Source: https://casetext.com/case/prince-v-commonwealth-of-massachusetts
Timestamp: 2019-12-14 12:02:17
Document Index: 200687552

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 79', '§ 80', '§ 79', '§ 69', '§ 69', '§ 81', '§ 69', '§ 81', '§ 69']

Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158 | Casetext
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Princev.Massachusetts
U.S.Jan 31, 1944
“The state's authority over children's activities is broader than over like actions of adults.... A…
At the same time, the Supreme Court has made abundantly clear that children's rights are not coextensive with…
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Argued December 14, 1943. Decided January 31, 1944.
1. A state statute provides that no minor (boy under 12 or girl under 18) shall sell, or offer for sale, upon the streets or in other public places, any newspapers, magazines, periodicals, or other articles of merchandise. The statute makes it unlawful for any person to furnish to a minor any article which he knows the minor intends to sell in violation of the law; and for any parent or guardian to permit a minor to work in violation of the law. Held — as applied to a guardian who furnished a minor ward with religious literature and permitted the minor to distribute the same on the streets, although the guardian accompanied the minor and both were acting in accord with their religious beliefs — not violative of freedom of religion, nor a denial of the equal protection of the laws, under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Federal Constitution. P. 167. 2. Whether there was a "sale" or "offer to sell," and whether what the minor was doing was "work," within the meaning of the state statute, were questions of local law upon which, on this record, the decision of the state court is binding here. P. 163. 3. With respect to the public proclaiming of religion in streets and other public places, as in the case of other freedoms, the power of the State to control the conduct of children is broader than its power over adults. P. 170. 4. There is no denial of equal protection of the laws in excluding children of a particular sect from such use of the streets as is barred also to all other children. P. 170. 313 Mass. 223, 46 N.E.2d 755, affirmed.
When the offenses were committed she was the aunt and custodian of Betty M. Simmons, a girl nine years of age. Originally there were three separate complaints. They were, shortly, for (1) refusal to disclose Betty's identity and age to a public officer whose duty was to enforce the statutes; (2) furnishing her with magazines, knowing she was to sell them unlawfully, that is, on the street; and (3) as Betty's custodian, permitting her to work contrary to law. The complaints were made, respectively, pursuant to §§ 79, 80 and 81 of Chapter 149, Gen. Laws of Mass. (Ter. Ed.). The Supreme Judicial Court reversed the conviction under the first complaint on state grounds; but sustained the judgments founded on the other two. 313 Mass. 223, 46 N.E.2d 755. They present the only questions for our decision. These are whether §§ 80 and 81, as applied, contravene the Fourteenth Amendment by denying or abridging appellant's freedom of religion and by denying to her the equal protection of the laws.
The court found there was no evidence that appellant was asked Betty's age. It then held that conviction for refusal to disclose the child's name, based on the charge under § 79, would violate Article 12 of the Declaration of Rights of the Commonwealth, which provides in part: "No subject shall be held to answer for any crimes or offence, until the same is fully and plainly, substantially and formally, described to him; or be compelled to accuse, or furnish evidence against himself."
Sections 80 and 81 form parts of Massachusetts' comprehensive child labor law. They provide methods for enforcing the prohibitions of § 69, which is as follows:
Mass. Gen. Laws (Ter. Ed.) c. 149, as amended by Acts and Resolves of 1939, c. 461.
The story told by the evidence has become familiar. It hardly needs repeating, except to give setting to the variations introduced through the part played by a child of tender years. Mrs. Prince, living in Brockton, is the mother of two young sons. She also has legal custody of Betty Simmons, who lives with them. The children too are Jehovah's Witnesses and both Mrs. Prince and Betty testified they were ordained ministers. The former was accustomed to go each week on the streets of Brockton to distribute "Watchtower" and "Consolation," according to the usual plan. She had permitted the children to engage in this activity previously, and had been warned against doing so by the school attendance officer, Mr. Perkins. But, until December 18, 1941, she generally did not take them with her at night.
Cf. the facts as set forth in Jamison v. Texas, 318 U.S. 413; Largent v. Texas, 318 U.S. 418; Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105; Busey v. District of Columbia, 75 U.S.App.D.C. 352, 129 F.2d 24. A common feature is that specified small sums are generally asked and received but the publications may be had without the payment if so desired.
That evening, as Mrs. Prince was preparing to leave her home, the children asked to go. She at first refused. Child-like, they resorted to tears; and, motherlike, she yielded. Arriving downtown, Mrs. Prince permitted the children "to engage in the preaching work with her upon the sidewalks." That is, with specific reference to Betty, she and Mrs. Prince took positions about twenty feet apart near a street intersection. Betty held up in her hand, for passers-by to see, copies of "Watch Tower" and "Consolation." From her shoulder hung the usual canvas magazine bag, on which was printed: "Watchtower and Consolation 5¢ per copy." No one accepted a copy from Betty that evening and she received no money. Nor did her aunt. But on other occasions, Betty had received funds and given out copies.
As the case reaches us, the questions are no longer open whether what the child did was a "sale" or an "offer to sell" within § 69 or was "work" within § 81. The state court's decision has foreclosed them adversely to appellant as a matter of state law. The only question remaining therefore is whether, as construed and applied, the statute is valid. Upon this the court said: "We think that freedom of the press and of religion is subject to incidental regulation to the slight degree involved in the prohibition of the selling of religious literature in streets and public places by boys under twelve and girls under eighteen, and in the further statutory provisions herein considered, which have been adopted as means of enforcing that prohibition." 313 Mass. 223, 229, 46 N.E.2d 755, 758.
In this respect the Massachusetts decision is contrary to the trend in other states. Compare State v. Mead, 230 Iowa 1217, 300 N.W. 523; State v. Meredith, 197 S.C. 351, 15 S.E.2d 678; State ex rel. Semansky v. Stark, 196 La. 307, 199 So. 129; Shreveport v. Teague, 200 La. 679, 8 So.2d 640; People v. Barber, 289 N.Y. 378, 46 N.E.2d 329; Thomas v. Atlanta, 59 Ga. App. 520, 1 S.E.2d 598; Cincinnati v. Mosier, 61 Ohio App. 81, 22 N.E.2d 418. Contra: McSparran v. Portland (Circuit Court, Multnomah County, Oregon, June 8, 1942), cert. denied, 318 U.S. 768.
The court's opinion said: "The judge could find that if a passer-by should hand over five cents in accordance with the sign on the bag and should receive a magazine in return, a sale would be effected. The judge was not required to accept the defendant's characterization of that transaction as a `contribution.' He could believe that selling the literature played a more prominent part in the enterprise than giving it away. He could find that the defendant furnished the magazines to Betty, knowing that the latter intended to sell them, if she could, in violation of § 69. . . . The judge could find that the defendant permitted Betty to `work' in violation of § 81. . . . we cannot say that the evils at which the statutes were directed attendant upon the selling by children of newspapers, magazines, periodicals, and other merchandise in streets and public places do not exist where the publications are of a religious nature." 313 Mass. 223, 227-228.
Appellant does not stand on freedom of the press. Regarding it as secular, she concedes it may be restricted as Massachusetts has done. Hence, she rests squarely on freedom of religion under the First Amendment, applied by the Fourteenth to the states. She buttresses this foundation, however, with a claim of parental right as secured by the due process clause of the latter Amendment. Cf. Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390. These guaranties, she thinks, guard alike herself and the child in what they have done. Thus, two claimed liberties are at stake. One is the parent's, to bring up the child in the way he should go, which for appellant means to teach him the tenets and the practices of their faith. The other freedom is the child's, to observe these; and among them is "to preach the gospel . . . by public distribution" of "Watchtower" and "Consolation," in conformity with the scripture: "A little child shall lead them."
Appellant's brief says: "The purpose of the legislation is to protect children from economic exploitation and keep them from the evils of such enterprises that contribute to the degradation of children." And at the argument counsel stated the prohibition would be valid as against a claim of freedom of the press as a nonreligious activity.
But the family itself is not beyond regulation in the public interest, as against a claim of religious liberty. Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145; Davis v. Beason, 133 U.S. 333. And neither rights of religion nor rights of parenthood are beyond limitation. Acting to guard the general interest in youth's well being, the state as parens patriae may restrict the parent's control by requiring school attendance, regulating or prohibiting the child's labor and in many other ways. Its authority is not nullified merely because the parent grounds his claim to control the child's course of conduct on religion or conscience. Thus, he cannot claim freedom from compulsory vaccination for the child more than for himself on religious grounds. The right to practice religion freely does not include liberty to expose the community or the child to communicable disease or the latter to ill health or death. People v. Pierson, 176 N.Y. 201, 68 N.E. 243. The catalogue need not be lengthened. It is sufficient to show what indeed appellant hardly disputes, that the state has a wide range of power for limiting parental freedom and authority in things affecting the child's welfare; and that this includes, to some extent, matters of conscience and religious conviction.
State v. Bailey, 157 Ind. 324, 61 N.E. 730; compare Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390; Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510; West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624.
Sturges Burn Mfg. Co. v. Beauchamp, 231 U.S. 320; compare Muller v. Oregon, 208 U.S. 412.
See also State v. Chenoweth, 163 Ind. 94, 71 N.E. 197; Owens v. State, 6 Okla. Cr. 110, 116 P. 345.
Concededly a statute or ordinance identical in terms with § 69, except that it is applicable to adults or all persons generally, would be invalid. Young v. California, 308 U.S. 147; Nichols v. Massachusetts, 308 U.S. 147; Jamison v. Texas, 318 U.S. 413; Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105; Martin v. City of Struthers, 319 U.S. 141. But the mere fact a state could not wholly prohibit this form of adult activity, whether characterized locally as a "sale" or otherwise, does not mean it cannot do so for children. Such a conclusion granted would mean that a state could impose no greater limitation upon child labor than upon adult labor. Or, if an adult were free to enter dance halls, saloons, and disreputable places generally, in order to discharge his conceived religious duty to admonish or dissuade persons from frequenting such places, so would be a child with similar convictions and objectives, if not alone then in the parent's company, against the state's command.
Pertinent also are the decisions involving license features: Lovell Page 168 v. City of Griffin, 303 U.S. 444; Schneider v. State, 308 U.S. 147; Hague v. Committee for Industrial Organization, 307 U.S. 496.
The state's authority over children's activities is broader than over like actions of adults. This is peculiarly true of public activities and in matters of employment. A democratic society rests, for its continuance, upon the healthy, well-rounded growth of young people into full maturity as citizens, with all that implies. It may secure this against impeding restraints and dangers within a broad range of selection. Among evils most appropriate for such action are the crippling effects of child employment, more especially in public places, and the possible harms arising from other activities subject to all the diverse influences of the street. It is too late now to doubt that legislation appropriately designed to reach such evils is within the state's police power, whether against the parent's claim to control of the child or one that religious scruples dictate contrary action.
See, e.g., Volumes 1-4, 6-8, 14, 18, Report on Condition of Women and Child Wage Earners in the United States, Sen. Doc. No. 645, 61st Cong., 2d Sess.; The Working Children of Boston, U.S. Dept. of Labor, Children's Bureau Publication No. 89 (1922); Fuller, The Meaning of Child Labor (1922); Fuller and Strong, Child Labor in Massachusetts (1926).
Street preaching, whether oral or by handing out literature, is not the primary use of the highway, even for adults. While for them it cannot be wholly prohibited, it can be regulated within reasonable limits in accommodation to the primary and other incidental uses. But, for obvious reasons, notwithstanding appellant's contrary view, the validity of such a prohibition applied to children not accompanied by an older person hardly would seem open to question. The case reduces itself therefore to the question whether the presence of the child's guardian puts a limit to the state's power. That fact may lessen the likelihood that some evils the legislation seeks to avert will occur. But it cannot forestall all of them. The zealous though lawful exercise of the right to engage in propagandizing the community, whether in religious, political or other matters, may and at times does create situations difficult enough for adults to cope with and wholly inappropriate for children, especially of tender years, to face. Other harmful possibilities could be stated, of emotional excitement and psychological or physical injury. Parents may be free to become martyrs themselves. But it does not follow they are free, in identical circumstances, to make martyrs of their children before they have reached the age of full and legal discretion when they can make that choice for themselves. Massachusetts has determined that an absolute prohibition, though one limited to streets and public places and to the incidental uses proscribed, is necessary to accomplish its legitimate objectives. Its power to attain them is broad enough to reach these peripheral instances in which the parent's supervision may reduce but cannot eliminate entirely the ill effects of the prohibited conduct. We think that with reference to the public proclaiming of religion, upon the streets and in other similar public places, the power of the state to control the conduct of children reaches beyond the scope of its authority over adults, as is true in the case of other freedoms, and the rightful boundary of its power has not been crossed in this case.
Cox v. New Hampshire, 312 U.S. 569; Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, 315 U.S. 568.