera inspection by the District Court.
The Government then filed in the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit a petition for a writ of mandamus to set aside the District Court order, which was stayed pending final disposition of the case. After concluding that it had jurisdiction, [n3] that court held that the surveillance was unlawful, and that the District Court had properly required disclosure of the overheard conversations, 444 F.2d 651 (1971). We granted certiorari, 403 U.S. 930.
Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act, 18 U.S.C. §§ 2510-2520, authorizes the use of electronic surveillance for classes of crimes carefully [p302] specified in 18 U.S.C. § 2516. Such surveillance is subject to prior court order. Section 2518 sets forth the detailed and particularized application necessary to obtain such an order, as well as carefully circumscribed conditions for its use. The Act represents a comprehensive attempt by Congress to promote more effective control of crime while protecting the privacy of individual thought and expression. Much of Title III was drawn to meet the constitutional requirements for electronic surveillance enunciated by this Court in Berger v. New York, 388 U.S. 41"] 388 U.S. 41 (1967), and 388 U.S. 41 (1967), and Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347 (1967).
Nothing contained in this chapter or in section 605 of the Communications Act of 1934 (48 Stat. 1143; 47 U.S.C. 605) shall limit the constitutional power of the President to take such measures as he deems necessary to protect the Nation against actual or potential attack or other hostile acts of a foreign power, to obtain foreign intelligence information deemed essential to the security of the United States, or to protect national security information against foreign intelligence activities. Nor shall anything contained in this chapter be deemed to limit the constitutional power of the President to take such measures as he deems necessary to protect the United States against the overthrow of the Government by force or other unlawful means, or against any other clear and present danger to the structure or existence of the Government. The contents of any wire or oral communication intercepted by authority of the President in the exercise of the foregoing powers may be received in evidence in any trial hearing, [p303] or other proceeding only where such interception was reasonable, and shall not be otherwise used or disclosed except as is necessary to implement that power.
in excepting national security surveillances from the Act's warrant requirement, Congress recognized the President's authority to conduct such surveillances without prior judicial approval.
Nothing contained in this chapter . . . shall limit the constitutional power of the President to take such measures as he deems necessary to protect . . .
Where the Act authorizes surveillance, the procedure to be followed is specified in § 2518. Subsection (1) thereof requires application to a judge of competent jurisdiction for a prior order of approval, and states in detail the information required in such application. [n5] [p305] Subsection (3) prescribes the necessary elements of probable cause which the judge must find before issuing an order authorizing an interception. Subsection (4) sets forth the required contents of such an order. [p306] Subsection (5) sets strict time limits on an order. Provision is made in subsection (7) for "an emergency situation" found to exist by the Attorney General (or by the principal prosecuting attorney of a State) "with respect to conspiratorial activities threatening the national security interest." In such a situation, emergency surveillance may be conducted "if an application for an order approving the interception is made . . . within forty-eight hours." If such an order is not obtained, or the application therefor is denied, the interception is deemed to be a violation of the Act.
Mr. HOLLAND. . . . The section [2511(3)] from which the Senator [Hart] has read does not affirmatively [p307] give any power. . . . We are not affirmatively conferring any power upon the President. We are simply saying that nothing herein shall limit such power as the President has under the Constitution. . . . We certainly do not grant him a thing.
There is nothing affirmative in this statement.
Mr. McCLELLAN. Mr. President, we make it understood that we are not trying to take anything away from him.
Mr. HOLLAND. The Senator is correct.
Mr. HART. Mr. President, there is no intention here to expand by this language a constitutional power. Cleary we could not do so.
Mr. McCLELLAN. Even though intended, we could not do so.
Mr. HART. . . . However, we are agreed that this language should not be regarded as intending to grant any authority, including authority to put a bug on, that the President does not have now.
Whether safeguards other than prior authorization by a magistrate would satisfy the Fourth Amendment in a situation involving the national security. . . .
The determination of this question requires the essential Fourth Amendment inquiry into the "reasonableness" of the search and seizure in question, and the way in which that "reasonableness" derives content and meaning [p310] through reference to the warrant clause. Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 473-484 (1971).
Though the Government and respondents debate their seriousness and magnitude, threats and acts of sabotage against the Government exist in sufficient number to justify investigative powers with respect to them. [n12] The covertness and complexity of potential unlawful conduct [p312] against the Government and the necessary dependency of many conspirators upon the telephone make electronic surveillance an effective investigatory instrument in certain circumstances. The marked acceleration in technological developments and sophistication in their use have resulted in new techniques for the planning, commission, and concealment of criminal activities. It would be contrary to the public interest for Government to deny to itself the prudent and lawful employment of those very techniques which are employed against the Government and its law-abiding citizens.
Civil liberties, as guaranteed by the Constitution, imply the existence of an organized society maintaining public order without which liberty itself would be lost in the excesses of unrestrained abuses.
not only the seizure of tangible items, but extends as well to the recording of oral statements . . . without any "technical trespass under . . . local property law."
Katz, supra, at 353. That decision implicitly recognized that the broad and unsuspected governmental incursions into conversational privacy which electronic surveillance entails [n14] necessitate the application of Fourth Amendment safeguards.
As the Fourth Amendment is not absolute in its terms, our task is to examine and balance the basic values at stake in this case: the duty of Government [p315] to protect the domestic security, and the potential danger posed by unreasonable surveillance to individual privacy and free expression. If the legitimate need of Government to safeguard domestic security requires the use of electronic surveillance, the question is whether the needs of citizens for privacy and free expression may not be better protected by requiring a warrant before such surveillance is undertaken. We must also ask whether a warrant requirement would unduly frustrate the efforts of Government to protect itself from acts of subversion and overthrow directed against it.
a valued part of our constitutional law for decades, and it has determined the result in scores and scores of cases in courts all over this country. It is not an inconvenience to be somehow "weighed" against the claims of police efficiency. It is, or should [p316] be, an important working part of our machinery of government, operating as a matter of course to check the "well-intentioned but mistakenly overzealous executive officers" who are a part of any system of law enforcement.
Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. at 481. See also United States v. Rabinowitz, supra, at 68 (Frankfurter, J., dissenting); Davis v. United States, 328 U.S. 582, 604 (1946) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting).
that the receiving or judging of the information should be left to the discretion of the officer. The magistrate ought to judge; and should give certain directions to the officer.
Lord Mansfield's formulation touches the very heart of the Fourth Amendment directive: that, where practical, a governmental search and seizure should represent both the efforts of the officer to gather evidence of wrongful acts and the judgment of the magistrate that the collected evidence is sufficient to justify invasion of a citizen's private premises or conversation. Inherent in the concept of a warrant is its issuance by a "neutral and detached magistrate." Coolidge v. New Hampshire, supra, at 453; Katz v. United States, supra, at 356. The further requirement of "probable cause" instructs the magistrate that baseless searches shall not proceed.
has never sustained a search upon the sole ground that officers reasonably expected to find evidence of a particular crime and voluntarily confined their activities to the least intrusive means consistent with that end.
Katz, supra, at 356-357. The Fourth Amendment contemplates a prior judicial judgment, [n18] not the risk that executive discretion may be reasonably exercised. This judicial role accords with our basic constitutional doctrine that individual freedoms will best be preserved through a separation of powers and division of functions among the different branches and levels of Government. Harlan, Thoughts at a Dedication: Keeping the Judicial Function in Balance, 49 A.B.A.J. 943-944 (1963). The independent check upon executive discretion is not [p318] satisfied, as the Government argues, by "extremely limited" post-surveillance judicial review. [n19] Indeed, post-surveillance review would never reach the surveillances which failed to result in prosecutions. Prior review by a neutral and detached magistrate is the time-tested means of effectuating Fourth Amendment rights. Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 96 (1964).
It is true that there have been some exceptions to the warrant requirement. Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752 (1969); Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968); McDonald v. United States, 335 U.S. 451 (1948); Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132 (1925). But those exceptions are few in number, and carefully delineated, Katz, supra, at 357; in general, they serve the legitimate needs of law enforcement officers to protect their own wellbeing and preserve evidence from destruction. Even while carving out those exceptions, the Court has reaffirmed the principle that the "police must, whenever practicable, obtain advance judicial approval of searches and seizures through the warrant procedure," Terry v. Ohio, supra, at 20; Chimel v. California, supra, at 762.
The Government argues that the special circumstances applicable to domestic security surveillances necessitate a further exception to the warrant requirement. It is urged that the requirement of prior judicial review would obstruct the President in the discharge of his constitutional duty to protect domestic security. We are told further that these surveillances are directed primarily to the collecting and maintaining of intelligence with [p319] respect to subversive forces, and are not an attempt to gather evidence for specific criminal prosecutions. It is said that this type of surveillance should not be subject to traditional warrant requirements which were established to govern investigation of criminal activity, not ongoing intelligence gathering. Brief for United States 15-16, 23-24; Reply Brief for United States 2-3.
as a practical matter would have neither the knowledge nor the techniques necessary to determine whether there was probable cause to believe that surveillance was necessary to protect national security.
would create serious potential dangers to the national security and to the lives of informants and agents. . . . Secrecy is the essential ingredient in intelligence gathering; requiring prior judicial authorization would create a greater "danger of leaks . . . because, in addition to the judge, you have the clerk, the stenographer and some other officer like a law assistant or bailiff who may be apprised of the nature" of the surveillance.
These contentions in behalf of a complete exemption from the warrant requirement, when urged on behalf of the President and the national security in its domestic implications, merit the most careful consideration. We certainly do not reject them lightly, especially at a time of worldwide ferment and when civil disorders in this country are more prevalent than in the less turbulent [p320] periods of our history. There is, no doubt, pragmatic force to the Government's position.
Nor do we believe prior judicial approval will fracture the secrecy essential to official intelligence gathering. The investigation of criminal activity has long [p321] involved imparting sensitive information to judicial officers who have respected the confidentialities involved. Judges may be counted upon to be especially conscious of security requirements in national security cases. Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act already has imposed this responsibility on the judiciary in connection with such crimes as espionage, sabotage, and treason, §§ 2516(1)(a) and (c), each of which may involve domestic as well as foreign security threats. Moreover, a warrant application involves no public or adversary proceedings: it is an ex parte request before a magistrate or judge. Whatever security dangers clerical and secretarial personnel may pose can be minimized by proper administrative measures, possibly to the point of allowing the Government itself to provide the necessary clerical assistance.
We emphasize, before concluding this opinion, the scope of our decision. As stated at the outset, this case involves only the domestic aspects of national security. We have not addressed, and express no opinion [p322] as to, the issues which may be involved with respect to activities of foreign powers or their agents. [n20] Nor does our decision rest on the language of § 2511(3) or any other section of Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968. That Act does not attempt to define or delineate the powers of the President to meet domestic threats to the national security.
In cases in which the Fourth Amendment requires that a warrant to search be obtained, "probable cause" is the standard by which a particular decision to search is tested against the constitutional mandate of reasonableness. . . . In determining whether a particular inspection is reasonable -- and thus in determining whether there is probable cause to issue a warrant for that inspection -- the need for the inspection must be weighed in terms of these reasonable goals of code enforcement.
The above paragraph does not, of course, attempt to guide the congressional judgment, but, rather, to delineate the present scope of our own opinion. We do not attempt to detail the precise standards for domestic security warrants any more than our decision in Katz sought to set the refined requirements for the specified criminal surveillances which now constitute Title III. We do [p324] hold, however, that, prior judicial approval is required for the type of domestic security surveillance involved in this case, and that such approval may be made in accordance with such reasonable standards as the Congress may prescribe.
the trial court can and should, where appropriate, place a defendant and his counsel under enforceable orders against unwarranted disclosure of the materials which they may be entitled to inspect.
1. I am the Attorney General of the United States.
2. This affidavit is submitted in connection with the Government's opposition to the disclosure to the defendant Plamondon of information concerning the overhearing of his conversations which occurred during the course of electronic surveillances which the Government contends were legal.
3. The defendant Plamondon has participated in conversations which were overheard by Government agents who were monitoring wiretaps which were being employed to gather intelligence information deemed necessary to protect the nation from attempts of domestic organizations to attack and subvert the existing structure of the Government. The records of the Department of Justice reflect the installation of these wiretaps had been expressly approved by the Attorney General.
4. Submitted with this affidavit is a sealed exhibit containing the records of the intercepted conversations, a description of the premises that were the subjects of surveillances, and copies of the memoranda reflecting the Attorney General's express approval of the installation of the surveillances.
5. I certify that it would prejudice the national interest to disclose the particular facts concerning these surveillances other than to the court in camera. Accordingly, the sealed exhibit referred to herein is being submitted solely for the court's in camera inspection, and a copy of the sealed exhibit is not being furnished to the defendants. I would request the court, at the conclusion of its hearing on this matter, to place the sealed exhibit in a sealed envelope and return it to the Department of Justice, where it will be retained under seal so that it may be submitted to any appellate court that may review this matter.
Jurisdiction was challenged before the Court of Appeals on the ground that the District Court's order was interlocutory, and not appealable under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. On this issue, the court correctly held that it did have jurisdiction, relying upon the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1651 and cases cited in its opinion, 444 F.2d at 655-656. No attack was made in this Court as to the appropriateness of the writ of mandamus procedure.
by authority of the President in the exercise of the foregoing powers may be received in evidence . . . only where such interception was reasonable. . . .
Congress took what amounted to a position of neutral noninterference on the question of the Constitutionality of warrantless national security wiretaps authorized by the President.
[t]he great majority of law enforcement officials believe that the evidence necessary to bring criminal sanctions to bear consistently on the higher echelons of organized crime will not be obtained without the aid of electronic surveillance techniques. They maintain these techniques are indispensable to develop adequate strategic intelligence concerning organized crime, to set up specific investigations, to develop witnesses, to corroborate their testimony, and to serve as substitutes for them -- each a necessary step in the evidence-gathering process in organized crime investigations and prosecutions.
founded on little more than a subjective view regarding the acceptability of certain sorts of police conduct, and not on considerations relevant to Fourth Amendment interests. Under such an unconfined analysis, Fourth Amendment protection in this area would approach the evaporation point.
[u]nless it appears that the Attorney General's determination that the proposed surveillance relates to a national security matter is arbitrary and capricious, i.e., that it constitutes a clear abuse of the broad discretion that the Attorney General has to obtain all information that will be helpful to the President in protecting the Government . . .
See n. 8, supra. For the view that warrantless surveillance, though impermissible in domestic security cases, may be constitutional where foreign powers are involved, see United States v. Smith, 321 F.Supp. 424, 425-426 (CD Cal.1971); and American Bar Association Project on Standards for Criminal Justice, Electronic Surveillance 120, 121 (Approved Draft 1971, and Feb.19-71 Supp. 11). See also United States v. Clay, 430 F.2d 165 (CA5 1970).
This is an important phase in the campaign of the police and intelligence agencies to obtain exemptions from the Warrant Clause of the Fourth Amendment. For, due to the clandestine nature of electronic eavesdropping, the need is acute for placing on the Government [p325] the heavy burden to show that "exigencies of the situation [make its] course imperative." [n1] Other abuses, such as the search incident to arrest, have been partly deterred by the threat of damage actions against offending officers, [n2] the risk of adverse publicity, or the possibility of reform through the political process. These latter safeguards, however, are ineffective against lawless wiretapping and "bugging" of which their victims are totally unaware. Moreover, even the risk of exclusion of tainted evidence would here appear to be of negligible deterrent value, inasmuch as the United States frankly concedes that the primary purpose of these searches is to fortify its intelligence collage, rather than to accumulate evidence to support indictments and convictions. If the Warrant Clause were held inapplicable here, then the federal intelligence machine would literally enjoy unchecked discretion.
several thousand articles, including books, magazines, catalogues, mailing lists, private correspondence (both open and unopened), photographs, drawings, and film.
Id. at 815. In Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States, 251 U.S. 385, federal agents "without a shadow of authority" raided the offices of one of the petitioners (the proprietors of which had earlier been jailed) and "made a clean sweep of all the books, papers and documents found there." Justice Holmes, for the Court, termed this tactic an "outrage." Id. at 390, 391. In Stanford v. Texas, 379 U.S. 476, state police seized more than 2,000 items of literature, including the writings of Mr. Justice Black, pursuant to a general search warrant issued to inspect an alleged subversive's home.
the secret cabinets and bureaus of every [p328] subject in this kingdom will be thrown open to the search and inspection of a messenger, whenever the secretary of state shall think fit to charge, or even to suspect, a person to be the author, printer, or publisher of a seditious libel.
Id. at 1063. In a related and similar proceeding, Huckle v. Money, 2 Wils. K.B. 206, 207, 95 Eng.Rep. 768, 769 (1763), the same judge who presided over Entick's appeal held for another victim of the same despotic practice, saying "[t]o enter a man's house by virtue of a nameless warrant, in order to procure evidence, is worse than the Spanish Inquisition. . . ." See also Wilkes v. Wood, 19 How.St.Tr. 1153, 98 Eng.Rep. 489 (1763). As early as Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, 626, and as recently as Stanford v. Texas, supra, at 485-486; Berger v. New York, 388 U.S. 41, 49-50; and Coolidge v. New Hampshire, supra, at 455 n. 9, the tyrannical invasions described and assailed in Entick, Huckle, and Wilkes, practices which also were endured by the colonists, [n6] have been recognized [p329] as the primary abuses which ensured the Warrant Clause a prominent place in our Bill of Rights. See J. Landynski, Search and Seizure and the Supreme Court 288 (1966). N. Lasson, The History and Development of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution 478 (1937); Note, Warrantless Searches In Light of Chimel: A Return To The Original Understanding, 11 Ariz.L.Rev. 457, 460 476 (1969).
As illustrated by a flood of cases before us this Term, e.g., Laird v. Tatum, No. 71-288; Gelbard v. United States, No. 71-110; United States v. Egan, No. 71-263; United States v. Caldwell, No. 757; United States v. Gravel, No. 71-1026; Kleindienst v. Mandel, No. 71-16, we are currently in the throes of another national seizure of paranoia, resembling the hysteria which surrounded the Alien and Sedition Acts, the Palmer Raids, and the McCarthy era. Those who register dissent or who petition their governments for redress are subjected to scrutiny by grand juries, [n7] by the FBI, [n8] or even by the military. [n9] Their associates are interrogated. [p330] Their home are bugged and their telephones are wiretapped. They are befriended by secret government informers. [n10] Their patriotism and loyalty are questioned. [n11] [p331] Senator Sam Ervin, who has chaired hearings on military surveillance of civilian dissidents, warns that "it is not an exaggeration to talk in terms of hundreds of thousands of . . . dossiers." [n12] Senator Kennedy, as mentioned supra, found "the frightening possibility that the conversations of untold thousands are being monitored on secret devices." More than our privacy is implicated. Also at stake is the reach of the Government's power to intimidate its critics.
Those who won our independence by revolution were not cowards. They did not fear political change. They did not exalt order at the cost of liberty.
[T]his concept of "national defense" cannot be deemed an end in itself, justifying any . . . power designed to promote such a goal. Implicit in the term "national defense" is the notion of defending those values and ideas which set this Nation apart. . . . It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of . . . those liberties . . . which [make] the defense of the Nation worthwhile.
In times of unrest, whether caused by crime or racial conflict or fear of internal subversion, this basic law [p333] and the values that it represents may appear unrealistic or "extravagant" to some. But the values were those of the authors of our fundamental constitutional concepts. In times not altogether unlike our own, they won . . . a right of personal security against arbitrary intrusions. . . . If times have changed, reducing everyman's scope to do as he pleases in an urban and industrial world, the changes have made the values served by the Fourth Amendment more, not less, important.
1. Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 455; McDonald v. United States, 335 U.S. 451, 456; Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752; United States v. Jeffers, 342 U.S. 48, 51.
2. See Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388.
3. Letter from Senator Edward Kennedy to Members of the Subcommittee on Administrative Procedure and Practice of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Dec. 17, 1971, p. 2. Senator Kennedy included in his letter a chart comparing court-ordered and department-ordered wiretapping and bugging by federal agencies. This chart is reproduced in the Appendix to this opinion. For a statistical breakdown by duration, location, and implementing agency of the 1,042 wiretap orders issued in 1971 by state and federal judges, see Administrative Office of the United States Courts, Report on Applications for Orders Authorizing or Approving the Interception of Wire or Oral Communications for 1971; The Washington Post, May 14, 1972, p. A30, col. 1 (final ed.).
4. Kennedy, supra, n. 3, at 2. See also H. Schwartz, A Report on the Costs and Benefits of Electronic Surveillance (American Civil Liberties Union 1971); Schwartz, The Legitimation of Electronic Eavesdropping: The Politics of "Law and Order," 67 Mich.L.Rev. 455 (1969).
5. For a complete itemization of the objects seized, see the Appendix to Kremen v. United States, 353 U.S. 346, 349.
On this side of the Atlantic, the argument concerning the validity of general search warrants centered around the writs of assistance which were used by customs officers for the detection of smuggled goods.
was a flame of fire! Every man of a crowded audience appeared to me to go away, as I did, ready to take arms against Writs of Assistance. Then and there was the first scene of opposition to the arbitrary claims of Great Britain. Then and there, the child Independence was born. In 15 years, namely in 1776, he grew to manhood, and declared himself free.
7. See Donner & Cerruti, The Grand Jury Network: How the Nixon Administration Has Secretly Perverted A Traditional Safeguard Of Individual Rights, 214 The Nation 5 (1972). See also United States v. Caldwell, O.T. 1971, No. 70-57; United States v. Gravel, O.T. 1971, No. 71-1026; Gelbard v. United States and United States v. Egan, O.T. 1971, Nos. 71-110 and 71-263. And see N.Y. Times, July 15, 1971, p. 6, col. 1 (grand jury investigation of N.Y. Times staff which published the Pentagon Papers).
8. E.g., N.Y. Times, April 12, 1970, p. 1, col. 2 ("U.S. To Tighten Surveillance of Radicals"); N.Y. Times, Dec. 14, 1969, p. 1, col. 1 ("F.B.I.'s Informants and Bugs Collect Data On Black Panthers"); the Washington Post, May 12, 1972, p. D21, col. 5 ("When the FBI Calls, Everybody Talks"); the Washington Post, May 16, 1972, p. B15, col. 5 ("Black Activists Are FBI Targets"); the Washington Post, May 17, 1972, p. B13, col. 5 ("Bedroom Peeking Sharpens FBI Files"). And, concerning an FBI investigation of Daniel Schorr, a television correspondent critical of the Government, see N.Y. Times, Nov. 11, 1971, p. 95, col. 4; and N.Y. Times, Nov. 12, 1971, p. 13, col. 1. For the wiretapping and bugging of Dr. Martin Luther King by the FBI, see V. Navasky, Kennedy Justice 135-155 (1971). For the wiretapping of Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt and John L. Lewis by the FBI see Theoharis & Meyer, The "National Security" Justification For Electronic Eavesdropping: An Elusive Exception, 14 Wayne L.Rev. 749, 760-761 (1968).
9. See Laird v. Tatum, O.T. 1971, No. 71-288; see also Federal Data Banks, Computers and the Bill of Rights, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, 92d Cong., 1st Sess. (1971); N.Y. Times, Feb. 29, 1972, p. 1, col. 3.
[N.Y. Times, April 8, 1971, p. 22, col. 1]. In Philadelphia's black community, for instance, a whole range of buildings "including offices of the Congress of Racial Equality, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference [and] the Black Coalition" [ibid.] was singled out for surveillance by building employees and other similar informers working for the FBI.
Note, Developments In The Law -- The National Security Interest and Civil Liberties, 85 Harv.L.Rev. 1130, 1272-1273 (1972). For accounts of the impersonation of journalists by police, FBI agents and soldiers in order to gain the confidences of dissidents, see Press Freedoms Under Pressure, Report of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on the Government and the Press 29-34, 86-97 (1972). For the revelation of Army infiltration of political organizations and spying on Senators, Governors and Congressmen, see Federal Data Banks, Computers and the Bill of Rights, Hearings before the Subcommittee on Constitutional Rights of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, 92d Cong., 1st Sess. (1971) (discussed in my dissent from the denial of certiorari in Williamson v. United States, 405 U.S. 1026). Among the Media Papers was the suggestion by the FBI that investigation of dissidents be stepped up in order to "‘enhance the paranoia endemic in these circles and [to] further serve to get the point across there is an FBI agent behind every mailbox.'" N.Y. Times, March 25, 1971, p. 33, col. 1.
11. E.g., N.Y. Times, Feb. 8, 1972, p. 1, col. 8 (Senate peace advocates said, by presidential adviser, to be aiding and abetting the enemy).
12. Amicus curiae brief submitted by Senator Sam Ervin in Laird v. Tatum, No. 71-288, O.T. 1971, p. 8.
13. E.g., New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713; Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486; United States v. Robel, 389 U.S. 258, 264; Aptheker v. Secretary of State, 378 U.S. 500; Baggett v. Bullitt, 377 U.S. 360; Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579; Duncan v. Kahanamoku, 327 U.S. 304; White v. Steer, 327 U.S. 304; De Jonge v. Oregon, 299 U.S. 353, 365; Ex parte Milligan, 4 Wall. 2; Mitchell v. Harmony, 13 How. 115. Note, The "National Security Wiretap": Presidential Prerogative or Judicial Responsibility, 45 S.Cal.L.Rev. 888, 907-912 (1972).
Such devices lay down a dragnet which indiscriminately sweeps in all conversations within its scope, without regard to the nature of the conversations, or the participants. A warrant authorizing such devices is no different from the general warrants the Fourth Amendment was intended to prohibit.
I would affirm the Court of Appeals, but on the statutory ground urged by defendant respondents (Brief 115) without reaching or intimating any views with respect [p337] to the constitutional issue decided by both the District Court and the Court of Appeals.
Nothing contained in this chapter or in section 605 of the Communications Act of 1934 (48 Stat. 1143; 47 U.S.C. 605) shall limit the constitutional power of the President to take such measures as he deems necessary to protect the Nation against actual or potential attack or other hostile acts of a foreign power, to obtain foreign intelligence information deemed essential to the security of the United States, or to protect national security information against foreign intelligence activities. Nor shall anything contained in this chapter be deemed to limit the constitutional power of the President to take such measures as he deems necessary to protect the United States against the overthrow of the Government by force or other unlawful means, or against any other clear and present danger to the structure or existence of the Government. The contents [p338] of any wire or oral communication intercepted by authority of the President in the exercise of the foregoing powers may be received in evidence in any trial hearing, or other proceeding only where such interception was reasonable, and shall not be otherwise used or disclosed except as is necessary to implement that power.
The defendants in the District Court moved for the production of the logs of any electronic surveillance to which they might have been subjected. The Government [p339] responded that conversations of Plamondon had been intercepted, but took the position that turnover of surveillance records was not necessary because the interception complied with the law. Clearly, for the Government to prevail, it was necessary to demonstrate, first, that the interception involved was not subject to the statutory requirement of judicial approval for wiretapping because the surveillance was within the scope of § 2511(3), and, secondly, if the Act did not forbid the warrantless wiretap, that the surveillance was consistent with the Fourth Amendment.
The United States has made no claim in this case that the statute may not constitutionally be applied to the surveillance at issue here. [n3] Nor has it denied that, to [p340] comply with the Act, the surveillance must either be supported by a warrant or fall within the bounds of the exceptions provided by § 2511(3). Nevertheless, as I read the opinions of the District Court and the Court of Appeals, neither court stopped to inquire whether the challenged interception was illegal under the statute, but proceeded directly to the constitutional issue without adverting to the time-honored rule that courts should abjure constitutional issues except where necessary to decision of the case before them. Ashwander v. Tennessee Valley Authority, 297 U.S. 288, 346-348 (1936) (concurring opinion). Because I conclude that, on the record before us, the surveillance undertaken by the Government in this case was illegal under the statute itself, I find it unnecessary, and therefore improper, to consider or decide the constitutional questions which the courts below improvidently reached.
deemed necessary to protect the nation from attempts of domestic organizations to attack and subvert the existing structure of the Government.
Government counsel, however, seek to save their case by reference to the in camera exhibit submitted to the [p342] District Court to supplement the Attorney General's affidavit. [n5] It is said that the exhibit includes the request for wiretap approval submitted to the Attorney General, that the request asserted the need to avert a clear and present danger to the structure and existence of the Government, and that the Attorney General endorsed his approval on the request. [n6] But I am unconvinced that the mere endorsement of the Attorney General on the request for approval submitted to him must be taken as the Attorney General's own opinion that the wiretap was necessary to avert a clear and present danger to the existence or structure of the Government [p343] when, in an affidavit later filed in court specifically characterizing the purposes of the interception and at least impliedly the grounds for his prior approval, the Attorney General said only that the tap was undertaken to secure intelligence thought necessary to protect against attempts to attack and subvert the structure of Government. If the Attorney General's approval of the interception is to be given a judicially cognizable meaning different from the meaning he seems to have ascribed to it in his affidavit filed in court, there obviously must be further proceedings in the District Court.
There remain two additional interrelated reasons for not reaching the constitutional issue. First, even if it were determined that the Attorney General purported to [p344] authorize an electronic surveillance for purposes exempt from the general provisions of the Act, there would remain the issue whether his discretion was properly authorized. The United States concedes that the act of the Attorney General authorizing a warrantless wiretap is subject to judicial review to some extent, Brief for United States 21-23, and it seems improvident to proceed to constitutional questions until it is determined that the Act itself does not bar the interception here in question.
[t]he contents of any wire or oral communication intercepted by authority of the President in the exercise of the foregoing powers may be received in evidence in any trial, hearing, or other proceeding only where such interception was reasonable, and shall not be otherwise used or disclosed except as is necessary to implement that power.
I certify that it would prejudice the national interest to disclose the particular facts concerning these surveillances other than to the court in camera. Accordingly, the sealed exhibit referred to herein is being submitted solely for the court's in camera inspection and a copy of the sealed exhibit is not being furnished to the defendants. I would request the court, at the conclusion of its hearing on this matter, to place the sealed exhibit in a sealed envelope and return it to the Department of Justice, where it will be retained under seal so that it may be submitted to any appellate court that may review this matter.
2. I cannot agree with the majority's analysis of the import of § 2511(3). Surely, Congress meant at least that, if a court determined that in the specified circumstances the President could constitutionally intercept communications without a warrant, the general ban of § 2511(1) would not apply. But the limitation on the applicability of § 2511(1) was not open-ended; it was confined to those situations that § 2511(3) specifically described. Thus, even assuming the constitutionality of a warrantless surveillance authorized by the President to uncover private or official graft forbidden by federal statute, the interception would be illegal under § 2511(1) because it is not the type of presidential action saved by the Act by the provision of § 2511(3). As stated in the text and n. 3, infra, the United States does not claim that Congress is powerless to require warrants for surveillances that the President otherwise would not be barred by the Fourth Amendment from undertaking without a warrant.
Q. . . . I take it from your answer that Congress could forbid the President from doing what you suggest he has the power to do in this case?
Q. Well, I would -- my next question will suggest that it is. Would you say, though, that Congress could forbid the President?
Mr. Mardian: I think, under the rule announced by this court in Colony Catering, that, within certain limits, the Congress could severely restrict the power of the President in this area.
Q. Well, let's assume Congress says, then, that the Attorney General, or the President may authorize the Attorney General, in specific situations, to carry out electronic surveillance if the Attorney General certifies that there is a clear and present danger to the security of the United States?
Q. Well, would you say that Congress would have the power to limit surveillances to situations where those conditions were satisfied?
Mr. Mardian: Yes, I would -- I would concur in that, Your Honor.
Q. . . . If all the in camera document contained was what this affidavit contained, it would not comply with the Safe Streets Act?
Mr. Mardian: I would concur in that, Your Honor.
that the in camera submission was not intended as a justification for the authorization, but simply [as] a proof of the fact that the authorization had been granted by the Attorney General of the United States, over his own signature.
[T]he affidavit was never intended as the basis for justifying the surveillance in question. . . . The justification, and again I suggest that it is only a partial justification, is contained in the in camera exhibit which was submitted to Judge Keith. . . . We do not rely upon the affidavit itself, but the in camera exhibit.
Those [in camera] documents, and not the affidavit, are the proper basis for determining the ground upon which the Attorney General acted.
6. Procedures in practice at the time of the request here in issue apparently resulted in the Attorney General's merely countersigning a request which asserted a need for a wiretap. We are told that, under present procedures, the Attorney General makes an express written finding of clear and present danger to the structure and existence of the Government before he authorizes a tap. Tr. of Oral Arg. 17-18.
Whenever any wire or oral communication has been intercepted, no part of the contents of such communication and no evidence derived therefrom may be received in evidence in any trial, hearing, or other proceeding in or before any court, grand jury, department, officer, agency, regulatory body, legislative committee, or other authority of the United States, a State, or a political subdivision thereof if the disclosure of that information would be in violation of this chapter.
MICHIGAN, Petitioner v. Raymond CLIFFORD and Emma Jean Clifford.
Joseph G. GRIFFIN, Petitioner, v. WISCONSIN.
TRUONG DINH HUNG, Applicant, v. UNITED STATES of America. No. A-73.
Anthony Joseph RUSSO, Jr., and Daniel Ellsberg v. William Matthew BYRNE, Jr., etc.
Anthony Joseph RUSSO, Jr., and Daniel Ellsberg, Applicants, v. William Matthew BYRNE, Jr., Judge of the United States District Court for the Central District of California. No. A-150.
WASHINGTON, Petitioner, v. Neil Martin CHRISMAN.

References: § 2516
 v. 
 v. 
 § 2518
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 2511
 § 1291
 § 1651
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 V. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 § 2511
 § 2511
 v. 
 § 2511
 § 2511
 § 2511
 § 2511
 § 2511
 § 2511
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.