Source: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/In_re_McConnell/Opinion_of_the_Court
Timestamp: 2019-12-10 00:52:14
Document Index: 639041713

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 401', '§ 401', '§ 401', '§ 401', '§ 4', '§ 15', '§ 15', '§ 1', '§ 1', '§ 1', '§ 401']

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In re McConnell/Opinion of the Court
< In re McConnell
921474In re McConnell — Opinion of the Court
No. 498. Argued: April 10, 1962. --- Decided: June 18, 1962.
The petitioner Thomas C. McConnell, a lawyer, was summarily found guilty of contempt of court for statements made while representing the Parmelee Transportation Company in an antitrust suit for treble damages and an injunction. The complaint charged that a number of defendants had unlawfully conspired to destroy Parmelee's business by restraining and monopolizing trade in violation of the Sherman Act. [1] Petitioner and his co-counsel, Lee A. Freeman, had done extensive pretrial preparation on the issue of conspiracy which was the heart of their case. At the very outset of the trial, however, the district judge on his own motion refused to permit counsel to try to prove their conspiracy charge, holding that they must first prove in a wholly separate trial that defendants' actions had resulted in an economic injury to the public-an erroneous holding since we have held that the right of recovery of a plaintiff in a treble damage antitrust case does not depend at all on proving an economic injury to the public. [2]
Cut off by the judge's erroneous ruling from trial of the basic issue of conspiracy and wishing to provide a record which would allow this ruling to be reviewed by the Court of Appeals, counsel for Parmelee asked counsel for defendants to stipulate that plaintiff would have introduced certain evidence of conspiracy had it been allowed to do so. Defense counsel refused to stipulate, however, insisting that Parmelee's counsel prepare their record by following the procedure set out in Rule 43(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 28 U.S.C.A., which requires that before an offer of proof is made questions upon which the offer is based must first be asked in the presence of the jury. [3] Unwilling to risk dismissal of their appeal for failure to follow Rule 43(c), Parmelee's counsel proceeded to produce and question witnesses in the presence of the jury in order to lay the proper foundation for their offers of proof of conspiracy. But during the process of this questioning the judge ordered it stopped and directed that any further offers of proof be made without first having asked questions of witnesses in the presence of the jury. This ruling placed Parmelee's counsel in quite a dilemma because defense counsel was still insisting that all offers of proof be made in strict compliance with Rule 43(c) and there was no way of knowing with certainty whether the Court of Appeals would treat the trial court's order to dispense with questions before the jury as an excuse for failure to comply with the Rule. Petitioner therefore not only sought to make clear to the court that he thought defense counsel's objection was 'right' [4] but also repeatedly insisted that he be allowed to make his offers of proof in compliance with the Rule. [5] Following the trial the judge charged petitioner and his co-counsel Freeman in a number of specifications with being guilty of contemptuous conduct during the course of the trial. After separate hearings both lawyers were summarily found guilty by the trial judge on all specifications. Both appealed to the Court of Appeals, which reversed all of Freeman's convictions, [6] reversed two of petitioner McConnell's convictions, but, with Judge Duffy dissenting, sustained the conviction of petitioner on Specification 6-the specification based on petitioner's insistence that he be allowed the make offers of proof in compliance with Rule 43(c). [7] Even as to this conviction, however, the Court of Appeals held that the jail sentence imposed by the trial judge should be reduced to a fine of $100. As in Offutt v. United States, [8] the 'importance of assuring alert self-restraint in the exercise by district judges of the summary power for punishing contempt' prompted us to bring the case here. [9]
This section is based on an Act passed in 1831 [10] in order to correct serious abuses of the summary contempt power that had grown up and was intended as a 'drastic delimitation * * * of the broad undefined power of the inferior federal courts under the Act of 1789,' [11] revealing 'a Congressional intent to safeguard constitutional procedures by limiting courts, as Congress is limited in contempt cases, to 'the least possible power adequate to the end proposed." [12] 'The exercise by federal courts of any broader contempt power than this,' we have said, 'would permit too great inroads on the procedural safeguards of the Bill of Rights, since contempts are summary in their nature, and leave determination of guilt to a judge rather than a jury.' [13] And we held long ago, in Ex parte Hudgings, [14] that while this statute undoubtedly shows a purpose to give courts summary powers to protect the administration of justice against immediate interruption of court business, it also means that before the drastic procedures of the summary contempt power may be invoked to replace the protections of ordinary constitutional procedures there must be an actual obstruction of justice:
I can hardly believe that the Court intends its opinion to mean that only a physical obstruction of pending judicial proceedings is punishable under 18 U.S.C. § 401, 18 U.S.C.A. § 401. For a court's power to punish summarily for contempt has always been available as a sanction against the use of abusive and insulting language in a courtroom. See, e.g., Offutt v. United States, 348 U.S. 11, 75 S.Ct. 11, 99 L.Ed. 11; Fisher v. Pace, 336 U.S. 155, 159-160, 69 S.Ct. 425, 427, 93 L.Ed. 569; Ex parte Terry, 128 U.S. 289, 307-309, 9 S.Ct. 77, 80-81, 32 L.Ed. 405. And it can scarcely be supposed that Congress' enactment of 18 U.S.C. § 401, 18 U.S.C.A. § 401 was intended to abrogate this power, even as the forerunner to that section was construed in In re Michael, 326 U.S. 224, 228, 66 S.Ct. 78, 80, 90 L.Ed. 30. Cf. Ex parte Hudgings, 249 U.S. 378, 383, 39 S.Ct. 337, 339, 63 L.Ed. 656.
^1 This action was brought under the Clayton Act, §§ 4 and 16, 38 Stat. 731, 737, 15 U.S.C. §§ 15, 26, 15 U.S.C.A. §§ 15, 26 and charged violations of §§ 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act, 26 Stat. 209, as amended, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1, 2, 15 U.S.C.A. §§ 1, 2.
^2 Radiant Burners, Inc. v. Peoples Gas Light & Coke Co., 364 U.S. 656, 660, 81 S.Ct. 365, 367, 5 L.Ed.2d 358; Klor's, Inc. v. Broadway-Hale Stores, Inc., 359 U.S. 207, 79 S.Ct. 705, 3 L.Ed.2d 741. See also Radovich v. National Football League, 352 U.S. 445, 77 S.Ct. 390, 1 L.Ed.2d 456.
^3 Rule 43(c) provides in part:
^4 Since our disposition of this case does not turn on whether petitioner was correct in thinking that Rule 43(c) absolutely requires that all offers of proof in jury trials be based on questions before the jury, we express no opinion on that question.
^5 The district judge did not change his ruling and ultimately gave judgment for defendants on the grounds that plaintiff had not proved public economic injury and that the facts alleged in the complaint and the proof offered at the trial did not constitute a violation of the antitrust laws. D.C., 186 F.Supp. 533. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the decision on this latter ground. 292 F.2d 794.
^6 7 Cir., 292 F.2d 806.
^7 7 Cir., 294 F.2d 310.
^8 348 U.S. 11, 13, 75 S.Ct. 11, 13, 99 L.Ed. 11.
^9 368 U.S. 936, 82 S.Ct. 380, 7 L.Ed.2d 337.
^10 4 Stat. 487. The present wording of § 401 comes from the 1948 revision and codification of Title 18. 62 Stat. 701.
^11 Nye v. United States, 313 U.S. 33, 45, 61 S.Ct. 810, 814, 85 L.Ed. 1172.
^12 In re Michael, 326 U.S. 224, 227, 66 S.Ct. 78, 79, 90 L.Ed. 30.
^13 Ibid.
^14 249 U.S. 378, 383, 39 S.Ct. 337, 339, 63 L.Ed. 656.
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