Court Opinion

ID: 9428303
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:23:23.402787+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:12.782389
License: Public Domain

Justice Brennan,
with whom Justice Marshall joins, dissenting.
United States v. Sanges, 144 U. S. 310 (1892), announced the general rule that governments may not appeal in criminal cases in the federal courts in the absence of express statutory authority. Finding, inter alia, that the predecessor to 28 U. S. C. § 1291 was not sufficiently express,1 Sanges refused to allow an appeal by the Federal Government. To*252day, however, the Court intertwines § 1291 with an Arizona statute authorizing writs of certiorari on behalf of the State in criminal cases in the Arizona courts to make § 1291 “sufficiently express” to authorize a State to appeal from a federal district court’s judgment of acquittal. Because this result flouts Congress’ authority to régulate the jurisdiction of the lower federal courts, I respectfully dissent.
I
The Court proposes the novel interpretation of Sanges and its progeny as “flow[ing] from a tradition of requiring that a prosecutorial appeal be affirmatively sanctioned by the same sovereign that sponsors the prosecution.” Ante, at 249.2 I find this reading of the Sanges rule inaccurate: in my view, Sanges plainly requires express authorization from the legislative body controlling federal-court jurisdiction for all government appeals in criminal cases in the federal courts.3 The Court stated that the express authorization must be made by the legislature “acting within its constitutional authority.” 144 U. S., at 318. Since Congress is the only entity constitutionally empowered to grant express authority for government appeals in the federal courts, the Sanges principle necessarily confines our inquiry to whether there is express authorization in federal statutes controlling criminal appeals by the States in federal court. Therefore, the Court’s finding that Arizona, the sovereign sponsoring the prosecution in the instant case, has sanctioned prosecutorial appeals in its courts is irrelevant to the question of federal appellate jurisdiction *253here. Focusing as we must on federal statutes, I find the pertinent federal statutes wholly barren of any express authorization of criminal appeals by States to the federal courts of appeals.4 Today, as in 1892, § 1291 “says nothing as to the party by whom the writ of error may be brought, and cannot therefore be presumed to have been intended to confer upon the government the right to bring [an appeal].” Id., at 323.
This conclusion is supported by Maryland v. Soper, 270 U. S. 9 (1926), which relied on the Sanges rule to conclude that a State has no right of appeal from a decision of a federal district court in a criminal case removed from state court. In Soper, four United States prohibition agents and their chauffeur were indicted for murder in the State of Maryland. The defendants petitioned the Federal District Court for removal, averring that they were federal agents5 and that their acts “were done in the discharge of their official duties as prohibition agents.” 270 U. S., at 22. The District Court granted defendants’ petition and the State subsequently applied to this Court for a writ of mandamus to overturn the removal order. Over respondent’s objection that mandamus did not lie to correct an erroneous removal order, this Court granted the writ. Observing that “there should be a more liberal use of mandamus [in removal of State criminal cases] than in removal of civil cases,” id., at 29, the Court specifically noted:
“Except by issue of mandamus, [the State] is without an opportunity to invoke the decision of this Court upon the issue it would raise. The order of the United States District Judge refusing to remand is not open to re*254view on a writ of error, and a judgment of acquittal in that court is final. United States v. Sanges, 144 U. S. 310 . . . Id., at 30 (emphasis added).
Significantly, the predecessor to § 1291 was available then, as it is now, to support an argument that the State had a right of appeal. Nonetheless, on the strength of Sanges, the Court concluded that a judgment of acquittal was unreviewable 6 because there was no express federal statute authorizing an appeal by the State. See Government of Virgin Islands v. Hamilton, 475 F. 2d 529, 530-531 (CA3 1973).
The Court attempts to deflect the force of this precedent by interpreting Maryland v. Soper as merely "reflect[ing] an awareness of controlling double jeopardy doctrine, which at the time was thought to protect a defendant once a judgment of acquittal had been entered in federal court.” Ante, at 248, n. 25. But this is a clearly incorrect reading, for it ignores the fact that at the time Maryland v. Soper was decided, the prohibition contained in the Fifth Amendment’s Double Jeopardy Clause was applicable only against the Federal Government in federal prosecutions, and not against state governments in state prosecutions. See Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U. S. 319 (1937).7 It was not until 32 years later that Benton *255v. Maryland, 395 U. S. 784 (1969), overruled Palko and held that the Double Jeopardy Clause was applicable against the States. Since the Double Jeopardy Clause did not apply to prosecutions initiated by the States, and state substantive law governed criminal cases removed to federal district court, Tennessee v. Davis, 100 U. S. 257, 271 (1880), the Court’s suggestion that the statement in Maryland v. Soper referred to double jeopardy limitations is plainly unfounded.
II
Even on its own terms the Court’s opinion is unpersuasive. The Court concludes that appeals by the States are permissible under § 1291 “when the legislature responsible for that power has spoken in express terms, or when a legislative enactment has been authoritatively construed by the sovereign’s highest court.” Ante, at 249. The Arizona statute supposedly authorizing appeal, however, is anything but “express.” That, statute provides:
“The writ of certiorari may be granted by the supreme and superior courts or by any judge thereof, in all cases when an inferior tribunal, board or officer, exercising judicial functions, has exceeded its jurisdiction and there is no appeal, nor, in the judgment of the court, a plain, speedy and adequate remedy.” Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. §12-2001 (1956) (emphasis added).
The State may obtain a writ of certiorari by filing a petition for special action pursuant to Rule 4, Rules of Procedure for Special Actions, vol. 17A, Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. (1973).
If it be true the State’s petition for review “has been routinely granted” by the appellate courts, ante, at 240, this hardly qualifies as an authoritative construction by the State’s highest court that the statute itself authorizes review in every case. The Court has failed to cite a single precedent in which the Arizona Supreme Court has investigated the intent of the state legislature in passing the statute authoriz*256ing prosecutorial appeals. More importantly, by relying on state-court decisions allowing certiorari review on behalf of the State, the Court has undercut the only rationale justifying today’s result. The Court reasons:
“Our continuing refusal to assume that the United States possesses any inherent right to appeal reflects an abiding concern to check the Federal Government’s possible misuse of its enormous prosecutorial powers. By insisting that Congress speak with a clear voice when extending to the Executive a right to expand criminal prosecutions, Sanges and its subsequent applications have placed the responsibility for such assertions of authority over citizens in the democratically elected legislature where it belongs.” Ante, at 247.
It is difficult to understand how the Court’s insistence that the democratically elected legislature speak with a clear voice can be satisfied without interpretive decisions of the State’s highest court holding that the state legislature has done so in the case of § 12-2001. Indeed, the Court’s application of a less stringent requirement of clarity in the case of state legislation than in the case of federal legislation, see, e. g., United States v. Martin Linen Supply Co., 430 U. S. 564, 568 (1977) (“express congressional authorization”); United States v. Wilson, 420 U. S. 332, 336 (1975) (“express statutory authority”) ; DiBella v. United States, 369 U. S. 121, 130 (1962) (“expressly authorized by statute”); Carroll v. United States, 354 U. S. 394, 399 (1957) (“expressly conferred by statute”); United States v. Burroughs, 289 U. S. 159, 161 (1933) (“express statutory authority”); United States v. Sanges, 144 U. S., at 318 (“statute expressly giving the right”), is surely unprecedented. The Court has offered no justification for its more expansive treatment of state statutes. Indeed, since the Court has convinced itself that there are “express” provisions in the Arizona statute, I see no logical barrier — under the Court’s novel determination of what is *257“express”— to a construction of § 1291 as an express grant of authority for state appeals, without reference to state statutes.
Ill
The Court has noted time and again that appeals by the government in criminal cases are exceptional and not favored. E. g., Will v. United States, 389 U. S. 90, 96-97 (1967); DiBella v. United States, supra, at 130; Carroll v. United States, supra, at 400. I would have thought, therefore, that the Court would be especially careful before concluding that Congress intended that § 1291 would authorize criminal appeals by the State in removal cases.8 See Will v. United States, supra, at 96-97 (“the Criminal Appeals Act is strictly construed against the Government’s right of appeal”). Instead, the Court has abandoned its traditional presumption in this area to imply — on the strength of its own policy analysis— authorization for a state appeal in a criminal case where no federal statute expressly authorizes one. But
“[i]t is axiomatic . . . that the existence of appellate jurisdiction in a specific federal court- over a given type of case is dependent upon authority expressly conferred by statute. And since the jurisdictional statutes prevailing at any given time are so much a product of the whole history of both growth and limitation of federal-court jurisdiction . . . , they have always been interpreted in the light of that history and of the axiom that clear statutory mandate must exist to found jurisdiction.” Carroll v. United States, supra, at 399.
*258It is hard to imagine a federal “statutory mandate” for government appeals that is less clear than one that fluctuates depending on state law.
This case admittedly presents an anomalous circumstance,9 and concededly there is great temptation to correct it. But because I believe it is for Congress, not the courts, to make changes in federal jurisdictional statutes, cf. Will v. United States, supra, at 97, n. 5, I respectfully dissent.

 This statute, the Judiciary Act of 1891, provided that “appeals or writs of error may be taken from the district courts or from the existing circuit courts direct to the Supreme Court . . . [i]n any case that involves the construction or application of the Constitution of the United States,” 26 Stat. 827-828, and to the circuit courts of appeal from final decisions of the district courts “in all cases other than those provided for in the preceding section of this act, unless otherwise provided for by law,” id., at 828.

 The Court also finds that allowing an appeal would not frustrate the removal statute’s primary purpose of providing an impartial setting in which a federal official's immunity defense may be considered. Ante, at 241-242. But the Court candidly admits that this alone would not establish the State’s right to appeal in federal court. Ante, at 244.

 Because Sanges dealt with a Government appeal to this Court, see n. 1, supra, the Court observed that “[t]he appellate jurisdiction of [this Court] rests wholly on the acts of Congress.” 144 U. S., at 319.

 Title 18 U. S. C. § 3731, authorizing criminal appeals from federal district courts by the United States, obviously cannot be read to give that authority to state prosecutors in removal cases.

 The petition claimed that the chauffeur was assisting the four agents under the authority of the Prohibition Director.

 The State of Maryland had conceded as much in its argument in its brief that, “[sjhould the final judgment be an acquittal, in whole or in part, the State could not have a writ of error to review it. United States v. Sanges, 144 U. S. 310. Unless this Court entertains the petition for mandamus, the State is without any redress.” See Maryland v. Soper, 270 U. S., at 12.

 In Palko, the Court rejected the broad thesis that “[w]hatever would be a violation of the original bill of rights (Amendments I to VIII) if done by the federal government is now equally unlawful by force of the Fourteenth Amendment if done by a state.” 302 U. S., at 323. Observing that “[t]o retry a defendant, though under one indictment and only one, subjects him, it is said, to double jeopardy in violation of the Fifth Amendment, if the prosecution is one on behalf of the United States,” the Court declined to adopt the argument that “there is a denial of life or liberty without due process of law, if the prosecution is one on behalf of the People of a State.” Id., at 322.

 Indeed, until Congress amended 18 U. S. C. § 3731 in 1971, no appeal would have been permitted the United States in a prosecution similar to the instant ease. The Court’s opinion today introduces the anomaly that § 1291 could be interpreted to permit appeals by state, but not by federal, prosecutors in federal court. Surely it is more reasonable to read § 1291 as not authorizing government appeals in any criminal case, whether federal or state.

 I suspect that Congress has never considered the issue presented in this case. The Court does not suggest the contrary.