Opinion ID: 490124
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Reasoning of the District Court

Text: 39 The district court distinguished Gillock on the grounds that the need to use evidence of legislative acts against the Tennessee representative provided a more compelling federal interest than the need in this case to obtain evidence from a state legislator that is independently obtainable. In doing so, the district court essentially read Gillock as denying state legislators only an absolute speech or debate privilege. In the implicit reasoning of the district court, Gillock did not preclude a qualified speech or debate privilege for state legislators, i.e., a privilege applicable to the full range of legislative activities normally protected by the Speech or Debate Clause for members of Congress but, when claimed by state legislators, surmountable by a federal prosecutor's particularized showing of need. 40 Having distinguished Gillock to its satisfaction, the district court proceeded to balance the competing interests of federal law enforcement and state legislative independence in this particular case to decide whether it should uphold the privilege claim. On the federal side, the court noted that the grand jury could obtain virtually all the information it sought from an independent investigation and that no state legislator was a target of the investigation. On the side favoring the privilege, the district court placed the integrity of the legislative process. Balancing these interests, the court held that the policy underlying the asserted privilege outweighs that favoring disclosure and thus justifies the protection requested by the Legislators. Only if the Grand Jury could demonstrate a particularized need for a specific document by showing that it could not obtain the document through another source would the district court be prepared to command compliance with the subpoena. 41 We agree with the district court that Gillock did not by its terms foreclose all possible forms of privilege for state legislative activity. Gillock made clear the importance the Supreme Court attached to the criminal context in which the case arose. Furthermore, the federal interest was obviously vital in that case because, in the Court's own terms, the privilege sought by Gillock threatened to immunize conduct proscribed by Congress. In contrast, the interest in enforcing the subpoena in this case is less crucial. The subpoena will assure the Grand Jury all the hard evidence obtained by the Committee, and the statements obtained by the Committee when the trail was fresh may provide insights not available later on or may provide important corroboration. Recognition of the privilege, however, is unlikely to thwart the investigation entirely. In light of this difference, the district court was correct not merely to cite Gillock and to forego all further analysis but instead to evaluate the request for a qualified privilege with the additional use of its reason and experience. Fed.R.Evid. 501, see typescript supra at 14. 42 Notwithstanding differences between this case and Gillock, we disagree with the district court's method of analysis in three important respects. First, the district court analyzed the Legislators' privilege request entirely in the context of this case. Such a narrow focus was in error because a court must first decide whether a qualified privilege exists or should exist before deciding how to apply it to a particular case. 43 By insisting on a two-step process, courts guide their discretion with rules developed from accumulated wisdom about the situations that justify a privilege. The requirement of general privilege rules also enables private actors to rely on those rules and thereby to engage more freely in the conduct privileges aim to encourage. Thus, although the concept of the qualified privilege permits courts to uphold or reject privilege claims in light of the particulars of an individual case, the decision to recognize a qualified privilege must still follow from a more broad-based view of how the privilege will work in general. 44 Second, although all privilege analysis involves some balancing, we disagree with the abstract nature of the district court's balancing approach. Common law privileges should be accepted 'only to the very limited extent that permitting a refusal to testify or excluding relevant evidence has a public good transcending the normally prudent principle of utilizing all rational means for ascertaining truth.'  Trammell v. United States, 445 U.S. 40, 50, 100 S.Ct. 906, 912, 63 L.Ed.2d 186 (1980) (citations omitted). The justification for a privilege must be specific, for courts should apply privileges only to the extent necessary to achieve their purpose. Freedman & Cortese, 541 F.2d at 382 (citing Fisher v. United States, 425 U.S. 391, 403, 96 S.Ct. 1569, 1577, 48 L.Ed.2d 39 (1976)). 45 In Trammel for example, the Supreme Court rejected the historically accepted privilege that permitted one spouse to exclude the testimony of the other despite the claim that it fostered the harmony and sanctity of the marriage relationship. Trammell, 445 U.S. at 44, 100 S.Ct. at 909. 6 The court found that the asserted benefit rested on a generalization and not on the required, sound, practical explanation of how the privilege would protect the relationship, id. at 51-53, 100 S.Ct. at 912-14. Similarly here, the district court should not have terminated its analysis with the assertion of the need for legislative independence but should have examined more specifically how a common law speech or debate privilege would realistically assist legislators to perform their function. 46 Finally, we do not believe the district court's efforts merely to distinguish Gillock paid proper respect to its significance. Gillock's reasoning undercuts the weight we may accord interests of comity and federalism, and Gillock's practical impact undermines the extent to which recognition of a speech or debate privilege for state legislators may realistically further the interests that the privilege has traditionally safeguarded. To analyze the Legislators' claim, we must evaluate the specific reasons for and against a qualified speech or debate privilege in light of the theoretical and practical limitations imposed by Gillock. 47