Source: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-supreme-court/401/66.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 10:47:24+00:00

Document:
[ Footnote * ] Together with No. 9, Fernandez v. Mackell, District Attorney of Queens County, et al., also on appeal from the same court.
1. Since there was no showing that appellants have suffered or will suffer great and immediate irreparable injury by virtue of their being prosecuted in the state courts, where they can make their constitutional contentions, there is no basis for federal injunctive relief. Younger v. Harris, ante, p. 37. Pp. 68-69.
2. The same principles that govern the propriety of federal injunctions of state criminal proceedings govern the issuance of federal declaratory judgments in connection with such proceedings, and appellants here should have been denied declaratory relief without consideration of the merits of their constitutional claims. Pp. 69-74.
288 F. Supp. 348, affirmed.
BLACK, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which BURGER, C. J., and HARLAN, STEWART, and BLACKMUN, JJ., joined. DOUGLAS, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 74. STEWART, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which HARLAN, J., joined, ante, p. 54. BRENNAN, J., filed an opinion concurring in the result, in which WHITE and MARSHALL, JJ., joined, post, p. 75.
Victor Rabinowitz argued the cause for appellants in No. 7 on the original argument and on the rearguments. With him on the briefs were Leonard B. Boudin, Michael Standard, and Dorian Bowman. Eleanor Jackson Piel [401 U.S. 66, 67] argued the cause and filed briefs for appellant in No. 9 on the original argument and on the rearguments.
Frederick J. Ludwig argued the cause for appellee Mackell in both cases on the original argument and on the rearguments. With him on the briefs was Thomas J. Mackell, pro se. Maria L. Marcus, Assistant Attorney General, argued the cause for appellee Attorney General of New York in both cases on the original argument and on the rearguments. With her on the briefs were Louis J. Lefkowitz, Attorney General, pro se, Samuel A. Hirshowitz, First Assistant Attorney General, and Hillel Hoffman, Assistant Attorney General.
In No. 2, Younger v. Harris, ante, p. 37, we today decided on facts very similar to the facts in these cases that a United States District Court could not issue an injunction to stay proceedings pending in a state criminal court at the time the federal suit was begun. This was because it did not appear from the record that the plaintiffs would suffer immediate irreparable injury in accord with the rule set out in Douglas v. City of Jeannette, 319 U.S. 157 (1943), and many other cases. Since in the present case there is likewise no sufficient showing in the record that the plaintiffs have suffered or would suffer irreparable injury, our decision in the Younger case is dispositive of the prayers for injunctions [401 U.S. 66, 69] here. The plaintiffs in the present cases also included in their complaints an alternative prayer for a declaratory judgment, but for the reasons indicated below, we hold that this alternative prayer does not require a different result, and that under the circumstances of these cases, the plaintiffs were not entitled to federal relief, declaratory or injunctive. Accordingly we affirm the judgment of the District Court, although not for the reasons given in that court's opinion.
In our opinion in the Younger case, we set out in detail the historical and practical basis for the settled doctrine of equity that a federal court should not enjoin a state criminal prosecution begun prior to the institution of the federal suit except in very unusual situations, where necessary to prevent immediate irreparable injury. The question presented here is whether under ordinary circumstances the same considerations that require the withholding of injunctive relief will make declaratory relief equally inappropriate. The question is not, however, a novel one. It was presented and fully considered by this Court in Great Lakes Co. v. Huffman, 319 U.S. 293 (1943). We find the reasoning of this Court in the Great Lakes case fully persuasive and think that its holding is controlling here.
"The earlier refusal of federal courts of equity to interfere with the collection of state taxes unless the threatened injury to the taxpayer is one for which the state courts afford no adequate remedy, and the confirmation of that practice by Congress, [401 U.S. 66, 71] have an important bearing upon the appropriate use of the declaratory judgment procedure by the federal courts as a means of adjudicating the validity of state taxes.
"It is true that the Act of Congress speaks only of suits `to enjoin, suspend, or restrain the assessment, levy, or collection of any tax' imposed by state law, and that the declaratory judgment procedure may be, and in this case was, used only to procure a determination of the rights of the parties, without an injunction or other coercive relief. It is also true that that procedure may in every practical sense operate to suspend collection of the state taxes until the litigation is ended. But we find it unnecessary to inquire whether the words of the statute may be so construed as to prohibit a declaration by federal courts concerning the invalidity of a state tax. For we are of the opinion that those considerations which have led federal courts of equity to refuse to enjoin the collection of state taxes, save in exceptional cases, require a like restraint in the use of the declaratory judgment procedure." 319 U.S., at 299 .
See also H. J. Heinz Co. v. Owens, 189 F.2d 505, 508-509 (CA9 1951). We therefore hold that, in cases where the state criminal prosecution was begun prior to the federal suit, the same equitable principles relevant to the propriety of an injunction must be taken into consideration by federal district courts in determining whether to issue a declaratory judgment, and that where an injunction would be impressible under these principles, declaratory relief should ordinarily be denied as well.
We do not mean to suggest that a declaratory judgment should never be issued in cases of this type if it has been concluded that injunctive relief would be improper. There may be unusual circumstances in which an injunction might be withheld because, despite a plaintiff's strong claim for relief under the established standards, the injunctive remedy seemed particularly intrusive or offensive; in such a situation, a declaratory judgment might be appropriate and might not be contrary to the basic equitable doctrines governing the availability of relief. Ordinarily, however, the practical effect of the two forms of relief will be virtually identical, and the basic policy against federal interference with pending state criminal prosecutions will be frustrated as much by a declaratory judgment as it would be by an injunction.
For the reasons we have stated, we hold that the court below erred in proceeding to a consideration of the merits of the New York criminal anarchy law. Here, as in the Great Lakes case, the judgment dismissing the complaint was based on an adjudication that the statutes challenged here are constitutional and is thus in effect a declaratory judgment. We affirm the judgment dismissing the complaint, but solely on the ground that, in the appropriate exercise of the court's discretion, relief by way of declaratory judgment should have been denied without consideration of the merits. We, of course, express [401 U.S. 66, 74] no views on the propriety of declaratory relief when no state proceeding is pending at the time the federal suit is begun.
[ Footnote 1 ] These provisions were repealed effective September 1, 1967, and a new criminal anarchy statute, in somewhat different form, took effect on the same date.
[ Footnote 2 ] The complaint in No. 7 was filed in the Southern District of New York. The complaint in No. 9 was originally filed in the Eastern District, but was later transferred to the Southern District by consent.
[ Footnote 3 ] The court also said that even if its view on the merits was wrong, relief should be withheld because the statutes being challenged were no longer in effect. With respect to the plaintiffs' challenge to the selection of the grand jury, the District Court held, in reliance on Douglas v. City of Jeannette, 319 U.S. 157 (1943), that this claim could be effectively presented to the New York courts and therefore did not call for federal intervention at this stage.
"It is said that this manifesto was more than a theory, that it was an incitement. Every idea is an incitement. It offers itself for belief and if believed it is acted on unless some other belief outweighs it or some failure of energy stifles the movement at its birth. The only difference between the expression of an opinion and an incitement in the narrower sense is the speaker's enthusiasm for the result. Eloquence may set fire to reason. But whatever may be thought of the redundant discourse before us it had no chance of starting a present conflagration. If in the long run the beliefs expressed in proletarian dictatorship are destined to be accepted by the dominant forces of the community, the only meaning of free speech is that they should be given their chance and have their way."
In Gitlow the only overt acts were advocacy of overthrow and publication of the writings that contained the advocacy. Id., at 655. Gitlow and its progeny, including Whitney v. California, 274 U.S. 357 , went into the discard with our decision in Brandenburg v. Ohio, [401 U.S. 66, 75] 395 U.S. 444 . In that case the indictment charged advocating terrorism "by word of mouth" as a method of political reform and assembly for the purpose of such advocacy. We held that neither advocacy nor assembly in order to advocate political action may be made punishable.
Brandenburg, however, is of no help to these appellants. For while some of the counts embrace only advocacy or acts which fall within its penumbra, still others are in the field of activities far removed from the protection of the First Amendment. There is a question concerning some of the overt acts - whether, as I asked in my dissent in Epton v. New York, 390 U.S. 29, 30 , a constitutionally protected right such as speech or assembly may be used as an overt act in furtherance of a conspiracy. But other overt acts relate to the acquisition of weapons, gunpowder, and the like, and the storing of gasoline to start fires. Persuasion by such means plainly has no First Amendment protection.
It therefore cannot be said that the cases against Samuels and Fernandez are palpably unconstitutional. It is for the state courts by sifting out the chaff from the charges through motions to strike, instructions to the jury, and other procedural devices to preserve such First Amendment rights as may be involved here. Certainly violence has no sanctuary in the First Amendment, and the use of weapons, gunpowder, and gasoline may not constitutionally masquerade under the guise of "advocacy."

References: v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v. 
 v.