Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/195/65/
Timestamp: 2019-04-24 12:58:59+00:00

Document:
A written waiver of a jury by a defendant in an action brought by the United States to recover a penalty of fifty dollars under § 11 of the act of 1886 as amended by the Act of May 9, 1902, is not in conflict with the laws and Constitution of the United States, and does not invalidate the judgment.
McCray v. United States, ante, p. 195 U. S. 27, followed as to constitutionality of the oleomargarine legislation.
"That every person who knowingly purchases or receives for sale any oleomargarine which has not been branded or stamped according to law shall be liable to a penalty of fifty dollars for each such offense."
In each case, the parties in writing waived a jury and agreed to submit the issues to the court. Judgments were entered in favor of the United States, and their collection ordered by only the civil process of execution. That the defendants had failed to comply with the section was proved. Indeed, it was not seriously disputed, the defense resting only on the alleged unconstitutionality of the act. The waiver of a jury was not assigned as error nor referred to by counsel at the hearing before us either in brief or argument. The question of its effect upon the judgment was suggested by this Court, and briefs were called for from the respective parties. Such briefs have been filed, and both agree that the waiver of a jury did not invalidate the proceedings. Notwithstanding this, the fact of the waiver appears in the record.
dignity of a crime. Not infrequently, a single statute in its several sections provides for offenses of different grades, subject to different punishments and to prosecution in different ways. In some states, in the same act are gathered all the various offenses against the person, ranging from simple assault to murder, and imposing punishments, from a mere fine to death. This very statute furnishes an illustration. By one clause, the knowingly selling of adulterated butter in any other than the prescribed form subjects the party convicted thereof to a fine of not more than $1,000 and imprisonment for not more than two years. An officer of customs violating certain provisions of the act is declared guilty of a misdemeanor, and subject to a fine of not less than one thousand dollars nor more than five thousand dollars and imprisonment for not less than six months nor more than three years. Obviously, these violations of certain provisions of the statute must be classed among serious criminal offenses, and can be prosecuted only by indictment, while the violations of the statute in the cases before us were prosecuted by information. The truth is, the nature of the offense and the amount of punishment prescribed, rather than its place in the statutes, determine whether it is to be classed among serious or petty offenses -- whether among crimes or misdemeanors. Clearly both indicate that this particular violation of the statute is only a petty offense.
"in all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed."
"is the system from which our judicial ideas and legal definitions are derived. The language of the Constitution and of many acts of Congress could not be understood without reference to the common law."
"The interpretation of the Constitution of the United States is necessarily influenced by the fact that its provisions are framed in the language of the English common law, and are to be read in the light of its history."
"In this as in other respects, it must be interpreted in the light of the common law, the principles and history of which were familiarly known to the framers of the Constitution. Minor v. Happersett, 21 Wall. 162; Ex Parte Wilson, 114 U. S. 417, 114 U. S. 422; Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616, 116 U. S. 624-625; Smith v. Alabama, 124 U. S. 465."
See also Kepner v. United States, post, p. 195 U. S. 100; 1 Kent, Com. 336.
Blackstone's Commentaries are accepted as the most satisfactory exposition of the common law of England. At the time of the adoption of the federal Constitution, it had been published about twenty years, and it has been said that more copies of the work had been sold in this country than in England, so that undoubtedly the framers of the Constitution were familiar with it. In this treatise, vol. 4, p. 5. is given a definition of the word "crimes:"
dye; while smaller faults and omissions of less consequence are comprised under the gentler name of 'misdemeanors' only."
"Except in that class or grade of offenses called petty offenses, which, according to the common law, may be proceeded against summarily in any tribunal legally constituted for that purpose, the guaranty of an impartial jury to the accused in a criminal prosecution, conducted either in the name, or by or under the authority, of the United States, secures to him the right to enjoy that mode of trial from the first moment, and in whatever court, he is put on trial for the offense charged."
"of all crimes and offenses cognizable under the authority of the United States, committed within their respective districts, or upon the high seas, the punishment of which is not capital."
"In all prosecutions within the jurisdiction of said court in which, according to the Constitution of the United States, the accused would be entitled to a jury trial, the trial shall be by jury unless the accused shall, in open court, expressly waive such trial by jury and request to be tried by the judge, in which case the trial shall be by such judge, and the judgment and sentence shall have the same force and effect in all respects as if the same had been entered and pronounced upon the verdict of a jury. In all cases where the accused would not by force of the Constitution of the United States be entitled to trial by jury, the trial shall be by the court without a jury, unless in such of said last-named cases wherein the fine or penalty may be $50 or more, or imprisonment as punishment for the offense may be thirty days or more, the accused shall demand a trial by jury, in which case the trial shall be by jury."
And it is a well known fact that, in many territories organized by act of Congress, the legislature has authorized the prosecution of petty offenses in the police courts of cities without a jury.
him the further right "to be confronted with the witnesses against him . . . and to have the assistance of counsel." Is it possible that an accused cannot admit, and be bound by the admission, that a witness not present would testify to certain facts? Can it be that, if he does not wish the assistance of counsel, and waives it, the trial is invalid? It seems only necessary to ask these questions to answer them. When there is no constitutional or statutory mandate, and no public policy prohibiting, an accused may waive any privilege which he is given the right to enjoy. Authorities in the state courts are in harmony with this thought. In Commonwealth v. Dailey, 12 Cush. 80, the defendant in a misdemeanor case waived his right to a full panel and consented to be tried by eleven jurors, and this action was sustained by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. Chief Justice Shaw, delivering the opinion of the court, said (p. 83): "He may waive any matter of form or substance, excepting only what may relate to the jurisdiction of the court." The same doctrine was laid down in Murphy v. Commonwealth, 1 Met. 365; Tyra v. Commonwealth, 2 Met. 1, and in State v. Kaufman, 51 Ia 578. In Connelly v. State, 60 Ala. 89, a statute authorizing the waiver of a jury was sustained. The same rule was made in State v. Worden, 46 Conn. 349, which was a case of a felony. See also People v. Rathbun, 21 Wend. 509, 542.
THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE BROWN, and MR. JUSTICE PECKHAM concur in the views expressed in this opinion, although they dissent from the judgments on the ground of their dissent in McCray v. United States, ante, p. 195 U. S. 64.
of August 2, 1886, entitled "An Act Defining Butter, Also Imposing a Tax Upon and Regulating the Manufacture, Sale, Importation, and Exportation of Oleomargarine," supplemented by the Act of October 1, 1890, and amended by the Act of May 9, 1902. 24 Stat. 209, c. 840; 26 Stat. 621, c. 1244, § 41, 32 Stat. 193, c. 784.
The informations against Schick and Broadwell were substantially of the same character. Each charged that the defendant, a retail dealer in oleomargarine, unlawfully and knowingly purchased and received for sale certain oleomargarine which had not been stamped according to law.
The parties, in writing, waived a jury, and agreed to submit the issues to the court. The accused in each case pleaded not guilty. Evidence having been introduced, the defendant in each case moved the court to render a verdict and judgment of not guilty, and that he be discharged upon the ground that the above act of Congress, as amended, was in contravention of the Constitution of the United States in that it deprived the defendant and the oleomargarine manufacturers and dealers in the United States of their liberty and property without due process of law, was an unwarranted encroachment upon, and interference with, the police powers reserved to the several states and to the people of the United States, invested an inferior executive officer with the power finally and arbitrarily to determine judicial questions concerning property rights, and so arbitrarily discriminated against oleomargarine in favor of butter as to be repugnant to the fundamental principles of equality and justice that were inherent in the Constitution.
In each case, the motion was overruled, the defendant excepting. Motions for a new trial and in arrest of judgment having been severally overruled, the court, no jury having been impaneled, found the defendant in each case guilty and adjudged that he pay a fine of $50 and costs, and that execution issue therefor. From those judgments the present writs of error were prosecuted.
The assignments of error here present the same questions of constitutional law that were raised on the motion to render judgment for the defendant, and, in addition, they question the action of the trial court in striking out and refusing to consider certain evidence.
Upon the face of the record, the question arises whether the court below, without the aid of a jury, had jurisdiction to ascertain the facts, and, finding the defendants severally guilty of the offense charged, to impose upon each the fine prescribed by the statute.
"to pass out of his custody or control without compliance by the owner or importer thereof with the provisions of this section relating thereto, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall be fined not less than $1,000, nor more than $5,000, and imprisoned not less than six months, nor more than two years."
"shall for each such offense, be fined, not exceeding $50, and imprisoned not less than ten days, nor more than six months. And any person who fraudulently gives away or accepts from another, or who sells, buys, or uses for packing oleomargarine any such stamped package, shall, for each such offense, be fined not exceeding $100, and be imprisoned not more than one year."
"of a misdemeanor, and shall be punished by a fine of not less than one hundred dollars, nor more than two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment for not less than thirty days, nor more than six months."
"shall be fined not less than five hundred dollars nor more than five thousand dollars, and be imprisoned not less than six months, nor more than three years."
"That every person who knowingly purchases or receives for sale any oleomargarine which has not been branded or stamped according to law, shall be liable to a penalty of fifty dollars for each such offense."
"These words have been used by the great masters of Crown law and the elementary writers as synonymous with the word 'punishment,' in connection with crimes of the highest grade. Thus, Blackstone speaks of criminal law as that 'branch of jurisprudence which teaches of the nature, extent, and degrees of every crime, and adjusts to it its adequate and necessary penalty.' Alluding to the importance of this department of legal science, he says: 'The enacting of penalties to which a whole nation shall be subject should be calmly and maturely considered.' Referring to the unwise policy of inflicting capital punishment for certain comparatively slight offenses, he speaks of them as 'these outrageous penalties,' and frequently refers to laws that inflict the 'penalty of death.'"
"In the municipal law of England and America, the words 'penal' and 'penalty' have been used in various senses. Strictly and primarily, they denote punishment, whether corporal or pecuniary, imposed and enforced by the state for a crime or offense against its laws. . . . Penal laws, strictly and properly, are those imposing punishment for an offense committed against the state, and which, by the English and American Constitutions, the executive of the state has the power to pardon."
Besides, the act throughout uses the words "fine," and "fined" -- words which, in their primary sense, import the punishment of a person convicted of crime.
"in view of the word 'offense' in section 11 of the Oleomargarine Act, there is ground for saying that the penalty which it provides was imposed as a fine for the violation of what is made a misdemeanor."
If the United States could have proceeded in some form of civil action to recover the fine imposed by that section, it has not done so. It chose to proceed by criminal information, and the accused pleaded not guilty of the crime charged.
crime charged against him? Has the law designated any particular tribunal, or prescribed any special mode, for trying the issue as to his guilt? The words of the Constitution upon this subject are clear and explicit. They leave no room for interpretation. Its express mandate is that "the trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by jury." Const. Art. III. When the Constitution was placed before the people for adoption or rejection, many deemed those words, explicit as they were, inadequate to secure all the benefits of a jury trial as it existed at common law.
"The Constitution of the United States has exhibited great solicitude on the subject of the trial of crimes, and has declared that the trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by the jury, and has, in some cases, prescribed, and in others required Congress to prescribe, the place of trial. And certain amendments of the Constitution, in the nature of a Bill of Rights, have been adopted, which fortify and guard this inestimable right of trial by jury."
United States v. Gibert, 2 Sumner 19, 38. See also Capital Traction Co. v. Hof, 174 U. S. 1; Natal v. Louisiana, 139 U. S. 621, 139 U. S. 624; 4 Black.Com. 280; 1 Stephen's History of the Criminal Law 123.
"we must examine the Constitution itself to see whether this process be in conflict with any of its provisions. If not found to be so, we must look to those settled usages and modes of proceeding existing in the common and statute law of England before the emigration of our ancestors, and which are shown not to have been unsuited to their civil and political condition by having been acted on by them after the settlement of this country."
without a jury -- the accused pleading not guilty -- we must inquire whether the Constitution forbids such an exercise of authority by the court, without a jury. If it does, that is the end of the matter; if it does not, then, and then only, may we look to such usages and modes of proceeding as existed at the common law for the trial of crimes before the adoption of the Constitution.
court, he is put on trial for the offense charged. In such cases, a judgment of conviction, not based upon a verdict of guilty by a jury, is void."
If, in analogy to the powers exercised by the Parliament of England prior to the adoption of our Constitution, it should be held that Congress could treat the particular crime here in question as a petty offense, triable by the court, without a jury or with a jury of less than twelve persons, it is sufficient to say that Congress has not legislated to that effect in respect of the offense charged against these defendants, or of any other offense defined in the acts relating to oleomargarine. If it has the power to do so, Congress has not assumed, directly or indirectly, to withdraw such offenses from the operation of the constitutional provision that the trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by jury. And the question is whether, in the face of that explicit provision and in the absence of any statute authorizing it to be done, the court, a jury being waived, has jurisdiction to try the accused for the crime charged.
murder may plead guilty. But, in doing so, he renders a trial unnecessary. The Constitution does not prohibit an accused from pleading guilty. His right to do so was recognized long before the adoption of that instrument, and it was never supposed that such a plea impaired the force of the requirement that a trial for crime, under a plea of not guilty, shall be by jury. It is not to be assumed that the Constitution intended, when preserving the right of trial by jury, to change any essential rule of criminal practice established at the common law before the adoption of that instrument. When the accused pleads guilty before a lawful tribunal, he admits every material fact well averred in the indictment or information, and there is no issue to be tried; no facts are to be found; no trial occurs. After such a plea, nothing remains to be done except that the court shall pronounce judgment upon the facts voluntarily confessed by the accused. What the Constitution requires is that the trial of a crime shall be by jury. If the accused pleads not guilty, there must, of necessity, be a trial, for by that plea, he puts "himself on his country, which country the jury are;" he contests, by that plea, every fact necessary to establish his guilt; he is presumed to be innocent; nothing is confessed, and the facts necessary to show guilt must be judicially ascertained, in the mode prescribed by law, before any judgment can be rendered. But the vital inquiry is in what way, when the defendant pleads not guilty, are the facts to be ascertained, and the plea of not guilty overcome? Under the express words of the Constitution, the answer must be: by trial before a jury of twelve persons, organized to determine whether the charge of guilt be true, the function of the court being simply to conduct the trial, and render a judgment in accordance with the verdict of the jury as to the facts. The court and the jury, not separately, but together, constitute the appointed tribunal which alone, under the law, can try the question of crime, the commission of which by the accused is put in issue by a plea of not guilty.
may not be legally done or legally omitted in a criminal prosecution, even with the consent of the accused. This is abundantly established by authority. The grounds upon which the decisions rest are, upon principle, applicable alike in cases of felonies and misdemeanors, although the consequences to the accused may be more evident as well as more serious in the former than in the latter cases. Certain it is that felonies and misdemeanors are equally crimes within the meaning of the constitutional provision that the trial of all crimes shall be by jury, and there is no warrant to construe that provision as if it read, "the trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment and in misdemeanors, shall be by jury."
Let us look at some of the authorities in cases both of felonies and misdemeanors, and ascertain whether the consent, express or implied, of the accused can have the effect to dispense with the mode of trial appointed by law for criminal cases. As the question here presented has never been decided by this Court, and is of importance, a somewhat extended reference to authorities is justified.
"We are of opinion that it was not within the power of the accused or his counsel to dispense with the statutory requirement as to his personal presence at the trial.
The argument to the contrary necessarily proceeds upon the ground that he alone is concerned as to the mode by which he may be deprived of his life or liberty, and that the chief object of the prosecution is to punish him for the crime charged. But this is a mistaken view as well of the relations which the accused holds to the public as of the end of human punishment. The natural life, says Blackstone,"
"cannot legally be disposed of or destroyed by any individual, neither by the person himself, nor by any other of his fellow creatures, merely upon their own authority."
"1 Bl.Com. 133. The public has an interest in his life and liberty. Neither can be lawfully taken except in the mode prescribed by law. That which the law makes essential in proceedings involving the deprivation of life or liberty cannot be dispensed with or affected by the consent of the accused, much less by his mere failure, when on trial and in custody, to object to unauthorized methods."
"It is sufficient to say that it was not in the power of one accused of felony, by consent expressly given or by his silence, to authorize a jury of only eight persons to pass upon the question of his guilt. The law in force when this crime was committed did not permit any tribunal to deprive him of his liberty except one constituted of a court and a jury of twelve persons."
the punishment of which is confinement in a penitentiary could not legally consent that the trial proceed in his absence, still less could he assent to be deprived of his liberty by a tribunal not authorized by law to determine his guilt."
"in case of a trial by a jury of less than twelve, by consent, would be that the tribunal would be one unknown to the law, created by mere voluntary act of the parties, and it would in effect be an attempt to submit to a species of arbitration the question whether the accused has been guilty of an offense against the state."
to be a sufficient safeguard to the public interests. But when issue is joined upon an indictment, the trial must be by the tribunal and in the mode which the Constitution and laws provide, without any essential change. The public officer prosecuting for the people has no authority to consent to such a change, nor has the defendant. Applying the above reasoning to the present case, the conclusion necessarily follows that the consent of the plaintiff in error to the withdrawal of one juror, and that the remaining eleven might render a verdict, could not lawfully be recognized by the court at the circuit, and was a nullity. If a deficiency of one juror might be waived, there appears to be no good reason why a deficiency of eleven might not be, and it is difficult to say why, upon the same principle, the entire panel might not be dispensed with, and the trial committed to the court alone. It would be a highly dangerous innovation, in reference to criminal cases, upon the ancient and invaluable institution of trial by jury, and the Constitution and laws establishing and securing that mode of trial, for the court to allow of any number short of a full panel of twelve jurors, and we think it ought not to be tolerated."
"But a criminal prosecution, in which the people in their sovereign capacity prosecute for a crime against the laws of the whole society, and seek to subject the defendant to punishment, must, it seems to us, be considered as a proceeding in invitum, against the will of the defendant throughout, so far as relates to a question of this kind, or any question as to the legal constitution of the court or jury by which he is to be tried. It would be adding materially to the generally recognized force of the obligation of contracts to hold that a defendant charged with a crime might, without a trial, enter into a building contract with the prosecuting attorney (representing the state) to go to the penitentiary for a certain number of years in satisfaction for the offense. And yet it would approximate such a position to hold that he might be bound by a contract providing for a trial before a court or jury unknown to the Constitution or the laws, the result of which trial might be to place him in the same penitentiary. The true theory, we think, is that the people, in their political or sovereign capacity, assume to provide by law the proper tribunals and modes of trial for offenses, without consulting the wishes of the defendant as such, and upon them therefore devolves the responsibility not only of enacting such laws, but of carrying them into effect by furnishing the tribunals, the panels of jurors, and other safeguards for his trial in accordance with the Constitution which secures his rights."
"But, independent of all theories and as a practical question, we think there would be great danger in holding it competent for a defendant in a criminal case, by waiver or stipulation, to give authority which it could not otherwise possess to a jury of less than twelve men for his trial and conviction, or to deprive himself in any way of the safeguards which the Constitution has provided him in the unanimous agreement of twelve men qualified to serve as jurors by the general laws of the land. Let it once be settled that a defendant may thus waive this constitutional right, and no one can foresee the extent of the evils which might follow; but the whole judicial history of the past must admonish us that very serious evils should be apprehended, and that every step taken in that direction would tend to increase the danger. One act or neglect might be recognized as a waiver in one case, and another in another, until the constitutional safeguards might be substantially frittered away. The only safe course is to meet the danger in limine, and prevent the first step in the wrong direction. It is the duty of courts to see that the constitutional rights of a defendant in a criminal case shall not be violated, however negligent he may be in raising the objection. It is in such cases emphatically that consent should not be allowed to give jurisdiction."
mere statutory privilege, but an imperative provision, based, as we view it, upon the soundest conception of public policy. Life and liberty are too sacred to be placed at the disposal of any one man, and always will be, so long as man is fallible. The innocent person, unduly influenced by his consciousness of innocence and placing undue confidence in his evidence, would, when charged with crime, be the one most easily induced to waive his safeguards. There is no resemblance between such a case and that of a person pleading guilty. In the latter case, there is no trial, but mere judgment upon the plea. If the language of the statute were less imperative than it is, the adjudications would support us in reaching the same conclusion."
when he is upon trial, cannot be permitted to change the law and substitute another and a different tribunal to pass upon his guilt or innocence. The law as to criminal trials should be based upon fixed standards, and should be clear, definite, and uniform, and absolute. If one juror can be withdrawn, there is no reason why six or eight may not be, and thus the accused, through persuasion or other causes, may have his life put in jeopardy or be deprived of his liberty through a body constituted in a manner unknown to the law. Aside from the illegality of such a procedure, public policy condemns it. The prisoner is not in a condition to exercise a free and independent choice without often creating prejudice against him."
"Hence, there would seem to be no other mode for the trial of a criminal issue than that by jury. The difficulty is not obviated by any waiver of this mode of trial, because the legislature has provided no other mode, in lieu of it, in such an event, as it has in civil cases. Nothing short of a confession of the facts, or the finding of them by the verdict of the jury, can regularly authorize the judgment of the court. If the accused would not only waive his right to a trial by jury, but go further and withdraw his plea, and then confess the facts charged against him in the indictment, the court would be authorized to render a judgment against him; but so long as his plea of not guilty is in, there is no mode by which the court can dispose of it, although the accused may waive a trial by jury, with all its attendant privileges, and desire ever so much that the issue may be disposed of by a reference of it to the judge, or any other referee or arbitrator, and the prosecuting attorney may desire the same, and act in concert with the accused, for the simple reason that the law makes no provision for any such referee or arbitrator in criminal cases. The only provision is for a confession of the facts, or a trial by jury to determine them."
concurring assent of twelve of his peers, and no law has ever attempted to authorize it to be done. If the power exists to diminish the number of the jury, it may be applied to all cases, and it may be reduced to two as well as to six. The same constitutional provision that secures the right in a charge involving the life of the accused secures it also in every other criminal case. It is no answer to say that this would not likely be done. If it had been deemed safe to leave it to the discretion of the general assembly, no constitutional provision was needed; but, whether needed or not, it has been ordained by a power which both the general assembly and this Court are bound to obey."
"But, without pursuing these considerations further, our opinion is that the essential and distinguishing features of the trial by jury as known at common law, and generally, if not universally, adopted in this country, were intended to be preserved, and its benefits secured to the accused in all criminal cases, by the constitutional provisions referred to. That it is beyond the power of the general assembly to impair the right, or materially change its character; that the number of jurors cannot be diminished, or a verdict authorized, short of a unanimous concurrence of all the jurors. It follows that the act under which this conviction was obtained, insofar as it provides for a jury of six only, and authorizes a conviction upon their finding, is unconstitutional and void."
In United States v. Taylor, 11 F. 470, which was a criminal prosecution by information for the offense of carrying on the business of a retail dealer in liquors without having paid the special taxes required by law, the main question was as to the authority of the court to direct a verdict of guilty under the evidence. It was held by Judge McCrary that no such power existed in the court. In the course of his opinion, he said that the constitutional guaranty of a jury in a criminal case was a right that could not be waived, and that such a trial before the court, by the prisoner's consent, was erroneous. It appears from the report of that case that Mr.
Justice Miller was consulted by Judge McCrary, and concurred in the latter's views.
"as no statute conferred on the superior court the power to try this or any other criminal charge, excepting through the intervention of a jury, the court below could not legally try the case in the manner in which it had done, and would not be able to render a legal judgment on the facts if the advice of this Court was given upon them. They therefore refused to entertain the case."
"Another objection, equally fatal to the judgment, was the trial of the cause by the court on the plea of not guilty. It has heretofore been virtually decided by this Court in two cases that, unless the defendant pleads guilty to the charge contained in the indictment, the court cannot try the issue and assess a fine against him. Thomas v. State, 6 Mo. 457; Ross v. State, 9 Mo. 687. It is exclusively the province of a jury to try the issue of not guilty, and the consent of the defendant for the court to try the same cannot confer such power on the court."
A case directly in point is that of State v. Stewart, 89 N.C. 563, 564. That was an indictment for an assault and battery.
"It is a fundamental principle of the common law, declared in 'Magna Charta' and again in our Bill of Rights, that 'no person shall be convicted of any crime but by the unanimous verdict of a jury of good and lawful men, in open court.' Art. I, section 13. The only exception to this is where the legislature may provide other means of trial for petty misdemeanors, with the right of appeal -- proviso in same section. This is not one of the petty misdemeanors embraced in the proviso, and if it was, no such means of trial as that adopted in this case has been provided by the legislature. The court here has undertaken to serve in the double capacity of judge and jury, and try the defendant without a jury, which it had no authority to do, even with the consent of the prisoner."
which it could properly rest. The defendant could not consent to a conviction by the court. It had no authority to try the issue of fact raised by the pleadings. The defendant did not plead guilty; he did not enter the plea of nolo contendere, or submit; he pleaded autrefois convict, and a jury must try the issue raised by that plea. State v. Stewart, 89 N.C. 563; State v. Moss, 2 Jones 66; 1 Bishop, Cri.Pl. § 759, and cases there cited; Cancemi v. People, 18 N.Y. 128. The legislature has not provided a means for the trial of cases like this different from the ordinary method provided by law. The court erred in passing upon the facts agreed upon and submitted to it without the finding of a jury, and for such error the judgment must be reversed and the court proceed to dispose of the case according to law."
"a prisoner on his arraignment hath pleaded not guilty, and for his trial hath put himself upon the country, which country the jury are, the sheriff of the county must return a panel of jurors, liberos et legales homines, de vicineto."
authority to try the crime in a mode inconsistent with the one prescribed by the law.
In my judgment, the same principle must apply in the present case, although a fine only can be imposed. The case is embraced by the very words of the Constitution; for the offense charged is a crime -- nonetheless a crime because only a fine is involved -- and the constitutional mandate is that the trial of all crimes, except impeachment, shall be by jury. By what authority can a federal court except from the operation of the constitutional mandate a crime punishable by fine? It is said that only the property of the accused can be affected, and therefore to his consent in this criminal case should be accorded the same effect as is given to his consent in a purely civil case to which he might be a party, and which involved no element of crime. In this view I cannot concur. Something more than property is involved in a criminal case, although the penalty imposed may be simply a fine. Whether the accused has violated the laws of his country, and whether he shall be branded by the judgment of a court as a criminal, are things of more consequence to the public than property the value of which is to be measured in money. What shall constitute a crime, how that crime shall be tried, and in what way the guilt of the accused shall be manifested when he pleads not guilty are exclusively for the government to declare and regulate, and it is not for the accused and the prosecutor, by the device of an agreement between them, to evade the requirements of the Constitution and provide a tribunal for the determination of the issue of crime or no crime different from that designated by the law. Crime or no crime, if the plea be not guilty, can be established in a court of the United States only by the verdict of a jury.
shall be tried by jury is to be interpreted in the light of that fact. But it may be repeated that the trial even of such cases without a jury was contrary to the genius of the common law, and was allowed by the courts only in obedience to acts of Parliament, which was not bound by a written constitution, and whose authority in matters of legislation was omnipotent, and therefore not to be disputed by any English court. An enumeration of all crimes against the United States which may be reasonably declared to belong to the class known at the common law as petty offenses, punishable under legislative sanction without the intervention of a jury, need not here be attempted. Nor is it necessary to express any final judgment upon the question whether the particular crime here involved might, by statute, be placed in that class and tried without a jury. It is enough to say that, even if Congress could place it in that class, and authorize its trial by summary proceedings, without a jury, or with a jury of less than twelve, it has not done so. The case therefore is controlled by the express constitutional injunction that all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be tried by a jury. The agreement of the accused and the prosecutor cannot confer jurisdiction, much less have the effect to displace the mode of trial established by the fundamental law, and substitute for it one inconsistent with the principles of the common law, as unmodified by any valid statute.
as is the case here -- is it to be deemed a petty offense? And yet is one punishable by a fine of $500 to be deemed a serious one? Must there not be some fixed rule or limit on the subject? In my judgment, the Constitution establishes a rule which must be respected by every branch of the government. Yet, under the principles now announced, an offense punishable by a fine of five or ten thousand dollars may be regarded, if the court so wills, as a petty offense, triable without a jury. I cannot understand where the judiciary derives its authority to prescribe any rule on the subject, in face of the absolute constitutional requirement that all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be tried by a jury, and in face of the further significant fact that no court at common law ever assumed to regard any crime, however trivial, as triable without a jury except under express legislative sanction.
tried. If the offense or crime be, in reality, in its essence, a petty one, then Congress may authorize it to be tried without a jury. But Congress has not so declared in respect of the offense or crime charged against the present defendant. The trial by jury is not one of form, but of the very substance of the mode prescribed for the trial of crimes. It may not be waived merely by the consent of the accused and the prosecutor. In the present case, the court, as I think, entrenches upon the domain of the legislative department of the government. It assumes without authority to prescribe a rule of criminal procedure which Congress has not, in its wisdom, undertaken to prescribe. It has made, not declared, law. There is no tendency, in these latter days, more dangerous than the assumption by one department of the government of powers that belong to another department.
"And, however convenient these may appear at first (as doubtless all arbitrary powers, well executed, are the most convenient), yet let it be again remembered, that delays and little inconveniences in the forms of justice are the price that all free nations must pay for their liberty in more substantial matters; that these inroads upon this sacred bulwark of the nation are fundamentally opposite to the spirit of our Constitution, and that, though begun in trifles, the precedent may gradually increase and spread, to the utter disuse of juries in questions of the most momentous concern."
Book 4, c. 27, 350.
was a crime against the United States; as the Constitution expressly declares, without qualification, that the trial of all crimes, except impeachment, shall be by jury; as Congress has not assumed to declare that this case and like ones may be tried without a jury, the parties assenting, and as the trial of these cases by the court alone, without a jury, has no other sanction than the consent of the accused and the district attorney, the judgment in each case should be reversed, and each case remanded with directions to set aside the judgment, grant a new trial, and take such further proceedings as may be in conformity with law.

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 § 759
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