Opinion ID: 76374
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Legislative History of Post-Conviction Relief Statutes

Text: 19 For the sake of completeness, we look at the history of federal habeas corpus. We focus specifically on the following discrete points in time: (i) the 1789 grant to the federal courts of the limited power to grant writs of habeas corpus; (ii) the 1867 Amendments to the federal habeas statutes; (iii) the 1874 codification of the statutes; (iv) the 1948 recodification; (v) the 1966 Amendments; and (vi) the 1996 AEDPA Enactment. 20
21 The First Congress, in legislation establishing the federal judiciary, saw fit to extend to the federal courts a limited power to grant the writ of habeas corpus. According to section 14 of the Judiciary Act of 1789, 22 [A]ll the before-mentioned courts of the United States, shall have power to issue writs of ... habeas corpus. .... And... either of the justices of the supreme court, as well as judges of the district courts, shall have power to grant writs of habeas corpus for the purpose of an inquiry into the cause of commitment. — Provided, That writs of habeas corpus shall in no case extend to prisoners in gaol, unless where they are in custody, under or by colour of the authority of the United States, or are committed for trial before some court of the same, or are necessary to be brought into court to testify. 23 Act of Sept. 24, 1789, ch. 20, § 14, 1 Stat. 73, 81-82 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2241). Under the final clause of section 14, the authority of the federal courts to issue writs of habeas corpus was limited to federal prisoners. See id.; see also Ex parte Dorr, 44 U.S. (3 How.) 103, 105, 11 L.Ed. 514 (1845). Despite minor amendments, the habeas corpus statute remained mostly unchanged for nearly eight decades. 24
25 Following the Civil War, Congress amended the habeas corpus statute to expand its scope to include state prisoners: 26 [T]he several courts of the United States, and the several justices and judges of such courts, within their respective jurisdictions, in addition to the authority already conferred by law, shall have power to grant writs of habeas corpus in all cases where any person may be restrained of his or her liberty in violation of the constitution, or of any treaty or law of the United States.... 27 Act of Feb. 5, 1867, ch. 28, § 1, 14 Stat. 385, 385 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2241). Significantly, the 1867 amendments were the first time Congress authorized the federal courts to issue the Great Writ to any prisoner held in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United States, even to a prisoner held in state custody. 28
29 In 1874, Congress codified the federal statutes, locating those governing habeas corpus in §§ 751-66. See Rev. Stat. §§ 751-66 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2241 et seq. ). The basic grant of the authority to issue writs of habeas corpus was set out in § 751. See Rev. Stat. § 751 (The Supreme Court and the circuit and district courts shall have power to issue writs of habeas corpus.). Consistent with the 1867 Act's expansion of the writ of habeas corpus, § 753 provided: 30 The writ of habeas corpus shall in no case extend to a prisoner in jail, unless where he is in custody under or by color of the authority of the United States, or is committed for trial before some court thereof; ... or is in custody in violation of the Constitution or of a law or treaty of the United States.... 31 Rev. Stat. § 753. Later codifications of the habeas statutes were substantively identical. See, e.g., 28 U.S.C. §§ 451-463 (1940) (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2241 et seq. ).
32 In 1948, Congress recodified the post-conviction relief statutes. The recodification left the basic grant of authority to issue writs of habeas corpus unchanged. See Act of June 25, 1948, ch. 646, § 2241, 62 Stat. 964, 964-65 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2241). The new § 2241 provided as follows: 33 (a) Writs of habeas corpus may be granted by the Supreme Court, any justice thereof, the district courts and any circuit judge within their respective jurisdictions.... 34 .... 35 (c) The writ of habeas corpus shall not extend to a prisoner unless — 36 .... 37 (3) He is in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States.... 38 Id. § 2241, 62 Stat. 964-65. The new § 2241(c) listed five classes of persons who could seek the writ of habeas corpus, with § 2241(c)(3) including the 1867 extension of the writ to state prisoners. As the Reviser's Notes to the 1948 recodification explained, § 2241 merely consolidate[d] sections 451, 452 and 453 of title 28, U.S.C., 1940 ed., with changes in phraseology necessary to effect the consolidation. H.R.Rep. No. 80-308, App., at 1905 (1947). 39 The 1948 recodification did more, however, than simply restructure § 2241. It also added §§ 2254 and 2255 to the statutory scheme. In § 2254, Congress codified the judicially-constructed exhaustion requirement: 6 40 An application for a writ of habeas corpus in behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court shall not be granted unless it appears that the applicant has exhausted the remedies available in the courts of the State, or that there is either an absence of available State corrective process or the existence of circumstances rendering such process ineffective to protect the rights of the prisoner. 41 An applicant shall not be deemed to have exhausted the remedies available in the courts of the State, within the meaning of this section, if he has the right under the law of the State to raise, by any available procedure, the question presented. 42 Act of June 25, 1948, ch. 646, § 2254, 62 Stat. at 967 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2254). 43 In Section 2255, Congress provided a new statutory motion by which federal prisoners could seek post-conviction relief, separate and apart from an application for a writ of habeas corpus. See Act of June 25, 1948, ch. 646, § 2255 ¶ 1, 62 Stat. 967 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. § 2255) (A prisoner in custody under sentence of a court of the United States claiming the right to be released ... may move the court which imposed the sentence to vacate, set aside or correct the sentence.); see also Wofford v. Scott, 177 F.3d 1236, 1239-42 (11th Cir.1999) (discussing legislative history of § 2255). Prior to the enactment of § 2255, federal prisoners petitioned for writs of habeas corpus in the district where they were detained, which frequently was different from the district where they had been tried, convicted, and sentenced. This created significant procedural problems for federal courts. See United States v. Hayman, 342 U.S. 205, 212-14, 72 S.Ct. 263, 268-69, 96 L.Ed. 232 (1952); Wofford, 177 F.3d at 1239. The new motion under § 2255 alleviated many of these procedural difficulties by directing prisoners to file the motion in the court where they were convicted and before the judge who sentenced them, though without any purpose to impinge upon prisoners' rights of collateral attack upon their convictions. Hayman, 342 U.S. at 219, 72 S.Ct. at 272. The § 2255 motion, however, was not a petition for a writ of habeas corpus. See id. at 220, 72 S.Ct. at 273; see also H.R.Rep. No. 80-308, at 1908 (1947) (This section restates, clarifies and simplifies the procedure in the nature of the ancient writ of error coram nobis. It provides an expeditious remedy for correcting erroneous sentences without resort to habeas corpus.). 7 44 Section 2255 also included exclusivity language that renders the writ of habeas corpus (authorized by § 2241) unavailable to most federal prisoners seeking to challenge their convictions or sentences. 45 An application for a writ of habeas corpus [under §§ 2241] in behalf of a prisoner who is authorized to apply for relief by motion pursuant to this section [i.e., § 2255], shall not be entertained if it appears that the applicant has failed to apply for relief, by motion [under § 2255], to the court which sentenced him, or that such court has denied him relief, unless it also appears that the remedy by motion [under § 2255] is inadequate or ineffective to test the legality of his detention. 46 28 U.S.C. § 2255 ¶ 5. Although the exact purpose of this language is unclear, see Wofford, 177 F.3d at 1238-42, it is evident that this clause integrated the new § 2255 remedy with the traditional writ of habeas corpus. The purpose of the § 2255 motion was to replace, in certain situations, the application for a writ of habeas corpus — which in the case of federal prisoners posed significant administrative problems — with a similar but different remedy. If Congress had not simultaneously limited the availability of the writ of habeas corpus to federal prisoners when it authorized the new § 2255 motion, § 2255 would have failed to solve the problem posed by federal prisoners petitioning for writs of habeas corpus in districts other than those in which they had been convicted. At the same time, the last clause of the § 2255 provision quoted above avoided any serious question about whether the replacement of the writ of habeas corpus for a federal prisoner with the new § 2255 caused an unconstitutional suspension of the writ. See Swain v. Pressley, 430 U.S. 372, 381, 97 S.Ct. 1224, 1229-30, 51 L.Ed.2d 411 (1977); Hayman, 342 U.S. at 223, 72 S.Ct. at 274. 47
48 The statutes governing post-conviction relief were again amended in 1966. Act of Nov. 2, 1966, Pub.L. No. 89-711, 80 Stat. 1104 (codified as amended at 28 U.S.C. §§ 2241-2255). Although the basic grant of habeas power in § 2241 remained the same, see id., § 2254 was substantially altered and separated into subsections. The new subsection (a) provided: 49 The Supreme Court, a Justice thereof, a circuit judge, or a district court shall entertain an application for a writ of habeas corpus in behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court only on the ground that he is in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States. 50 Id. § 2(b) (amending § 2254). The two paragraphs of § 2254 that were created in 1948 were preserved as subsections (b) and (c). See id. § 2(c). Subsections (d), (e), and (f) were also added, including a statutory presumption in favor of state courts' factual findings. See id. § 2(d)-(f). 51 Much of the debate surrounding the 1966 revisions to § 2254 pertained to a proposal to require all habeas petitions to be heard by three-judge district courts, an idea that was ultimately withdrawn. See S.Rep. No. 89-1797 (1966), reprinted in 1966 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3663, 3666; H.R.Rep. No. 89-1892, at 3 (1966). Neither the House nor the Senate committee reports included substantive comment on the revision to § 2254(a); the House report commented on that subsection merely by repeating its language. See H.R.Rep. No. 89-1892, at 8 (1966). The absence of any substantive comment supports a conclusion that the new § 2254(a) merely reiterated the basic scope of habeas relief articulated in § 2241. There is no evidence of any intent for § 2254 to broaden the scope of relief or to provide an independent, alternative remedy to the writ of habeas corpus authorized by § 2241. Indeed, all the provisions of § 2254 curtail a court's authority to grant habeas corpus relief to state prisoners. 52
53 Most recently, the statutes governing federal post-conviction relief were amended by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). Pub.L. No. 104-132, 110 Stat. 1214 (1996) (codified at 28 U.S.C. §§ 2241-2255). AEDPA included many significant restrictions on the availability of post-conviction relief in the federal courts. See H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 104-518, at 111 (1996), reprinted in 1996 U.S.C.C.A.N. 944, 944 (AEDPA incorporate[d] reforms to curb the abuse of the statutory writ of habeas corpus, and to address the acute problems of unnecessary delay and abuse in capital cases.). See generally Larry W. Yackle, A Printer on the New Habeas Corpus Statute, 44 Buff. L.Rev. 381 (1996). Among the significant additions were new statutes of limitation in both §§ 2254 and 2255, bars on filing second or successive petitions, provisions curtailing review of state court factual determinations, and restrictions on evidentiary hearings in federal court. See Pub.L. No. 104-132, §§ 101, 104-106, 110 Stat. 1214, 1217-21 (1996) (amending 28 U.S.C. §§ 2244, 2254 & 2255). AEDPA did not, however, amend §§ 2241(c), 2254(a), or 2255 ¶ 1. 54