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Document Index: 321994998

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 636', '§ 3501', '§ 636', '§ 631', '§ 634', '§ 922', '§ 636', '§ 636', '§ 11', '§ 10', '§ 636']

UNITED STATES V. RADDATZ, 447 U. S. 667 (1980)
US Supreme Court Decisions On-Line> Volume 447 > UNITED STATES V. RADDATZ, 447 U. S. 667 (1980)
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1. Under the statute -- which calls for "de novo determination," not a de novo hearing -- the District Court was not required to rehear the testimony on which the Magistrate based his findings and recommendations in order to make an independent evaluation of credibility. The legislative history discloses that Congress purposefully used the word chanrobles.com-red
BURGER, C.J.,delivered the opinion of the Court, in which WHITE, BLACKMUN, REHNQUIST, and STEVENS, JJ., joined. BLACKMUN, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 447 U. S. 684. POWELL, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part, post, p. 447 U. S. 686. STEWART, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BRENNAN and MARSHALL, JJ., joined, post, p. 447 U. S. 687. MARSHALL, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BRENNAN, J., joined, post, p. 447 U. S. 694. chanrobles.com-red
The evidence received at the suppression hearing disclosed that, on August 8, 1976, two police officers responded to a report of a crime in progress. When they arrived at the scene, they observed respondent standing next to one Jimmy Baston, who was lying on the street, bleeding from the head. chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 670
Respondent was placed under arrest for illegal use of a weapon, and was given Miranda warnings. The arresting officers testified that respondent explained at the time of his arrest and after the warning that he had been fighting with Baston over a family dispute and had brought the gun with him in case any of Baston's friends tried to interfere.
On January 12, 1977, respondent telephoned the agents and requested a meeting. At this interview, he retracted his November 19 version and stated that he had not taken the gun from Baston, but had obtained it from his half-brother. chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 671
He testified at the suppression hearing that he made the incriminating statements at the January 12 meeting only after first obtaining confirmation from the agents of their November 19 promise that the indictment would be dismissed if he cooperated. The agents testified that no such promise was ever made to respondent, either on November 19 or on January 12. They testified that, at the January 12 meeting, respondent agreed to act as an informant, and that they gave him $10 at that time to assist him in gathering information.
"I find the testimony of the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Agent more credible . . . ;
Page 447 U. S. 672
I find that Federal agents never advised [respondent] that charges against him would be dismissed, if he cooperated."
The Court of Appeals reversed. 592 F.2d 976. It first rejected the statutory arguments, holding that the District Court had the power to refer to a magistrate the motion to suppress, and did not abuse its discretion under the statute in deciding the issue without hearing live testimony of disputed questions of fact. Turning to the constitutional issues, the court held that the referral provisions of the Federal Magistrates Act, 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B), did not violate Art. III of the Constitution because the statute required the District Court to make a de novo determination of any disputed portion of the Magistrate's proposed findings and recommendations. However, the Court of Appeals held that respondent had been deprived of due process by the failure of the District Court personally to hear the controverted testimony. Where chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 673
credibility is crucial to the outcome, "the district court cannot constitutionally exercise its discretion to refuse to hold a hearing on contested issues of fact in a criminal case." 592 F.2d 986. The District Court was directed to hold a new hearing.
Page 447 U. S. 674
or in part, the findings or recommendations made by the magistrate. The judge may also receive further evidence or recommit the matter to the magistrate with instructions."
The bill, as reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, did not include the language requiring the district court to make a de novo determination. [Footnote 2] Rather, it included only the chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 675
language permitting the district court to "accept, reject, or modify, in whole or in part, the findings or recommendations made by the magistrate." Yet the Senate Report which accompanied the bill emphasized that the purpose of the bill's language was to vest "ultimate adjudicatory power over dispositive motions" in the district court while granting the "widest discretion" on how to treat the recommendations of the magistrate. S.Rep. at 10.
H.R.Rep. at 3. chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 676
H.R.Rep. at 3-4 (emphasis added), quoting 501 F.2d 206. [Footnote 3]
Congressional intent, therefore, is unmistakable. Congress focused on the potential for Art. III constraints in permitting a magistrate to make decisions on dispositive motions. See S.Rep. at 6; H.R.Rep. at 8. The legislative history discloses that Congress purposefully used the word determination, rather than hearing, believing that Art. III was satisfied if the ultimate adjudicatory determination was reserved to the district court judge. And, in providing for a "de novo determination," rather than de novo hearing, Congress intended to permit whatever reliance a district judge, in the exercise of sound judicial discretion, chose to place on a magistrate's proposed findings and recommendations. See Mathews v. Weber, 423 U. S. 261, 423 U. S. 275 (1976). chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 677
Of course, the resolution of a suppression motion can and chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 678
often does determine the outcome of the case; this may be true of various pretrial motions. We have repeatedly pointed out, however, that the interests underlying a voluntariness hearing do not coincide with the criminal law objective of determining guilt or innocence. [Footnote 4] See, e.g., United States v. Janis, 428 U. S. 433, 428 U. S. 453-454 (1976); United States v. Peltier, 422 U. S. 531, 422 U. S. 535-536, 422 U. S. 538-539 (1975); Rogers v. Richmond, 365 U. S. 534, 365 U. S. 540-544 (1961). In Lego v. Twomey, 404 U. S. 477 (1972), we considered whether the prosecution was required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a confession was voluntary. In holding that a preponderance of the evidence was sufficient, we stated that "the purpose that a voluntariness hearing is designed to serve has nothing whatever to do with improving the reliability of jury verdicts." Id. at 404 U. S. 486. Accord, Jackson v. Denno, 378 U. S. 368, 378 U. S. 384-385 (1964), holding that the "reliability of a confession has nothing to do with its voluntariness." A defendant who has not prevailed at the suppression hearing remains free to present evidence and argue to -- and may persuade -- the jury that the confession was not reliable, and therefore should be disregarded. [Footnote 5] See 18 U.S.C. § 3501(a). [Footnote 6] chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 679
Queen v. Bertrand, 4 Moo. P. C. N. S. 460, 481, 16 Eng.Rep. 391, 399 (1867). This admonition was made with reference to an appellate court's review of a nisi prius judge in a trial on the merits; chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 680
We conclude that the due process rights claimed here are adequately protected by § 636(b)(1). While the district court judge alone acts as the ultimate decisionmaker, the statute grants the judge the broad discretion to accept, reject, or modify the magistrate's proposed findings. That broad discretion includes hearing the witnesses live to resolve conflicting credibility claims. Finally, we conclude that the statutory scheme includes sufficient procedures to alert the chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 681
district court whether to exercise its discretion to conduct a hearing and view the witnesses itself. [Footnote 7]
We need not decide whether, as suggested by the Government, Congress could constitutionally have delegated the task of rendering a final decision on a suppression motion to a non-Art. III officer. See Palmore v. United States, 411 U. S. 389 (1973). Congress has not sought to make any such delegation. Rather, Congress has provided that the magistrate's chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 682
proposed findings and recommendations shall be subjected to a de novo determination "by the judge who . . . then exercise[s] the ultimate authority to issue an appropriate order." S.Rep. at 3. Moreover, "[t]he authority -- and the responsibility -- to make an informed, final determination . . . remains with the judge." Mathews v. Weber, 423 U.S. at 423 U. S. 271. On his Art. III claim, Crowell v. Benson, 285 U. S. 22 (1932), and its progeny offer little comfort to respondent. [Footnote 9] There, the Court stated that,
285 U.S. at 285 U. S. 64, the Court pointedly noted a "distinction of controlling importance" between records formed before administrative agencies and those compiled by officers of the court such as masters in chancery or commissioners in admiralty where the proceeding is "constantly subject to the court's control." We view the statutory scheme here as rendering a magistrate's recommendations chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 683
more analogous to a master or a commissioner than to an administrative agency for Art. III purposes. [Footnote 11]
We conclude that the statute strikes the proper balance chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 684
In the latter context, the judge accurately can be described as a "backup" jurist whose review serves to enhance reliability and benefit the defendant. Respondent was afforded procedures by which a neutral decisionmaker, after seeing and hearing the witnesses, rendered a decision. [Footnote 2/2] After that decisionmaker found against him, respondent received a second chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 685
turn, albeit. on a cold record, before another neutral decisionmaker. In asking us to invalidate the magistrate program, respondent in effect requests removal of the second level of procedural protections afforded him and others like him. [Footnote 2/3] In my view, such a result would tend to undermine, rather than augment, accurate decisionmaking. It therefore is not a result I could embrace under the Due Process Clause.
It is also significant that the Magistrates Act imposes significant requirements to ensure competency and impartiality, §§ 631(b), (c), and (i), 632, 637 (1976 ed. and chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 686
Supp. II), including a rule generally barring reduction of salaries of full-time magistrates, § 634(b). Even assuming that, despite these protections, a controversial matter might be delegated to a magistrate who is susceptible to outside pressures, the district judge -- insulated by life tenure and irreducible salary -- is waiting in the wings, fully able to correct errors. Under these circumstances, I simply do not perceive the threat to the judicial power or the independence of judicial decisionmaking that underlies Art. III. We do not face a procedure under which "Congress [has] delegate[d] to a non-Art III judge the authority to male final determinations on issues of fact." Post at 447 U. S. 703 (dissenting opinion). Rather, we confront a procedure under which Congress has vested in Art. III judges the discretionary power to delegate certain functions to competent and impartial assistants, while ensuring that the judges retain complete supervisory control over the assistants' activities.
The Court recognizes that "serious questions" would be raised if a district judge rejected a magistrate's proposed findings on credibility. See ante at 447 U. S. 681, n. 7. But the Court finds no error in this case, where the District Court accepted the Magistrate's judgment on credibility. I would reach a different conclusion. Under the standards set out in Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319, 424 U. S. 335 (1976), due process requires a district court to rehear crucial witnesses when, as in this case, a suppression hearing turns only on credibility. As MR. JUSTICE MARSHALL points out in his dissenting opinion, chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 687
A federal indictment was returned charging the respondent, who had previously been convicted of a felony, with unlawfully receiving a firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(h)(1). Before the trial, the respondent filed in the District Court a motion to suppress various incriminating statements he had made to agents of the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 688
Tobacco, and Firearms. [Footnote 3/1] Pursuant to the Federal Magistrates Act (Act), 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1), [Footnote 3/2] the District Judge referred this motion to a Magistrate, who held an evidentiary hearing and then recommended that the respondent's motion be denied. Without taking further evidence, the District Judge accepted the Magistrate's recommendation and denied chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 689
If the respondent's testimony was true, his motion to suppress evidence of his incriminating statements should have been granted. See Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 1, 378 U. S. 7; Bram v. United States, 168 U. S. 532, 168 U. S. 542-543. The Magistrate, however, did not believe him, expressly finding that "the testimony of the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agent[s is] more credible" and that the "Federal agents never advised Raddatz that charges against him would be dismissed, if he cooperated." In concluding for this reason that the motion should be denied, chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 690
the Magistrate properly exercised the authority granted him by 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B) "to submit . . . proposed findings of fact and recommendations for the disposition" of the suppression motion. But the Act also empowered the respondent to object to these findings. He did so, and the responsibility then devolved on the District Judge to "make a de novo determination" of the contested issues of fact.
And in United States v. First City National Bank, 386 U. S. 361, 386 U. S. 368, this Court observed that "review de novo" means "that the court should make an independent determination of the issues" and should "not . . . give any special weight to the [prior] determination of" the administrative agency. [Footnote 3/4] chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 691
Contrary to the Court's assertion, nothing in the legislative history of the 1976 amendments to the Federal Magistrates Act compels a different conclusion. Congress, to be sure, explicitly rejected a version of the ultimately enacted bill that would have required a district judge always to "hear de novo" those aspects of the case whose proposed resolution by the magistrate dissatisfied one or more of the parties. Compare S.Rep. No. 9625, p. 2 (1976) (hereinafter S.Rep.) (bill as reported by Senate Committee on the Judiciary), with S. 1283, 94th Cong., 1st Sess. (1975) (bill as originally introduced by Senator Burdick). Moreover, as the Court points out, the Report of the House Judiciary Committee says that "[t]he use of the words de novo determination' is not intended to require the judge to actually conduct a new hearing on contested issues." H.R.Rep. No. 91609, p. 3 (1976) (hereinafter H.R.Rep.). chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 692
Ibid. (emphasis supplied) . See also 122 Cong.Rec. 35182 (1976) (Rep. Railsback). It is thus evident that Congress anticipated that occasions would arise when a district judge could not make the requisite "de novo determination" without hearing the evidence himself. [Footnote 3/6] Congress' prime objective in 1976 was to overrule this Court's decision in Wingo v. Wedding, 418 U. S. 461, which had interpreted the then existing Federal Magistrates Act as chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 693
barring a magistrate from holding an evidentiary hearing on a petition for habeas corpus. See S.Rep. at 3, 9; H.R.Rep. at 5, 11. The 1976 Act thus granted magistrates the power to take evidence on matters like habeas corpus petitions and motions to suppress. By enacting such legislation, Congress obviously anticipated that hearings conducted by magistrates would, in many instances, obviate the need for district judges to take evidence as well.
More importantly, the "de novo determination" requirement of the Federal Magistrates Act applies to a much wider range of motions and applications than simply pretrial motions to suppress. [Footnote 3/7] Some of these -- such as motions to dismiss for failure to state a claim, motions for judgment on the pleadings, chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 694
and motions for summary judgment -- presume as a legal matter the lack of any need for an evidentiary hearing, even at the magistrate's level. Others -- such as motions for injunctive relief, motions to dismiss or quash an indictment, motions to dismiss or to permit maintenance of a class action, motions to dismiss an action involuntarily, applications for post-trial relief made by those convicted of criminal offenses, and petitions by prisoners challenging conditions of confinement -- could often, as a practical matter, be granted or denied by a district court on the strength alone of the transcript of the magistrate's hearing and his recommendation. Thus, contrary to the Court's suggestion, the plain reading I would give to the pertinent statutory language would not equate "de novo determination" with "de novo hearing."
"file a petition with the Court of Claims for a redetermination thereof. . . . A proceeding before the Court of Claims to finally determine the amount, if any, of excessive profits shall not be treated as a proceeding to review the determination of the Board, but shall be treated as a proceeding de novo. . . ."
See 447 U. S. 2, supra.
In my view, the Due Process Clause requires that a judicial officer entrusted with finding the facts in a criminal case must hear the testimony whenever a fair resolution of disputed issues cannot be made on the basis of a review of the cold chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 695
One of the most deeply engrained principles in Anglo-American jurisprudence requires that an official entrusted with finding facts must hear the testimony on which his findings will be based. As I explained in Swisher v. Brady, 438 U. S. 204, 438 U. S. 229-233 (1978) (dissenting opinion), [Footnote 4/1] our constitutional chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 696
The principle is not, however, based solely on the constitutional interest in accurate factfinding. It also derives from the notion that, as a matter of basic fairness, a person facing the prospect of grievous loss is entitled to relate his version of the facts to the official entrusted with judging its accuracy. The Due Process Clause "promot[es] participation and dialogue chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 697
. . . in the decisionmaking process," Marshall v. Jerrico, Inc., 446 U. S. 238, 446 U. S. 242 (1980), by ensuring that individuals adversely affected by governmental action may confront the ultimate decisionmaker, and thus play some part in formulating the ultimate decision. See Carey v. Piphus, 435 U. S. 247 (1978); Board of Curators, Univ. of Mo. v. Horowitz, 435 U. S. 78, 435 U. S. 103, n. 15 (1978) (MARSHALL, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). [Footnote 4/2] In this respect, the requirement that a finder of facts must hear the testimony offered by those whose liberty is at stake derives from deep-seated notions of fairness and human dignity. See Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Comm. v. McGrath, 341 U. S. 123, 341 U. S. 170 (1951) (Frankfurter, J., concurring). A rule that would allow a criminal defendant to face a jail sentence on the basis of factual findings made by one who has not heard the evidence is, in my view, foreign to notions of fair adjudicative procedure embodied in the Due Process Clause. [Footnote 4/3] chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 698
It is true that the principle that "[t]he one who decides must hear" should not be applied with mechanical rigidity. Administrators are permitted to base factual findings on a record compiled before a hearing examiner who does not play a role in formulating the ultimate findings. See 298 U. S. 481 (1936); 2 K. Davis, Administrative Law Treatise § 11.02 (1958). Similar qualifications of the principle have been recognized by lower courts in certain civil contexts. See, e.g., Utica Mutual Ins. Co. v. Vincent, 375 F.2d 129 (CA2), cert. denied, 389 U.S. 839 (1967) (National Labor Relations Board determination of proper unit in a representation election). The Court errs, however, in suggesting that those exceptions provide support for the decision announced today. In a number of the cases in which such exceptions have been permitted, the factual issues to be resolved did not at all depend on issues of credibility; the demeanor of the witnesses was entirely irrelevant. See examples cited ante at 447 U. S. 680. And in other cases, the factfinder was not entrusted, as was the District Judge here, with making a de novo determination, but was instead permitted to give appropriate deference to the conclusions of the official who conducted the hearing. See 2 K. Davis, supra,@ § 10.04.
As the Court correctly observes, see ante at 447 U. S. 677, under Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U. S. 319, 424 U. S. 335 (1976), the determination of "what process is due" turns on a balancing of three chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 700
"In our criminal justice system as it has developed, suppression hearings often are as important as the trial which may follow. The government's case may turn
Page 447 U. S. 701
upon the confession or other evidence that the defendant seeks to suppress, and the trial court's ruling on such evidence may determine the outcome of the case."
Finally, the governmental interest -- essentially one of administrative convenience -- is not, in this context, substantial. The Court of Appeals' holding would not require the district judge to hear the witnesses whenever objection is made to the magistrate's findings. A rehearing requirement would be imposed only in situations in which the case turns on issues of credibility that cannot be resolved on the basis of a record. Nor is there much force to the Government's argument that an occasional rehearing of the witnesses would impose an chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 702
intolerable burden on the district courts. [Footnote 4/5] Finally, I would afford the district judge considerable discretion to determine whether a rehearing of the witnesses was required in order for him to make the requisite de novo determination. If the district judge offered a statement of reasons presenting his independent view of the facts and explaining in some reasoned manner why it was not necessary for him to hear the witnesses in order to adopt that view, it would be an exceptionally rare case in which an abuse of discretion should be found.
By today's decision, the Court permits the vindication of Fifth Amendment rights to depend on a form of bureaucratic factfinding foreign to our chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 703
"both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour, and shall, at stated Times, receive for their Services, a Compensation,
Page 447 U. S. 704
It is true that a number of our decisions have recognized Congress' authority to create legislative tribunals unprotected by the tenure and salary provisions of Art. III. See Glidden Co. v. Zdanok, supra, at 370 U. S. 543-552, and cases cited. Those decisions do not, however, provide any support for the proposition that Congress may, with respect to suppression hearings in criminal cases, displace the federal judiciary and entrust the finding of case-dispositive facts to a non-Art. III tribunal. chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 705
The rationale of our decisions involving legislative courts has been far more limited, focusing on Congress' plenary power over specialized areas of geography or subject matter and on the manifest need for a more flexible tribunal to perform adjudicatory functions in those areas. See generally 370 U.S. at 370 U. S. 543-552. Nor has the Court suggested that it will defer blindly to a congressional determination that an alternative tribunal is necessary.
Palmore v. United States, 411 U. S. 389, 411 U. S. 407-408 (1973) (emphasis added). Congress has never attempted to displace Art. III courts when laws of nationwide applicability were involved, and nothing in our prior decisions suggests that it may constitutionally do so. [Footnote 4/6] chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 706
Id. at 350 U. S. 16. Accordingly, Congress' power to circumvent criminal trials in Art. III tribunals would not "be inferred through the Necessary and Proper Clause," but would instead call "for limitation to the least possible power adequate to the end chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 707
proposed,'" id.; at 350 U. S. 22-23 (emphasis omitted), quoting 19 U. S. 231 (1821). The Quarles decision has been applied in other contexts to limit sharply Congress' power to try civilians in Art. I courts. See Reid v. Covert, 354 U. S. 1 (1957) (civilian dependents living with servicemen on military base may not be tried in Art. I court); O'Callahan v. Parker, 395 U. S. 258 (1969) (crimes that are not service-connected may not be tried in Art. I court). In my view, [email protected] and its progeny foreclose the conclusion that Congress may use its Art. I powers to create legislative tribunals in order to divest Art. III courts of their authority to conduct federal criminal proceedings.
As the Court rightly observes, the primary case relevant to the question is Crowell v. Benson, 285 U. S. 22 (1932). There the Court upheld the constitutionality of an administrative chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 708
scheme by which deputy commissioners adjudicated compensation claims under the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act, but, at the same time, ruled that the federal district court must find de novo whether a master-servant relationship existed and whether the injury occurred on the navigable waters of the United States. Mr Chief Justice Hughes, speaking for the Court, did rely on the "historic practice" of permitting the courts to be assisted in factual findings by masters and commissioners, id. at 285 U. S. 51. But the Court's opinion in Crowell provides no authority for the statutory scheme upheld today.
"[T]he question is not the ordinary one as to the propriety of provision for administrative determinations. . . . It is rather a question of the appropriate maintenance of the Federal judicial power in requiring the observance of constitutional restrictions. It is the question whether the Congress may substitute for constitutional courts, in which the judicial power of the United States is vested, an administrative agency . . . for the final determination of the existence of the facts upon which the enforcement of the constitutional rights of the citizen depend. The recognition of the utility and convenience of administrative agencies for the investigation and finding of facts within their proper province, and the support of their authorized action, does not require the conclusion that there is no limitation of their use, and that the Congress could completely
Page 447 U. S. 709
oust the courts of all determinations of fact by vesting the authority to make them with finality in its own instrumentalities or in the Executive' Department. That would be to sap the judicial power as it exists under the Federal Constitution, and to establish a government of a bureaucratic character alien to our system, wherever fundamental rights depend, as not infrequently they do depend, upon the facts, and finality as to facts becomes in effect finality in law."
"A citizen who claims that his liberty is being infringed is entitled, upon habeas corpus, to the opportunity of a judicial determination of the facts. And so highly is this liberty prized that the opportunity must be accorded to any
Page 447 U. S. 710
resident of the United States who claims to be a citizen."
It may fairly be said that, in certain respects, at least, Mr. Justice Brandeis' views in Crowell and St. Joseph Stock Yards have become the law. It can no longer be claimed that a person is entitled under Art. III or the Due Process Clause to a de novo judicial determination of the facts in every case that implicates constitutional rights. Yet neither Crowell nor Ng Fung Ho has been overruled, and the Court has cited both with approval in recent years. See Agosto v. INS, 436 U. S. 748 753 (1978); Atlas Roofing Co. v. Occupational Safety and Health Review Comm'n, 430 U. S. 442, 430 U. S. 450, n. 7 (1977). Cf. Hampton v. Mow Sun Wong, 426 U. S. 88, 426 U. S. 118 (1976) (REHNQUIST, J., dissenting); Paris Adult Theatre I v. Slaton, 413 U. S. 49, 413 U. S. 102, and n. 20 (1973) (BRENNAN, J., dissenting). [Footnote 4/8] chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 711
The Court's conclusion to the contrary appears premised on its perception that, under the Act, effective control of suppression motions remains in the hands of district judges, and the submission of "recommendations" by magistrates is a relatively mechanical task for which the special characteristics of an Art. III judge are unnecessary. But in view of the likely finality of the magistrate's decision and the importance of factfinding to the process of legal decision, that view is unsupportable. As I have explained, in cases like this one the magistrate's decision is effectively unreviewable if the district judge does not hear the witnesses. The fact that the judge is permitted to hear the witnesses is an irrelevance in any case in which he does not do so. Moreover, the Court has emphasized that the vindication of constitutional rights more frequently depends on findings of fact than abstract principles of law. See Speiser v. Randall, 357 U.S. at 357 U. S. 520. And it cannot seriously be suggested that the majoritarian pressures the Framers sought to avoid by the tenure and salary protections of Art. III become inapplicable when the relevant question is one of fact. Indeed, it is precisely in resolving constitutional issues that are dependent on questions of credibility as between a government official and one accused of crime that a detached and independent arbiter may be most indispensable. A contrary conclusion would mean that the chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 712
As noted above, Mr. Justice Brandeis would have restricted the requirement of independent judicial factfinding to situations in which personal liberty was at stale, such as habeas corpus and deportation. I agree that for both criminal cases and deportation, a citizen is constitutionally entitled to an independent determination of the case-dispositive facts by an Art. III court. My conclusion is based on two factors, the nature of the issue and the individual interest in a determination by an Art. III judge. [Footnote 4/9] Resolution of the issues involved in criminal cases and deportation proceedings does not require specialization or expertise in an area in which a federal judge is untrained. Moreover, the Framers adopted Art. III precisely in order to protect individual interests of the sort involved here. [Footnote 4/10] In my view, the independence provided by chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 713
Art. III is hardly dispensable in finding facts underlying a motion to suppress evidence on Fifth Amendment grounds. Nor, for these purposes, is it possible to distinguish between suppression motions and the trial itself; as experience shows, the primary issues in a criminal case often deal with whether evidence should be excluded because illegally obtained. I am therefore brought to the conclusion that the Constitution entitled respondent to an independent judicial determination of the facts on which his motion to suppress was based. [Footnote 4/11]
The Court's holding today is undoubtedly influenced by its sympathy with Congress' perception that the assistance of federal magistrates was a necessary measure to ensure that the already severe pressures on the federal district courts do not become overwhelming. I too sympathize with that concern. And I applaud the conspicuous and conscientious legislative effort to conform to the dictates of the Constitution by ensuring maximum control of suppression motions by the federal district courts. I agree with my Brother STEWART that § 636(b)(1) chanrobles.com-red
Page 447 U. S. 714
should be construed to avoid the constitutional objections and to require the district court to call witnesses when a fair resolution of the facts is not otherwise possible.
Federal courts on habeas corpus are not obliged to examine the facts independently in every case. Under Townsend v. Sain, 372 U. S. 293 (1963), deference to the state court findings is permitted in the absence of any allegation of procedural irregularity. As the holdings of Ng Fung Ho and Crowell make clear, however, this deference is based on the special role played by state courts in the federal system, and not on any rule allowing Congress to create non-Art. III tribunals to make findings of fact that are binding on Art. III courts. See 447 U. S. 6, supra.
Actual rehearing of the witnesses, of course, would be required only in exceptional cases. In most circumstances, the requirement of independent judicial factfinding would be satisfied on the basis of record review. It is only when that task cannot fairly be performed in the absence of the witnesses that a de novo hearing should be required. And as I have indicated, see supra at 447 U. S. 701-702, if the district judge offered a statement of reasons explaining why it was not necessary for him to hear the witnesses, an abuse of discretion would be found quite rarely. See 447 U. S. 693-694 (STEWART, J., dissenting).