Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/102846/mackey-vs-united-states
Timestamp: 2016-12-04 06:17:44
Document Index: 437865020

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 7201', '§ 4401', '§ 4401', '§ 2255', '§ 4401', '§ 2255', '§ 2254', '§ 2241', '§ 2255', '§ 2244', '§ 2244', '§ 4401', '§ 7201', '§ 7203', '§ 6011', '§ 44', '§ 44', '§ 1084', '§ 1301', '§ 1952', '§ 1953']

Mackey Vs United States - Citation 102846 - Court Judgment | LegalCrystal
Save as PDF Add a Tag Add a Note Semantics Visualize Mackey Vs. United States - Court Judgment	LegalCrystal Citationlegalcrystal.com/102846CourtUS Supreme CourtDecided OnApr-05-1971Case Number401 U.S. 667AppellantMackeyRespondentUnited StatesExcerpt:
mackey v. united states - 401 u.s. 667 (1971)
at petitioner's trial for income tax evasion, the government used monthly wagering tax forms petitioner had filed, as required by statute, to show that the gross amount of wagers he reported, less business expenses, exceeded the gambling profits reported on his income tax returns. petitioner objected on the ground that the forms were prejudicial and irrelevant, but he was convicted in 1964, and the court of appeals affirmed. after this..... Judgment:
At petitioner's trial for income tax evasion, the Government used monthly wagering tax forms petitioner had filed, as required by statute, to show that the gross amount of wagers he reported, less business expenses, exceeded the gambling profits reported on his income tax returns. Petitioner objected on the ground that the forms were prejudicial and irrelevant, but he was convicted in 1964, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. After this Court's 1968 decisions in
, petitioner applied for post-conviction relief on the ground that the Fifth Amendment barred the prosecution's use of the wagering tax forms. The District Court denied the application. The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that
would not be applied retroactively to overturn the earlier income tax evasion conviction based on the then-applicable constitutional principles.
401 U. S. 671
-675,
401 U. S. 700
-701,
401 U. S. 703
MR. JUSTICE WHITE, joined by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE STEWART, and MR. JUSTICE BLACKMUN, concluded that
are not to be applied retroactively, since no threat to the reliability of the factfinding process was involved in the use of the wagering tax forms at petitioner's trial.
Williams v. United States, ante,
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN concluded that, in this case, here on collateral review, the judgment should be affirmed, since he cannot say that the pre-
rule that prevailed at the time of petitioner's conviction,
that the registration requirement and obligation to pay the gambling tax did not violate the Fifth Amendment, was so grossly erroneous as to work an inexcusable inequity against petitioner, and that the then-existing justification for that result (that persons could avoid self-incrimination by ceasing to engage in illegal activities) is not without some force. Pp.
that, in furtherance of the general scheme of collecting taxes and enforcing the tax laws, required those in the business of accepting wagers to report their income, a situation readily distinguishable from that in
where the Amendment was held to bar forced disclosure of information that would have subjected the individual concerned to the "real and appreciable" hazard of self-incrimination for violating pervasive state or federal laws proscribing gambling. Pp.
WHITE, J., announced the Court's judgment and delivered an opinion in which BURGER, C.J., and STEWART and BLACKMUN, JJ., joined. HARLAN, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment,
401 U. S. 675
. BRENNAN, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, in which MARSHALL, J., joined,
401 U. S. 702
. DOUGLAS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BLACK, J., joined,
401 U. S. 713
An indictment was returned in March, 1963, charging petitioner Fred T. Mackey in five counts of evading payment of income taxes by willfully preparing and causing to be prepared false and fraudulent tax returns for the years 1956 through 1960, in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 7201. On January 21, 1964, a jury in the District Court for the Northern District of Indiana found Mackey guilty on all five counts. [
] The conviction was affirmed on appeal by the Court of Appeals for the
Seventh Circuit in the spring of 1965. 345 F.2d 499 (CA7),
382 U.S. 824 (1965).
At petitioner's trial, the Government used the net worth method to prove evasion of income taxes. [
] As part of its case, it introduced 60 wagering excise tax returns -- one for every month of each of the five years covered by the indictment -- filed by petitioner pursuant to 26 U.S.C. § 4401. A summary exhibit prepared from these returns and petitioner's income tax returns were also introduced, and an Internal Revenue Service technical advisor testified that, for the years in question, the totals of the gross amount of wagers reported on the wagering tax returns, less the expenses of running petitioner's "policy wheel" operation as reported on his annual income tax returns, exceeded the net profits from gambling reported on the petitioner's income tax returns. Defense counsel objected to the introduction of these exhibits, arguing that they were prejudicial, inflammatory, and irrelevant; the Government responded that the wagering tax returns and the summary exhibit were relevant because they showed a likely source of unreported income. The exhibits were admitted, and the Court of Appeals found, without specific discussion, no error in the ruling. [
§§ 4401, 4411, 4412.
(1968). Petitioner, who had begun serving his sentence in December, 1965, filed on February 12, 1968, a motion pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255 to vacate his sentence and set aside the judgment of conviction on authority of
The motion was denied by the District Court for the Northern District of Indiana, [
] and the Court of Appeals affirmed. 411 F.2d 504 (CA7 1969).
Although the Court of Appeals suggested that petitioner's argument that he had not waived the Fifth Amendment claim by his failure to raise it at trial was open to question, 411 F.2d at 506-507, it specifically held that
would not be applied retroactively to upset a pre-
evading payment of income tax simply because the wagering excise tax returns filed pursuant to 26 U.S.C. § 4401 were introduced in evidence at trial. Employing the threefold analysis set forth in our retroactivity decisions,
see, e.g., Stovall v. Denno,
(1967), the Court of Appeals found that law enforcement officials had relied on the old rule, that retroactive application of
in cases such as petitioner's would have a substantial impact on the administration of justice, and that
(1953), a prosecution for failure to register and pay the gambling tax, this Court held that the registration requirement and the obligation to pay the gambling tax did not violate the Fifth Amendment. The Court construed the privilege as relating
345 U.S. at
348 U. S. 419
(1955), reaffirmed this construction of the Fifth Amendment. Thirteen years later, we could not agree with what was deemed an "excessively narrow" view of the scope of the privilege. 390 U.S. at
390 U. S. 52
evidence.' 390 U.S. at
390 U. S. 54
. The gambling registration and tax requirements were held to present substantial risks of self-incrimination, and therefore to be unenforceable; imposition of criminal penalties for noncompliance was an impermissible burden on the exercise of the privilege."
then, the registration and gambling tax provisions had the express approval of this Court; the Fifth Amendment provided no defense to a criminal prosecution for failure to comply. But as of January 29, 1968, the privilege was expanded to excuse noncompliance. The statutory requirement to register and file gambling tax returns was held to compel self-incrimination and the privilege became a complete defense to a criminal prosecution for failure to register and pay the related taxes. It followed that the registration and excise tax returns filed in response to the statutory command were compelled statements within the meaning of the Fifth Amendment, and accordingly were inadmissible in evidence as part of the prosecution's case in chief. The question before us is whether the
rule applies retroactively and invalidates Mackey's conviction because his gambling excise tax returns were introduced against him at his trial for income tax evasion.
We have today reaffirmed the nonretroactivity of decisions overruling prior constructions of the Fourth Amendment.
Elkanich v. United States, ante,
. The decision in those cases represents the approach to the question of when to accord retroactive sweep to a new constitutional rule taken by this Court in the line of cases from
] in 1965 to
] in 1969. Among those cases were two which determined that earlier decisions extending the
(1966), the Court declined to apply the rule of
(1965), to prisoners seeking collateral relief.
had construed the Fifth Amendment to forbid comment on defendants' failure to testify, thereby removing a burden from the exercise of the privilege against compulsory self-incrimination and further implementing its purpose. The basic purpose of the privilege, we said, was not related to "protecting the innocent from conviction," 382 U.S. at
382 U. S. 415
; the privilege "is not an adjunct to the ascertainment of truth," but is aimed at serving the complex of values on which it has historically rested. 382 U.S. at
382 U. S. 416
. Given this purpose, clear reliance on the pre-
rules, and the frustration of state interests which retroactivity would have entailed, we refused relief to a state prisoner seeking collateral relief although the prosecutor's comment on his failure to take the stand at his trial would have infringed the new rule that was announced in
and was being applied in contemporary trials.
(1966), reaffirmed this view of the Fifth Amendment by declining to apply the
] rules to cases pending on direct review as well as to those involving applications for collateral relief. Stating that the "prime purpose of these rulings is to guarantee full effectuation of the privilege against self-incrimination, the mainstay of our adversary system of criminal justice," 384 U.S. at
, the Court also recognized that the new rules to some extent did guard against the possibility of unreliable admissions given
during custodial interrogation.
384 U. S. 730
. The question, however, was one of "probabilities." The hazard of untrustworthy results in past trials was not sufficiently apparent to require retroactive application in view of the existing, well defined remedies against the use of many involuntary confessions, the obvious fact that the new warnings had not been standard practice prior to
and the consequent disruption to the administration of the criminal law.
Guided by our decisions dealing with the retroactivity of new constitutional interpretations of the broad language of the Bill of Rights, we agree with the Court of Appeals that
should not have any retroactive effect on Mackey's conviction. Petitioner was convicted in strict accordance with then-applicable constitutional norms. Mackey would have a significant claim only if
must be given full retroactive sweep. But, in overruling
Kahriger
the Court's purpose was to provide for a broader implementation of the Fifth Amendment privilege a privilege that does not include at its core a concern for improving the reliability of the results reached at criminal trials. There is no indication in
that one of the considerations which moved the Court to hold that the Congress could not constitutionally compel citizens to register as gamblers and file related tax returns was the probable unreliability of such statements once given. Petitioner has not advanced any objective considerations suggesting such unreliability. The wagering tax returns introduced in evidence at his trial have none of the characteristics, and hence none of the potential unreliability, of coerced confessions produced by "overt and obvious coercion."
. Nor does Mackey suggest that his returns -- made under
oath -- were inaccurate in any respect. [
] Thus, a gambling excise tax return, like physical evidence seized in violation of a new interpretation of the Fourth Amendment, is concededly relevant and probative even though obtained by the Government through means since defined by this Court as constitutionally objectionable. As in
Desist, Elkanich,
the result here should be that a pre-
trial in which the Government employed such evidence is not set aside through retroactive application of the new constitutional principle.
The short of the matter is that
raise not the slightest doubt about the accuracy of the verdict of guilt returned here. Under these circumstances, the principles represented by
must control. For
indicate that, even though decisions reinterpreting the Fifth Amendment may create marginal doubts as to the accuracy of the results of past trials, the purposes of those decisions are adequately served by prospective application. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
This method of prosecution is discussed and approved in
Friedberg v. United States,
348 U. S. 142
348 U. S. 147
United States v. Calderon,
348 U. S. 160
In rejecting petitioner's application for relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, the District Judge so read the Court of Appeals' earlier opinion.
The District Court advanced several reasons for denying petitioner's application.
App. 27-38. Noting that, with gambling excise tax returns, "there is little danger of their unreliability other than their possible understatement of liability,"
at 32, the District Judge held that
should not be applied to petitioner's case:
We note in reference to the last point mentioned by the District Judge that, at trial, the court's charge to the jury included several strong admonitions to the effect that the question of whether any business run by petitioner was legal or illegal was irrelevant to the offense charged in the indictment -- failure to report income for five years.
Brief for the United States 11.
One of these cases is before us on direct review, No. 81,
the other two being here on collateral review, No. 82,
Elkanich,
and No. 36,
In each instance, the new rule is held not applicable, and, in
consequence, the judgments below are affirmed without reaching the merits of the underlying questions presented. Two of the cases,
involve the Court's decision in
(1969), changing the rule as to the scope of permissible searches and seizures incident to a lawful arrest. The other case,
involves the Court's decisions in
390 U.S. 39 (1968), and
390 U.S. 62 (1968), changing the rule as to the application of the privilege against self-incrimination with respect to criminal prosecutions arising under the federal gambling tax statutes.
Today's decisions mark another milestone in the development of the Court's "retroactivity" doctrine, which came into being somewhat less than six years ago in
(1965). That doctrine was the product of the Court's disquietude with the impacts of its fast-moving pace of constitutional innovation in the criminal field. Some members of the Court, and I have come to regret that I was among them, initially grasped this doctrine as a way of limiting the reach of decisions that seemed to them fundamentally unsound. Others rationalized this resort to prospectivity as a "technique" that provided an "impetus . . . for the implementation of long overdue reforms, which otherwise could not be practicably effected."
395 U. S. 218
(1969). The upshot of this confluence of viewpoints was that the subsequent course of
became almost as difficult to follow as the tracks made by a beast of prey in search of its intended victim.
394 U. S. 256
-257 (1969).
See also United States v. United States Coin & Currency, post,
401 U. S. 728
(appendix to concurring opinion of BRENNAN, J.). It was this train of events that impelled me to suggest two Terms ago, in
that the time had come for us
to pause to consider just where these haphazard developments might be leading us. That is what I had thought underlay the taking of these cases, and their companions,
United States v. United States Coin & Currency, post,
Hill v. California, post,
. Regrettably, however, this opportunity has largely eventuated in little more than a reaffirmation of the post-
But we possess this awesome power of judicial review, this duty to bind coordinate branches of the federal system with our view of what the Constitution dictates, only because we are a court of law, an appellate court charged with the responsibility of adjudicating cases or controversies according to the law of the land, and because the law applicable to any such dispute necessarily includes the Federal Constitution. That is the classic explanation for the basis of judicial review, an explanation first put forth by Chief Justice Marshall in
-178 (1803), and, from that day to this, the sole continuing rationale for the exercise of this judicial power:
If we do not resolve all cases before us on direct review in light of our best understanding of governing constitutional principles, it is difficult to see why we should so adjudicate any case at all. If there is no need for an anti-majoritarian judicial control over the content of our legal system in nine cases precisely like that presented by Mr. Chimel's dispute with the State of California, it is hard to see the necessity, wisdom, or justification for imposing that control in the
case itself. In truth, the Court's assertion of power to disregard current law in adjudicating cases before us that have not already run the full course of appellate review, is quite simply an assertion that our constitutional function is not one of adjudication but in effect of legislation. We apply and definitively interpret the Constitution, under this view of our role, not because we are bound to, but only because we occasionally deem it appropriate, useful, or wise. That sort of choice may permissibly be made by a legislature or a council of revision, but not by a court of law.
governing at the time we are possessed of jurisdiction in the case entails additional significant untoward consequences. By this doctrine another courts in this country are, in effect, reduced largely to the role of automatons, directed by us to apply mechanistically all then-settled federal constitutional concepts to every case before them. No longer do the inferior courts -- and, in the constitutional realm, all courts are inferior to us -- bear responsibility for developing or interpreting the Constitution. For it is a necessary corollary of this current retroactivity doctrine that an inferior court errs when it arrives at a result which this Court subsequently adopts but later decides must operate prospectively only.
394 U. S. 259
Cf. United States v. White, post,
401 U. S. 754
(Part II), and my dissenting opinion in that case,
401 U. S. 768
401 U. S. 730
(WHITE, J., dissenting). Although it is necessary for the proper functioning of the federal system that this Court possess the last word on issues of federal constitutional law, it is intolerable that we take to ourselves the sole ability to speak to such problems.
Refusal to apply new constitutional rules to all cases arising on direct review may well substantially deter those whose financial resources are barely sufficient to withstand the costs of litigating to this Court, or attorneys who are willing to make sacrifices to perform their professional obligation in its broadest sense, from asserting rights bottomed on constitutional interpretations different from those currently prevailing in this Court. More importantly, it tends to cut this Court loose from the force of precedent, allowing us to restructure artificially those expectations legitimately created by extant law and thereby mitigate the practical force of
stare decisis, Linkletter v. Walker,
381 U. S. 644
(BLACK, J., dissenting), a force which ought properly to bear on the
judicial resolution of any legal problem.
Cf. Moragne v. States Marine Lines,
398 U. S. 375
398 U. S. 403
One could catalogue virtually
what I view as unacceptable ancillary consequences of this aspect of the Court's ambulatory retroactivity doctrine. For me, the fact that this doctrine entails an inexplicable and unjustifiable departure from the basic principle upon which rests the institution of judicial review is sufficient to render it untenable. I continue to believe that a proper perception of our duties as a court of law, charged with applying the Constitution to resolve every legal dispute within our jurisdiction on direct review, mandates that we apply the law as it is at the time, not as it once was. Inquiry into the nature, purposes, and scope of a particular constitutional rule is essential to the task of deciding whether that rule should be made the law of the land. That inquiry is, however, quite simply irrelevant in deciding, once a rule has been adopted as part of our legal fabric, which cases then pending in this Court should be governed by it.
Of the cases presently under discussion, only
involves direct review of a nonfinal criminal judgment. The other two,
were brought here by persons in federal custody, seeking release through issuance of a writ of habeas corpus. [
] At the time their
As I first pointed out in my dissent in
394 U. S. 260
-261, this Court's function in reviewing a decision allowing or disallowing a writ of habeas corpus is, and always has been, significantly different from our role in reviewing on direct appeal the validity of nonfinal criminal convictions. While the entire theoretical underpinnings of judicial review and constitutional supremacy dictate that federal courts having jurisdiction on direct review adjudicate every issue of law, including federal constitutional issues, fairly implicated by the trial process below and properly presented on appeal, federal courts have never had a similar obligation on habeas corpus.
have become otherwise final. It is not designed as a substitute for direct review. The interest in leaving concluded litigation in a state of repose, that is, reducing the controversy to a final judgment not subject to further judicial revision, may quite legitimately be found by those responsible for defining the scope of the writ to outweigh in some, many, or most instances the competing interest in readjudicating convictions according to all legal standards in effect when a habeas petition is filed. Indeed, this interest in finality might well lead to a decision to exclude completely certain legal issues, whether or not properly determined under the law prevailing at the time of trial, from the cognizance of courts administering this collateral remedy. This has always been the case with collateral attacks on final civil judgments. [
] More immediately relevant here is the fact that,
(1953), federal courts would never consider the merits of a constitutional claim raised on habeas if the petitioner had a fair opportunity to raise his arguments in the original criminal proceeding,
372 U. S. 449
-463 (1963), unless the petitioner attacked the constitutionality of the federal,
(1880), or state,
Crowley v. Christensen,
137 U. S. 86
(1890), statute under which he had been convicted.
Bator, Finality in Criminal Law and Federal Habeas Corpus for State Prisoners, 76 Harv.L.Rev. 441, 463 (1963); Note, Developments in the Law -- Federal Habeas Corpus, 83 Harv.L.Rev. 1040, 1042-1062 (1970).
Thus, prior to
it must have been crystal clear that the "retroactivity" of a new constitutional rule was a function of the scope and purposes of the habeas corpus writ. Absent unusual circumstances, a new rule was not cognizable on habeas simply because of the limited scope of the writ. While the extent of inquiry into alleged constitutional error on habeas has been drastically expanded in the past 20 years, the retroactivity problem remains analytically constant. In my view, the issues respectively presented by the two cases I treat here that arise on collateral review (
) -- whether the new rules of the
cases should be applied "retroactively" -- must be considered as none other than a problem as to the scope of the habeas writ. We can properly decline to apply the
rule, or the principles of
to the present cases only if that is consistent with the reasons for the provision, in our federal legal system, of a habeas corpus proceeding to test the validity of an individual's official confinement.
me with difficult problems. I have consistently protested a long course of habeas decisions in this Court which, I still believe, constitute an unsound extension of the historic scope of the writ and an unfortunate display of insensitivity to the principles of federalism which underlie the American legal system.
See, e.g., Fay v. Noia,
373 U. S. 23
394 U. S. 242
372 U. S. 325
(1963) (STEWART, J., dissenting). If I felt free to decide the present cases consistently with my own views of the legitimate role of the Great Writ, I should have little difficulty. But as my views on this score have not commended themselves to most of my Brethren, I feel obliged to approach these two collateral cases within the framework of current habeas corpus doctrine. This is not an easy exercise, for present habeas corpus decisions provide little assistance in fathoming the underlying understanding of habeas corpus upon which these decisions have been premised. The short of the matter is that this Court has in recent times yet to produce any considered, coherent statement of the general purposes of habeas. In considering the problem of "retroactivity" on direct review, it is possible to work from a general classic theory of judicial review, but while the specific uses of the habeas writ have greatly multiplied, the earlier perception of its general metes and bounds has been swallowed up and gone unreplaced. About the only way to proceed is to work from the bottom up, ascertaining first which issues are cognizable on habeas, and which are not, and thereafter inferring what must be thought to be the nature of the writ.
knowingly and deliberately waived or constitutes mere harmless error. That seems to be the implicit premise of
Brown v. Allen, supra,
and the clear purport of
Kaufman v. United States, supra.
This is not to say, however, that the function of habeas corpus is to provide a federal forum for determining whether any individual is presently "in custody in violation of the constitution . . . of the United States," 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (1964 ed., Supp. V), in the sense that the basis for his incarceration would, under the law existing at the time a petition is filed or adjudicated, as distinguished from the law that was applicable at the time his conviction became final, be held free of constitutional error.
Meador, Habeas Corpus and the "Retroactivity" Illusion, 50 Va.L.Rev. 1115 (1964).
While it has been generally, although not universally, assumed that habeas courts should apply current constitutional law to habeas petitioners before them, [
] I do not believe this is or should be the correct view. First, no such proposition has ever been squarely considered and embraced by this Court, at least since the recent proliferation of criminal defendants' protected constitutional
rights and the concomitant expansion of the writ. [
] Moreover, applying current constitutional standards to convictions finalized while different views were ascendant appears unnecessary to achieve the ends sought by
The primary justification given by the Court for extending the scope of habeas to all alleged constitutional errors is that it provides a
-appellate review function, forcing trial and appellate courts in both the federal and state system to toe the constitutional mark.
See Kaufman v. United States,
394 U. S. 226
. However, the opinion in
itself concedes that there is no need to apply new constitutional rules on habeas to serve the interests promoted by that decision. 394 U.S. at
394 U. S. 229
. Further, as I explain in the margin below, [
] Congress, in at least one significant
In my view, however, these interests are too easily overstated. Some discrimination must always exist in the legal treatment of criminal convicts within a system where the governing law is continuously subject to change. And it has been the law, presumably for at least as long as anyone currently in jail has been incarcerated, that procedures utilized to convict them must have been fundamentally fair, that is, in accordance with the command of the Fourteenth Amendment that "[n]o State shall . . . deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law."
(1908). Moreover, it is too easy to suggest that constitutional updating is necessary in order to assure that the system arrives only at "correct" results. By hypothesis, a final conviction, state or federal, has been adjudicated by a court cognizant of the Federal Constitution and duty bound to apply it. To argue that a conclusion reached by one of these "inferior" courts is somehow forever erroneous because years later this Court took a different view of the relevant constitutional command
carries more emotional than analytic force. No one has put this point better than Mr. Justice Jackson, in his concurring opinion in
More importantly, there are operative competing policies in this area which I regard as substantial. It is, I believe, a matter of fundamental import that there be a visible end to the litigable aspect of the criminal process. Finality in the criminal law is an end which must always be kept in plain view.
372 U. S. 445
(Clark, J., dissenting);
Spencer v. Texas,
385 U. S. 554
385 U. S. 583
(1967) (Warren, C.J., concurring and dissenting).
Bator, Finality in Criminal Law and Federal Habeas Corpus for State Prisoners, 76 Harv.L.Rev. 441 (1963); Friendly, Is Innocence Irrelevant? Collateral Attack on Criminal Judgments, 38 U.Chi.L.Rev. 142, 146-151 (1970). As I have stated before,
-25 (HARLAN, J., dissenting). At some point, the criminal process, if it is to function at all, must turn its attention from whether a man ought properly to be incarcerated to how he is to
A rule of law that fails to take account of these finality interests would do more than subvert the criminal process itself. It would also seriously distort the very limited resources society has allocated to the criminal process. While men languish in jail, not uncommonly for over a year, awaiting a first trial on their guilt or innocence, it is not easy to justify expending substantial quantities of the time and energies of judges, prosecutors, and defense lawyers litigating the validity under present law of criminal convictions that were perfectly free from error when made final.
at 148-149. This drain on society's resources is compounded by the fact that issuance of the habeas writ compels a State that wishes to continue enforcing its laws against the successful petitioner to relitigate facts buried in the remote past through presentation of witnesses whose memories of the relevant events often have dimmed. This very act of trying stale facts may well, ironically, produce a second trial no more reliable as a matter of getting at the truth than the first.
Amsterdam, Search, Seizure, and Section 2255: A Comment, 112 U.Pa.L.Rev. 378, 384 (1964).
Although not necessary to the resolution of either of the two collateral cases now here, for sake of completeness, I venture to add that I would make two exceptions to this general principle. First, the above discussion is written only with new "procedural due process" rules in mind, that is, those applications of the Constitution that forbid the Government to utilize certain techniques or processes in enforcing concededly valid societal proscriptions on individual behavior. [
] New "substantive due process" rules, that is, those that place, as a matter of constitutional interpretation, certain kinds of primary, private individual conduct beyond the power of the criminal law-making authority to proscribe, [
] must, in my view, be placed on a different footing. As I noted above, the writ has historically
been available for attacking convictions on such grounds. [
] This, I believe, is because it represents the clearest instance where finality interests should yield. There is little societal interest in permitting the criminal process to rest at a point where it ought properly never to repose. Moreover, issuance of the writ on substantive due process grounds entails none of the adverse collateral consequences of retrial I have described above. Thus, the obvious interest in freeing individuals from punishment for conduct that is constitutionally protected seems to me sufficiently substantial to justify applying current notions of substantive due process to petitions for habeas corpus.
Part II of my opinion for the Court in
Secondly, I think the writ ought always to lie for claims of nonobservance of those procedures that, as so aptly described by Mr. Justice Cardozo in
302 U. S. 325
(1937), are "implicit in the concept of ordered liberty." Typically, it should be the case that any conviction free from federal constitutional error at the time it became final will be found, upon reflection, to have been fundamentally fair and conducted under those procedures essential to the substance of a full hearing. However, in some situations, it might be that time and growth in social capacity, as well as judicial perceptions of what we can rightly demand of the adjudicatory process, will properly alter our understanding of the bedrock procedural elements that must be found to vitiate the fairness of a particular conviction.
For example, such, in my view, is the case with the right to counsel at trial now held a necessary condition precedent to any conviction for a serious crime.
my separate opinion in
372 U. S. 349
(1963), where I concurred in conferring this right on a state prisoner, seeking state habeas corpus, on the grounds that this "new" rule was mandated by
Hence, I would continue to apply
itself on habeas, even to convictions made final before that decision was rendered. Other possible exceptions to the finality rule I would leave to be worked out in the context of actual cases brought before us that raise the issue.
Subsequent reflection upon what I wrote in
where I undertook to expose in a preliminary way some of the considerations I thought ought to govern the problem of deciding which, if any, new constitutional rules should be held cognizable in habeas proceedings, leads me to these additional observations. There, I tentatively suggested we might apply those new rules that "significantly improve the preexisting factfinding procedures" mandated by the Federal Constitution. 394 U.S. at
394 U. S. 262
Mishkin, The Supreme Court 1964 Term -- Foreword: The High Court, The Great Writ, and the Due Process of Time and Law, 79 Harv.L.Rev. 56, 77-101 (1965). As indicated above, I am now persuaded that those new rules cognizable on habeas ought to be defined not by the "truth-determining" test, but by the
test. My reasons are several. First, adherence to precedent, particularly
must ineluctably lead one to the conclusion that it is not a principal purpose of the writ to inquire whether a criminal convict did in fact, commit the deed alleged. Additionally, recent decisions of this Court,
e.g., Coleman v. Alabama,
(1970), have revealed just how marginally effective are some new rules purportedly aimed at improving the factfinding
process. I cannot believe that the interest in finality is always outweighed by the interests protected in cases like
Cf. Spencer v. Texas,
(Warren, C.J., concurring and dissenting). I believe
more correctly marks the tipping point of finality interests not only in terms of divining which new rules should apply on habeas, but also in its reminder that a particular rule may be more or less crucial to the fairness of a case depending on its own factual setting. Finally, I find inherently intractable the purported distinction between those new rules that are designed to improve the factfinding process and those designed principally to further other values. For a perfect example, note the plurality's difficulty today in explaining, on that basis, retroactivity decisions such as
(1967); and
Williams v. United States, ante
401 U. S. 655
-656, n. 7.
I went to some lengths to point out the inevitable difficulties that will arise in attempting
-269. I remain fully cognizant of these problems, and realize they will produce some difficulties in administering the writ, but believe they would be greatly ameliorated by adequate recognition of the principle of finality in the operation of the criminal process.
In the plurality opinions in
the only challenge I perceive to my views is the single assertion that my analysis is untenable because unsupported by precedent.
-652. Truly, this is a remarkable claim. For
the wellspring of the current retroactivity doctrine, took as its point of departure the very distinction between direct review and collateral attack which I have argued is crucial to any analysis in this field, a distinction which the Court now firmly discards.
Further, as the dissenting opinion in
United States v. United States Coin & Currency, post
401 U. S. 735
, points out, in an analogous situation, the legislative repeal of a criminal statute,
been the model for the judicial process. Indeed, it would seem that the only precedential support for the position that prevails today is that conflicting and confusing flurry of "retroactivity" opinions that commenced less than five years ago with
Other aspects of the dissent in
Coin & Currency, supra,
might, it seems to me, be construed as a further challenge to the views I have expressed here since that opinion is subscribed to by a majority of those members of the Court who have determined that, for purposes of deciding whether new search and seizure rules apply to subsequent cases arising in federal courts, the process invoked by the litigants is irrelevant. In any event, I find the implications of the analysis underlying that dissent startling. For example, that Congress currently provides that statutory repeal shall not abate pending prosecutions or require reversal of nonfinal convictions seems to me a singularly unhelpful bit of information. We sit as a court of law, not a council of revision. Our powers of judicial review are judicial, not legislative, in nature. The assertion that this evidence is relevant data for resolving the problems at hand serves, at best, only to make explicit that which I have attempted to demonstrate in
401 U. S.
but, rather, something akin to a legislative, process. If, in fact, that premise is true, we ought not to be writing retroactivity opinions but instead relinquishing some of our powers of judicial review.
of our fabric of "positive law," and the issue, therefore, is whether this Court should carry this policy over to the realm of constitutional interpretation. Three cases are cited that allegedly reveal we are not foreclosed from taking this course. The short answer to all this remains the same: the distinction between judicial and legislative power is equally woven deeply into the fabric of our positive law. So, too, is the notion that this Court definitively interprets the Constitution only because its role as a court of law requires it to do so. It is not surprising, then, to discover upon closer analysis that the cited cases do not bear the heavy weight placed on them.
1 Wall. 175 (1864), holds only that state courts may be compelled in some situations by particular provisions of the Federal Constitution to apply certain new rules prospectively only. No such claim has ever been made about these new constitutional rules of criminal procedure.
Great Northern R. Co. v. Sunburst Oil Refining Co.,
(1932), merely holds that the Federal Constitution imposes no barrier to a state court's decision to apply a new state common law rule prospectively only. Is it not sufficient answer to the dissenters' final assertion of precedential support to point out that
(1940), was a collateral attack on a civil judgment already otherwise final and entitled to
effect? And, further, that it was written by the same Chief Justice, Hughes, who had held six years earlier, in
(1934), that repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment abated all prosecutions begun, and required reversal on direct review of all convictions obtained, under statutes dependent for their constitutionality on the repealed amendment, yet did not affect final convictions so obtained?
(direct review). As this case is here on direct review, I would apply to its resolution the rule enunciated in
. The plurality correctly describes the salient facts in this case at n. 2 of its opinion,
401 U. S. 650
-651, and I agree they plainly reveal a violation of
Indeed, the Ninth Circuit panel below, although it held
nonretroactive, explicitly found the search here involved inconsistent with the dictates of
418 F.2d 159, 161 (CA9 1969). Consequently, I would reverse the judgment below and remand with instructions to vacate the judgment of conviction.
Elkanich v. United States
(collateral review). I agree, but for wholly different reasons, with the Court's view, expressed in n. 2 of its opinion,
, that we need not evaluate the search of Elkanich's apartment in light of the precepts of
His conviction became final five years prior to
Chimel's
promulgation, and prevailing law at that time certainly validated the search here involved.
(1947). An appraisal of the facts surrounding this search leads me quite easily to conclude that the procedures used in obtaining this conviction were not so fundamentally devoid of the necessary elements of procedural
(collateral review). Petitioner in this case seeks relief from confinement by way of habeas. At his trial for evading payment of income taxes, part of the Government's case in chief consisted of the introduction of 60 wagering excise tax returns. At the time his conviction became final in 1965, the introduction of these statements would have been permissible under the authority of
(1953). I find it unnecessary to inquire whether it inevitably follows from the new rule enunciated in
that such a procedure would today be held an unacceptable abridgment of petitioner's Fifth Amendment right to be free of compulsory self-incrimination. For, even assuming the latter cases, if applicable, would produce a different result, I cannot conclude that this change in the law would be sufficient to entitle petitioner to the issuance of a writ of habeas corpus.
Mackey is not asserting that the conduct for which he is being punished, evading payment of his federal income taxes, has been held to be constitutionally immune from punishment. In this regard, Mackey's claim differs from that raised by the respondent in
Coin & Currency,
also decided today, where
do operate to render Congress powerless to punish
the conduct there at issue. Instead, Mackey's claim is that the procedures utilized in procuring his conviction were vitiated by the
decisions. Since matters of procedure rather than substance are involved,
I would apply to the resolution of this habeas petition the law in effect at the time Mackey's conviction became final, absent a showing that the procedures employed were fundamentally unfair. While
did, indeed, in my judgment, rest upon an "excessively narrow" view of the scope of the privilege against self-incrimination, I cannot say that hindsight reveals that judgment to have been so grossly erroneous as to amount to the perpetration of an inexcusable inequity against Mackey in these circumstances. Despite our rejection of it as a matter of Fifth Amendment policy, the prior justification of the Government's activity in this area -- that persons affected could avoid incrimination by ceasing to engage in illegal activities -- is not without some force.
none other than one of resettling the limits of the reach of the Great Writ, which, under the recent decisions of this Court, has been given almost boundless sweep. [
] Until the Court is prepared to do this, I can see no really satisfactory solution to the retroactivity problem. Meanwhile, I very much regret to see the existing free-wheeling approach to that problem now rewritten into the jurisprudence of this Court.
I realize, of course, that state prisoners are entitled to seek release via habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241, while federal prisoners technically utilize what is denominated a motion to vacate judgment under 28 U.S.C. § 2255. However, our cases make these remedies virtually congruent, and the purpose of substituting a motion to vacate for the traditional habeas action in the federal system was simply to alter one minor jurisdictional basis for the writ.
See United States v. Hayman,
(1952). As I do not propose to make any distinction, for retroactivity purposes, between state and federal prisoners seeking collateral relief, I shall refer throughout this opinion to both procedures as the writ of habeas corpus, and cases before us involving such judgments as cases here on collateral review.
For example, we have more than once in recent years had before us a libel case in which a party was allegedly libeled and brought suit for redress prior to this Court's decision in
(1964), where we announced a new constitutional rule governing liability in libel suits brought by public officials. Yet no one connected with such cases has ever been heard to do so much as hint that the
rule is not applicable because the conduct complained of occurred or the suit was brought before this new rule was promulgated.
See, e.g., Rosenblatt v. Baer,
-283 (1969).
Conversely, is it not perfectly clear that, had such a party procured and collected a final damage award prior to
the defendant could not have urged that the case be reopened solely because of our subsequent decision in that case? Absent proof of fraud or want of jurisdiction in the trial court, that judgment would be
and entitled to full faith and credit throughout the land.
"prior to
the criteria applied in federal habeas corpus proceedings were uniformly the constitutional standards in effect at the time of those proceedings, regardless of when the conviction was actually entered."
Mishkin, The Supreme Court 1964 Term -- Foreword: The High Court, the Great Writ, and the Due Process of Time and Law, 79 Harv.L.Rev. 56, 78 (1965).
Note, Developments in the Law -- Federal Habeas Corpus, 83 Harv.L.Rev. 1040, 1151, 1153 (1970);
373 U. S. 17
Miller v. Gladden,
341 F.2d 972, 975 (CA9 1965).
For a counter-example,
see Milton v. Wainwright,
306 F.Supp. 929 (SD Fla.1969), where a district judge adjudicating a habeas petition declined to consider any of this Court's decisions relating to involuntary confessions that post-dated 1958, the time at which the petitioner's murder conviction became final.
(1961), tacitly holds that habeas petitions must be judged in accordance with current law. The Court there directed the issuance of the writ on the ground that petitioner's conviction, which became final in 1936, had been procured by the introduction into evidence of an illegally obtained confession, relying heavily on cases decided by this Court subsequent to 1936. The District Court, in denying relief, had clearly held that the admissibility of his confession was to be judged by standards prevailing in 1936.
United States ex rel. Reck v. Ragen,
172 F.Supp. 734, 745-746 (ND Ill.1959). However, this choice of law problem was not expressly adverted to, and the case arose before this Court produced the recent enlargement of new constitutional rules of criminal procedure.
In 1966, Congress amended the habeas statutes to deal with this Court's discussion in
(1963), of
principles as they apply to habeas corpus. One subsection of that new statute provides:
"In a habeas corpus proceeding brought in behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court, a prior judgment of the Supreme Court of the United States on an appeal or review . . . of the decision of such State court, shall be conclusive as to all issues of fact or law . . . actually adjudicated by the Supreme Court therein, unless the applicant . . . shall plead and the court shall find the existence of
a material and controlling fact
which did not appear in the record of the proceeding in the Supreme Court [and could not have been put in by exercising due diligence]."
28 U.S.C. § 2244(c) (1964 ed., Supp. V) (emphasis added). Unless one is to read "fact" as including a change in the law, it would seem that Congress has provided in these circumstances for finality as to legal determinations. That "fact" is properly read narrowly seems the better view in light of subsections (a) and (b), which permit a subsequent habeas petition (where there was no Supreme Court review) if it presents a "new ground" or "a factual or other ground not adjudicated on the [prior] hearing." Although the legislative history is extremely sparse, it fully supports this reading. Both the House and Senate committee reports accompanying these amendments stated that the purpose of the reformulation of § 2244 was to introduce a greater measure of finality into the law by providing for a qualified application of the
H.R.Rep. No. 1892, 89th Cong., 2d Sess., 3, 8 (1966); S.Rep. No. 1797, 89th Cong., 2d Sess., 2 (1966). There was no relevant floor debate on these amendments.
I have in mind, of course, decisions such as
(1967). Some rules may have both procedural and substantive ramifications, as I have used those terms here.
my discussion, in
Grosso v. United States,@
(1968), bear on the problems raised by today's Fifth Amendment cases.
See, e.g., Ex parte Siebold,
(1886). And see cases collected in Amsterdam, Search, Seizure, and Section 2255: A Comment, 112 U.Pa.L.Rev. 378, 384 n. 30 (1964), and the discussion therein of the finality implications such instances present.
For example, though correct in its result, I am now of the view that
would have been better decided had it simply held that federal habeas corpus does not lie for claimed errors in the introduction of illegally seized evidence.
Three years ago, we held that the federal wagering tax statutes, 26 U.S.C. § 4401
subjected those to whom they applied to such a real and substantial danger of self-incrimination that those statutes could
390 U. S. 42
(1968). This case presents the question what, if any, use the Government is entitled to make of wagering excise tax returns, filed pursuant to the statutory scheme, in a prosecution for income tax evasion. Since I believe the Fifth Amendment does not prevent the use of such returns to show a likely source of unreported income in a criminal prosecution for income tax evasion, I concur in the judgment of the Court. [
The relevant facts may be briefly stated. As required by statute, petitioner from 1956 through 1960 filed monthly wagering excise tax returns showing his name, address, and the gross amount of wagers accepted by him during the month in question. [
] He was subsequently indicted for willfully attempting to evade payment of his income taxes for those years. 26 U.S.C. § 7201. At trial, the Government used the wagering tax returns to show that the gross amount of wagers reported, less the expenses of petitioner's business as reported on his annual income tax returns, was greater than the profits from gambling reported on those same annual returns. The Court of Appeals affirmed over petitioner's claim that the returns were inflammatory, prejudicial, and irrelevant. 345 F.2d 499 (CA7 1965). After our decisions in
petitioner filed an application for post-conviction relief on the ground that use of the wagering tax returns was barred by the Fifth Amendment. The application was denied by the District Court in an unreported opinion, and the denial was affirmed by the Court of Appeals. 411 F.2d 504 (CA7 1969).
lacked the power to compel the information absent a waiver of his Fifth Amendment privilege unless it provided the necessary immunity from prosecution.
390 U.S. 62 (1968);
227 U. S. 131
227 U. S. 143
-144 (1913);
142 U. S. 584
-586 (1892). Since petitioner filed the wagering tax returns under threat of criminal prosecution for failure to do so, 26 U.S.C. § 7203, and since he never knowingly waived his Fifth Amendment privilege,
see Grosso v. United States, supra,
390 U. S. 70
-71, he is entitled to the immunity required by the Fifth Amendment.
Adams v. Maryland,
(1954). Therefore, petitioner argues, the Government was foreclosed from using the information provided by him on the wagering tax returns against him in a criminal prosecution for evasion of the income tax.
we dealt with the question whether, in light of possible uses of testimonial evidence sought to be compelled over a claim of privilege, the Fifth Amendment allows the individual concerned to withhold the evidence without penalty. In the present case, however, we deal with the scope of immunity required when the privilege is claimed and the evidence is nevertheless compelled. This distinction, in my view, critical, is overlooked by petitioner. Where testimony has been refused, adjudication of necessity must take place in something of a vacuum. Although an individual may not "draw a conjurer's circle around the whole matter" by refusing to provide any explanation why the information sought might be incriminating,
274 U. S. 264
(1927), he need not provide the incriminating evidence in order to demonstrate that the privilege was validly invoked,
Hoffman v. United States,
341 U. S. 479
341 U. S. 486
(1951). In such circumstance, sanctions may be applied for refusal
from a careful consideration of all the circumstances in the case . . . that the answer[s] cannot possibly have [a] tendency' to incriminate."
341 U. S. 488
Temple v. Commonwealth,
75 Va. 892, 898 (1881) (emphasis in original).
400 U. S. 558
(1971) (BRENNAN, J., dissenting). Thus, even when the privilege against self-incrimination permits an individual to refuse to answer questions asked by the Government, if false answers are given, the individual may be prosecuted for making false statements.
396 U. S. 80
-83 (1969).
The flaw in petitioner's argument lies in its misunderstanding of
as applied to a situation where testimonial evidence has been compelled over a claim of privilege. For we did not, in those cases, cast any doubt upon the power of the United States to impose taxes on unlawful, as well as on lawful, activities. 390 U.S. at
390 U. S. 44
. Nor did we suggest that the Fifth Amendment would make it impossible for Congress to construct an enforceable statutory scheme for reporting by individuals of their illicit gains.
390 U. S. 72
(BRENNAN, J., concurring). Rather, we noted that "[t]he laws of every State, except Nevada, include broad prohibitions against gambling, wagering, and associated activities," and that even Nevada imposed
"criminal penalties upon lotteries and certain other wagering activities taxable under [the federal] statutes."
-46. We noted that federal statutes prohibit the use of the mails and of interstate commerce for many activities ancillary to wagering. [
. On that basis, we concluded that,
"throughout the United States, wagering is 'an area permeated with criminal statutes,' and those engaged in wagering are a group 'inherently suspect of criminal activities.'
Albertson v. SACB,
. Accordingly, registration and payment of the occupational tax, or the filing of a wagering excise tax return that the Government required as a prerequisite to payment of the excise tax, [
] would subject the individual concerned to "
real and appreciable,' and not merely `imaginary and unsubstantial,' hazards of self-incrimination."
390 U. S. 64
-67. Since we found the "required records" doctrine of
(1948), inapplicable to the statutory requirement that a gambler admit his present or future involvement in gambling activity,
390 U. S. 55
-57;
390 U. S. 67
-69, we held that the privilege against self-incrimination was available to the petitioners as a defense to prosecution for failure to register for, report, or pay the federal wagering taxes. [
Had the present case arisen in the context of a federal investigation designed simply to uncover evidence of criminal activity, we would need to go no further. [
] In such a situation, petitioner would be entitled to "absolute immunity . . . from prosecution [under federal laws] for any transaction revealed in that testimony."
(BRENNAN, J., dissenting);
-586. But although we recognized in
390 U. S. 58
-59, [
] we nevertheless concluded that the "United States' principal interest is evidently the collection of revenue, and not the punishment of gamblers."
390 U. S. 57
see United States v. Calamaro,
354 U. S. 358
to insure compliance with the scheme.
See Marchetti,
390 U. S. 60
-74 (concurring opinion). In the latter situation, the privilege may not be claimed if the danger of incrimination is only that the information required may show a violation of the taxing or regulatory scheme. Thus, in
(1948), we upheld a conviction based upon records of sales provided under compulsion of a regulation under the Emergency Price Control Act, 56 Stat. 23. The privilege had been claimed on the basis that the records would (as they did) provide evidence of a violation of the Act. We rejected the claim, reasoning that the Government has power to compel
335 U. S. 33
(1927), we rejected a claim that the privilege against self-incrimination allowed an individual whose income was earned in crime to file no form of income tax return whatsoever. Although dubious, we noted the possibility that the privilege could be claimed to excuse reporting the amount of income earned because that alone would disclose the criminal activities that had produced the income.
-264. But neither in
nor in any other of our cases is there the slightest suggestion that an individual may refuse to disclose the income he has earned solely because such disclosure will indicate a failure to pay the taxes imposed on that income.
labeling the inquiry a necessary incident of a regulatory scheme. Where the essence of a statutory scheme is to forbid a given class of activities, it may not be enforced by requiring individuals to report their violations.
See Marchetti, supra; Haynes v. United States,
(1965). But where the statutory scheme is not designed to forbid certain acts, but only to require that they be done in a certain way, the Government may enforce its requirements by a compulsory scheme of reporting, directed at all who engage in those activities, and not on its face designed simply to elicit incriminating information.
Shapiro v. United States, supra; see Albertson v. SACB, supra,
382 U. S. 77
Viewed in this light, then,
are the outgrowth of two principles inapplicable to the problem at hand. The first is that, when a given class of activities is, in the main, made criminal by either state or federal law, an individual may not be compelled to disclose whether he engages in activities within the class unless his disclosure is compensated by the requisite grant of immunity. [
Marchetti, supra; Haynes v. United States, supra; Albertson v. SACB, supra.
The second is that such individuals may likewise not be compelled, absent sufficient immunity, to disclose the details of their activities within such a suspect class: for if the mere admission of engaging in any of a class of activities is sufficiently likely to lead to criminal prosecution that the privilege against self-incrimination may be invoked,
admission of the details of these activities is
likely to lead to incrimination.
Grosso, supra.
Neither of these principles, however, controls the case at hand. The relevant class of activities "permeated with criminal statutes,"
, is the class of activities related to gambling. But this case does not involve a prosecution for gambling or related activities. It involves a prosecution for income tax evasion, by use of information compelled pursuant to a scheme requiring all those who engage in the business of accepting wagers [
] to report their income twice. For the reasons discussed above, the Government may validly enforce the tax laws by a scheme of required reports, directed at all persons engaging in certain types of activity, and requiring them to report the amount of their income so that the Government may insure that the requisite taxes have been paid. If such a reporting requirement raises a substantial danger of incrimination under state or federal statutes making criminal the activity that is being taxed, an individual may, of course, assert the privilege against self-incrimination and refuse to disclose the information sought. We so held in
And if the information has been compelled over a claim of privilege, application of those cases requires that the individual be protected against the use of that information in state prosecutions under the statutes making criminal the taxed activity, and to complete immunity from prosecution under federal statutes of like kind.
400 U. S. 561
-574 (BRENNAN, J., dissenting);
cf. Murphy v. Waterfront Comm'n,
378 U. S. 79
, and n. 18 (1964). He is, in short, entitled to the protection
required by the Fifth Amendment. But here the Government was entitled to demand the information that petitioner supplied -- his gross income from wagering -- in order to enforce the tax laws. Petitioner was entitled to claim the privilege only because of the possibility of prosecution under state or federal gambling laws. No such prosecution is involved here. "Once the reason for the privilege ceases, the privilege ceases."
350 U. S. 439
(1956). Since the United States was entitled to demand the information at issue here for the purpose to which it was eventually put, the danger that petitioner's disclosures might also have been impermissibly used does not prevent their present, legitimate use even though the danger of impermissible use would justify refusal to provide the information at all. [
Finally, our decisions in both
not to attempt to salvage the statutory scheme by imposing
use restrictions do not require that, once evidence has actually been compelled, we refuse to protect a valid governmental interest by restricting use of that evidence any more than is required by the Fifth Amendment. For although we recognized in
390 U. S. 59
, the primary basis for our refusal to impose such restrictions was that
] Since a balance between effective state enforcement of gambling laws and the interests of the federal treasury was one to be struck by Congress, and not this Court, we declined to impose the proposed restrictions.
-60. And, in
we merely noted that it would be
"inappropriate to impose such restrictions upon one portion of a statutory system when we have concluded that it would be improper, for reasons discussed in
to do so upon 'an integral part' of the same system."
390 U. S. 69
. Once again, however, different considerations apply when the question is not whether information may be compelled, but rather to what uses compelled information may be put. Once the return has
been filed, prosecution under state gambling laws can take place only if the State can demonstrate that its evidence is not tainted by information derived from the incriminatory aspects of the return. Since disclosure, once made, may never be completely undone, this burden must be borne by the State regardless of what additional restrictions are imposed upon use of the return. Accordingly, the considerations that led us to decline the imposition of use restrictions for the future in
are not compelling in situations where the incriminating information has already been disclosed. Petitioner is therefore entitled to the immunity required by the Fifth Amendment, and to no more. Since I believe the Amendment is no bar to the use to which his wagering tax returns were put, I concur in the judgment of the Court.
This view of the case makes it unnecessary for me to decide whether petitioner's conviction should be examined without regard to the standards embodied in
The balance of this opinion is written on the assumption that
26 U.S.C. § 6011(a); Treas.Reg. § 44.6011(a)-1(a), 26 CFR § 44.6011(a)-1(a).
18 U.S.C. § 1084 (interstate transmission of wagering information), §§ 1301-1304 (conduct of lotteries by mails or broadcasting), § 1952 (interstate travel in aid of,
gambling), § 1953 (interstate transportation of wagering paraphernalia).
We were informed by the United States in
that the wagering excise tax would not be accepted unless accompanied by the required return. 390 U.S. at
390 U. S. 65
In addition, we declined in both
the Government's invitation to salvage the statutory scheme by imposing use restrictions on the information required.
. The relevance of this to the issue before us is discussed
401 U. S. 711
-713. For the moment, it is sufficient to note that even the imposition of use restrictions could not have saved the convictions at issue in those cases, for the petitioners obviously had no way of knowing, when they failed to register and file the required forms, that use restrictions might be imposed.
See Murphy v. Waterfront Comm'n,
-80 (1964);
Regina v. United States,
364 U. S. 507
364 U. S. 514
-515 (1960).
we remarked that,
and that the Revenue Service, in fact, disseminated such information to "interested prosecuting authorities."
390 U. S. 66
The regulation upheld in
required only the keeping of records, and not their reporting; the information there was compelled pursuant to an administrative subpoena. But as we noted in
this situation is constitutionally indistinguishable from a simple reporting requirement. 390 U.S. at
390 U. S. 56
Since the statutory scheme in
provided no immunity whatsoever, and since those cases arose in the context of an attempt by the Government to punish individuals for failure to disclose the information requested, we had no occasion there to determine the precise scope of the immunity that would be required to displace the privilege.
The few exceptions to this requirement are noted in
The filing of a wagering tax return (or registration as a prospective gambler) necessarily involves an admission that one has engaged in, or intends to engage in gambling. Since gambling and related activities are very likely to be criminal under state or federal law, the Government lacks power to compel such an admission absent the requisite grant of immunity. This was the question involved in
But what is relevant to the present case is not whether petitioner was involved in criminal activity, but whether he paid the taxes imposed on his income. I have indicated above why I believe that the Government may enforce an otherwise unobjectionable scheme designed to insure that individuals report the amount of their income in order to enforce the tax laws. It therefore follows that the registration and reporting requirements of the federal wagering tax statutes could properly be enforced under a statute granting those who complied with the requirements immunity from prosecution under federal statutes that outlaw gambling and related activities, and protection against the use of information contained in the returns in aid of prosecution under state or federal laws making such activities criminal.
That this was the primary basis for our refusal is evidenced by our recognition that the "United States' principal interest is evidently the collection of revenue, and not the punishment of gamblers." 390 U.S. at
. Absent the necessity for balancing state and federal interests, we would surely not have crippled the primary purpose of the statutes because a secondary purpose was necessarily disabled.
I had assumed that all criminal and civil decisions involving constitutional defenses which go in favor of the defendant were necessarily retroactive. That is to say, the Constitution has, from Chief Justice Jay's time, been retroactive,
for there were no decisions on the points prior thereto.
, exonerated defendants who, when they failed to file returns, were not, by reason of
, entitled to a constitutional immunity. Why Marchetti and Grosso are entitled to relief and Mackey is not is a mystery. It is said that Mackey's gambling return,
I could understand today's decision if
had announced only a prospective rule applicable to all like defendants. But when the defendants in those cases are given the benefit of a new constitutional rule forged by the Court, it is not comprehensible, if justice, rather than the fortuitous circumstances of the time of the trial, is the standard, why all victims of the old unconstitutional rule should not be treated equally.
I can find nothing in the Constitution that authorizes some constitutional rules to be prospective and others to be retroactive. The majority often says the test is whether a new rule affects the integrity of the factfinding process,
. Yet even that test is not applied when the majority thinks that the impact of the new rule, if applied with due regard to the Equal Protection Clause, would be "devastating."
382 U. S. 419
. The Constitution grants this Court no such legislative powers.
My views have been expressed in
381 U. S. 640
384 U. S. 736
, and I adhere to them. I would continue to construe all constitutional safeguards "strictly."