Court Opinion

ID: 9662012
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:57:10.677497+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:35.930544
License: Public Domain

BROCK, Justice,
dissenting.
In writing the opinion for the Court, Mr. Justice Cooper, as he customarily does, has accurately and fairly stated the law as it presently exists and is pertinent to this case in which the State of Tennessee seeks to prosecute and punish the defendant for robbing a bank in Hardeman County, although he has already been tried by the Federal Government and sentenced to a term of 12 years for the same robbery.
Nevertheless, I respectfully dissent from the decision of the Court holding that the State may proceed with a second trial and punishment. I do so although it appears that the United States Supreme Court, as indicated in its recent decision in United States v. Wheeler, 435 U.S. 313, 98 S.Ct. 1079, 55 L.Ed.2d 303 (1978), still takes the position that the double jeopardy and due process clauses of the Constitution of the United States permit not only double jeopardy but also double punishment for the same conduct so long as that conduct is proscribed both by an act of Congress and a state statute.
Although it may be permissible under the Federal Constitution as presently interpreted for Tennessee to try the petitioner, La-von, a second time and to punish him a second time for the single act of robbing the Hardeman County bank, I am unwilling to agree that such procedure complies with the Constitution of the State of Tennessee. I would interpret the double jeopardy provision of Article I, Section 10, and the “law of the land” provision of Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution of Tennessee, to prohibit such double jeopardy and double punishment under the circumstances of this case.
For the purpose of construing and applying the double jeopardy provision of Article I, Section 10, of the Constitution of Tennessee,1 I would hold that a substantial identi*116ty of offenses exists when an act of Congress and a statute of the Tennessee legislature each proscribes essentially the same conduct, as in this case the robbery of a bank, and prescribes substantial punishment for the offender, as is also true in the instant case. If, at the time the State prosecution came on for trial, it were shown that the defendant had been either acquitted or convicted in the Federal court for the substantially identical offense, I would hold that his further prosecution by the State is prohibited by Article I, Section 10, and by Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution of Tennessee. It is my view that such a procedure would more nearly comport with common sense, the sentiments of our people, and serve to implement the protection against double jeopardy embedded in the Constitutions of both the nation and the state than does the opinion of the Court in the instant case. See, Commonwealth v. Mills, 447 Pa. 163, 286 A.2d 638 (1971); People v. Cooper, 398 Mich. 450, 247 N.W.2d 866 (1976); State v. Hogg, N.H., 385 A.2d 544 (1978).
Because he says it so well, I adopt, as an expression of my own views, the following excerpt from the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Black, writing for himself, Chief Justice Warren and Mr. Justice Douglas, in Bartkus v. People of State of Illinois, 359 U.S. 121, 79 S.Ct. 676, 3 L.Ed.2d 684 (1959), to wit:
“Fear and abhorrence of governmental power to try people twice for the same conduct is one of the oldest ideas found in western civilization. Its roots run deep into the Greek and Roman times. Even in the Dark Ages, when so many other principles of justice were lost, the idea that one trial and one punishment were enough remained alive through the canon law and the teachings of the early Christian writers. By the thirteenth century it seems to have been firmly established in England, where it came to be considered as a ‘universal maxim of the common law.’ It is not surprising, therefore, that the principle was brought to this country by the earliest settlers as part of their heritage of freedom, and that it has been recognized here as fundamental again and again. Today it is found, in varying forms, not only in the Federal Constitution, but in the jurisprudence or constitutions of every State, as well as most foreign nations. It has, in fact, been described as a part of all advanced systems of law and as one of those universal principles “of reason, justice, and conscience, of which Cicero said:
‘Nor is it one thing at Rome and another at Athens, one now and another in the future, but among all nations it is the same.’ ”
While some writers have explained the opposition to double prosecutions by emphasizing the injustice inherent in two punishments for the same act, and others have stressed the dangers to the innocent from allowing the full power of the state to be brought against them in two trials, the basic and recurring theme has always simply been that it is wrong for a man to ‘be brought into Danger for the same Offense more than once.’ Few principles have been more deeply ‘rooted in the traditions and conscience of our people.’ The Court apparently takes the position that a second trial for the same act is somehow less offensive if one of the trials is conducted by the Federal Government and the other by a State. Looked at from the standpoint of the individual who is being prosecuted, this notion is too subtle for me to grasp. If double punishment is what is feared, it hurts no less for two ‘Sovereigns’ to inflict it then for one. If danger to the innocent is emphasized, that danger is surely no less when the power of the State and Federal Governments is brought to bear on one man in two trials, than when one of these ‘Sovereigns’ proceeds alone. In each case, inescapably, a man is forced to face danger twice for the same conduct.
The Court, without denying the almost universal abhorrence of such double prosecutions, nevertheless justifies the practice here in the name of ‘federalism.’ This, it seems to me, is a misuse and desecration of the concept. Our Federal *117Union was conceivéd and created ‘to establish Justice’ and to ‘secure the Blessings of Liberty,' not to destroy any of the bulwarks on which both freedom and justice depend. We should, therefore, be suspicious of any supposed ‘requirements’ of ‘federalism’ which result in obliterating ancient safeguards. I have been shown nothing in the history of our Union, in the writings of its Founders, or elsewhere, to indicate that individual rights deemed essential by both State and Nation were to be lost through the combined operations of the two governments. Nor has the Court given any sound reason for thinking that the successful operation of our dual system of government depends in the slightest on the power to try people twice for the same act.” 79 S.Ct. at 696-98.
Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and affirm that of the trial court. I am authorized to say that Mr. Chief Justice HENRY joins in this dissent.

. “That no person shall, for the same offense, be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” Article I, Section 10, Constitution of Tennessee.