Court Opinion

ID: 9425698
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:15:29.303582+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:16:20.796636
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Marshall,
with whom Mr. Justice Douglas and Mr. Justice Brennan join, dissenting.
I agree with my Brother Douglas that the provisions of the District of Columbia Code requiring a showing of need for execution of a search warrant at night govern the search involved in this case, and, accordingly, I join in his dissenting opinion. A majority of the Court, however, rejects this argument and goes on to discuss the standards imposed by 21 U. S. C. § 879 (a) upon issuance of search warrants for nighttime execution in federal narcotics cases. Obviously, the Court’s interpretation of § 879 (a) is of far greater significance, of national rather than purely local concern. I cannot let the .Court’s construction óf § 879 (a) pass without registering my dissent on this issue as well.
The opinion of the Court, it seems to me, analyzes the § 879 (a) issue in a vacuum, without any discussion of some of the important policy considerations which underlie this question of statutory interpretation. Perhaps a partial vacuum would be a more appropriate description, since the Court is. obviously fully cognizant of the substantial governmental interest in enforcement of the narcotics laws, an interest- which- its interpretation of § 879. (a) so well serves. But plainly there are other concerns implicated in our 'interpretation of this con*462gressional enactment restricting the issuance of search warrants — the protection of individual privacy which is the very purpose of the statute’s search warrant requirement and which of course is given constitutional recognition in the Fourth Amendment. The Court seems totally oblivious to these constitutional considerations. Taking them into account, I find that the only acceptable interpretation of the statute is one which requires some additional justification for authorizing a nighttime search over and above the ordinary showing of probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed and that evidence of the crime will be found upon the search.
Fundamentally at issue in this case is the extent of the protection which we will all enjoy from police intrusion into the privacy of our homes during the middle of the night. The Fourth Amendment was intended to protect our reasonable expectations of privacy from unjustified governmental intrusion. Katz v. United States, 389 U. S. 347, 360-362 (1967) (Harlan, J., concurring). In my view, there is no expectation of privacy more reasonable and. more demanding of constitutional protection than our right to expect that we will be let. alone in the. privacy of our homes during the night. The idea of the police unnecessarily forcing their way into the home in the middle of the night — frequently, in narcotics cases, without knocking and announcing their purpose — rousing the residents out of their beds, and forcing them to stand by in indignity in their night clothes'while the police rummage through their belongings does indeed smack of a “ ‘police state’ lacking in the respect for . . . the right of privacy dictated by the U. S. Constitution.” S.Rep. No. 91-538, p. 12 (1969). The public outrage at the series of mistaken'nighttime raids by narcotics agents in Collinsville, Illinois, last *463April, see N. Y. Times, Apr. 29, 1973, p. 1, col. 5; N. Y. Times, Apr. 30, 1973, p. 30, col. 1, serves to emphasize just how inconsistent with our constitutional guarantees such nighttime searchés are.
This Court has consistently recognized that the intrusion upon privacy engendered by a search of a residence at night is of an order of magnitude greater than that produced by an ordinary search. Mr. Justice Harlan observed in holding a nighttime search unconstitutional in Jones v. United States, 357 U. S. 493, 498 (1958): “[I]t is difficult to imagine a more severe invasion of privacy than the nighttime intrusion into a private home.” In Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U. S. 443, 477 (1971), the Court again recognized that a midnight entry into a home was an “extremely serious intrusion.” And our decision in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U. S. 479 (1965), was in large part based upon our revulsion at the thought of nighttime searches of the marital bedroom to discover evidence of illegal contraceptive use. See id., at 485-486.
It is small wonder, then, that Congress has consistently required more stringent justification for nighttime searches. than that needed to authorize a search during the day. The first congressional enactment setting out comprehensive search warrant procedures, § 10 of Tit. XI of the Espionage Act of 1917, 40 Stat. 217, 229, 18 U. S. C. § 620 (1940 ed.). required that the affiant must be “positive” that the property to be seized was on the premises to justify a nighttime search. When the provisions of the Espionage Act were replaced by the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure in 1946, this requirement of positivity was carried forward in Rule 41. Despite the stringency of this requirement, it remained with us until very recently, until the 1972 amendments to Rule 41. And although the Rule was then modified to require *464“reasonable cause” for nighttime execution of a warrant, significantly the amended Rule retained the principle that nighttime searches require an' additional showing of justification over and above probable cause. Congress has also manifested its concern for protection of individual privacy against nighttime searches in its legislation for the District of Columbia, as Mr. Justice Douglas’ opinion amply demonstrates with respect to enactment of the D. C. Court Reform and Criminal Procedure Act in 1970. Ante, at 460.1
.The strong policy underlying these congressional enactments is clear. As even the Government in this case concedes, “searches conducted in the middle of the night . . . involve a greater intrusion than ordinary searches and therefore require a greater justification.” Brief for United States 14. In my view, this principle may well be a constitutional imperative. It is by now established Fourth Amendment doctrine that increasingly severe standards of probable cause are necessary to justify increasingly intrusive searches. In Camara v. Municipal Court, 387 U. S. 523 (1967), after holding that search warrants were required to authorize administrative inspections, we held that the quantum of probable cause required, for issuance of an inspection warrant must be determined in part.by the reasonableness of the proposed search.. As Mr. Justice White stated, “there can be no ready test for determining reasonableness other than by balancing.the need to search against the invasion which the search entails.” Id., at 536-537. The Court in Camara thus approved the issu*465anee of area inspection warrants in part because such searches “involve a relatively limited invasion of the urban citizen’s privacy.” Id., at 537. See also Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1, 20-21 (1968); Couch v. United States, 409 U. S. 322, 349 n. 6 (1973) (Marshall, J., dissenting). I do not regard this principle as a one-way street, to be used only to water down the requirement of probable cause when necessary to authorize governmental intrusions. In some situations — and the search of a private home during nighttime would.seem to be a paradigm— this principle requires a showing of additional justification for a search over and above the ordinary showing of probable cause. Cf. Stanford v. Texas, 379 U. S. 476, 485-486 (1965).
. Of course, this constitutional question is not presented in this case and need not be resolved here. But the long history of congressional authorization of nighttime searches only upon a showing of additional justification, the strong constitutionally based policy which these statutes implement, and the substantial, constitutional question posed by the majority’s interpretation of § 879 (a) are surely relevant to the question of statutory interpretation with which we. are faced. Viewed against this background, I think it is plain that the majority’s interpretation of. the statute should be rejected
' Section 879 (a) provides that search warrants may be executed at night only if “there is probable cause to. believe that grounds exist for the warrant and for its service at such time.” It seems to me quite, clear that the statute, on its face, imposes two distinct requirements: that there be probable cause for the issuance of the warrant, and that there be cause “for its service at such time.” While the Coprt relies on legislative history which suggests that § 879 (a) merely “incorporates” the provisions of its predecessor, 18 U. S. C. § 1405 (1964 ed.), the plain *466fact is that § 879 (a) doés far more than this: it also adds to the language- of § 1405 the final clause — “and for its service at such time” — which is at the heart of the dispute in this case. I can see no plausible interpretation of this final clause other than that it imposes an additional requirement of justification for a search at night over and above a showing of probable cause.
The Court, while conceding this to be a “possible” meaning of the statute’s final clause, argues that “it is by no means the only possible meaning attributable to --the words.” Ante, at 455. Unfortunately, the Court then fails to come forward with any alternative interpretation of these final words of §879 (a). Instead, the Court simply reads the disputed language out of the statute entirely, and decrees that the statute shall be interpreted as if it were not there. The Court'holds that the statute requires only “a showing that the contraband is likely to be on the'property or-person to be searched at that time” to -justify nighttime execution of a search warrant. Ante, at 458. But the showing of probable cause required for issuance of any warrant necessarily includes a showing that the objects to be seized will probably be found on thé premises at the time of the search. See Sgro v. United States, 287 U. S. 206, 210-211 (1932); Schoeneman v. United States, 115 U. S. App. D. C. 110, 113, 317 F. 2d 173, 176-177 (1963); Rosencranz v. United States, 356 F. 2d 310, 315-318 (CA1 1966). ' This requirement is clearly iifiposed by the Fourth Amendment itself. It is also clearly mandated by the first part of the statutory language, which merely incorporates the constitutional requirement of probable cause for issuance of the warrant. The majority’s interpretation of the statute thus leaves the final clause of § 879 (a) — the language in controversy here — totally without meaning. See United States v. Thomas, 294 A. 2d 164, 170 (DC Ct. App.) *467(Kelly, J., dissenting), cert. denied, 409 U. S. 992 (1972); United States v. Gooding, 155 U. S. App. D. C. 259, 273, 477 F. 2d 428, 442 (1973) (Robinson, J., concurring in result). I cannot subscribe to such an eviseération of the statute.2
*468The Court bases its holding upon the meager recorded legislative history of § 879 (a). But when the language of a statute is as clear and unambiguous as it is here, it is neither helpful nor appropriate to look to its legislative history. Ex parte Collett, 337 U. S. 55, 61 (1949); United States v. Oregon, 366 U. S. 643, 648 (1961). While committee reports in particular are often a helpful guide to the meaning 'of ambiguous statutory language, even 'they must be disregarded, if inconsistent with the j>l£iin language of the statute. Helvering v. City Bank Farmers Trust Co., 296 U. S. 85, 89 (1935); George Van Camp & Sons Co. v. American Can Co., 278 U. S. 245, 253-254 (1929). It is. the language of the statute, as enacted by the Congress, that is the law of the land, not the language of & committee report which may or may not represent accurately the views of the hundreds of other legislators who voted for the bill.
In any event, even if resort to examination of the legislative history were appropriate. here, I do not find it nearly so conclusive as does the majority of the Court. The Court relies on a single brief statement on § 879 (a) in the committee report stating that the statute merely incorporated the provisions of § 1405, which had been .construed not to impose any requirement for a nighttime search warrant over and above probable cause. Yet this statement fails to provide any explanation for the language which Congress added to § 1405, the language *469in controversy here. As to the meaning — or, as the Court would have it, the lack of meaning — of this language, the Court relies basically upon the law enforcement goals of the Department, of Justice and the silence of Congress. But, as -we have frequently warned, “[i]t is at best treacherous tó find in, congressional silence alone the adoption of „a controlling rule of law.” Girouard v. United States, 328 U. S. 61, 69 (1946); see H. M. Hart & A. Sacks, The Legal Process:Basic Problems in the Making and Application of Law 1395-1398 (tent. ed. 1958), and cases there cited. The Court in. effect presumes from Congress’ failure to explain the meaning of the final'clause ,of § 879 (a) its acquiescence in the Justice Department’s apparent view that- this language in fact serves no purpose. , . . .
I would presume the contrary. Congress’ consistent protection of nighttime privacy by imposing restrictions, upon the availability of warrants for nighttime searches; reinforces the unambiguous statutory language. Both lead me to the conclusion. that: .the final' clause of § 879 (a) must be viewed as another congressional mani-. festation of its strong policy against nighttime intrusions into the home. I do not think that this interpretation is at all inconsistent with the narcotics law-enforcement objectives which were the principal focus of this legislation. The requirement that cause be shown for the' necessity of a nighttime search is still a substantial easing of the requirement of positivity which was then embodied in Rule 41, and which would otherwise, have applied to many of the searches now covered by § 879 (a). I respectfully dissent..

 Similarly, most of the States' laws provide that search warrants may only be served during the day unless express authorization for a nighttime search is obtained, and such authorization can generally be obtained only by meeting special requirements for a' nighttime search. See L. Hall, Y. Kamisar, W. LaFave & J. Israel, Modern Criminal Procedure 259 (3d ed. 1969).

 In an effort to conjure up ambiguity in the statutory language, the Court argues that the statute could have been drawn with more precision, and specifically points out that read literally, the statutory requirement of cause “for its service at such time” would seem to apply to daytime searches as well as those conducted at night. Ante, at 455-456. ■ I readily agree that the statute could have been more artfully drafted, but the fact that it could have been stated in different words hardly justified disregarding the plain meaning of the statutory language with which we must deal. It ill suits the Court to suggest that this language is ambiguous when the Court is unable to come forward with any plausible alternative construction.
The Court's suggestion that the statute is ambiguous because it could be literally applied to daytime searches as well as those during the night is wholly insubstantial. As the Court well knows, ho one has ever proposed that an additional burden of justification for daytime searches' is necessary or appropriate; in sharp contrast, the Cong'•ess has consistently acted to protect nighttime privacy through such an additional burden on nighttime searches. The Court’s confusion arises only because the words “at such time” in the statute logically refer back to‘ its authorization of service “at 'any time of the day or night.” But this latter phrase has consistently been used in congressional enactments as a shorthand expression for a warrant whose service at night is authorized, see, e. g., D. C. Code § 33-414 (h), ante, at 433 n. 3; §§ 23-521 (f) (5), 23-522 (c) (1), ante, at 435-436, n. 4; cf. former Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 41 (c), ante, at 436-437, n. 5, to distinguish such a warrant from any other warrant, which may be served only in the day. Plainly the statute’s requirement of cause “for its service at such time” was intended to apply only to nighttime execution of search warrants.
As for the Court’s complaint that a requirement of cause for nighttime service of a warrant is not the “traditional limitation” imposed upon nighttime searches, it should suffice to point out that Congress became aware in its consideration of the D. C. Court Reform and Criminal Procedure Act in 1969 that a requirement of cause would provide greater protection for nighttime privacy than the old posi*468tivity test, by eliminating unnecessary nighttime searches.regardless of how sure police were of their basis for the'search. See Hearings on Crime, in the National Capital before the Senate Committee on the District of Columbia, 91st Cong., 1st Sess., pt. 4, p. 1404 (1969); Brief for United States 49-60. This change was therefore incorporated into the D. C. Code, see D. C. Code §§23-521 to 23-523. It was also adopted in the 1972 amendment-to Rule .41. ..It..would hardly be surprising for the Cong'ress to introduce a modification along the same lines into § 879 (a). .