Court Opinion

ID: 9462380
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:39:40.843714+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:33.910418
License: Public Domain

TONE, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I concur in the result. I agree with the court that the speech or debate clause of the Illinois Constitution is inapplicable in this federal criminal proceeding, and that the question to be decided is whether the federal common law of evidence includes the privilege asserted. I disagree, however, with the court’s view that, absent waiver, the defendant could claim a speech or debate privilege under the federal common law of evidence.
*782Several recent opinions of the Supreme Court have made it clear that the protection afforded state legislators from liability under federal law for acts done in their legislative roles, see Tenney v. Brandhove, 341 U.S. 367, 71 S.Ct. 783, 95 L.Ed. 1019 (1951), is not based upon the speech or debate clause of the Federal Constitution, see United States v. Brewster, 408 U.S. 501, 516 n. 10, 92 S.Ct. 2531, 33 L.Ed.2d 507 (1972), a clause that applies only to Congress, but rather upon the common-law doctrine of official immunity. See Wood v. Strickland, 420 U.S. 308, 316-318, 95 S.Ct. 992, 43 L.Ed.2d 214 (1975); Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 243-244, 94 S.Ct. 1683, 40 L.Ed.2d 90 (1974); Doe v. McMillan, 412 U.S. 306, 318-320, 93 S.Ct. 2018, 36 L.Ed.2d 912 (1973). This is the same doctrine that was applied in Pierson v. Ray, 386 U.S. 547, 554-555, 87 S.Ct. 1213, 18 L.Ed.2d 288 (1967), to provide immunity to a judge for acts done in the course of his judicial duties.1
The speech or debate clause of the Federal Constitution protects members of Congress from being “questioned in any other Place” concerning, the Supreme Court has held, “legislative acts or the motivation for actual performance of legislative acts.” See United States v. Brewster, supra, 408 U.S. at 509, 92 S.Ct. at 2536. The clause provides both immunity from liability and a commensurate privilege against disclosure. Gravel v. United States, 408 U.S. 606, 616, 92 S.Ct. 2614, 33 L.Ed.2d 583 (1972). The privilege against disclosure and the immunity from liability should also be commensurate when the basis for protection is common-law official immunity. Where there is no immunity, it would be incongruous, if not useless, to recognize an evidentiary privilege. Accordingly, I think that whether the claimed privilege should be recognized as a development in the federal common law of evidence depends on whether there is an underlying immunity.
The common-law immunity of state legislators has not been held to be coextensive with that which members of Congress enjoy under the federal speech or debate clause. Even with respect to civil liability, speech-or-debate immunity is broader than official immunity. The former bars injunction actions directed at legislative activities of Congress. E. g., Eastland v. United States Servicemen’s Fund, 421 U.S. 491, 95 S.Ct. 1813, 44 L.Ed.2d 324 (1975); Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 89 S.Ct. 1944, 23 L.Ed.2d 491 (1969). The doctrine of official immunity, on the other hand, has been held by one court not to bar injunctive relief against state legislative activities which offend federal law, Jordan v. Hutcheson, 323 F.2d 597 (4th Cir. 1963), and in other cases federal injunctions against state legislative action have been sustained without discussion of the question of immunity. E. g., Bond v. Floyd, 385 U.S. 116, 87 S.Ct. 339, 17 L.Ed.2d 235 (1966); Bush v. Orleans Parish School Board, 191 F.Supp. 871 (E.D.La.), aff’d sub nom. Denny v. Bush, 367 U.S. 908, 81 S.Ct. 1917, 6 L.Ed.2d 1249 (1961).
Unlike federal speech or debate immunity, see United States v. Johnson, 383 U.S. 169, 86 S.Ct. 749, 15 L.Ed.2d 681 (1966), common-law official immunity has not been extended to criminal liability. In O’Shea v. Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 503, 94 S.Ct. 669, 680, 38 L.Ed.2d 674 (1974), the Court said: *783Thus judicial officers are not immune from criminal liability for conduct within the scope of their judicial duties. Braatelien v. United States, 147 F.2d 888, 895 (8th Cir. 1945); see also United States v. Manton, 107 F.2d 834 (2d Cir. 1939). State legislators are similarly subject to federal criminal liability for analogous conduct which falls within the prohibition of a federal criminal statute, as the Court stated in O’Shea.
*782“[W]e have never held that the performance of the duties of judicial, legislative, or executive officers, requires or contemplates the immunization of otherwise criminal deprivations of constitutional rights. ... On the contrary, the judicially fashioned doctrine of official immunity does not reach ‘so far as to immunize criminal conduct as proscribed by an Act of Congress. . . . ’ [Citing Gravel v. United States, supra, 408 U.S. at 627, 92 S.Ct. 2614]”
*783Immunity from civil but not criminal liability has been regarded as sufficient to achieve the purpose of the doctrine of official immunity, which is to promote independence and fearless discharge of duty on the part of the protected officials. While the federal speech or debate clause serves the same purpose, it has an additional, more fundamental purpose grounded in the separation of powers in the federal government. As the Court said in Gravel v. United States, supra, 408 U.S. at 616, 617, 92 S.Ct. at 2622, 2623:
“The Speech or Debate Clause was designed to assure a co-equal branch of the government wide freedom of speech, debate, and deliberation without intimidation or threats from the Executive Branch.
“[T]he central role of the Speech or Debate Clause [is] to prevent intimidation of legislators by the Executive and accountability before a possibly hostile judiciary, United States v. Johnson, 383 U.S. 169, 181, 86 S.Ct. 749, 755, 15 L.Ed.2d 681 (1966) . ..”
There being no problem of separation of powers between the federal executive (represented in this case by the United States Attorney) and a state legislature, the Constitution itself does not create an immunity for state legislators as it does for members of Congress. I see no need for the courts to do so either. Nothing in our history or in the authorities relied upon by the court in this case suggests that there is a threat of federal executive interference with the independence of state legislatures that would warrant extending the judicially developed doctrine of official immunity beyond its traditional boundaries. Accordingly, I would hold that the state legislator’s official immunity does not extend to liability under federal criminal statutes, and that he therefore has no commensurate official2 privilege against disclosure.
In questioning the view that the existence of the privilege should depend upon whether there is a corresponding immunity, the majority states in footnote 5 that “[a] member of Congress is not immune from prosecution on charges of bribery or conflict of interest,” and “[y]et the prosecutor is prohibited from attempting to prove those offenses by questioning the congressman about the motives for his legislative acts,” citing Brewster and Johnson. This overlooks, I believe, an important distinction made in Brewster. As I understand that case, it did not hold that conduct which is not protected by an immunity from liability may nevertheless be privileged from inquiry. Brewster was charged with taking bribes in return for being influenced in respect of his official acts and with taking a bribe for an official act already performed by him. The Court held that the speech or debate clause permitted the government to prosecute those charges, because it could be done without inquiring into “the legislative acts of the defendant member of Congress or his motives for performing them.” 408 U.S. at 526, 92 S.Ct. at 2544, quoting from Johnson, supra, 383 U.S. at 185. See also 408 U.S. at 527, 92 S.Ct. 2531. The Court said:
“There is no need for the Government to show that appellee fulfilled the alleged illegal bargain; acceptance of the bribe is the violation of the statute, not performance of the illegal promise.
“Taking a bribe is, obviously, no part of the legislative process or func*784tion; it is not a legislative act.” Id. at 526, 92 S.Ct. at 2544.
On the other hand, prosecution for legislative acts and inquiry into those acts or their motives, would have been prohibited by the speech or debate clause. Since bribe taking, however, was not protected by the speech or debate clause, the Court held that “inquiry into [such] activities” was not prohibited by the speech or debate clause. 408 U.S. at 528, 92 S.Ct. 2531. In other words, for those acts for which there was no immunity, there was likewise no testimonial privilege. Thus Brewster shows that the immunity and the privilege are correlated.
The majority further states in the same footnote that the testimonial privilege for state legislators “rests on the constitutional judgment that the courts are not deemed the proper place to hold legislators accountable for their acts as elected representatives,” citing Tenney v. Brandhove. I do not believe Tenney supports the view that state legislators have a speech or debate immunity derived from the Federal Constitution. See p. 781 above. If they do not, and if I am correct that the doctrine of official immunity leaves state legislators criminally liable under federal law for even their legislative acts, I cannot believe they are privileged (unless they choose to avail themselves of their fifth amendment right) to withhold testimony concerning acts for which they may be prosecuted.
In reaching the conclusion expressed in this concurring opinion, I have assumed that the Mail Fraud Act (18 U.S.C. § 1341) and the Hobbs Act (18 U.S.C. § 1951) extend to conduct of a state legislator in the performance of his official duties. It would be inappropriate, if not beyond our jurisdiction, to pass on the sufficiency of the indictment in this interlocutory appeal of an order suppressing evidence. Cf. United States v. Merritts, 527 F.2d 713, p. 715 (7th Cir. 1975). Moreover, it is unnecessary to consider the scope of those statutes in order to decide this appeal: applying the approach of Tenney and Pierson, determining whether the doctrine of official immunity shields given legislative conduct is only a preliminary step in resolving the ultimate question of whether Congress intended a statute to apply to that conduct. It is accordingly unnecessary to reach that question in order to decide this case.

. Tenney v. Brandhove and Pierson v. Ray held that Congress had not intended by adopting the Civil Rights Acts to abrogate the official immunity of legislators and judges, supported as it was by strong tradition and sound reasons.

. He has of course the same privilege against self-incrimination that any other citizen has. He has not chosen to assert that privilege in this case.