Opinion ID: 412022
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Mainstream of Due Process Adjudication

Text: 38 In addition, we conclude that Daye satisfied the exhaustion requirement because the contention that the trial judge's evident partiality and his assumption of a hostile and prosecutorial stance deprived Daye of a fair trial was sufficient to alert the state court that a federal due process claim was being asserted. Under the Due Process Clause there is a well developed right, established in a long line of cases, to a trial before an unbiased judge. The fundamental nature of this right is demonstrated by the fact that not even the appearance of bias is tolerated. Fairness of course requires an absence of actual bias in the trial of cases. But our system of law has always endeavored to prevent even the probability of unfairness.... '[J]ustice must satisfy the appearance of justice.'  In re Murchison, 349 U.S. 133, 136, 75 S.Ct. 623, 625, 99 L.Ed. 942 (1955) (quoting Offutt v. United States, 348 U.S. 11, 14, 75 S.Ct. 11, 13, 99 L.Ed. 11 (1954)). This principle is reflected in a long line of cases, involving a variety of circumstances bespeaking the real or apparent bias of the trial judge. E.g., Taylor v. Hayes, 418 U.S. 488, 501, 94 S.Ct. 2697, 2704, 41 L.Ed.2d 897 (1974); Ward v. Village of Monroeville, 409 U.S. 57, 59-60, 93 S.Ct. 80, 82-83, 34 L.Ed.2d 267 (1972); Mayberry v. Pennsylvania, 400 U.S. 455, 91 S.Ct. 499, 27 L.Ed.2d 532 (1971); In re Oliver, 333 U.S. 257, 278, 68 S.Ct. 499, 510, 92 L.Ed. 682 (1948); Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U.S. 510, 523, 534, 47 S.Ct. 437, 441, 445, 71 L.Ed. 749 (1927). In Murchison and Oliver, the risk of bias inhered in the fact that the trial judge was the person who had brought the charges. In Taylor and Mayberry, the potential bias came from the fact that the judge presided over a trial adjudicating allegedly contemptuous behavior toward himself. And in Ward and Tumey, the appearance of potential bias was reflected in the fact that any fine or costs payable by the defendant upon conviction were to be paid to the judge. 39 We regard it as immaterial that none of these cases dealt with a bias manifested through allegedly excessive and one-sided intervention in the trial. The gravamen of a claim of denial of a fair trial due to judicial bias does not depend on the source of the bias or the manner of its manifestation. If judicial bias, or the appearance of it, existed, due process was denied. We do not believe it reasonable to assume that state judges presented with a claim of manifested judicial bias would fail to recognize the implication of due process rights simply because half a century of due process cases dealt with the mere risk of bias or with actual bias manifested in other ways. 40 Thus, to the extent that Johnson v. Metz actually construed Johnson's claim as one of bias (i.e., denial of an impartial trial, see 609 F.2d at 1054), rather than one simply complaining of the overall conduct of the trial judge, id., or simply complaining of intervention, id. at 1056, we disagree with its conclusion that the claim as one with constitutional thrust was novel, and with its decision to giv[e] the state court the first opportunity to pass on whether or not the novel constitutional point is 'within the mainstream of due process adjudication,'  id. n. 5. 41 In the present case there can be little doubt that Daye asserted his fair trial claim in terms of the alleged bias displayed by the trial judge. Having started from the basic doctrine that the judge must be scrupulously free from and above even the appearance or taint of partiality, (Daye's brief to Appellate Division at 8), Daye proceeded to assert, inter alia, that [t]hroughout the trial the Court set impartiality aside in favor of the prosecution, (id.); that the court assume[d] the role of prosecutor and thereby demonstrated to the jury that the Trial Judge believed the defendant to be guilty, (id. at 14); that the trial judge demonstrated an inability to remain 'impartial and dispassionate and not appear as an advocate,'  (id. at 20); and that the court blatantly and repeatedly indicated its disbelief in the defendant's testimony ... and assumed an obviously hostile and prosecutorial stance towards the defendant, (id. at 24). We conclude that the state courts were alerted to Daye's complaint that he had been deprived of a trial before an unbiased judge and unprejudiced jury, and we cannot assume that those courts did not recognize the constitutional implications of such a claim.