Court Opinion

ID: 9422449
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:02:41.034537+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:36.823464
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Harlan,
whom Mr. Justice Clark joins,
dissenting.
Whether or not the clear and present danger doctrine of Bridges v. California, 314 U. S. 252, 260-263, 271, should be deemed to limit a state or federal court’s use of the contempt power when employed against a member of its official entourage who has scandalized the conduct of the court in relation to and during the course of a pending judicial proceeding is a question which I need not reach in this case. For even under the most expansive view of Bridges and its offshoots the contempt judgment against this sheriff should be upheld.
*396Over fifty years ago Mr. Justice Holmes wrote: “The theory of our [judicial] system is that the conclusions to be reached in a case will be induced only by evidence and argument in open court, and not by any outside influence, whether of private talk or public print.” Patterson v. Colorado, 205 U. S. 454, 462. For this reason this Court has repeatedly held that a criminal conviction based on the verdict of jurors influenced by extrajudicial statements of the case cannot stand consistently with due process of law. E. g., Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U. S. 717. But invalidation of a proceeding so infected is not the only remedy available to combat interference with judicial processes; so to hold would confer a right to frustrate those processes with impunity. And so it is that this Court has uniformly upheld the power of courts to protect themselves by citations for contempt from improper influence upon proceedings before them. Sustaining this power against a claim of freedom of speech in Patterson v. Colorado, supra, 205 U. S., at 463, Mr. Justice Holmes wrote: “When a case is finished, courts are subject to the same criticism as other people, but the propriety and necessity of preventing interference with the course of justice by premature statement, argument or intimidation hardly can be denied.” The right of free speech, strong though it be, is not absolute; when the right to speak conflicts with the right to an impartial judicial proceeding, an accommodation must be made to preserve the essence of both. Thus in Bridges v. California, supra, 314 U. S., at 271, the Court said:
“The very word ‘triar connotes decisions on the evidence and arguments properly advanced in open court. Legal trials are not like elections, to be won through the use of the meeting-hall, the radio, and the newspaper. ... We must therefore turn to the particular utterances here in question and the circumstances of their publication to determine to *397what extent the substantive evil of unfair administration of justice was a likely consequence, and whether the degree of likelihood wras sufficient to justify summary punishment.”
And again in Pennekamp v. Florida, 328 U. S. 331, 347: “Courts must have power to protect the interests of prisoners and litigants before them from unseemly efforts to pervert judicial action.” See Craig v. Harney, 331 U. S. 367, 372-373.
The Court professes to recognize these principles. It holds nevertheless that the contempt sanction cannot be applied in this case, arguing both that “the limitations on free speech assume a different proportion when expression is directed toward a trial as compared to a grand jury investigation,” ante, p. 390, and that the findings of clear and present danger are unsupported by the record. I cannot agree with either proposition.
I.
The grand jury is an integral part of the judicial process, Levine v. United States, 362 U. S. 610, 617; Gates v. State, 73 Ga. App. 824, 826, 38 S. E. 2d 311, 312; contempt sanctions are available to protect its functions. Levine v. United States, supra. Congress has recognized the need for safeguarding the deliberations of federal grand juries by making it a crime to attempt to influence a federal gj-and juror by extrajudicial communication.1 Even *398assuming that a State may constitutionally permit a grand jury, unlike a petit jury, to be influenced by extrajudicial statements, a question explicitly left open in Beck v. Washington, 369 U. S. 541, 546, it certainly does not compel them to that course.
The Court does not dispute this. But, says the Court, no individual is on trial here; and “When the grand jury is performing its investigatory function into a general problem area, without specific regard to indicting a particular individual, society’s interest is best served by a thorough and extensive investigation, and a greater degre • of disinterestedness and impartiality is assured by £-.:''rw-ing free expression of contrary opinion.” Ante, p. 3? 2 This, however, is surely a policy decision with respect to which a State may legitimately take a different view. Th o Court does not suggest that Georgia was attempting to use the mantle of judicial proceedings in order to insulate the transaction of nonjudicial business from criticism; investigation is a traditional function of the grand jury. I see no reason why the State cannot determine for itself what shall and what shall not be considered by grand jurors in conducting any of their traditional tasks. Moreover, it is not the fact that individual rights were not at stake in this proceeding. The judge charged the jury:
“if there is sufficient evidence of unlawful acts, then all parties participating, white and colored, candidates or non-candidates, should be indicted by this Grand Jury so that the guilty parties, if there are any, may be brought to trial.”
That petitioner’s statements would tend to aid rather than to prejudice implicated individuals was equally true in Bridges v. California, supra, but was rightly afforded no significance; the State as well as the individual is entitled to a day in court.
It is not suggested that in declaring that grand jurors shall be protected from improper “outside” influence *399Georgia lias improperly departed from her own prior law. Nor could it well be maintained that the Georgia courts undertook to judge petitioner’s conduct in terms of something other than the Bridges clear and present danger standard. The Georgia Court of Appeals held:
“With respect to the question as to whether these acts of the defendant constituted a clear, present, or imminent danger or serious threat to the administration of justice, it is to be noted that the citation as amended so charges, the court below has by its conviction so found, and the evidence supports the finding.” 103 Ga. App., at 321; 119 S. E. 2d, at 273.
To be sure this holding cannot preclude this Court from examining the evidence for itself. But this does not mean that it may do so with the same latitude as if it were sitting as a state court of review. The Court’s functions are exhausted once it is determined that federal constitutional standards have been met. It is of course not incumbent on the state courts to deal in detail with the facts of this Court’s earlier decisions in order to “display an awareness of the standards enunciated in those cases,” or to make “elaborate findings” to demonstrate “how the publications interfered with the grand jury’s investigation.” Ante, pp. 386-387.
Accepting as I do for present purposes the Bridges test, this conviction must be upheld if the record supports the inference of clear and present danger.
II.
That test is amply met here. Petitioner, a public official connected with the court, accused, from his office in the courthouse, the Superior Court judges of fomenting race hatred; of misusing the criminal law to persecute and to intimidate political and racial minorities; of political naiveté, racial prejudice, and hypocrisy. He *400compared the calling of the grand jury to the activities of the Ku Klux Klan. He made an undisguised effort to influence the outcome of the investigation by declaring that only the politically naive could believe Bibb County Negroes might be guilty of selling votes. It was stipulated that both of petitioner’s formal statements were read by the grand jurors during the course of their investigation.
The Court considers this evidence insufficient because there was no showing of “an actual interference with the undertakings of the jury,” that the jurors “felt unable or unwilling to complete their assigned task because petitioner 'interfered’ with its completion,” that “the investigation was not ultimately successful or, if it was not, that the petitioner’s conduct was responsible for its failure.” Ante, p. 387. Surely the Court cannot mean that attempts to influence judicial proceedings are punishable only if they are successful. Speech creating sufficient danger of an evil which the State may prevent may certainly be punished regardless of whether that evil materializes. See Feiner v. New York, 340 U. S. 315, 320-321. Indeed, the test suggested by the Court is even more stringent than that which it applies in determining whether a conviction should be set aside because of prejudicial “outside” statements reaching a trial jury. In such cases, although the question is whether the rights of the accused have been infringed rather than whether there has been a clear and present danger of their infringement, it is necessary only to show a substantial likelihood that the verdict was affected, and it is no answer that each juror expresses his belief that he remains able to be fair and impartial. Irvin v. Dowd, supra, 366 U. S., at 728; cf. Marshall v. United States, 360 U. S. 310, 312-313; Spano v. New York, 360 U. S. 315, 324. The test for punishing attempts to influence a grand or petit jury should be less rather than more stringent.
*401I cannot agree with the Court that petitioner’s statements would have been likely to affect the outcome of the investigation “only if the charge was so manifestly unjust that it could not stand inspection.” Ante, p. 391. This is to discredit the persuasiveness of argument, which the Court purports to value so highly. Any expression of opinion on the merits of a pending judicial proceeding is likely to have an impact on deliberations. In this instance that likelihood was increased by two factors which were not present in Bridges, Pennekamp, or Craig, in which the Court held the evidence insufficient to show clear and present danger. None of those cases involved statements by officers of the court; and all concerned statements whose alleged interference was with the deliberations of a judge rather than a jury. Georgia law requires the sheriff to execute and return court processes and orders and to preserve order during sessions of the courts. Ga. Code Ann., 1959, § 24 — 2813. Petitioner was thus a law-enforcement officer, whose office was in the very courthouse where the grand jury was sitting. Whether or not he issued the statements “in his capacity as sheriff,” and whether or not the contempt citation alleged it, his words assumed an overtone of official quality and authority that lent them weight beyond those of an ordinary citizen.
Of equal if not greater importance is the fact that petitioner’s statements were calculated to influence, not a judge chosen because of his independence, integrity, and courage and trained by experience and the discipline of law to deal only with evidence properly before him, but a grand jury of laymen chosen to serve for a limited term from the general population of Bibb County. It cannot be assumed with grand jurors, as it has been with judges, Craig v. Harney, supra, 331 U. S., at 376, that they are all “men of fortitude, able to thrive in a hardy climate.” What may not seriously endanger the independent delib*402erations of a judge may well jeopardize those of a grand or petit jury. See Maryland v. Baltimore Radio Show, Inc., 338 U. S. 912, 920 (opinion of Frankfurter, J.).
Moreover, the statements themselves were of such a nature as to distinguish this case from Bridges, Penne-kamp, and Craig. It cannot be said here, as it was in Bridges, that petitioner’s charges of racial bias, hypocrisy, political intimidation, persecution, and political naiveté, and his comparison of the judges with the Ku Klux Klan, “did no more than threaten future adverse criticism which was reasonably to be expected anyway,” or that “if there was electricity in the atmosphere, it was generated by the facts; the charge added by the . . . [petitioner’s statement] can be dismissed as negligible.” 314 U. S., at 273, 278. The sheriff’s remarks were not, as in Pennekamp, 328 U. S., at 348, general criticisms with respect to rulings already made, but specific attacks directed toward the disposition of the pending investigation. They cannot be characterized, as in Craig, 331 U. S., at 374-375, as merely unfair reports of the activities of others; unlike the editorial in that case, id., at 376-377, petitioner’s criticisms went squarely to the merits of the investigation and impugned as well the motives and honesty of those conducting it. I do not understand how it can be denied that a grand juror, reading in the course of this investigation the sheriff’s statement that the judges who instructed the grand jury to undertake it were racial bigots making discriminatory use of the laws for purposes of political repression, and that the charges themselves were incredibly false, might well be influenced in his deliberations.
The petitioner’s last formal statement, which he and the Court characterize as a “defense,” was also properly found to constitute a contempt. Defenses, like charges, should be presented to a court judicially and not through the public press. But in fact the affirmance of petitioner’s conviction was not based at all on the allegation *403that this defense interfered with his trial for contempt. Rather, the Court of Appeals held that this further statement had been made “in an apparent effort to hamper the grand jury which was still considering the charges given it by the court.” 103 Ga. App., at 321, 119 S. E. 2d, at 273. This conclusion, based on the repetition of a number of petitioner’s previous statements and the allegation that they were true,2 was clearly justified.
*404Finally, petitioner’s case is not saved by the fact that both he and the judges he attacked are elected officials, or by the fact that the statement concerned an issue of some political moment. There was ample opportunity to bring the judges’ performance to the voters after the investigation was closed. “Political interest” cannot be used as an excuse for affecting the result of a judicial inquiry.
I would affirm.

 “Whoever attempts to influence the action or decision of any grand or petit juror of any court of the United States upon any issue or matter pending before such juror, or before the jury of which he is a member, or pertaining to his duties, by writing or sending to him any written communication, in relation to such issue or matter, shall be fined not more than $1,000 or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.
“Nothing in this section shall be construed to prohibit the communication of a request to appear before the grand jury.” 18 U. S. C. § 1504.

 Petitioner’s last statement was as follows:
“My defense will be simply that I have spoken the truth. Anyone who will read, point by point, my statements concerning the Judges’ charge will find those statements true.
“The Judges were wrong to use ‘Negro Bloc Voting’, the campaign slogan of Talmadge, and similar phrases as language with which to instruct a Grand Jury. When I stated ‘It is shocking to find a Judge charging a Grand Jury in the style and language of a race baiting candidate for political office’ was it contempt of court or was I pointing out the truth?
“When I said ‘If anyone in this community be free of racial prejudice, it should be our Judges’ was this contempt of Court or was I stating a truth?
“The Judges were morally wrong to suddenly order a Grand Jury to single out the Negro political leaders for indictments under a forgotten law which even judges have violated. When I said ‘It further seems that [sz'c] the height of hypocrisy to dust off an old blue law that has been ignored for fifty years and suddenly order its rigid enforcement against a minority group of voters’ was this contempt of Court or was I speaking the truth?
“The Judges were professionally wrong in involving the Court in political affairs. I stated that the Judges’ charges ‘threaten political persecution carried out under the guise of law enforcement’ and further that ‘this action appears either as a crude attempt at judicial intimidation of Negro voters and leaders, or, at best, as agitation for a “Negro Vote” issues [szc] in local politics.’ Can anyone read the Judges’ instructions for indictments under the old ‘influencing voters’ law and honestly say no political persecution is threatened when almost all office holders have violated this law ? Can anyone read the long charge reciting political rumors and charges against Negro leaders and voters and honestly say there is no appearance of any attempt at intimidation of Negro voters and leaders? Likewise can anyone deny *404such a charge and such an investigation in the midst of local political races agitates a 'Negro Vote’ issue?
“If the Court will permit I believe that many thousands of witnesses would testify in my behalf that they drew the same conclusions as I from the language used by the Judges in their charge.
“Is it just, or even fair play, for the Judges to say they intended no threat, no intimidation, no agitation and therefore it is contempt of court to publicly state honest, sincere conclusions and practical effects caused by the language of the charge.
“Two wrongs do not make a right, and the Judges are wrong to cite me for contempt. I cannot view the Judges’ action in any light except to believe I am to be prosecuted for daring to criticise the Judges and for speaking the truth.
“I had hoped that the entire ill-will and race agitation stirred up by the Judges’ charge would be permitted to die after a face-saving presentment by the Courts’ Grand Jury. To this end I remained silent despite grossly false and discrediting conclusions presented. Now it appears that the Judges want the satisfaction of find [sic] me in contempt of court, but if they so do, they are in effect saying that the court has done no wrong because the court itself finds it has done no wrong.
:/s/ James I. Wood”