Court Opinion

ID: 9422387
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:02:23.576401+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:36.395293
License: Public Domain

*455Mr. Justice Stewart,
with whom Mr. Justice Brennan agrees,
concurring.
In joining the opinion and judgment of the Court, I think it appropriate to add a few words. The rule of Ellis v. United States is a simple one. An appeal in forma pauperis must be allowed in a criminal case “unless the issues raised are so frivolous that the appeal would be dismissed in the case of a nonindigent litigant.” 356 U. S. 674, 675. The difficulties which the Courts of Appeals have encountered in applying this simple and practical test are largely, I think, of their own making.
These difficulties may stem in part from a failure to consider the in forma pauperis statute in the context of the over-all scheme governing criminal appeals. Our statutes and rules make an appeal in a criminal case a matter of right. The provisions governing appeals in forma pauperis are not to be read as diluting that right by imposing a more stringent test of merit. Rather, 28 U. S. C. § 1915 provides at most a device for advance screening of appeals which, if paid, would upon motion be dismissed before argument as frivolous. The only justification for such a preliminary screening is the absence of the built-in pecuniary brake upon frivolous appeals which is present in nonindigent cases. There is no other difference between paid and unpaid appeals. In both, the burden of showing that the right to appeal has been abused is on the party making the suggestion.
It has been said that a District Court’s certification that an appeal is not taken in good faith is entitled to great weight. Johnson v. United States, 352 U. S. 565, 566. Nevertheless, if a District Court has denied leave to appeal in forma pauperis, the Court of Appeals has the ultimate responsibility of deciding for itself whether the appeal is frivolous. Justice demands an independent and objective assessment of a district judge’s appraisal of his *456own conduct of a criminal trial. Anything less would impose a disability upon indigent defendants far greater than that contemplated by the preliminary screening provision which § 1915 permits. The statutory safeguard against overindulgence in free frivolous appeals cannot be allowed to impinge upon the fundamental right of every litigant, rich or poor, to equal consideration before the courts.
When a Court of Appeals chooses to utilize the preliminary screening device permitted by § 1915, difficulties of the kind evident in this case frequently arise. The bare application for leave to appeal in forma pauperis seldom furnishes sufficient material for evaluating the weight of the issues involved. For this reason, we have held that in such cases a Court of Appeals must provide the applicant with the assistance of counsel and with a record of sufficient completeness to give him full opportunity to show that the appeal is in “good faith.” Johnson v. United States, supra; Farley v. United States, 354 U. S. 521. In the course of such proceedings, however, experience has shown that there may be a tendency to lose sight of the precise issue before the court at this point — whether the appeal is so frivolous that it would be dismissed even if all the fees had been paid. Obviously arguments concerning the weight of the issues raised by an appeal are difficult to disengage from arguments dealing with the ultimate merits of these same issues. Understandably and commendably, counsel for indigent defendants often exert every effort to prove the substantial nature of their clients’ claims — -an exertion of energy which draws a similar effort from government counsel. The product of these forces is a procedure which may bear close superficial resemblance to the appeal itself.
The result is that a Court of Appeals may come to think of these preliminary proceedings as tantamount to appeals on the merits, and may tend to decide whether or *457not to grant leave to appeal by appraising the entire case in terms of whether or not reversible error appears. By the same token, when leave to appeal has been denied, and the case has come here, the Government has argued in the past, as it argues in this case, that the preliminary screening procedure was itself the equivalent of an affirmance on the merits. See Lurk v. United States, 366 U. S.712.
This attempted conversion of the proceedings to determine good faith into a truncated substitute for appeal distorts the purpose of § 1915, and, if accepted, would raise serious questions of due process. The filing of memoranda in support of an application for leave to appeal is not an appeal. The merits of the ultimate issues are not logically involved at this point, but only the weight of those issues. Appellate briefs are not written or submitted. There is no oral argument. The court’s mode of considering such memoranda, as a matter of internal machinery, may markedly differ from the process employed in the decision of cases actually on appeal. For all these reasons the interim proceeding permitted by § 1915 cannot itself be deemed to constitute the appeal to which a person convicted of crime in the federal courts is entitled.
In addition to the danger of equating the “good faith” determination with the appeal itself, there are other disadvantages inherent in compelling the parties to go through the preliminary procedure permitted by § 1915. It is a serious imposition upon appointed counsel to require dissipation of energy and time in preliminary skirmishing. Moreover, the delay occasioned by this extended interim proceeding is itself offensive to the ideal of speedy administration of criminal justice.
The primary responsibility for containing within limited bounds the separate “good faith” proceeding permitted by § 1915 rests upon those Courts of Appeals *458which choose to utilize this system of dealing with in forma pauperis appeals. While I would not deny great latitude to the various circuits autonomously to deyise their own procedures consistent with their appraisal of local conditions and needs, the courts’ duty in this area can be properly achieved only by keeping in mind the very limited test of “good faith” which the Ellis case established.
This suggests that each Court of Appeals might well consider whether its task could not be more expeditiously and responsibly performed by simply granting applications to appeal from criminal convictions in forma pauperis as a matter of course, and appointing counsel to brief and argue each case on the merits. The Government would then be free in any case to file before argument a motion to dismiss the appeal as frivolous, as every appellee is always free to do. In the absence of such a motion an appeal which after argument appeared clearly without merit could be expeditiously disposed of by summary affirmance, in the secure knowledge that all the issues had been fully canvassed. This procedure, it seems to me, would not only save the time and energy of court and counsel, but would obviate the many difficulties which, as the present case shows, the complicated two-step system is all too likely to produce.