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Timestamp: 2017-03-27 14:38:20
Document Index: 392555757

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1951', '§ 2255', '§ 2', '§ 1951', '§ 2113', '§ 2255', '§ 2255']

CALLANAN V. UNITED STATES, 364 U. S. 587 (1961) - US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE
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CALLANAN V. UNITED STATES, 364 U. S. 587 (1961)
Subscribe to Cases that cite 364 U. S. 587 U.S. Supreme CourtCallanan v. United States, 364 U.S. 587 (1961)Callanan v. United StatesNo. 47Argued November 15-16, 1960Decided January 9, 1961364 U.S. 587CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
Held: under the Act, obstructing interstate commerce by extortion and conspiring to do so are separate offenses; separate consecutive sentences may be imposed for each offense. Pp. 364 U. S. 587-597.
Petitioner was convicted by a jury in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri on two counts. Count I charged a conspiracy to obstruct commerce by extorting money, and Count II charged the substantive offense of obstructing commerce by extortion, both crimes made punishable by the Hobbs Anti-Racketeering chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 588
Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1951. [Footnote 1] Petitioner was sentenced to consecutive terms of twelve years on each count, but the sentence on Count II was suspended and replaced with a five-year probation to commence at the expiration of his sentence under Count I. [Footnote 2] On appeal, the conviction was affirmed, 223 F.2d 171.
Petitioner thereafter sought a correction of his sentence, invoking Rule 35 of the Federal Rules of Criminal chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 589
Procedure, as well as 28 U.S.C. § 2255. [Footnote 3] He claimed that the maximum penalty for obstructing interstate commerce under the Act by any means is twenty years, and that Congress did not intend to subject individuals to two penalties. The District Court denied relief, holding that the Hobbs Act gave no indication of a departure from the usual rule that a conspiracy and the substantive crime which was its object may be cumulatively punished. 173 F.Supp. 98. The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed this judgment, 274 F.2d 601. Deeming the question raised by petitioner of sufficient importance, we brought the case here. 362 U.S. 939.
Under the early common law, a conspiracy -- which constituted a misdemeanor -- was said to merge with the completed felony which was its object. See Commonwealth v. Kingsbury, 5 Mass. 106. This rule, however, was based upon significant procedural distinctions between misdemeanors and felonies. The defendant in a misdemeanor trial was entitled to counsel and a copy of the indictment; these advantages were unavailable on trial for a felony. King v. Westbeer, 1 Leach 12, 15, 168 Eng.Rep. 108, 110 (1739); see Clark and Marshall, Crimes, § 2.03, n. 96 (6th ed). Therefore, no conviction was permitted of a constituent misdemeanor upon an indictment for the felony. When the substantive crime was also a misdemeanor, People v. Mather, 4 Wend., N.Y., 229, 265, or when the conspiracy was defined by statute as a felony, State v. Mayberry, 48 Me. 218, 238, merger did not obtain. As these common law procedural niceties disappeared, the chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 590
merger concept lost significance, and today it has been abandoned. Queen v. Button, 11 Q.B. 929, 116 Eng.Rep. 720; Pinkerton v. United States, 328 U. S. 640.
The present Hobbs Act had as its antecedent the Anti-Racketeering Act of 1934. [Footnote 4] In view of this Court's restrictive chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 591
decision in United States v. Local 807, 315 U. S. 521 (1942), Congress, under the leadership of Representative Hobbs, sought to stiffen the 1934 legislation. After several unsuccessful attempts over a period of four years, a bill was passed in 1946 which deleted any reference to wages paid by an employer to an employee, on which the decision in Local 807 had relied. [Footnote 5] The 1934 Act was further invigorated by increasing the maximum penalty from ten to twenty years.
Petitioner relies on numerous statements by members of Congress concerning the severity of the twenty-year penalty to illustrate that cumulative sentences were not chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 592
contemplated. [Footnote 6] But the legislative history sheds no light whatever on whether the Congressmen were discussing the question of potential sentences under the whole bill, or merely defending the maximum punishment under its chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 593
Pinkerton v. United States, 328 U. S. 640, 328 U. S. 643. See also Pereira v. United States, 347 U. S. 1, 347 U. S. 11. Over the years, this distinction has been applied in various situations. For example, in Clune v. United States, 159 U. S. 590, the Court upheld a two-year sentence for conspiracy over the objection that the crime which was the object of the unlawful agreement could only be punished by a $100 fine. The same result was reached when, as in the present case, both offenses were described within the same statute. In Carter v. McClaughry, 183 U. S. 365, cumulative sentences for conspiracy to defraud and fraud were upheld. "Cumulative sentences," the Court pronounced,
183 U.S. at 183 U. S. 394.
This settled principle derives from the reason of things in dealing with socially reprehensible conduct: collective criminal agreement -- partnership in crime -- presents a greater potential threat to the public than individual delicts. Concerted action both increases the likelihood that the criminal object will be successfully attained and decreases the probability that the individuals involved will depart from their path of criminality. Group association for criminal purposes often, if not normally, makes possible the attainment of ends more complex than those which one criminal could accomplish. Nor is the danger of a conspiratorial group limited to the particular end toward which it has embarked. Combination in crime chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 594
makes more likely the commission of crimes unrelated to the original purpose for which the group was formed. In sum, the danger which a conspiracy generates is not confined to the substantive offense which is the immediate aim of the enterprise. [Footnote 7]
United States v. Rabinowich, 238 U. S. 78, 238 U. S. 88.
These considerations are reinforced by a prior interpretation of the Sherman Act whose minor penalties influenced the enactment of the 1934 anti-racketeering legislation. [Footnote 8] In 328 U. S. 788-789. To dislodge such conventional consequences in the outlawing of two disparate offenses, conspiracy and substantive conduct, and effectuate a reversal of the settled interpretation we pronounced in American Tobacco would require specific language to the contrary. See also Albrecht v. United States, 273 U. S. 1, 273 U. S. 11; Burton v. United States,@ 202 U. S. 344, 202 U. S. 377.
Petitioner argues that some of the other provisions of § 1951 seem to overlap, and would not justify cumulative punishment for separate crimes. From this he deduces a congressional intent that the statute allows punishment for only one crime, no matter how many separately outlawed offenses have been committed. These contentions raise problems of statutory interpretation not now here. That some of the substantive sections may be repetitive as being variants in phrasing of the same delict, or that petitioner could not be cumulatively punished for both an attempt to extort and a completed act of extortion, has no relevance to the legal consequences of two incontestably distinctive offenses, conspiracy and the completed crime chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 596
Petitioner invokes the rule of lenity for decision in this case. But that "rule," as is true of any guide to statutory construction, only serves as an aid for resolving an ambiguity; it is not to be used to beget one. [Footnote 9] "To rest upon a formula is a slumber that, prolonged, means death." Mr. Justice Holmes, in Collected Legal Papers, p. 306. The rule comes into operation at the end of the process of construing what Congress has expressed, not at the beginning as an overriding consideration of being lenient to wrongdoers. That is not the function of the judiciary. In United States v. Universal C.I.T. Credit Corp., 344 U. S. 218; Bell v. United States, 349 U. S. 81, and Ladner v. United States, 358 U. S. 169, the applicable statutory provisions were found to be unclear as to the appropriate unit of prosecution; accordingly, the rule of lenity was utilized, in favorem libertatis, to resolve the ambiguity. In Price v. United States, 352 U. S. 322, and Heflin v. United States, 358 U. S. 415, the Court had to meet the problem whether various subsidiary provisions of the Federal Bank Robbery Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2113, which punished entering with intent to commit robbery and possessing stolen property merged when applied to a defendant who was also being prosecuted for the robbery itself. Again, the rule of lenity served to resolve the doubt with which Congress faced the Court. chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 597
Both courts below ruled that 28 U.S.C. § 2255 was not available, since it would be premature to claim the "right to be released" from a sentence not yet served. Since, as the Government concedes, Rule 35 is available to correct an illegal sentence when the claim is based on the face of the indictment even if such claim had not been raised on direct appeal, Heflin v. United States, 358 U. S. 415, 358 U. S. 418, 358 U. S. 422, the applicability of § 2255 need not be considered.
"* * * *" "Mr. FISH. . . . I want to refer likewise to some of the excessive penalties. The penalties in this bill in my opinion are too severe -- 20 years and $10,000 fine. When we reach this section of the bill, there should be very careful consideration given to reducing both the extent of the imprisonment and fines."
"* * * *" "Mr. SPRINGER. May I ask my distinguished colleague on the Committee on the Judiciary if it is not a fact that, under the provisions of this bill, the question of penalty is left entirely discretionary with the court trying the case? Under the provisions of this bill, a person could be penalized to the extent of 1 year or less than 1 year or up to 20 years, all in the discretion of the court."
"* * * *" "Mr. CELLER. Or his sentence might be suspended. I agree with the gentleman. But why do we single out labor and impose even a possible penalty of 20 years?"
"* * * *" "Mr. ROBSION. . . . There is some objection to the penalties prescribed in this bill for robbery and extortion. It has gone forth to the country that the penalty is 20 years. That is not a correct statement. The penalties range from 1 hour up to 20 years, according to the offense, and fines of $1 to $10,000. In other words, the 20 years and the $10,000 fine are the maximum."
"* * * *" "Mr. FISH. . . . When the bill was before the Rules Committee, it seemed to me at that time that these penalties were excessive. Twenty years is just about as bad as a life sentence, and I want to give the House the opportunity to reduce it by cutting it in half. This applies to threats. A man may be sent to jail for 20 years merely for threatening extortion."
"When Congress leaves to the Judiciary the task of imputing to Congress an undeclared will, the ambiguity should be resolved in favor of lenity." Bell v. United States, 349 U. S. 81, 349 U. S. 83.
To be sure, it is now a commonplace of our law that the commission of a substantive crime and a conspiracy to commit it may be treated by Congress as separate offenses, cumulatively punishable. Pinkerton v. United States, 328 U. S. 640, 328 U. S. 643. It is also true that Congress has often chosen to exercise its power to make separate offenses of the two. [Footnote 2/1] But neither of these generalities provides an answer to the question now before us. The question here is the meaning of this law, the Hobbs Anti-Racketeering Act. I do not agree that, under this statute, a man can be separately convicted and cumulatively punished chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 598
The relevant section of the Act, repeated for convenience in the margin, [Footnote 2/2] is not a model of precise verbal structure. Purely as a matter of syntax, the section could be read as creating separate offenses for obstructing commerce, for delaying commerce, and for affecting commerce by any one of the proscribed means. It could be read, again merely as a matter of grammar, as creating distinct offenses for obstructing commerce by robbery, for threatening physical violence to property in connection with the same robbery, for committing the physical violence which had been threatened, for attempting to do so, and for conspiring to do so. Read in such a way, the Act could be made to justify the imposition upon one man of separate sentences totalling more than a hundred years for one basic criminal transaction. To construe this statute that way would obviously be absurd, and I do not understand that the Court today even remotely suggests any such construction.
The Act, then, must mean something else. I think its language can fairly be read as imposing a maximum twenty-year sentence for each actual or threatened interference with interstate commerce accomplished by any one or more of the proscribed means. Such a reading of chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 599
"The accompanying proposed statute is designed to avoid many of the embarrassing limitations in the wording and interpretation of the Sherman Act, and to extend Federal jurisdiction over all restraints of any commerce within the scope of the Federal Government's constitutional powers. Such restraints if accompanied by extortion, violence, coercion, or intimidation, are made felonies, whether the restraints are in form of conspiracies or not."
After the bill had passed the Senate, fear was expressed that some of the provisions of the proposed legislation might endanger legitimate activities of organized labor. In response to these fears, the bill was revised by the House Judiciary Committee along lines suggested by the Attorney General, and it was then that the statutory reference to conspiracy was added, without explanation. H.R.Rep. No. 1833, 73d Cong., 2d Sess. The bill was passed by the House after adoption of an amendment chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 600
In 1942, this Court considered the 1934 Act in United States v. Local 807, 315 U. S. 521, holding that, under the statute's labor exemption, the petitioners there had been wrongly convicted. Within a few weeks after that decision, Representative Hobbs introduced a bill in the House designed to eliminate the labor exemption from the statute. Similar amendatory bills were introduced in succeeding sessions of Congress, and in 1946, the Act was finally amended by deletion of the provision exempting wages paid by an employer to an employee, the exemption upon which the decision in the Local 837 case had been based.
With that aspect of the 1946 amendment we are not here concerned. But the amendment made one other significant change in the Act: it increased the maximum penalty from ten to twenty years' imprisonment. The congressional debates over that provision throw considerable light upon the problem now before us. For two conclusions can be drawn from a review of the discussions in Congress of the proposed increase in the penalty provision. First, it is clear that many Members of Congress were seriously concerned by the severity of a penalty of twenty years in prison for violation of this statute. Expressions such as "too drastic," "too severe," and "excessive" were used in describing what was referred to by one Member as "even a possible penalty of 20 years." 89 Cong.Rec. 3162, 3194, 3201, 3229. Secondly, it is clear that there was general agreement among both the proponents and the opponents of the legislation that twenty years was to be the maximum penalty that could be imposed upon a defendant convicted of violating the chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 601
It is said, however, that despite all this, we must attribute to Congress a "tacit purpose" to provide cumulative punishments for conspiracy and substantive conduct under this statute. We are told that this presumption of a tacit purpose must prevail because there is no "specific language to the contrary" in the Act. [Footnote 2/3] But to indulge in such a presumption seems to me wholly at odds with principles firmly established by our previous decisions. chanroblesvirtualawlibraryPage 364 U. S. 602
In Bell v. United States, 349 U. S. 81, we described the approach to be taken in a case such as this.
349 U.S. at 349 U. S. 83. In Ladner v. United States, 358 U. S. 169, we said:
358 U.S. at 358 U. S. 178. In Prince v. United States, 352 U. S. 322, we spoke of the doctrine as one
352 U.S. at 352 U. S. 329. These recent expressions are but restatements in a specific context of the ancient rule that a criminal statute is to be strictly construed. I would not depart from that rule in the present case.
The Court's reliance upon American Tobacco Co. v. United States, 328 U. S. 781, seems to me misplaced. The discussion of multiple punishment in that opinion was in response to the contention that Congress could not, because of the double jeopardy provision of the Fifth Amendment, impose multiple punishment for substantive conduct and conspiracy. Moreover, to decide the meaning of this Act upon the basis of what Congress may have provided in another statute would seem to me a dubious way to resolve the issue. Cf. Bell v. United States, 349 U. S. 81, 349 U. S. 83.