Court Opinion

ID: 9419562
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:50:10.174356+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:18.916122
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Frankfurter,
dissenting.
In the past, to soften the undue rigors of the criminal law, courts frequently employed canons of artificial construction to restrict the transparent scope of criminal statutes. I am no friend of such artificially restrictive interpretations. Criminal statutes should be given the meaning that their language most obviously invites unless authoritative legislative history or absurd consequences preclude such natural meaning. There are surely deep1 considerations of policy why the scope of criminal condemnation should not be extended by a strained reading. The natural reading of the conspiracy provision of § 11 of the Selective Service Act of 1940 1 confines its ap*347plication to the immediately preceding clause which punishes “any person or persons who shall knowingly hinder or interfere in any way by force or violence with the administration of this Act or the rules or regulations made pursuant thereto.” Since no absurd consequences preclude the indicated natural reading of this criminal statute and since all available extraneous aids confirm the rendering which the text invites, I think it should be given it.
It is difficult for me to believe that if one were reading § 11 without consciousness of the problem now before us and merely as a matter of English one would make the “so” in the phrase “conspire to do so” relate back to all that is contained in the twenty-two preceding lines rather than to the “force or violence” clause immediately preceding. The structure of the sentence, grammar, and clarity of expression combine to attribute to the phrase *348“to do so” a limited reference instead of making “so” carry the burden of the whole paragraph as antecedent. Good sense reinforces these textual considerations. It is made an offense to conspire to violate not only the seven substantive offenses enumerated by Congress but also the multitudinous “rules and regulations.” There is an obvious difference between conspiracies to violate by force and violence any rule issued under the Act and a mere unexecuted arrangement between two people peacefully to escape one of such rules.
All extraneous aids confirm rather than contradict this construction.
The only authoritative legislative commentary we have on § 11 is the statement by Senator Sheppard, Chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, in a formal speech expounding the various provisions of the Act. There is every reason to believe that Senator Sheppard’s speech had behind it the authority of those who framed this legislation and who were cognizant of the prior legislation upon which they were building. Senator Sheppard stated that § 11 “contains the penalty provisions of the bill, which are substantially the same as those of the World War act. Experience with the World War provisions shows that they worked satisfactorily in providing the necessary protection.” 86 Cong. Rec. 10095. It is to be noted that Senator Sheppard spoke of the “World War provisions” and thereby evidently had in mind the various enactments available for dealing with interferences with the raising of an army.
In its arsenal of punishment the Government had provisions dealing specifically with conspiracies affecting the recruiting of an army as well as the all-comprehending conspiracy statute outlawing conspiracies to commit, any offense against the United States — an old enactment known to every tyro of federal law since Reconstruction days (R. S. § 5440, Act of March 2, 1867). What then *349were the specific conspiracy provisions which were “substantially” drawn upon for this war from the legislation of the First World War? (a) Section 6 of the Criminal Code, 18 U. S. C. § 6, punished conspiracies “by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States . . .” with a fine of $5,000 or imprisonment for six years or both. No overt act was required for prosecution for this conspiracy, (b) Section 4 of the Espionage Act, 40 Stat. 217, 219, 50 U. S. C. § 34, outlawed conspiracies to violate §§ 2 and 3 of the Espionage Act, to be punished by a fine of $10,000, imprisonment for twenty years or both. Section 4 required an overt act. This section survived the last war but was not, however, operative when the Selective Service Act was enacted because it applies only “when the United States is at war.”
If the conspiracy clause in § 11 is confined to offenses involving force or violence, the provisions as to conspiracy remain substantially the same under the 1940 Act as they were during the last war. Conspiracies to commit nonviolent offenses — that is, conspiracies to commit the range of substantive offenses, some of them rather minor in character, contained in § 11 — are of course still punishable under the general conspiracy provision, to wit § 37 of the Criminal Code, as was the situation during the last war. Offenses of violence which fell within § 6 of the Criminal Code in 1917 are now included within § 11, neither of which requires an overt act. The punishment for these conspiracies of violence is substantially similar— a $5,000 fine and six years imprisonment under § 6 and a $10,000 fine and five years imprisonment under § 11. Senator Sheppard’s desire for penalties “which are substantially the same as . . . the World War provisions” would thus appear to be accomplished.
But the Government urges that if § 11 of the 1940 Act merely hits a conspiracy to do an act of violence, the *350conspiracy clause will be redundant in that it will accomplish nothing except to increase the limit of the fine from $5,000 to $10,000 and to decrease the allowable imprisonment from six years to five years. This argument wholly overlooks two important changes effected by the conspiracy provision of the 1940 Act. The cases had raised doubt whether § 6 of the Criminal Code was properly applicable to conspiracies to violate by force the Draft Act. Compare Reeder v. United States, 262 F. 36, cert. denied, 252 U. S. 581, with Haywood v. United States, 268 F. 795, 799, cert. denied, 256 U. S. 689. By specific inclusion of a conspiracy provision in the Selective Service Act, instead of leaving it to the generality of § 6 of the Criminal Code, the doubt was completely eliminated. That in itself saves the conspiracy provision from mere redundancy, for it gives it, as a matter of law enforcement, an important function.
The Government also fails to take into account that the conspiracy provision of § 11 added considerably to the scope of § 6 — that the net of § 11 would catch many offenders left free by § 6 of the Criminal Code. The latter merely reaches conspiracies to obstruct by force the operation of “any law of the United States.” For more than half a century, ever since United States v. Eaton, 144 U. S. 677, it has been the settled principle of federal criminal law that a provision merely punishing violation of a “law” does not cover violations of rules or regulations made in conformity with that law. See United States v. Grimaud, 220 U. S. 506, 518-519. Section 6, therefore, does not cover violations of rules or regulations. Section 11 of the 1940 Act made an important addition in that it punishes conspiracies to interfere forcibly not merely “with the administration of this Act” but also with “the rules or regulations made pursuant thereto.”
United States v. Eaton is not a judicial sport. It is the application of a principle which has been undeviatingly *351applied by this Court — most recently in Viereck v. United States, 318 U. S. 236, 241 — and upon the basis of which Congress legislates. In re Kollock, 165 U. S. 526; United States v. Grimaud, supra; United States v. George, 228 U. S. 14. The principle is that a crime is defined by Congress, not by an executive agency. See United States v. Smull, 236 U. S. 405, 409. "Where the charge is of crime, it must have clear legislative basis.” United States v. George, supra, at 22. It is only when Congress in advance prescribes criminal sanctions for violations of authorized rules that violations of such rules can be punished as crimes. It is this far-reaching distinction which, it was pointed out in the Grimaud case, put on one side the doctrine of the Eaton case, where violation of rules and regulations was not made criminal, and on the other side legislation such as that enforced in the Grimaud case where Congress specifically provided that “any violation of the provisions of this act or such rules and regulations [of the Secretary of Agriculture] shall be punished.” (Italics added by Mr. Justice Lamar.) United States v. Grimaud, supra, at 515. Congress consciously gave an effect to the conspiracy clause of § 11 which is absent from that of § 6 of the Criminal Code.
There is another strong ground for concluding that the draftsmen of the Selective Service Act did not intend by its dubious language to extend the conspiracy provision beyond violent attempts and to sweep into this clause all conspiracies to violate the Act or any of its regulations. Whenever Congress desires to make a conspiracy provision apply to a whole series of substantive offenses, it does so explicitly. Either the conspiracy provision is set off in a separate section or subsection made applicable to all preceding sections, or else clear words of reference to "any provision” or “any of the acts made unlawful” are employed. See National Stolen Property Act, § 7, 53 Stat. 1178, 1179, 18 U. S. C. § 418a; Farm Credit Act, § 64 (f), *35248 Stat. 257, 269, 12 U. S. C. § 1138 (f); Sherman Act, § § 1—3, 26 Stat. 209, as amended, 15 U. S. C. §§ 1-3; Act of July 31, 1861, R. S. § 1980, 8 U. S. C. § 47. The absence of such explicitness in the Selective Service Act is a strong indication that no such sweeping scope was intended.
A statute defining specific crimes presents to courts a very different duty of construction than do regulatory enactments wherein Congress recites a broad policy in light of which the specific provisions of the regulatory scheme must be construed. In the latter situation, a particular provision of a statute derives meaning from the broad policy expressed. See Phelps Dodge Corp. v. Labor Board, 313 U. S. 177, 194. In a criminal statute like the one now under review language defining the crime is self-contained — there is no background of broad policy to guide the duty of giving such language its easy, most natural meaning.
In the past, decisions undoubtedly worked hard to narrow the scope of a criminal statute. It is against the whole tenor of reading a criminal statute to work hard to give it the broadest possible scope. The responsibility of Congress for manifesting its will is ill served by easy-going judicial construction of criminal statutes.
These views call for reversal of the judgment.
Mr. Justice Roberts, Mr. Justice Murphy and Mr. Justice Rutledge join in this dissent.

 54 Stat. 885, 894, 50 U. S. C. App. § 311. “Any person charged as herein provided with the duty of carrying out any of the provisions of this Act, or the rules or regulations made or directions given thereunder, who shall knowingly fail or neglect to perform *347such duty, and any person charged with such duty, or having and exercising any authority under said Act, rules, regulations, or directions who shall knowingly make, or be a party to the making, of any false, improper, or incorrect registration, classification, physical or mental examination, deferment, induction, enrollment, or muster, and any person who shall knowingly make, or be a party to the making of, any false statement or certificate as to the fitness or unfitness or liability or nonliability of himself or any other person for service under the provisions of this Act, or rules, regulations, or directions made pursuant thereto, or who otherwise evades registration or service in the land or naval forces or any of the requirements of this Act, or who knowingly counsels, aids, or abets another to evade registration or service in the land or naval forces or any of the requirements of this Act, or of said rules, regulations, or directions, or who in any manner shall knowingly fail or neglect to perform any duty required of him under or in the execution of this Act, or rules or regulations made pursuant to this Act, or any person or persons who shall knowingly hinder or interfere in any way by force or violence with the administration of this Act or the rules or regulations made pursuant thereto, or conspire to do so, shall, upon conviction in the district court of the United States having jurisdiction thereof, be punished by imprisonment for not more than five years or a fine of not more than $10,000, or by both such fine and imprisonment . . .”