Court Opinion

ID: 9651909
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 16:58:58.84582+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:43.070959
License: Public Domain

WHITAKER,
Judge (concurring).
I desire to state very briefly the reason for my concurrence in the result reached by the court.
In the brief filed for the Congress it is argued that the power of that body to appropriate money is without limitation and, hence, that it can attach any condition it pleases on the use of the money appropriated. Even if we accept this statement without limitation, still, section 304 goes much beyond a mere restriction on the use of the money appropriated by that Act. It not only prohibits the use of the money thereby appropriated to pay plaintiffs’ salaries, but it also prohibits the use of any money theretofore or thereafter to be appropriated to pay their salaries, either in their present positions or in any other governmental positions, except as jurors or members of the armed forces. This amounts to depriving plaintiffs of their rights as citizens to enjoy the emoluments of office. It is, therefore, an Act inflicting punishment upon them without a judicial trial.
The passage of such an Act is prohibited by clause 3 of section 9 of Article I of the Constitution, which reads: “No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.” A bill of attainder has been defined by the Supreme Court as “a legislative act which inflicts punishment without a judicial trial. If the punishment be less than death, the act is termed a bill of pains and penalties. Within the meaning of the Constitution, bills of attainder include bills of pains and penalties.” Cummings v. Missouri, 4 Wall. 277, 323, 18 L.Ed. 356.
I have no doubt that section 304 of this appropriation Act violates this provision of the Constitution; no judicial tribunal has found them guilty of any crime, but by this Act they have been denied the salary attached to any office they may now or hereafter occupy. Patently, this violates this provision of the Constitution. If it does, it is void, although it was enacted in the exercise of the power of Congress to appropriate money. The grant of any power by the Constitution is subject to the limitation that it must not be exercised in a way that would nullify another provision of the Constitution. See, for instance, Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 2 L.Ed. 60; State of Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 12 Pet. 657, 9 L.Ed. 1233; Knowlton v. Moore, 178 U.S. 41, 20 S.Ct. 747, 44 L.Ed. 969; Dick v. United States, 208 U.S. 340, 28 S.Ct. 399, 52 L.Ed. 520.
Since I am convinced that this Act does violate this provision of the Constitution, I find it unnecessary to consider the other constitutional objections to it, to wit, whether it amounted to a removal of these men from office or a denial of due process of law.
„ Courts never take pleasure in saying that a coordinate branch of the Government has exceeded its constitutional powers; certainly in this case I take no pleasure in saving that Congress has done that which it had no power to do; but since I am convinced that the restriction amounts to a bill of attainder, I am under compulsion to say that the restriction is invalid and, hence, cannot operate to deprive these men *149of the salaries to which their positions entitle them.