Opinion ID: 547455
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Fact or Law

Text: 59 In Dixson v. United States, 465 U.S. 482, 484, 104 S.Ct. 1172, 1173, 79 L.Ed.2d 458 (1984), the Supreme Court held that, for purposes of the federal bribery statute, the officers of a private, nonprofit corporation administering and expending federal community development block grants are 'public officials.'  The appellants assert that, because the district court in Dixson had submitted this issue to the jury, it must be a question of fact and not of law. 60 Nothing in the Supreme Court's decision in Dixson remotely supports this reasoning. The Court did not address the procedure used by the district court, and it never referred to the jury's determination or suggested that it was reviewing the evidence for the proposition that the defendants were public officials. On the contrary, the Court reached its conclusion through an exercise in statutory interpretation, which conclusively shows that this is not a question for the jury. For example, it considered the nature of the defendants' positions in relation to Congress's intent, as evidenced by the legislative history of the federal bribery statute. Id. at 496-98, 104 S.Ct. at 1179-80. Therefore, we hold that whether an individual is a public official within the meaning of the statute is a question of law, and as such, a matter for judicial resolution, see Caldwell v. United States, 218 F.2d 370, 372 (D.C.Cir.1954).