Court Opinion

ID: 9541632
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:27:16.772037+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:04:14.135791
License: Public Domain

Kirk, J.
(dissenting) Mr. Justice Spiegel and I do not agree with the opinion.
We do not condone falsehood before the Crime Commission or elsewhere. That, however, is not the issue before us.
*114Our primary concern here is the law established by the majority and its effect upon the fundamental rights of the citizens of the Commonwealth. We are deeply disturbed by the construction given to GK L. c. 268, § 1. We base our dissent particularly on the meaning attributed to the second clause of the first sentence of § 1 (hereafter referred to as “the second clause”). With respect to the second clause, the majority reach the general conclusion that “all wilfully false (and relevant) statements under oath, otherwise than in or ancillary to judicial or adjudicatory proceedings . . . constitute perjury, where the oath reasonably should he regarded as ‘required hy law’ ” (emphasis supplied). They also say that the second clause, as distinguished from the first clause, deals with “false statements under oath where there was statutory or other legal justification for requiring an oath in particular circumstances” (emphasis supplied). We regard the judicial infusion of these vague and imprecise words into a criminal statute as a strange precedent indeed. We feel it is our duty to set out the reasons for our disagreement.
Our objection to the majority’s construction of the second clause is fourfold: First, that it miscarries the legislative intent; second, that it is contradictory to the history of the statute; third, that it raises grave constitutional problems; fourth that it constitutes, immediately and prospectively, a judicial declaration of crimes. Incidental to the discussion of these points we shall indicate that the second clause, as we read it, is clearly constitutional, carries out the legislative intent, and does not involve, now or later, judicial intrusion into the legislative domain.
1. Under the majority’s construction, the second clause becomes a catchall ‘ definition” of the crime of perjury. It reduces the first clause to the status of a mere specific application of the catchall “definition,” and, in effect, renders the first clause superfluous. Surely, one who is “lawfully required to depose the truth in a judicial proceeding or in a proceeding in a course of justice [and who] wilfully swears . . . falsely in a matter material to the issue or point in *115question” falls clearly within the majority’s definition of one who makes “wilfully false (and relevant) statements under oath . . . where the oath reasonably should be regarded as ‘required by law’ and also falls clearly within the majority’s alternate definition of one who makes “false statements under oath where there was . . . legal justification for requiring an oath in the particular circumstances.” The majority, having thus declared the catchall significance of the second clause and having acknowledged that, under our decisions, the first clause is inapplicable to the case before us, make the abrupt and unwarranted conclusion: “Thus perjury in the course of . . . [the Crime Commission’s hearings] could properly be reached only under the second clause.” We venture the comment that this conclusive statement does not answer the question before the court. This statement assumes that a false statement made by a person who has been placed under oath by the Crime Commission is perjury. That which the statement assumes to be the law is the very question of law we are called upon to decide. It also overlooks the fact that had the Legislature intended that false testimony before the Crime Commission should constitute perjury or be punishable as perjury it could have so provided expressly in the resolve creating the commission.
In comparable situations, the Legislature has done so in the past. The references in footnote 11 of the majority opinion are examples of the clear expression of the legislative will. Unlike the majority, however, we do not think that when the Legislature expressly has provided that false testimony before a particular investigatory agency shall constitute perjury, the provision can properly be treated as surplusage, and be explained away on the ground that it “may have been . . . from an excess of caution” by the Legislature. Nor do we think that where such an express provision has been pointedly omitted by a succeeding Legislature, the omission can be explained away as “possibly in reliance on Gr. L. c. 268, § 1.” We reject the idea that felony statutes may be construed against the citizen be*116cause of a “may have been” or a “possibly.” We feel it is our duty to point out that one of the results of the majority’s reasoning is that, in any one of the several hearings which may be held under G. L. c. 7, § 11, any citizen who is summoned as a witness and who testifies falsely is subject to punishment as a perjurer. And this is so, according to the majority, even though there is nothing in Gr. L. e. 7, § 11, so providing; and it is so, according to the majority, despite the further fact that the Legislature, when it incorporated St. 1912, c. 719, § 9, as affected by St. 1916, c. 296, § 1, and St. 1917, c. 165, § 2, into the General Laws, pointedly omitted the provision for perjury.
We do not think for a moment that the Legislature ever intended that the second clause should have the all-inclusive sweep imputed to it by the majority. We submit also that the majority’s construction is repugnant to and in contradiction of the statutory history, which we now consider.
2. The majority note, and we agree, that the statute of origin of the second clause was St. 1829, c. 56. We quote in full the latter statute: “Be it enacted by the Senate and Souse of Representatives, in General Court assembled, and. by the authority of the same, That if any person, of whom an oath is required by the provisions of the acts incorporating any Bank, Manufactory, or other incorporation, or by any general law of this Commonwealth, shall wilfully and falsely swear or affirm in regard to any matter or thing respecting which such oath is required to be made, such person shall be deemed guilty of Perjury, and on conviction thereof before the Supreme Judicial Court, or before the Municipal Court of the City of Boston, if said offence be committed within the County of Suffolk, shall be punished in the same manner as perjury is now punished by the act to which this is in addition.” The majority opinion does not, however, cite the title to St. 1829, c. 56, which reads: “An Act in addition to ‘An Act against perjury and subornation of perjury’ ” (emphasis supplied). The act, to which St. 1829, c. 56, was an addition, was St. 1812, c. 144, § 1, relating to common law perjury, i.e., falsely deposing in *117a proceeding in a course of justice. Statute 1812, c. 144, § 1, bore the title which is quoted in the title of St. 1829, c. 56. Nor does the majority opinion refer to the final words of St. 1829, c. 56, which read: “shall be punished in the same manner as perjury is now punished by the act to which this is an addition” (emphasis supplied). These words, which we have emphasized, indicate to us that the original predecessor of the second clause was specifically supplemental to, and not inclusive of, the statute to which it was an addition. And we maintain that nothing has happened in the meantime, legislatively or judicially, to alter the significance of and the relationship between the two statutory provisions.
We resume the history. By Rev. Sts. c. 128, §§ 1, 2 (1836), the two provisions (St. 1812, c. 144, § 1, and St. 1829, e. 56) were brought together for the first time. Considering the statute in that precise form, the court, speaking through Justice Charles A. Dewey1 in Jones v. Daniels, 15 Cray, 438, 439 (1860), said: “By § 2, £if any person, of whom an oath shall be required by law, shall wilfully swear falsely in regard to any matter or thing respecting which such oath is required,’ such person shall be deemed guilty of perjury. This latter provision, as found in the second section, might seem from its very general language to embrace all eases where an oath had been lawfully administered in the execution of official duty. But from a reference to the original act from which this provision was transferred to the Rev. Sts. we are inclined to the opinion that the section had reference to oficial oaths, as oaths required of directors of banks or other corporations, or individuals of whom by special statute provisions oaths are *118required. St. 1829, c. 56.” The wording of the statute as it appeared in the 1836 revision and as thus construed has never been changed in any material element despite general revisions of the laws. See Pub. Sts. c. 205, §§ 1, 2 (1882); B. L. c. 210, § 1 (1902); and G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 268, § 1. No extensive citation of cases is necessary to stress the significance of this fact where the issue is one of statutory construction. It is enough to recall what the court said, speaking through Justice Metcalf, in Commonwealth v. Hartnett, 3 Gray, 450, 451: “ [W]hen the same legislature, in a later statute, uses the terms of an earlier one which has received a judicial construction, that construction is to be given to the later statute. And this is manifestly right. For if it were intended to exclude any known construction of a previous statute, the legal presumption is, that its terms would be so changed as to effect that intention.” The court recently indorsed this principle in Weiner v. Boston, 342 Mass. 67, 73. Despite this salutary rule and despite the long and consistent legislative history, conjoined with the judicial construction of the second clause in 1860, the majority now reach back to 1836 and point to the same statute as one which “would put any person on notice that his conduct will be criminal if he wilfully lies under oath before a body such as the Crime Commission” or before the Boston Finance Commission, or under G. L. c. 7, § 11, before “any commissioner [who] . . . may require the attendance and testimony of witnesses.”
The majority appear to rely upon a comment made in Avery v. Ward, 150 Mass. 160, 163 (1889), to the effect that the statement in Jones v. Daniels was not necessary to the decision. This comment does not, in our judgment, impair the validity of the construction given in Jones v. Daniels particularly in light of the fact that the statute has remained essentially unchanged for more than a century. Furthermore no different construction was made of the statute in Avery v. Ward.
The oath involved in Avery v. Ward was analogous to the examples of those oaths covered by the second clause *119given in Jones v. Daniels. The proof of loss oath2 in the Avery case resembles the “official oaths” mentioned in the J ones case in that it was given not as a guaranty of truth in a proceeding at law, but as an affirmation of existing facts given by a citizen for the purpose of securing the reliance of other citizens to the advantage of the oath-taker. Just as a director’s oath is intended to secure the reliance of depositors or shareholders on the soundness of the enterprise, so also is the claimant’s oath meant to satisfy the insurer in relying on the truth of a claim. On this basis, therefore, the holding in Avery v. Ward does not conflict with the construction of the second clause given in Jones v. Daniels. Neither case justifies the long step taken by the majority here in extending the scope of the second clause to sworn testimony, before an investigatory body, which is neither a part of a proceeding in a course of justice nor an element of a reliance-creating arrangement between private citizens.
We take the view that the construction of the statute in Jones v. Daniels is correct and that it accomplishes what the Legislature intended, namely, that where there is a specific statute or a provision in a general law which requires that a statement regarding a particular matter or thing be made under oath, and the statement is made wilfully and falsely under oath, the affiant shall be punished as a perjurer. We do not think the statute is aimed at an answer made to a question during a continuing or running interrogation by a body whose powers are investigatory and in no sense adjudicatory.
We consider that our position is strengthened by the language of Gr. L. c. 268, § ÍA, which, while retaining the penalty for perjury, permits written statements, “required by law ... to be verified by oath,” to be made under the penalties of perjury. Section 1A, it seems to us, clearly re*120fers to the matters covered by the second clause and merely changes the method by which the particular statement may be made without derogating from the penal consequences if the statement is falsely and wilfully made.
3. We turn now to the constitutional problems which we think are inherent in the construction made by the majority. Their interpretation leaves the crime of perjury in such a state of indefiniteness, vagueness and uncertainty as plainly to run afoul of art. 12 of the Declaration of Rights of the Constitution of the Commonwealth and the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. We are perplexed by the words “other legal justification for requiring an oath in particular circumstances” and also by the words “where the oath reasonably should be regarded as ‘required by law.’ ” If we understand the opinion, the majority say that this court should apply these generalizations as each case arises, as indeed it has in the ease before us. In short, under the construction made by the majority, the inherent vagueness and uncertainty of the second clause may, in a particular case, achieve certainty when this court speaks. We think that no citizen should be expected to make that perilous prediction. Commonwealth v. Slome, 321 Mass. 713, 715. “A ‘statute which either forbids or requires the doing of an act in terms so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning and differ as to its application, violates the first essential of due process of law.’ ” Commonwealth v. Carpenter, 325 Mass. 519, 521, and cases cited. Lanzetta v. New Jersey, 306 U. S. 451, 453. On this point our position is that, as construed by the majority, the statute fails for want of certainty and definiteness. See Jones v. Robbins, 8 Gray, 329, 337-350; Commonwealth v. Pentz, 247 Mass. 500; Commonwealth v. Reilly, 248 Mass. 1; Jaquith v. Commonwealth, 331 Mass. 439, 441-442.
4. Our fourth point is corollary to the third. No standard is set by the words “other legal justification for requiring an oath in particular circumstances” or by the *121words “where the oath reasonably should be regarded as ‘required by law.’ ” These words, engrafted on the statute by the majority, not only leave their meaning and applicability to the judiciary, but they implicitly require the court, as each case arises, to supply an essential element of the crime, namely, the particular oath, whether required by statute or not, to which the penalty for false swearing attaches. Penal statutes should not be left in such a peripatetic state. From the founding of the Commonwealth public policy has been against such enactments. ‘ ‘ The public policy of the Commonwealth in the creation of crimes is not for this court to determine, but for the Legislature. Our function is merely that of discovering the meaning of the words that the Legislature has used, bearing in mind that under the American system of law a citizen is not to be punished criminally unless his deed falls plainly within the words of the statutory prohibition, construed naturally. His deed is not to be declared a crime upon ambiguous words or by a strained construction.” Lummus, J., in Commonwealth v. Corbett, 307 Mass. 7, 8, and cases cited.
5. It is our hope that the discussion of the foregoing objections has served to point out that the second clause has a special and limited purpose, that the purpose was stated in Jones v. Daniels, 15 Gray, 438, that the construction there given makes clear, definite and certain to all citizens the particular acts which are punishable, that the construction is the only logical one, and that it avoids the constitutional pitfalls to which the majority’s construction would lead us.
6. We are not content, however, to rest'our dissent exclusively on the grounds thus far advanced. Bising above all that we have said is our firm belief that the procedure here followed is alien to the spirit which has characterized the administration of justice in our Commonwealth. To be specific: — The Crime Commission, so called, was established by the Legislature with the approval of the Governor, by Bes. 1962, c. 146. Its powers are defined in the resolve and by this court’s interpretation of it. Sheridan v. Gardner, 347 Mass. 8. Gardner v. Callahan, 347 Mass. *12221. Gardner v. Massachusetts Turnpike Authy. 347 Mass. 552. Gardner v. Massachusetts Turnpike Authy. 348 Mass. 532. Under these legislative and judicial authorities, the Crime Commission has its limitations as well as its capabilities. It is an investigating agency. Its ultimate mission is to report the results of its investigation to the Legislature with recommendations for legislation. It is not, as is the grand jury, an arm of the court. Its powers are not adjudicatory. Its hearings must he conducted in private. A single member of the commission can conduct its hearings. Witnesses “shall before testifying he sworn.” Its records shall be kept secret.
Against this background one who, either under summons or voluntarily, enters the private quarters of the commission may he wholly unaware of the reason which calls for his appearance. He is charged with no crime. In truth, he may have committed no violation of existing law. The investigation may be directed solely to the supposed misdoings of others as to which the witness may be suspected of having knowledge. And yet, under the majority holding, a person who thus appears before the commission (or a single member) whose powers are as defined, and testifies to a fact which, in the judgment of the commission (or a single member), is not the truth, may emerge from the hearing subject to an indictment for the heinous crime of perjury. Such an indictment rests on an utterance made in the presence of the commission (or a single member) during an extended interrogation, even though there had been no allegation or accusation of wrongdoing against the witness prior to his appearance before the commission. This procedure, we feel deeply, is contrary to the very fundamentals of justice as we have believed them to be. It is inquisitorial. It is a procedure which up to this moment has never been tolerated in the Commonwealth. It should not now be countenanced except by authority of the Legislature expressed in clear and unmistakable language. Such authority, we respectfully submit, should not be found, as the majority have found it, in the judicial revelation of *123a novel meaning of a substantive criminal statute enacted more than 130 years ago. St. 1829, c. 56. Rev. Sts. c. 128, § 2 (1836). Pub. Sts. c. 205, § 2 (1882). R. L. c. 210, § 1 (1902). G. L. (Ter. Ed.) c. 268, § 1.
We would hold that the indictment was not properly brought and, accordingly, we would reverse the judgment.

 Justice Dewey assumed Ms position on the Supreme Judicial Court in 1837, one year after the revision of the statutes. At the time of his appointment he had been for several years district attorney for the Western District of the Commonwealth, then comprising Hampden, Hampshire, Franklin and Berkshire counties. He served on the court for twenty-nine years (1837-1866), twenty-three of wMch were with CMef Justice Shaw, who was CMef Justice when Jones v. Daniels was written. Justice Dewey was senior associate Justice for sixteen years. Remarks at his memorial may be found in 12 Allen, 617. _ At page 624, Chief Justice Bigelow referred to Ms command of the criminal law and Ms “extensive knowledge of the statutes of the Commonwealth.”

 In the Avery case a statute required that, before an action be commenced under a fire insurance policy, proof of loss must be filed under oath. A wilfully false statement in the proof of loss, made under oath, was held to be perjury within the meaning of the common law, since the oath required by the statute lay “at the foundation of proceedings in court.’’