Court Opinion

ID: 9598365
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:08:16.768018+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:46:15.028932
License: Public Domain

Townsend, Presiding Judge.
(Specially concurring as to count 1.)  First, it should be stated that I concur in the judgment of conviction of the defendant as to count 1, on the *325ground that the contents of the newspaper article were both contumacious and sufficient to amount to an obstruction of the administration of justice. It must appear from the record to be both of these things. Clark v. State of Ga., 90 Ga. App. 330 (2) (83 S. E. 2d 45). It was definitely contumacious in that it accused the judges of “threatening political persecution under the guise of law enforcement,” of "a crude attempt at judicial intimidation”; of “manipulating the law in a manner to persecute the few, as “shocking” and “the height of hyprocrisy,” and so forth. This was sufficient to amount to an obstruction of the administration of justice. The court’s charge instructed the grand jury to inquire into certain rumored infractions of criminal law by means of traffic in, and the purchase and sale of bloc votes between some candidates for office and some Negro leaders in elections where it did not appear that any issue was involved such that their self-interest would be a factor in their decision. The grand jury was in session and presumably investigating or about to investigate the matter at the time the article was published. The grand juiy is an arm of the superior court and the law and a part of the machinery of government. Gates v. State, 73 Ga. App. 824 (38 S. E. 2d 311); Cook v. Sikes, 210 Ga. 722 (82 S. E. 2d 641). In Atlanta Newspapers v. State of Ga., 216 Ga. 399 (116 S. E. 2d 580) the court, after quoting from McGill v. State of Ga., 209 Ga. 500 (1) (74 S. E. 2d 78), to the effect that an abuse of the right to freedom of speech which results in obstructing the administration of justice will subject the abuser to punishment for contempt of court, held that the newspaper article in question there was not an abuse for the reason that at the time when it was published there was no reasonable duty on the newspaper to anticipate that the article in question would come to the attention of the jurors or otherwise interfere with the trial of the case.
There must always be a balance between the right of freedom of speech and the right to unimpeded justice. To paraphrase the Apostle, there is a time to speak and a time to keep silent. The time to speak, even to accuse the judge of hypocrisy and moral laxness, justly or unjustly, could well exist, say, during a political campaign when a candidate for office is arguing against *326the re-election of that judge. It could exist at other times, when no election is imminent, but under the general right of a citizen of the State to criticize his elected officials. When it cannot exist is when the words are directed toward the impeding of a judicial proceeding presently in progress. It is implicit in the decision in the Atlanta Newspapers case, supra, that the very same article, published at a time and in a place where it would tend to influence the jury, would constitute a contempt. I agree that count 1 relating to a newspaper article written by the sheriff, a man associated in the minds of many lay people with the pronouncement as well as the enforcement of the law, accusing the judge of instructing the grand jury to ferret out certain crimes relating to possible bribery, not in accordance with his duty to so instruct the jury, but as a cover for personal reasons aimed at stirring up race prejudice, is a contempt of the court and the grand jury, necessarily calculated to impede the administration of justice, and should be punished as such.
“Judges are not exempt from public criticism of their official acts or conduct. It is only when such criticism obstructs the administration of justice that they constitute contempt of court.” Townsend v. State of Ga., 54 Ga. App. 627, 637 (188 S. E. 560).
(Dissenting as to count 3). In count 3 of the rule for contempt the court found that the defendant committed an additional contempt when he issued a news release after the citation for contempt had been served on him, in which he stated publicly his defense against the attachment for contempt, contending that he spoke no more than the truth and that he had a right to speak the truth. The defense necessarily dealt with the charge, and throughout its body reiterated most of what the defendant had previously stated. It begins: “My defense will be simply that I have spoken the truth,” which indicates that the contents of the contempt citation, including the prior statements made by the defendant, had already been made public. We have held in this opinion that, as to a contempt, truth is not necessarily a good defense, but this fact did not deprive the defendant of relying upon it and urging it before the court. Whether or not he later interposed the same defense that he announced he would urge, he had a right to urge it before the court, and *327it certainly amounted to no obstruction of justice for him to state outside of the court that he intended to do so.
This statement contains no new defamatory or obstructive material, and it is but a repetition of the original statements on which the contempt charge was made and an analysis of them in line with the proposed defense to be urged. Whether it amounted to a republication within the rule relating to slander and libel is completely irrelevant, and in my opinion the court in holding that this is an additional contempt is departing from the “clear and present danger” rule recognized by our courts and by the majority opinion. It was the court itself which, and we hold correctly, gave the statement status as a case in court when he cited the defendant, and there is and can be no rule of law which prevents a defendant in a judicial proceeding from making public his defense, whether in or out of court, on the ground that the publication of such defense is obstructive to the administration of justice. It is obvious that the defendant could file this same defense in answer to the citation and that the newspapers could publish it; therefore the defendant could relay its contents directly to the newspapers for the purpose of publication. In my opinion the court erred in holding the defendant in contempt under count 3. All citizens against whom charges of any nature are brought must be accorded the right to defend, and any intimidation tending to restrict such right is a step toward totalitarianism.

Felton, C. J., joins in this dissent.