Court Opinion

ID: 9418211
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:12:54.375828+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:21:57.489115
License: Public Domain

Me. Justice McKenna
dissenting*
I am unable to concur.with my brethren, and if the application of a constitutional provision, indeed a constitutional provision whose purpose is the protection of personal liberty, were not involved I might not even signify opposition. The application of the Constitution of the’ United States, especially as it may affect personal privileges, is the most serious duty of the court. It is sure to have consequence beyond the instance, and justifies the expression of the views a member of the court may have about it.
The facts are stated in the opinion, but they are not all of equal significance, indeed may confuse unless distinguished. I put to one side, therefore, all consideration of the process by which the letter-press books were brought into court or before the grand jury. They were taken there, of course, in deference-^ — in submission, it may be better to say — to the command of the law expressed in the sub*387pcena. Resistance to that was not offered by Wilson, nor was it necessary. Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616. His constitutional right was asserted afterwards. With Wilson then and the books in his possession we have to deal and the rights he had in such situation, and let us keep in mind that it was his guilt under the law that was under investigation and which the books were sought for the purpose of exposing. Three indictments had already been found against him. Crime, therefore, had been formally - charged, and further crime was being investi-. gated — not crime by the corporation, but crime by him, and the proof, it was supposed, lay in the books. • They were sought for no other reason. They were demanded of him to convict him. To the demand he answered that the Constitution of his country protected him from producing evidence against himself. And he was certainly asked to produce such evidence. The books were in his possession in an assertion of right over them against everybody. In the transactions they recorded he was a participant, and, it may be, the only doer. It is made something of in the opinion that the corporation was willing to have the books surrendered. The more unmistakable, therefore, was the claim of Wilson a personal privilege. And let it be kept in mind that it was his own privilege that he claimed, not that of the corporation; and I pass by as irrelevant a consideration of what disclosures could have been required of it, even if it had been accused of crime and there had been pending an inquiry against it.
Upon what ground was the privilege denied? Upon the ground that the books were not his property but that of the corporation, and they are assimilated in the opinion to public documents, a consideration I pass for the present. How far, as affecting the privilege, is the rule of the title to property to be carried? Every rule may be tested by what can be done under it. Whenever a privilege is claimed against the production of books, or, of course other *388property, may an issue be raised as to title and upon its decision by the court the right to the privilege be determined, or shall the rule only be applied when such issue is not made? And what of partnership property, or property otherwise owned in: common? Does the degree of interest affect the rule? -In the case at bar Wilson asserted the right to hold the books against the corporation. However, such considerations are, in my view, of minor importance; and I instance them only to show to what uncertainties we may go when we leave the clear' and simple directness of the privilege against self-mcrimmatiom As the privilege is a guaranty, of personal'liberty it.should not be qualified..by construction and a distinction based on the ownership of the books demanded as evidence is immaterial. Such distinction has not, been regarded except in the case of public records, as will be exhibited by a review of the authorities..
In Rex. v. Granatelli, Reports of State Trials, New Series, 979, 986, Prince Granatelli was prosecuted for breach of the Foreign Enlistment Act in fitting out certain vessels to be used in hostilities against the King of the Two Sicilies. A witness'was subpoenaed to produce an agreement whereby Granatelli agreed to buy the vessels of a certain navigation company of which the witness was the secretary. The witness refused to produce it, on the ground that it might contain matter that might criminate himself or other partiés for whom he was interested. It was ruled that he could not be compelled to produce the agreement.
In Rex v. Cornelius, 2 Strange, 1210, an information was granted against the defendants, who were justices of the .peace, for taking money for granting licenses to alehouse keepers. A rule was applied for to inspect the books of the corporation. It was refused, on the ground that it would in effect oblige a defendant indicted for misdemeanor to furnish evidence against himself.
*389In Rex v. Purnell, 1 W. Bl. 37, an information was exhibited against the defendant, who was the Vice Chancellor of. Oxford, for neglect of his duty in not punishing certain persons who had spoken treasonable words in the streets of Oxford. The Attorney General moved for a rule directed to the proper officers of the university to permit their books and archives to be inspected to furnish evidence against the defendant. The motion was attempted to be supported “on a suggestion that the King, being a visitor of the university, had a right to inspect théir books whenever he thought proper.” It was argued besides that “when a man is a magistrate, and as such has books in his custody, his having the office shall not secrete those books which another Vice Chancellor must have produced.” The rule was refused, the court saying: “We know no instance wherein this court has granted a rule to inspect books in a criminal prosecution nakedly considered.” The corporations in those eases were considered as private, as observed by Wigmore on Evidence, notes to § 2259. For the same reason, in Rex v. Worsenham, 1 Ld. Raym. 705, the. production of customhouse books in an information against custom-house officers for forging a custom-house bond were not compelled. And in Regina v. Mead, 2 Ld. Raym. 927, books of the defendant who, with eight others, were incorporated as highway surveyors, being considered of a private nature, were not required to be produced. Such corporations would, no doubt, be regarded to-day as public, as observed by Wigmore, and he cites cases in which certain records were deemed public, as follows: In a libel suit a parish vestry book required by statute to be kept; registered pharmacist’s reports filed as required .by law; in a criminal prosecution for unlawful railroad charges, a tariff sheet publicly posted; a druggist’s record .of sales kept under a statute to charge him with illegál liquor selling. By a statute in Massachusetts, “no official paper *390or record” produced by a witness at a legislative hearing is to be within the privilege against self-crimination.
As a deduction, from the cases I have cited the rule is-laid down in Wigmore on Evidence to be: “Where the corporation’s misconduct involves also the claimant’s misconduct, or where the document is in reality the personal act of the claimant, though nomiiially that of the corporation, the disclosures are virtually his own, and to that extent his privilege protects him from producing them.”
It would unduly extend this opinion to review the cases which are said to oppose Wigmore’s deduction, but ás Hale v. Henkel, 201 U. S. 43, is cited in the opinion of the court, I will refer to it briefly.
It was there held that an officer of a corporation could not refuse to produce its books on the ground that they would criminate the corporation. ■ What privilege an officer of the corporation had from producing the books on the ground that they might criminate him was not necessary to decide, as' immunity from prosecution was given by statute for any matter as to which he should testify. It may be contended that it is a natural inference from the decision that but for the immunity granted he could have claimed such privilege. See also Nelson v. United States, 201 U. S. 92. Circuit Judge Gilbert, in a well-considered opinion in Ex parte Chapman, 153 Fed. Rep. 153, made such deduction from Hale v. Henkel, and discharged Chapman from custody to which he had been committed for refusing to produce, for the inspection of a grand Jury the books and papers belonging to a corporation of which he was an officer.
The weight of authority, therefore, is against the power of a court to compel the production of books of a private corporation by any one whom they would criminate. And the cases seem right on principle. The spirit of the privilege is that a witness shall not be used in any way to his crimination. When that may be the effect of anv evidence *391required of him, be it oral or documentary, he may resist. He cannot be made use of at all to secure the evidence. This must necessarily be the extent of the privilege. Rex v. Purnell, supra, is specially in point. The Solicitor General .for the crown, replying to the .objection that no one was bound to furnish evidence against himself, said, “Agreed, but a distinction may be made. When a man is a magistrate, and as such has books in his custody, his having the office shall not secrete those books, which another Vice Chancellor must have produced. Besides, the statutes are not in the Vice Chancellor’s custody only, but also in the hands of the Custos Archivorum.”
v And the constitutional protection is not measured by the effect, great or small, on the prosecution. It may be invoked- even though the prosecution may be defeated. It is the contemplation of the provision of the Constitution that such may be the result and that it is less evil than requiring a person to aid in his conviction of crime.
Neither plausible arguments therefore nor considerations of expediency should prevail against or limit a principle deemed important enough to be made constitutional. Sueh a principle should be adhered to firmly. It is said in Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616, 635, that “constitutional provisions for the security of person and property should be liberally construed. A close and literal construction deprives them of half their efficacy, and leads to gradual depreciation of the right, as if it consisted more in sound than in substance^ It is the duty of courts to be watchful for the constitutional rights of the citizen, .and against any stealthy encroachments thereon. Their motto should be obsta principiis.”
In a case of seizure and forfeiture of certain property under the customs-revenue laws for fraudulent invoicing, Boyd entered a claim for the property. Before the trial it became important to know the quantity and value of the property. In obedience to an order issued by the court *392under a statute of the United States, Boyd produced the invoice of the property, but objected to inspection, on the ground that in a suit for forfeiture no evidence can be coiñpélled from the claimants, and also that the statute, so far as it compelled production of the evidence to be used against him, was unconstitutional and void. It was held that the order of the court and the statute violated both the Fourth and Fifth Amendments of the Constitution of the United States, notwithstanding that the statute could trace its purpose back to one passed in 1863, which had been sustained by decisions in the Circuit and District Courts, and notwithstanding it. also had been sustained by such decisions. The case has been criticised, but it has endured and has become the foundation of other decisions. Indeed, eminent legal names may be cited in criticism, if not ridicule, of the policy expressed by the Fifth Amendment, that is, the policy of protection against self-crimination. It is declared to have no logical relation to the abuses that are said to sustain it, and that the pretense for it, so far as based on hardship, is called an “old woman’s reason,” (also a “lawyer’s reason,”) and a “double distilled and treble refined sentimentality.” So far as based on unfairness it is called “the fox hunter’s reason,” its basis being that a criminal and a fox must have a chance to escape, the subsequent pursuit being made thereby more interesting. And it is asked, supposing a witness upon the stand in a prosecution for robbery, “a question is put, the effect of which were he to answer it, might be to subject him to conviction in respect to another robbery, attended with murder (such high offenses give emphasis to the argument), on the ground of public utility and common sense is there any reason why the collateral advantage thus proffered by fortune to justice should be foregone?” Bentham on Judicial Evidence, vol. 5, page 229 et seq. A reply would'be difficult if government had no other concern than the punishment of crime.
*393If the Government had no other concern, short-cuts to conviction would be justified and. commendable in proportion to their shortness. The general warrants which John Wilkes resisted were such a cut; so were writs of assistance issued in Colonial times. Their inducement was the detection of crime, and yet popular rights were vindicated in the resistance tó the first, and the “child Independence was born ” by resistance to the second.
I will uot pause to vindicate the privilege of the Fifth Amendment against considerations of expediency nor to inquire whether it is a well-reasoned principle, one logically following from abuses, properly adapted to the facts of life when it was adopted, or if so then, not now. It has passed from polemics and has secured the sanction óf constitutional law. Courts cannot change .it, or add to it or take from it to suit the “condition of modern ‘civilization, ’ ’ as it was suggested in a case submitted with this. It is as vital now as when ordained and is not uncertain. It is plain and direct as to the source of criminating evidence. The accused person cannot be made the source. What Lord C.amden denominated “an argument of utility” should not prevail now as it did not in Westminster Hall when he pronounced his great judgment against general warrants. Indeed English courts, as I have shown, have never wavered nor felt constrained by the demands of criminal justice to depart from or qualify in any way the strength of the privilege; Is it possible that a written constitution is more flexible in its adaptations than an unwritten one, and that the spirit of English liberty is firmer or more consistent than that of American liberty, or discerns more clearly the danger of relaxing the strictness of any of tfie guarantees of personal rights?
A limitation by construction of any of the constitutional securities for personal liberty is to be deprecated. A people may grow careless and overlook at what cost and through what travail they acquired even the least of their liberties. *394The process of deterioration is simple. It may even be conceived to be advancement, and that intelligent self-government can be trusted to adapt itself to occasion, not needing the fetters of a predetermined rule. It may come to be considered that a constitution is the cradle of infancy, that a nation grown up may boldly advance in confident security against the abuses of power and that passion will not sway moré than reason. But what of the end when the lessons of history are ignored, when the barriers erected by wisdom gathered from experience are weakened or destroyed? And weakened or destroyed they may be when interest and desire feel their restraint. What then of the end; will history repeat itself? And this is not a cry of alarm. “Obsta principiis” was the warning of Mr, Justice Bradley in Boyd v. United States against the attempt of the Government to break down the constitutional privilege of the citizen by attempting to exact from him evidence of fraud against the customs laws. I repeat the warning. The présent case is another attempt of the same kind and should be treated in the same way.