Court Opinion

ID: 9472129
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 03:50:44.266222+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:42:45.980565
License: Public Domain

*1188DUMBAULD, Senior District Judge.
On March 7, 1983, Attorney General William F. Smith announced new guidelines to govern “Domestic Security/Terrorism Investigations” by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Separate actions were brought by appellees Alliance to End Repression (Alliance) and American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to enjoin enforcement of certain parts of said guidelines on the ground that they conflict with the terms of a settlement agreement (hereinafter referred to as the consent decree) approved by District Judge Susan Getzendanner on August 11, 1981, in class actions brought by appellees herein at Nos. 74 C 3268 and 75 C 3295, and reported at 91 F.R.D. 182 (N.D.Ill.E.D.1981).1 On August 18, 1983, Judge Getzendanner granted a permanent injunction.2
The only provision enjoined was that stating:
When, however, statements advocate criminal activity ... an investigation under these Guidelines may be warranted unless it is apparent, from the circumstances or the context in which the statements are made, that there is no prospect of harm. [Appellants’ Brief, p. 17a; 561 F.Supp. at 583.]
Paragraph 3.6 of the consent decree contemplates that the provisions of paragraph 3.5 regulating investigative activities in Chicago shall be superseded by future federal statutes or executive orders or Department or Bureau regulations or guidelines
“Provided, that future or amended written Departmental or Bureau regulations, guidelines, or other procedures, or conduct relating to the use of investigative techniques described in Paragraph 3.5 shall be in accordance with the principles stated in Paragraph 3.4, and the applicable provisions of federal statutes and the United States Constitution.” [Joint Appendix (J.A.) 22]
Paragraph 3.4(a) of the consent decree prescribes as a general principle applicable to FBI activities in Chicago:
The FBI, in conducting domestic security investigations and inquiries, shall be ■ concerned only with conduct and only such conduct as is forbidden by a criminal law of the United States, or by a state criminal law when authorized by federal statute. The FBI shall not conduct an investigation solely on the basis of activities protected by the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, or on the lawful exercise of any right secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States. [J.A. 19]
The above paragraph embodies the distinction recognized in the challenged Smith guidelines between “preliminary inquiries” (which “shall be promptly terminated when it becomes apparent that a full investigation is not warranted”) and “investigations.” Investigations must be “based upon a reasonable factual predicate and shall have a valid law enforcement purpose.”
The guidelines then proceed to the paragraph the last sentence of which was stricken down by the District Court’s decision:
In its efforts to anticipate or prevent crime the FBI must at times initiate investigations in advance of criminal conduct. It is important that such investigations not be based solely on activities protected by the First Amendment or on the lawful exercise of any other rights secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States. When, however, statements advocate criminal activity or indicate an apparent intent to engage in crime, particularly crimes of violence, an investigation under these Guidelines may be warranted unless it is apparent, from the circumstances of the context in which *1189the statements are made, that there is no prospect of harm. [J.A. 77]
Investigations include “general crimes investigations” (J.A. 81) and “criminal intelligence investigations” (J.A. 83), which are subdivided into “racketeering enterprise investigations” (J.A. 84) and “Domestic Security/Terrorism Investigations” (J.A. 87). This last category is the type of investigation under scrutiny in the case at bar, and to which the challenged guidelines are addressed.
The definition of criminal intelligence investigations and the policies to be practiced in their conduct are set forth clearly in the guidelines. These investigations deal with “enterprises.” Such enterprises may
see either to obtain monetary or commercial gains or profits through racketeering activities or to further political or social goals through activities that involve criminal violence. These investigations differ from general crimes investigations ... in several important respects. As a general rule, an investigation of a completed criminal act is normally confined to determining who committed that act and with securing evidence to establish the elements of the particular offense____ An intelligence investigation of an ongoing criminal enterprise must determine the size and composition of the group involved, its geographic dimensions, its past acts and intended criminal goals, and its capacity for harm. While a standard criminal investigation terminates with the decision to prosecute or not to prosecute, the investigation of a criminal enterprise does not necessarily end, even though one or more of the participants may have been prosecuted.
In addition, the organization provides a life and continuity of operation that are not normally found in a regular criminal activity. As a consequence, these investigations may continue for several years. Furthermore, as Justice Powell noted, the focus of such investigations “May be less precise than that directed against more conventional types of crime.” United States v. United States District Court, 407 U.S. 297, 322, 92 S.Ct. 2125, 2139, 32 L.Ed.2d 752 (1972). Unlike the usual criminal case, there may be no completed offense to provide a framework for the investigation. It often requires the fitting together of bits and pieces of information many meaningless by themselves to determine whether a pattern of criminal activity exists. For this reason, the investigation is broader and less discriminate than usual, involving “the interrelation of various sources and types of information.” Id.
Members of groups or organizations acting in concert to violate the law present a grave threat to society. An investigation of organizational activity, however, may present special problems particularly where it deals with politically motivated acts. “There is often a convergence of First and Fourth Amendment values, ” in such matters that is “not found in cases of ‘ordinary’ crime. ” Id. Thus special care must be exercised in sorting out protected activities from those which may lead to violence or serious disruption of society. As a consequence, the guidelines establish safeguards for group investigations of special sensitivity, including tighter management controls and higher levels of review. (J.A. 83-84, italics supplied)
With respect to domestic security/terrorism investigations the guidelines explain that these deal with “enterprises, other than those involved in international terrorism, whose goals are to achieve political or social change through activities that involve force or violence.” Like racketeering enterprise investigations, they are “concerned with the investigation of entire enterprises, rather than individual participants and specific criminal acts,” and include “investigations to determine the structure and scope of the enterprise as well as the relationship of the members.” (J.A. 87)
More specifically, the guidelines provide that:
*1190A domestic security/terrorism investigation may be initiated when the facts or circumstances reasonably indicate that two or more persons are engaged in an enterprise for the purpose of furthering political or social goals wholly or in part through activities that involve force or violence and a violation of the criminal laws of the United States. The standard of “reasonable indication” is identical to that governing the initiation of a general crimes investigation____ In determining whether an investigation should be conducted, the FBI shall consider all of the circumstances including: (1) the magnitude of the threatened harm; (2) the likelihood it will occur; (3) the immediacy of the threat; and (4) the danger to privacy and free expression posed by an investigation. (J.A. 87-88)
With this context of the structure of the guidelines in view, we turn to the specific question addressed by the District Court: Whether in fact the new guidelines embody standards inconsistent with those established by the consent decree.
In reviewing the passage enjoined in the District Court’s judgment, the District Court points out that: “Plainly read, the final sentence of the passage last quoted allows investigations when (1) the target ‘advocate[s] criminal activity’; and (2) it is not ‘apparent ... that there is no prospect of harm.’ ” [561 F.Supp. at 578]
The District Court then states that: “Much of the advocacy covered by this standard, however, falls within the protective shield of the First Amendment” and fails to comply with the teaching of Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444, 447, 89 S.Ct. 1827, 1829, 23 L.Ed.2d 430 (1969) that “the constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.”
According to the District Court:
The standard embraced by the Reagan Guidelines is more lenient in three respects. First, under the Guidelines, the feared “harm” need not be, as it must under Brandenburg, “imminent.” Second, and also contrary to Brandenburg, the feared “harm” need not be “likely.” Finally, the speech need not be “directed” {i.e., intended) to cause imminent, lawless action. [561 F.Supp. at 578]
These deviations from Brandenburg are not substantial. Indeed, were we construing the guidelines by themselves, without the guidance afforded by the consent decree and by the argument of government counsel, we should be tempted to suppose that the guidelines were substantially equivalent to the Brandenburg formulation, and constituted an attempt to paraphrase the traditional principle in operational bureaucratic prose.
As the District Court points out, paragraph 3.1 of the consent decree states that the settlement agreement “is entered into voluntarily by the parties, based on the ... [Levi] guidelines ... and on the understanding of them reflected in fl 2;2 ... ” (J.A. 17).
Paragraph 2.2 of the consent decree indicates the view that “the Guidelines are not intended to permit domestic security investigations of groups which advocate the necessity for violent revolution at some time in the indefinite future, but which do not now engage in serious crimes or violence or advocate imminent serious crime or violence.” (J.A. 12)
In other words, it was understood that the phrase “protected by the First Amendment” in paragraph 3.4 “incorporated the test enunciated in Brandenburg.” 561 F.Supp. at 579.
Likewise at the argument in the case at bar government counsel rejected the suggestion that the Brandenburg standard and that set forth in the challenged Smith guidelines were substantially the same with a vigorous thwertutnay.3
*1191Government counsel seek to escape Brandenburg as an authoritative precedent by arguing that it deals only with punishment, rather than with investigation. They contend that:
The Brandenburg decision dealt with attempts by the state to punish speakers through criminal sanctions. The Reagan Guidelines, by contrast, deal only with the “more limited” power to investigate. Thus, according to the Government, an activity may be “protected” from punishment, but not from investigation. [561 F.Supp. at 379]
This ingenious distinction may or may not be true as a matter of constitutional law, but it has no impact on the case at bar, and like the District Court we do not pause to determine its validity.
The case at bar involves a proceeding to enforce the consent decree, not one to vindicate constitutional rights per se. The government may improvidently or as a matter of trial tactics have entered into a voluntary settlement of broader scope than what was required by the Constitution. And the subject matter of the consent decree was investigations. See paragraphs 1.4 and 3.5. If with respect to investigations they adopted the Brandenburg standards, it is immaterial that that case was not strictly speaking an applicable binding precedent. The then Attorney General’s authority to enter into consent decrees included “the power to make erroneous decisions as well as correct ones,” Swift & Co. v. U.S., 276 U.S. 311, 332, 48 S.Ct. 311, 317, 72 L.Ed. 587 (1928), and, we might add, improvident as well as judicious ones.
For that matter, Brandenburg could be viewed as an inapplicable precedent, not only because it dealt with punishment rather than investigation, but because it dealt with State rather than federal prosecution.
But this would be an equally fatuous distinction. The traditional principle which the consent decree derived from Brandenburg had been applied to the federal government in Dennis.4 Since five verbose opinions were published in Dennis, it was natural to rely on the clearer statement in Brandenburg, even when referring to limitations on the activities of federal agencies such as the FBI. Indeed, the traditional principle involved in Brandenburg was nothing new. It was enunciated by Thomas Jefferson in the celebrated Virginia Act for Establishing Religious Freedom in these words: “it is time enough for the rightful purposes of civil government for its officers to interfere when principles break out into overt acts against peace and good order.”5 And the Supreme Court had declared that “Congress was deprived of all legislative power over mere opinion, but was left free to reach actions which were in violation of social duties or subversive of good order.” 6
Since the government has rejected the interpretation of the guidelines as paraphrasing the Brandenburg standards, and since there is therefore a violation of the settlement agreement which appellees are entitled by the terms thereof to enforce judicially, the judgment of the District Court must be affirmed, except with regard to the scope of relief granted.
We are not satisfied that an injunction against the offending passage of the guidelines is necessary. Recurring to what Justice Frankfurter often spoke of as “the traditional requisites of equity jurisdiction,” the extraordinary remedy of injune*1192tion should not be resorted to unless there is lack of an adequate remedy at law and a sufficient showing of irreparable damage is made. The District Court (561 F.Supp. at 580) could “conceive of no meaningful way to calculate whatever damages might be due.” But the injunction provided no pecuniary compensation to any plaintiff, and merely dealt with conduct in futuro. The government should be given the benefit of the Brandenburg doctrine which appellees espouse: unless there is substantial and imminent danger of action by the FBI violating the Brandenburg principle as embodied in the consent decree, an injunction is inappropriate, for there is no irreparable injury sustained by any plaintiff.
We do not believe that there is sufficient likelihood of such violations by the FBI in disregard of this Court’s decision and of the provisions in the guidelines themselves, quoted hereinabove, recognizing the importance of the rule that “investigations not be based solely on activities protected by the First Amendment or on the lawful exercise of any other rights secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States,” and calling for exercise of “special care” and “safeguards ... of special sensitivity, including tighter management controls and higher levels of review” in cases where there could be impact on such constitutionally “protected activities.”
We note especially the specific provision, hereinabove quoted, from the guidelines which mandates (in terms reminiscent of the Brandenburg-Dennis principle) that the FBI “shall consider all of the circumstances including: (1) the magnitude of the threatened harm; (2) the likelihood it will occur; (3) the immediacy of the threat; and (4) the danger to privacy and free expression posed by an investigation.” (J.A. 87-88).
We note also the clear statement of Director Webster that “These guidelines do not alter our clearly stated obligation to respect constitutional safeguards reflected especially in the First Amendment” (J.A. 129) and shall expect his review of the propriety of commencing and continuing investigations in “advocacy” cases to be in keeping with the obligation he has here enunciated. Moreover, the lack of need for an injunction is further reinforced by the terms of paragraph 3.6(c) of the consent decree. In substance this provision is self-operative, and has the effect of preventing the Reagan guidelines from going into effect in Chicago or superseding the provisions of Paragraph 3.5 as they stood prior to the new guidelines unless the new guidelines .were consistent with Paragraph 3.4 of the consent decree.7
Accordingly we direct that the District Court retain continuing jurisdiction of the case at bar, so that if any occasion for future relief might arise the proceedings may be reinstated in statu quo, without unnecessary formalities or delays, to consider any supervening alleged violations.
The judgment of the District Court will be modified by striking out the passage granting injunctive relief, and as so modified and treated as a declaratory judgment interpreting the terms of the consent decree of August 11, 1981, will be
Affirmed.

. Paragraph 5.1 of the consent decree authorizes petitions to enforce the settlement to be brought by appellees and others. In any event the court would have inherent power to enforce a judgment.

. Her opinion and order are reported in Alliance to End Repression v. City of Chicago, 561 F.Supp. 575 (N.D.Ill.E.D.1983).

. According to John W. Davis, this term is an old English expression signifying an emphatic *1191denial. “If the question warrants a negative answer, do not fence with it but respond with a bold thwertutnay — which for the benefit of the illiterate I may explain as a term used in ancient pleading to signify a downright No." John W. Davis, “The Argument of an Appeal,” 26 Am.Bar Assn.J. (1940) 895, 897.

. Dennis v. U.S., 341 U.S. 494, 509-510, 71 S.Ct. 857, 867, 95 L.Ed. 1137 (1951), adopting the formulation by Learned Hand in the court below.

. 12 Hening, The Statutes at Large [of Virginia], 84-86 (1823).

. Reynolds v. U.S., 98 U.S. 145, 164, 25 L.Ed. 244 (1878). See also other cases cited in Dumbauld, The Bill of Rights and What It Means Today (1957) 111.

. Paragraph 3.6 reads: "Any provision of Paragraph 3.5 shall be superseded by ...
(c) Any future ... guideline ...
Provided, that future ... guidelines ... shall be in accordance with the principles stated in Paragraph 3.4, and the applicable provisions of federal statutes and the United States Constitution." J.A. 21-22.