Court Opinion

ID: 9427984
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:22:30.887763+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:10.376607
License: Public Domain

Mr. Chief Justice Burger,
concurring.
If the question presented by this case were as simple and easy as the dissent formulates it — whether “the directors of a narcotics distribution business [should] be punished less severely than their subordinates who merely peddle the poison” — none of us would have any difficulty with the decision. But that is not really the issue. Rather, the question before the Court is substantially more limited: What do the words of the statute mean? Of course, we must try to discern the intent of Congress. But we perform that task by beginning with the ordinary meaning of the language of the statute. Our compass is not to read a statute to reach what we perceive — or even what we think a reasonable person should perceive — is a “sensible result”; Congress must be taken at its word unless we are to assume the role of statute revisers. Aaron v. SEC, 446 U. S. 680 (1980); TV A v. Hill, 437 U. S. 153, 173 (1978).
Particularly in the administration of criminal justice, a badly drawn statute places strains on judges. See, e. g., Busic v. United States, 446 U. S. 398 (1980); LaRocca v. United States (decided with Busic). The temptation to exceed our limited judicial role and do what we regard as the more sensible thing is great, but it takes us on a slippery *402slope. Our duty, to paraphrase Mr. Justice Holmes in a conversation with Judge Learned Hand, is not to do justice but to apply the law and hope that justice is done. The Spirit of Liberty: Papers and Addresses of Learned Hand 306-307 (Dilliard ed. 1960).
Not without the same reluctance that in my view underlies the Court's opinion, I join the opinion.