Opinion ID: 1495397
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Role of the State Constitution

Text: Having found that the trial court's gag orders violate article I, section 8 of the Texas Constitution, this court need not consider whether the United States Constitution has also been violated. Today we reaffirm our prior pronouncement that [o]ur constitution has independent vitality, and this court has the power and duty to protect the additional state guaranteed rights of all Texans. LeCroy v. Hanlon, 713 S.W.2d 335, 339 (Tex.1986). We decline to limit the liberties of Texans to those found in the Federal Constitution when this court is responsible for the preservation of Texas' own fundamental charter. When a state court interprets the constitution of its state merely as a restatement of the Federal Constitution, it both insults the dignity of the state charter and denies citizens the fullest protection of their rights.
Over the past twenty years, state courts have increasingly looked to tneir own constitutions, rather than the Federal Constitution, in examining the extent of their citizens' liberties. [21] This trend toward what has variously been called state constitutionalism and new federalism has met with broad approval. [22] Numerous commentators and courts, both state and federal, have advocated and applied a method of constitutional analysis wherein the state court may examine its own constitution first to determine whether the right in question is protected. [23] Within the context of such an analysis, a state court can benefit from trie insignts or well-reasonea and developed federal jurisprudence, but is not compelled to reach identical results. Our courts recognized the importance of our state constitution long before new federalism even had a name. A ceoturylong line of Texas cases support applying our state's constitution, [24] particularly in the area of free speech. Our decision in 1920 to rely on the plain language of article I, section 8 in striking down a prior restraint in Ex Parte Tucker, 220 S.W. at 76, predated the application of the First Amendment to the states. See Ex Parte Price, 741 S.W.2d 366, 369 (Tex.1987) (Gonzalez, J., concurring). [25] In Traveler's Insurance Co. v. Marshall, 124 Tex. 45, 76 S.W.2d 1007, 1010 (1934), this court struck down a state statute solely under the Texas Constitution, dismissing relevant caselaw interpreting a similar federal constitutional provision regarding the state's police power because it can have no application to the Constitution of Texas. The court explained that [i]t is quite oDvious the same rule ot interpretation cannot be applied to the contract clause in our State Constitution.... Id., 76 S.W.2d at 1011. In Sax v. Votteler, 648 S.W.2d 661 (Tex. 1983), we invalidated a statute of limitations under the Texas Constitution's open courts provision. While expressly recognizing that the appeal was brought under both federal and state law, id. at 663, the court concluded that because article I, section 13 does accord Texas citizens additional rights, we choose not to decide this case on the basis of the United States Constitution. Id. at 664. [26] Holding legislation increasing a filing fee unconstitutional under the state open courts provision, we noted in LeCroy, 713 S.W.2d at 338, that state constitutions can and often do provide additional rights for their citizens. [27] We relied on the Texas Constitution because [b]y enforcing our constitution, we provide Texans with their full individual rights and strengthen federalism. Id. at 339 (emphasis added). In doing so we observed that Texas is in the mainstream of this [state constitutionalism] movement. Id. at 338. The next year, the court voided a gender-based distinction in the Family Code based solely on the Texas Constitution. In re Baby McLean, 725 S.W.2d 696, 698 (Tex.1987) ([b]ecause we hold that [a provision] of the Texas Family Code violates the Texas Constitution, we need not reach the federal law issues). Hence, in the past decade this court has strongly reaffirmed its continued commitment to our state constitution. [28] This approach has also been embraced by our sister court, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. We give thoughtful consideration to that court's analysis in part to avoid conflicting methods of constitutional interpretation in our unusual system of bifurcated highest courts of appeal. See Commissioners' Court of Nolan County v. Beall, 98 Tex. 104, 81 S.W. 526, 528 (1904). As noted above, in two early prior restraint cases, the Court of Criminal Appeals applied the state constitution to strike down orders that the press not publish testimony until after a trial was completed. In Ex Parte Foster, 71 S.W. 593, the court looked both to Texas' free speech clause and also our guarantee of public trials. Id. at 595. A year after this court decided Traveler's Insurance Co. v. Marshall , the Court of Criminal Appeals again relied on the state constitution in deciding Ex Parte McCormick, 88 S.W.2d 104, an equally notable case. [29] Most recently in Heitman v. State, 815 S.W.2d 681 (Tex.Crim.App.1991) (en banc), the argument that the Texas Constitution intended harmony with the federal Fourth Amendment was disavowed. Id. at 682. The court explained that it may review and `rethink' federal constitutional decisions and thereby ensure that... [Texas] citizens will have the `double security' the federal constitution was intended to provide. Id. at 687. After analysis of the history and placement of the Bill of Rights in our constitution, the court concluded that [c]learly our own state constitution was not intended by our own founding fathers to mirror that of the federal government. Id. at 690. This commitment of Texas to its own constitution is consistent with the principle of federalism embodied in the United States Constitution. Its authors intended that [i]n the compound republic of America, the power surrendered by the people is divided between two distinct governments____ Hence a double security arises to the rights of the people. The Federalist No. 51, at 323 (James Madison) (Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961) (emphasis added). The United States Supreme Court has long recognized that [i]t is fundamental that state courts be left free and unfettered by us in interpreting their state constitutions. Minnesota v. National Tea Co., 309 U.S. 551, 557, 60 S.Ct. 676, 679, 84 L.Ed. 920 (1940). It has reiterated its unwillingness to limit the authority of the State ... to adopt in its own Constitution individual liberties more expansive than those conferred by the Federal Constitution. Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins, 447 U.S. 74, 81, 100 S.Ct. 2035, 2040, 64 L.Ed.2d 741 (1980). Noting that the language of the Texas Constitution's due process and equal protection clauses is broader than the federal, it has concluded that: [A] state is entirely free to read its own State's constitution more broadly than this Court reads the Federal Constitution, or to reject the mode of analysis used by this Court in favor of a different analysis of its corresponding constitutional guarantee. City of mesqune v. Aiaaain's vasue, inc., 455 U.S. 283, 293, 102 S.Ct. 1070, 1077, 71 L.Ed.2d 152 (1982). [30] Indeed, the failure of a state judiciary to rely on its own constitution has appropriately been criticized for thereby increaspng] its own burdens as well as ours. Massachusetts v. Upton, 466 U.S. 727, 735, 104 S.Ct. 2085, 2089, 80 L.Ed.2d 721 (1984) (per curiam) (Stevens, 1, concurring). [31] The only limit on the states is that, in relying on their constitutions, they may not deny individuals the minimum level of protection mandated by the Federal Constitution. See Sax, 648 S.W.2d at 664 (While it is true that state constitutional protections cannot subtract from those rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution, there certainly is no prohibition against a state providing additional rights for its citizens.); LeCroy v. Hanlon, 713 S.W.2d at 338. This approach has been referred to as a federal safety net, ensuring that individuals receive all available guarantees of their rights. Shirley S. Abrahamson, Reincarnation of State Courts, 36 Sw.LJ. 951, 959 (1982). The involvement or state courts is particularly appropriate in the protection of free speech rights. Both state and federal courts have recognized such rights as involving community standards and local trends. Judith S. Kaye, A Midpoint Perspective on Directions in State Constitutional Law, 1 Emerging Issues in St. ConstL. 17, 23 (1988). Particularly in the context of judicial proceedings, state courts have long been involved with the protection of speech rights. [32] In the current case, the state interest is all the greater since at issue is the order of a Texas judge instructing members of the Texas bar and their Texan clients not to discuss a case ongoing in a Texas court with anyone.
Our Texas charter bears the distinction of being one of the few state constitutions that were derived from its own independent, national constitution. See M.P. Duncan III, Terminating the Guardianship: A New Role for State Courts, 19 St. Mary's L.J. 809, 839 (1988) (hereinafter Duncan, State Courts). [33] As we empha[t]he powers restricted and the individual rights guaranteed in the present constitution reflect Texas' values, customs, and traditions. 713 S.W.2d at 339. The diverse drafters of our Constitution represented a heterogenous miscellany of opinions. [34] The experiences and philosophies of this group were far different than those who sat in a Philadelphia meeting hall a century earlier. [35] As expressed by one commentator, [o]ur Texas Forbears surely never contemplated that the fundamental state charter, crafted after years of rugged experience on the frontier and molded after reflection on the constitutions of other states, would itself veer in meaning each time the United States Supreme Court issued a new decision. James C. Harrington, The Texas Bill of Rights 41 (1987). [36] Our state had a unique opportunity to address issues of state constitutionalism and federalism in the 1875 constitutional convention. Though some Texans feared that convening such a gathering so soon after Reconstruction would indicate too much independence from the federal government, [37] the convention was held. In the election of 1873, Democrats swept most state offices, including Richard Coke as Governor. Confronting the propriety of this election in Ex Parte Rodriguez, 39 Tex. 705 (1874), the Texas Supreme Court relied primarily on federal caselaw and the placement of a semicolon to declare the election illegal under the Texas Constitution. [38] The newly elected officials nonetheless came to Austin [39] and enacted a constitutional amendment reorganizing the Supreme court, which enabled Governor Coke to remove all three justices. Just as our history is distinctive in its insistence that our constitution is of independent force, so is the very letter of that fundamental document. The Texas Constitution begins with the declaration that: Texas is a free and independent State, subject only to the Constitution of the United States, and the maintenance of our free institutions and perpetuity of the Union depend upon the preservation of the right of local self-government, unimpaired to all the States. Tex.Const. art. I, § 1. Citing this article as a reason for ratifying the 1876 Constitution, Governor Coke explained that: [T]he new constitution declares, not as does the old one, that ... the perpetuity of our free institutions depends upon the preservation unimpaired of the right of local self-government to all the States. The reassertion of these great principles of government, and the expulsion from our organic law of that insult to the intelligence of the people of Texas, which denies them the right of self-government, their heritage and birthright ... and declares them [mere] vassals and serfs of [the federal government], is worth a thousand fold the cost and effort expended in making the new constitution, even if no other changes had been made. Address of Governor Coke, in Ratify, Galveston Daily News, Dec. 19, 1875 at 2, col. 4 (emphasis added) (hereinafter Coke Address). [40] The prominent language of section one and the words of its framers clariiy tnai our current l/onsuiuuon mienas to maintain the vitality and independence of our state law to the extent permissible under the Federal Constitution. Basing decisions on the state constitution whenever possible avoids unnecessary federal review. This not only lessens federal interference into state issues, but also results in efficient judicial management. [41] This approach relieves the overburdened docket of the United States Supreme Court, and spares state courts from having to deal anew with cases on remand. See Upton, 466 U.S. at 735, 104 S.Ct. at 2089 (Stevens, J., concurring). This efficiency is evidenced by several recent cases in which state courts decided that protection was available to an individual under the federal constitution, only to have the decision reversed by the Supreme Court. [42] Justice Hans Linde, formerly of the Oregon Supreme Court, explains that in each of those cases: [T]he state's appellate court was convinced of an important constitutional right. In each case, that right was guaranteed by the state's own constitution____ [T]hese cases did not need to go to the United States Supreme Court. The Court's nationwide pronouncement on those issues were not necessary. The cases could have ended with the state court's decisions if the state courts had not chosen otherwise. [43] Subsequently, several state courts on remand relied on state law to reach the same result originally reached under their reading of the federal law. [44] Such a cumbersome and time-consuming process obviously contributes little to an efficient judiciary. The soundest way to avoid such unnecessary review and delay for litigants is to rely on the state constitution in the first instance. Once the state court turns to its own constitution, it both enables a local voice in the judicial process and ensures its role as a national leader. State constitutions allow the people of each state to choose their own theory of government and of law, within what the nation requires, to take responsibility for their own liberties, not only in courts but in the daily practice of government. [45] A state's constitution is a fit place for the people of a state to record their moral values, their definition of justice, their hopes for the common good. A state constitution defines a way of life. [46] The revival of new federalism has thus returned popular constitutionalism to the American stage. [47] State constitutions lead all of us to face closer to home some fundamental values that the public has become accustomed to have decided for them by the faraway oracles in the marble temple. Hans A. Linde, First Things First: Rediscovering the States' Bills of Rights, 9 U.Balt.L.Rev. 379, 395 (1980) (hereinafter Linde, First Things First). While reflecting local concerns and assuring local accountability, reliance by this court on our own constitution allows Texas to have a meaningful voice in developing this nation's jurisprudence. What Justice Brandeis wrote sixty years ago regarding state legislatures is now particularly applicable to state judicial action: It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country. New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann, 285 U.S. 262, 811, 52 S.Ct. 371, 386-87, 76 L.Ed. 747 (1932) (Brandeis, J., dissenting). [48] Just as other states may rely on unique Texas law developed independently by the legislature and judiciary of this state, this court has a growing responsibility as one of fifty laboratories of democracy to assist the federal courts in shaping the fundamental constitutional fabric of our country. [49] The poet who only quotes the works of others is destined to be both ignored and forgotten. [50] As a state court, sitting in Texas, our expertise is in Texas law, our judges are Texas citizens and members of the Texas Bar, and our concerns are Texas concerns. If we simply apply federal law in all cases, why have a Texas Constitution, and why have a Texas Supreme Court? We agree that it is fundamentally illogical for a state court to skip past guarantees provided in the state's own law, for which the court itself is responsible, and then to conclude that its state falls short of the national standards.... Linde, New Federalism, at 256.
Having concluded that there are numerous reasons why the state constitution should be applied, we are left to consider how to apply it. Today's opinion has centered on a historical review to understand the origins of our liberties as Texans and the intentions of our forebears. This focus should not, however, be misconstrued to suggest any deviation from our traditional method of constitutional interpretation. In Edgewood Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Kirby, 111 S.W.2d 391 (Tex.1989), we outlined an appropriate approach: In construing [a provision of the Texas Constitution], we consider the intent of the people who adopted it. In determining that intent, the history of the times out of which it grew and to which it may be rationally supposed to have direct relationship, the evils intended to be remedied and the good to be accomplished, are proper subjects of the inquiry. However, because of the difficulties inherent in determining the intent of voters over a century ago, we rely heavily on the literal text. We seek its meaning with the understanding that the Constitution was ratified to function as an organic document to govern society and institutions as they evolve through time. Id. at 394 (citations omitted). See also Damon v. Cornett, 781 S.W.2d 597 (Tex. 1989); Vinson v. Burgess, 773 S.W.2d 263 (Tex.1989). [51] Our rich history demonstrates a longstanding commitment in Texas to freedom of expression as well as a determination that state constitutional guarantees be given full meaning to protect our citizens. But historical analysis is only a starting point. The constitution of our state is an organic document. Edgewood, 111 S.W.2d at 394. In no way must our understanding of its guarantees be frozen in the past; rather, our concept of freedom of expression continues to evolve over time. See id. Forms of expression not widely approved in 1875 may well demand state constitutional protection today, just as new methods of infringing on speech may require new methods of protection tomorrow. [52] In interpreting our constitution, this state's courts should be neither unduly active nor deferential; rather, they should be independent and thoughtful in considering the unique values, customs, and traditions of our citizens. With a strongly independent state judiciary, Texas should borrow from well-reasoned and persuasive federal procedural and substantive precedent when this is deemed helpful, [53] but should never feel compelled to parrot the federal judiciary. [54] With the approach we adopt, the appropriate role of relevant federal case law should be clearly noted, in accord with Michigan v. Long, 463 U.S. 1032, 1040-41, 103 S.Ct. 3469, 3476-77, 77 L.Ed.2d 1201 (1983) (presuming that a state court opinion not explicitly announcing reliance on state law is assumed to rest on reviewable federal law). A state court must definitely provide a plain statement that it is relying on independent and adequate state law, [55] and that federal cases are cited only for guidance and do not compel the result reached. Id. at 1040-41, 103 S.Ct. at 3476-77. See also William J. Brennan, The Bill of Rights and the States: The Revival of State Constitutions as Guardians of Individual Rights, 61 N.Y.U.L.Rev. 535, 552 (1986). Long offers further reason for developing state constitutional law, since now courts, rather than merely adjudicating state constitutional claims, must be prepared to defend their integrity by both quantitatively and qualitatively supporting their opinion with state authority. Duncan, State Courts, at 838. Consistent with this method, we may also look to helpful precedent from sister states in what New Jersey Justice Stewart Pollock has described as horizontal federalism. Stewart G. Pollock, Adequate and Independent State Grounds as a Means of Balancing the Relationship Between State and Federal Courts, 63 Tex.L.Rev. 977, 992 (1985). [56] Our consideration of state constitutional issues is encumbered when they are not fully developed by counsel. Many of our sister states, when confronted with similar difficulties, have nevertheless decided cases solely on state grounds or ordered additional briefing of the state issue. [57] We will follow this procedure as necessary and appropriate, when asserted state grounds have not been adequately briefed. [58]
Rejecting our careful and detailed analysis of the development and interpretation of article one, section eight, the concurrence advances an alternativeTexas judges should follow, but never lead, federal jurisprudence. Whenever both federal and state constitutional provisions overlap or correspond, 834 S.W.2d at 40, the Texas judge should never diverge from the path taken by the federal judiciary. No aspect of Texas history, no series of Texas decisions such as that present here should obscure the obligation of adherence to federal authority. Texans, we are told, must journey along the well-traveled road of [federal constitutional] jurisprudence. Id. at 29. [I]t is inefficient to blaze a trail through the wilderness when there is a perfectly good highway there already, built at considerable expense, and well traveled. Id. at 40. A traveller relying upon the concurrence's map will, however, find considerable detail missingthe road is marred with chugholes; unmarked detours appear; new roadblocks arise. The most crucial part of the route is just a dotted line where road construction has not yet even gotten underway. Viewed from this jurisprudential federal interstate charted by the concurrence, the history of the Texas Constitution is a mere farm to market road; the past decisions of this court, only undistinguished country lanes. The fallacy in the concurrence's roadwork is shown by both the federal law upon which it relies [59] and the state law upon which it does not. Because a prior restraint of the type involved here has not previously been the subject of an adequate pronouncement from Washington, the concurrence must search elsewhere for the federal mandate by which all Texans are to be bound. Its dim new travel beacon is Bernard v. Gulf Oil Co., 619 F.2d 459, 467 (5th Cir.1980) (en banc), affd on other grounds, 452 U.S. 89, 101 S.Ct. 2193, 68 L.Ed.2d 693 (1981). Described by the concurrence as [t]he principal authority applicable], 834 S.W.2d at 26, Bernard today achieves a renown which it has not previously enjoyed. Nevertheless, we learn much from carefully reviewing it. The complexity and unpredictability of federal law reflected in Bernard is evidenced by the fact that the relevant issue there was initially decided the opposite way, [60] was reconsidered in part because no other federal appellate court had ever ruled on it, [61] was decided on a very splintered vote, and thereafter disregarded by the United States Supreme Court. [62] On only three occasions have even the federal courts extracted a test from Bernard. [63] Solely by the most particularized selection of some of the many considerations in that procedurally unique case can the concurrence begin to construct the elements of a test having remote similarity with that we adopt today. The concurring justices recite a method for interpretation of our state constitutional guarantees that closely parallels our traditional approach in Edgewood and other cases [64] with one notable twist. They add an entirely new element [65] and then proceed to reject each factor with the exception of this one new arrivalfederal precedent. [66] Although differences in the language of the state and federal constitutional free speech provisions are declared to be as plain as day, 834 S.W.2d at 32, those differences are repudiated as meaningless. Despite the purported need to look to the historical context in which the provision was written, the concurrence trivializes the rather extensive historical discussion which we offer. [67] From our treasured state heritage, law and institutions, the concurrence claims, we can derive nothing. Only federal law, based on different language, different history and different cases, can resolve the issue we face today. Our attempt to give effect to what is indelibly written into our state constitution is dismissed in a series of buzzwords: chauvinism, arrogan[ce] autonomy, and liberal agenda. Id. at 41, 43, 39 & 43. Instead, the concurrence urges that we exclude any considerations specific to Texas in favor of conformity to a federal standard. Claiming that Texas was never unique nor first, id. at 33, the concurrence accuses the court of disrupting the harmony among the states regarding free speech nationwide. Id. at 25. We do not say that the Texas guarantee of free expression inevitably varies in all particulars from the federal, or that of New York or California. Rather, consistent with the very diversity that supplies strength to our union, we build from experience in Texas and elsewhere to enhance individual liberty. The national jurisprudence benefits as states across our country offer similar contributions. As individual voices develop strength and tone, so does the grand chorus improve. After ignoring all that is unique to Texas, the concurring justices repeatedly accuse the court of disregarding relevant federal law when we quite obviously do not. Id. at 25, 35 & 38-39. Federal decisions are potentially helpful but do not inextricably bind Texas in analyzing our constitution. Failing to differentiate between thoughtful review and unquestioning acceptance of federal rulings, the concurrence also mistakenly assumes that independent interpretation must necessarily yield a different result than that achieved by the federal judiciary. This, of course, is not true. Our investigation may reveal federal authority so complete, so well reasoned, and so consistent with the provisions of the Texas Constitution in protecting individual liberties that we reach the same conclusion. Certainly there may be some congruence between state and federal constitutions. Id. at 34. First Amendment jurisprudence is not irrelevant, but rather an important body of law to be referenced when well-reasoned. The concurrence next suggests that the record in this case does not support extensive writing on our state constitutional, free speech guarantee. [68] All of this masks a very simple truthif the parties here had dealt exclusively and extensively with the development and scope of our Texas Constitution, if they had fully presented it, the court would still be chastised for relying upon a state provision that has not grown and developed over time, id. at 30, and that represents largely uncharted terrain. Id. at 29. Even with the most completely briefed and argued cause, the concurrence would still seek marching orders from the federal judiciary. We prefer self-reliance. What we accept today is the responsibility to conduct a thoughtful, complete, and independent search for a sound understanding of our most fundamental state law.