Court Opinion

ID: 9430016
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:28:39.149992+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:22.441682
License: Public Domain

Justice White,
with whom The Chief Justice joins, dissenting.
Forsaking reliance on either the language or the history of § 2024(b)(1), the majority bases its result on the absence of an explicit rejection of the general principle that criminal liability requires not only an actus reus, but a mens rea. In my view, the result below is in fact supported by the statute’s language and its history, and it is the majority that has ignored general principles of criminal liability.
I
The Court views the statutory problem here as being how far down the sentence the term “knowingly” travels. See *435ante, at 424-425, n. 7. Accepting for the moment that if “knowingly” does extend to the “in any manner” language today’s holding would be correct — a position with which I take issue below — I doubt that it gets that far. The “in any manner” language is separated from the litany of verbs to which “knowingly” is directly connected by the intervening nouns. We considered an identically phrased statute last Term in United States v. Yermian, 468 U. S. 63 (1984). The predecessor to the statute at issue in that case provided: “ ‘[WJhoever shall knowingly and willfully . . . make . . . any false or fraudulent statements or representations ... in any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United States . . . shall be fined.’” Id., at 69, n. 6 (quoting Act of June 18, 1934, ch. 587, 48 Stat. 996). We found that under the “most natural reading” of the statute, “knowingly and willfully” applied only to the making of false or fraudulent statements and not to the fact of jurisdiction. 468 U. S., at 69, n. 6. By the same token, the “most natural reading” of § 2024(b)(1) is that “knowingly” modifies only the verbs to which it is attached.1
In any event, I think that the premise of this approach is mistaken. Even accepting that “knowingly” does extend through the sentence, or at least that we should read *436§ 2024(b)(1) as if it does, the statute does not mean what the Court says it does. Rather, it requires only that the defendant be aware of the relevant aspects of his conduct. A requirement that the defendant know that he is acting in a particular manner, coupled with the fact that that manner is forbidden, does not establish a defense of ignorance of the law. It creates only a defense of ignorance or mistake of fact. Knowingly to do something that is unauthorized by law is not the same as doing something knowing that it is unauthorized by law.
This point is demonstrated by the hypothetical statute referred to by the majority, which punishes one who “knowingly sells a security without a permit.” See ante, at 424-425, n. 7. Even if “knowingly” does reach “without a permit,” I would think that a defendant who knew that he did not have a permit, though not that a permit was required, could be convicted.
Section 2024(b)(1) is an identical statute, except that instead of detailing the various legal requirements, it incorporates them by proscribing use of coupons “in any manner not authorized” by law. This shorthand approach to drafting does not transform knowledge of illegality into an element of the crime. As written, § 2024(b)(1) is substantively no different than if it had been broken down into a collection of specific provisions making crimes of particular improper uses. For example, food stamps cannot be used to purchase tobacco. 7 CFR §§271.2, 274.10(a), 278.2(a) (1985). The statute might have said, inter alia, that anyone “who knowingly uses coupons to purchase cigarettes” commits a crime. Under no plausible reading could a defendant then be acquitted because he did not know cigarettes are not “eligible food.” But in fact, that is exactly what § 2024(b)(1) does say; it just does not write it out longhand.
The Court’s opinion provides another illustration of the general point: someone who used food stamps to purchase groceries at inflated prices without realizing he was over*437charged.2 I agree that such a person may not be convicted, but not for the reason given by the majority. The purchaser did not “knowingly” use the stamps in the proscribed manner, for he was unaware of the circumstances of the transaction that made it illegal.
The majority and I would part company in result as well as rationale if the purchaser knew he was charged higher than normal prices but not that overcharging is prohibited. In such a case, he would have been aware of the nature of his actions, and therefore the purchase would have been “knowing.” I would hold that such a mental state satisfies the statute. Under the Court’s holding, as I understand it, that person could not be convicted because he did not know that his conduct was illegal.3
*438Much has been made of the comparison between § 2024(b)(1) and § 2024(c). The Government, like the court below, see 735 F. 2d 1044, 1047-1048 (1984), argues that the express requirement of knowing illegality in subsection (c) supports an inference that the absence of such a provision in subsection (b)(1) was intentional. While I disagree with the majority’s refutation of this argument,4 I view most of this discussion as beside the point. The Government’s premise seems to me mistaken. Subsection (c) does not impose a requirement of knowing illegality. The provision is much like statutes that forbid the receipt or sale of stolen goods. See, e. g., 18 U. S. C. §§641, 2313. Just as those statutes generally require knowledge that the goods were stolen, so § 2024(c) requires knowledge of the past impropriety. But receipt-of-stolen-goods statutes do not require that the defendant know that receipt itself is illegal, and similarly § 2024(c) plainly does not require that the defendant know that it is illegal to present coupons that have been improperly used in the past. It is not inconceivable that someone presenting such coupons — again, like someone buying stolen goods — would think that his conduct was aboveboard despite *439the preceding illegality. But that belief, however sincere, would not be a defense. In short, because § 2024(c) does not require that the defendant know that the conduct for which he is being prosecuted was illegal, it does not create an ignorance-of-the-law defense.5
I therefore cannot draw the Government’s suggested inference. The two provisions are nonetheless fruitfully compared. What matters is not their difference, but their similarity. Neither contains any indication that “knowledge of the law defining the offense [is] an element of the offense.” See ALI, Model Penal Code §2.02, Comment 11, p. 131 (Tent. Draft No. 4, 1955). A requirement of knowing illegality should not be read into either provision.
I do agree with the Government that when Congress wants to include a knowledge-of-illegality requirement in a statute it knows how to do so, even though I do not consider subsection (c) an example. Other provisions of the United States Code explicitly include a requirement of familiarity with the law defining the offense — indeed, in places where, under the majority’s analysis, it is entirely superfluous. E. g., 15 U. S. C. §§79z-3, 80a-48. See also Model Penal Code, supra, at 139. Congress could easily have included a similar provision in § 2024(b)(1), but did not. Cf. United States v. Turkette, 452 U. S. 576, 580-581 (1981).
Finally, the lower court’s reading of the statute is consistent with the legislative history. As the majority points out, *440the history provides little to go on. Significantly, however, the brief discussions of this provision in the relevant congressional Reports do not mention any requirement of knowing illegality. To the contrary, when the Food Stamp Act was rewritten in 1977, the House Report noted that “[a]ny unauthorized use, transfer, acquisition, alteration, or possession of food stamps . . . may be prosecuted under” § 2024(b)(1). H. R. Rep. No. 95-464, p. 376 (1977) (emphasis added).
HH HH
The broad principles of the Court s opinion are easy to live with in a case such as this. But the application of its reasoning might not always be so benign. For example, § 2024(b)(1) is little different from the basic federal prohibition on the manufacture and distribution of controlled substances. Title 21 U. S. C. § 841(a) provides:
“ Except as authorized by this subchapter, it shall be unlawful for any person knowingly or intentionally— “(1) to manufacture, distribute, or dispense, or possess with intent to manufacture, distribute or dispense, a controlled substance . . . .”
I am sure that the Members of the majority would agree that a defendant charged under this provision could not defend on the ground that he did not realize his manufacture was unauthorized or that the particular substance was controlled. See United States v. Balint, 258 U. S. 250 (1922). On the other hand, it would be a defense if he could prove he thought the substance was something other than what it was. By the same token, I think, someone in petitioner’s position should not be heard to say that he did not know his purchase of food stamps was unauthorized, though he may certainly argue that he did not know he was buying food stamps. I would not stretch the term “knowingly” to require awareness of the absence of statutory authority in either of these provisions.
*441These provisions might be distinguished because of the different placements of the “except as authorized” and the “in any manner not authorized” clauses in the sentences. But see United States v. Yermian, 468 U. S., at 69, and n. 6. However, nothing in the majority’s opinion indicates that this difference is relevant. Indeed, the logic of the Court’s opinion would require knowledge of illegality for conviction under any statute making it a crime to do something “in any manner not authorized by law” or “unlawfully.” I suspect that if a case arises in the future where such a result is unacceptable, the Court will manage to distinguish today’s decision. But I will be interested to see how it does so.
I — I ► — I h-H
In relying on the “background assumption of our criminal law” that mens rea is required, ante, at 426, the Court ignores the equally well founded assumption that ignorance of the law is no excuse. It is. “the conventional position that knowledge of the existence, meaning or application of the law determining the elements of an offense is not an element of that offense . . . Model Penal Code, supra, at 130.
This Court’s prior cases indicate that a statutory requirement of a “knowing violation” does not supersede this principle. For example, under the statute at issue in United States v. International Minerals & Chemical Corp., 402 U. S. 558 (1971), the Interstate Commerce Commission was authorized to promulgate regulations regarding the transportation of corrosive liquids, and it was a crime to “knowingly violat[e] any such regulation.” 18 U. S. C. § 834(f) (1970 ed.). Viewing the word “regulations” as “a shorthand designation for specific acts or omissions which violate the Act,” 402 U. S., at 562, we adhered to the traditional rule that ignorance of the law is not a defense. The violation had to be “knowing” in that the defendant had to know that he was transporting corrosive liquids and not, for example, merely water. Id., at 563-564. But there was no requirement that *442he be aware that he was violating a particular regulation. Similarly, in this case the phrase “in any manner not authorized by” the statute or regulations is a shorthand incorporation of a variety of legal requirements. To be convicted, a defendant must have been aware of what he was doing, but not that it was illegal.
In Boyce Motor Lines, Inc. v. United States, 342 U. S. 337 (1952), the Court considered a statute that punished anyone who “knowingly violates” a regulation requiring trucks transporting dangerous items to avoid congested areas where possible. In rejecting a vagueness challenge, the Court read “knowingly” to mean not that the driver had to be aware of the regulation, see id., at 345 (Jackson, J., dissenting), but that he had to know a safer alternative route was available. Likewise, in construing 18 U. S. C. § 1461, which punishes “[wjhoever knowingly uses the mails for the mailing ... of anything declared by this section or section 3001(e) of Title 39 to be nonmailable,” we held that the defendant need not have known that the materials were nonmailable. Hamling v. United States, 418 U. S. 87, 120-124 (1974). “To require proof of a defendant’s knowledge of the legal status of the materials would permit the defendant to avoid prosecution by simply claiming that he had not brushed up on the law,” and was not required by the statute. Id., at 123-124. Accord, Rosen v. United States, 161 U. S. 29 (1896). See also United States v. Freed, 401 U. S. 601 (1971); id., at 612-615 (Brennan, J., concurring in judgment).
In each of these cases, the statutory language lent itself to the approach adopted today if anything more readily than does § 2024(b)(1).6 I would read § 2024(b)(1) like those stat*443utes, to require awareness of only the relevant aspects of one’s conduct rendering it illegal, not the fact of illegality. This reading does not abandon the “background assumption” of mens rea by creating a strict-liability offense,7 and is consistent with the equally important background assumption that ignorance of the law is not a defense.
> HH
I wholly agree that “[t]he contention that an injury can amount to a crime only when inflicted by intention is no provincial or transient notion.” Morissette v. United States, 342 U. S. 246, 250 (1952); ante, at 425. But the holding of the court below is not at all inconsistent with that longstanding and important principle. Petitioner’s conduct was intentional; the jury found that petitioner “realized what he was doing, and was aware of the nature of his conduct, and did not act through ignorance, mistake, or accident.” App. 33 (trial court’s instructions). Whether he knew which regulation he violated is beside the point.

 The majority’s efforts to distinguish Yermian are unavailing. First, it points out that under the statute at issue there, the prosecution had to establish some mens rea because it had to show a knowing falsehood. Ante, at 431-432. However, as the majority itself points out elsewhere, ante, at 423-424, n. 5, different mental states can apply to different elements of an offense. The fact that in Yermian mens rea had to be proved as to the first element was irrelevant to the Court’s holding that it did not with regard to the second. There is no reason to read this statute differently. Second, the majority states that the language in Yermian was “unambiguous.” Ante, at 432. Since it is identical, the language at issue in this case can be no less so. Finally, the majority notes, ibid., that the Court in Yermian did not decide whether the prosecution might have to prove that the defendant “should have known” that his statements were within the agency’s jurisdiction. 468 U. S., at 75, n. 14. However, that passing statement was irrelevant to the interpretation of the statute’s language the Court did undertake.

 Under the agency’s interpretation of the statute, as evidenced in the regulations, it is not at all clear that such a person would in fact be violating the statute. The regulation referred to by the majority, 7 CFR § 274.10(a) (1985), states that “coupons may be used only by the household ... to purchase eligible food for the household.” The prevailing price requirement is mentioned only in a section that applies to participating stores: “Coupons shall be accepted for eligible foods at the same prices and on the same terms and conditions applicable to cash purchases of the same foods at the same store.” § 278.2(b). For purposes of illustration, however, I will accept that not only overcharging, but also being overcharged, violates the statute.

 The appropriate prosecutorial target in such a situation would of course be the seller rather than the purchaser. I have no doubt that every prosecutor in the country would agree. The discussion of this hypothetical is wholly academic.
For similar reasons, I am unmoved by the specter of criminal liability for someone who is mistakenly mailed food stamps and throws them out, see ante, at 426-427, and do not think the hypothetical offers much of a guide to congressional intent. We should proceed on the assumption that Congress had in mind the run-of-the-mill situation, not its most bizarre mutation. Arguments that presume wildly unreasonable conduct by Government officials are by their nature unconvincing, and reliance on them is likely to do more harm than good. United States v. Dotterweich, 320 U. S. 277, 284-285 (1943). No rule, including that adopted by the Court today, is immune from such contrived defects.

 The Court asserts that the distinction would be meaningless because anyone who has violated subsection (c) will necessarily have violated subsection (b)(1) as well by “presenting], or eaus[ing] to be presented, coupons for payment or redemption” in an unauthorized manner. Ante, at 429. However, subsection (c) forbids presenting coupons knowing that they have been improperly used or acquired in the past. The manner of acquisition and presentation by the offender may be perfectly proper; the point is that the coupons are in a sense tainted by the prior transaction. Thus, if a check-out clerk accepts stamps for ineligible items, thereby violating § 2024(b)(1), and his employer collects the stamps and presents them for redemption in the normal course of business, it would not seem that the latter has violated § 2024(b)(1). He has done nothing in a manner not authorized by law. He has violated subsection (c) if, but only if, he knew of the clerk’s wrongdoing. It may be that merely by violating subsection (c) a grocer also violates subsection (b)(1); but absent the violation of subsection (c), I do not see how the grocer would violate subsection (b)(1) in such a ease.

 Similarly, it is a valid defense to a charge of theft that the defendant thought the property legally belonged to him, even if that belief is incorrect. But this is not because ignorance of the law is an excuse. Rather, “the legal element involved is simply an aspect of the attendant circumstances, with respect to which knowledge ... is required for culpability .... The law involved is not the law defining the offense; it is some other legal rule that characterizes the attendant circumstances that are material to the offense.” ALI, Model Penal Code § 2.02, Comment 11, p. 131 (Tent. Draft No. 4, 1955). Accord, United States v. Freed, 401 U. S. 601, 614-615 (1971) (Brennan, J., concurring in judgment). Cf. Morissette v. United States, 342 U. S. 246 (1952).

 The Court distinguishes these as “public welfare offense” cases involving inherently dangerous articles of commerce whose users should have assumed were subject to regulation. Ante, at 432-433. But see United States v. Freed, 401 U. S., at 612 (BRENNAN, J., concurring in judgment). Apart from the fact that a reasonable person would also assume food stamps are heavily regulated and not subject to sale and exchange, this dis*443tinction is not related to the actual holdings in those' cases. The Court’s opinion in Boyce and the concurrence in Freed do not discuss this consideration, And the Court’s references to the dangerousness of the goods in International Minerals were directed to possible due process challenges to convictions without notice of criminality. 402 U. S., at 564-565. As today’s majority acknowledges, ante, at 424, n. 6, there is no constitutional defect with the holding of the court below. The only issue here is one of congressional intent.

 Under a strict-liability statute, a defendant can be convicted even though he was unaware of the circumstances of his conduct that made it illegal. To take the example of a statute recently before the Court, a regulation forbidding hunting birds in a “baited” field can be read to have a scienter requirement, in which ease it would be a defense to prove that one did not know the field was baited, or not, in which case someone hunting in such a field is guilty even if he did not know and could not have known that it was baited. See Catlett v. United States, post, at 1074 (White, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari). I do not argue that the latter approach should be taken to this statute, nor would the statutory language allow it.