Court Opinion

ID: 9629194
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:38:58.950731+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:07:16.846687
License: Public Domain

CLARK, J., Dissenting.
In Jones v. North Carolina Prisoners’ Union (1977) 433 U.S. 119 [53 L.Ed.2d 629, 97 S.Ct. 2532], the United States Supreme Court upheld prison rules prohibiting prisoners from soliciting other inmates to join the Prisoners’ Union and barring union meetings and bulk mailings concerning the union from outside sources. Explaining its decision, the high court observed: “The interest in preserving order and authority in the prisons is self-evident. Prison life, and relations between the inmates themselves and between the inmates and prison officials or staff, contain the everpresent potential for violent confrontation and conflagration. Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S., at 561-562. Responsible prison officials must be permitted to take reasonable steps to *141forestall such a threat, and they must be permitted to act before the time when they can compile a dossier on the eve of a riot. The case of a prisoners’ union, where the focus is on the presentation of grievances to, and encouragement of adversary relations with, institution officials surely would rank high on anyone’s list of potential trouble spots. If the [prison officials’] views as to the possible detrimental effects of the organizational activities of the Union are reasonable, as we conclude they are, then the regulations are drafted no more broadly than they need be to meet the perceived threat—which stems directly from group meetings and group organizational activities of the Union.” (433 U.S. at pp. 132-133, fn. omitted [53 L.Ed.2d at p. 643].)
For the reasons stated by the high court, I conclude that the ban on official Prisoners Union correspondence between inmates and parolees is “necessary in order to provide for the reasonable security of the institution . . . and for the reasonable protection of the public.” (Pen. Code, § 2600.)