[Unknown Act > Facts]
On October 17, 1962, Ruth Elizabeth Chapman and Thomas LeRoy Teale registered at a motel in Fresno, California. At approximately 2:00 A.M. the following day, Chapman and Teale appeared at the Spot Club in Lodi. The only persons at the bar were Teale, Chapman, and the club’s bartender, Billy Dean Adcock. A short time later, a witness observed three persons in front of the Spot Club: a woman of Chapman’s general description and Adcock stood in front of the club’s door, while a man resembling Teale stood behind Adcock while he apparently locked the door.
The next day, the Spot Club’s owner found the club in disarray; someone had broken into the cash register and approximately $260 was missing. Routine housekeeping tasks normally performed by Adcock were left undone. Later, Adcock body’s was found in a remote area north of Lodi, half buried in an open roadside ditch. The time of death was approximately 3:00 AM on October 18th. Adcock was shot three times in the head. The bullets were fired from a .22 caliber weapon similar to one purchased by Chapman while with Teale in Reno, Nevada, six days before the killing. The gun was not found.
Officers arrested Teale in New Orleans on November 2, 1962. He carried a gun purchased the same day as Chapman’s .22 caliber weapon. An agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested Chapman in St. Joseph, Missouri on October 26, 1962. She gave conflicting accounts of her whereabouts on October 17 and 18, but a registration card from October 18 for occupancy of a motel room in Woodland, California was made out in her handwriting.
Chapman and Teale were charged with the first degree murder of Adcock. A prisoner locked up with Teale testified that Teale did not plan on killing Adcock, but when Chapman and Teale released Adcock from their car outside of Lodi, Chapman shot him once in the back of the head and twice more when he was on the ground. Neither defendant appeared as a witness, but Chapman’s conflicting testimony was introduced by direct examination of the FBI agent. The trial court instructed the jury that they could draw adverse conclusions from the defendants’ failure to testify. The jury convicted both defendants of first degree murder. Shortly thereafter, the Supreme Court held in Griffin v. State of California that California’s practice of allowing prosecutors to use defendants’ silence against them violated the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. On appeal, however, the California Supreme Court held that the unconstitutional jury instruction was a harmless error because it did not result in a miscarriage of justice.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No and no. In an 8-1 decision written by Justice Hugo Black, the Court affirmed that there may be some constitutional errors so unimportant and insignificant that they are harmless. Justice Black noted that all fifty states have harmless error statutes or rules, and that Congress established a longstanding rule for federal courts that judgments should not be reversed for errors that do not affect parties’ substantial rights.
Justice Black determined that federal law must govern the application of a state harmless error rule; the Court cannot leave the formulation of rules protecting individuals from invasion by the states to those very same states. Justice Black then cited the holding from Fahy v. State of Connecticut, where the Court determined that an error is harmful if there is a reasonable possibility that the evidence complained of might have contributed to the conviction. Here, the prosecution repeatedly told the jury that by their silence Chapman and Teale had served as irrefutable witnesses against themselves; absent these comments, reasonable jurors might well have returned a not-guilty verdict. Thus, the state had not demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt that the prosecutions’ comments did not contribute to Chapman and Teale’s conviction, and the error was harmful.
Justice Potter Stewart concurred, noting that the Court previously reversed all convictions of guilt when defendants had given involuntary confessions at trial. Justice Stewart rejected the notion that such constitutional violations could ever be harmless.
Justice John Harlan dissented, arguing that the state appellate court reasonably applied California’s harmless error rule to sustain Chapman and Teale’s conviction, and that California’s harmless error rule was consistent with the guarantee of fundamental fairness in the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. Justice Harlan rejected the majority’s assumption of a general supervisory power over the trial of federal constitutional issues, finding no source for that power in the Fourteenth Amendment.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Witherspoon was convicted of murder and sentenced to death by a jury in Illinois. An Illinois statute provides grounds for the dismissal of any juror with "conscientious scruples" against capital punishment. At Witherspoon's trial, the prosecution eliminated nearly half of the prospective jurors with qualms about capital punishment. The prosecution did not find out if most of the jurors dismissed would necessarily vote against capital punishment.
Witherspoon appealed, alleging that the dismissal of prospective jurors with qualms about capital punishment violated his Sixth Amendment right to an "impartial jury" and 14th Amendment right to due process. On appeal, the Illinois Supreme Court found that no constitutional violation took place.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. In an opinion delivered by Justice Potter Stewart, the Court held 6-3 that Witherspoon's death sentence was unconstitutional. The Court reasoned that a jury composed after the dismissal of all who oppose the death sentence was biased in favor the death sentence; such a jury was not impartial and thus violated the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments. The Court held that while jurors who say they will not impose the death sentence can be dismissed, jurors who simply oppose the death sentence as a personal belief may not. Justice William Douglas, concurring, argued that it also unconstitutional to dismiss prospective jurors who say they will never impose the death sentence.
Justice Hugo Black, with whom Justices John Harlan and Byron White joined, dissented. Douglas argued that the Constitution allows the dismissal of all jurors who oppose the death penalty personally, because they will be necessarily biased against the death penalty. In a separate dissent, White argued that the Illinois legislature was allowed to exclude "those with doubts" about "one of the punishments among which the legislature sought to have them choose...."


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Wayne Darnell Bumper was investigated and eventually arrested on charges of rape and felonious assault. During the investigation, police officials searched the home of Mrs. Hattie Leath, Bumper’s grandmother, with whom he was living at the time. Leath consented to a search of her home, but only after the police officials informed her they had a warrant, which they did not actually have. The officers found a rifle that was later introduced into evidence at Bumper’s trial. The trial court allowed the rifle to be entered into evidence because it held that Leath had consented to the search. The Supreme Court of North Carolina affirmed.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. Justice Potter Stewart delivered the opinion for the 7-2 majority. The Court held that, for a search to be lawful under the Fourth Amendment, the consent must have been freely and voluntarily given. A search that relies on a warrant cannot be justified on the basis of consent if the warrant turns out to be faulty, regardless of the police officer’s knowledge of the faultiness of the warrant. Therefore, the evidence obtained during the search in this case should not have been admitted into evidence.
In his concurring opinion, Justice John M. Harlan wrote that, because the introduction of the rifle into evidence was not harmless error in the sense that Bumper’s guilt was not adjudicated based solely on constitutionally admissible evidence, not in the sense that he was improperly convicted.
Justice Hugo L. Black wrote a dissent in which he highlighted the fact that Leath testified that her consent “was all [her] own free will.” The fact that the police did not have a warrant does not negate the fact that Mrs. Leath wanted the police to search her premises to show her innocence; therefore, her consent was freely and voluntarily given. Justice Black also argued that, while all evidence found in the illegal search must be thrown out, Bumper should still have been found guilty without a mandatory retrial. In his separate dissent, Justice White dissented and argued that not every search conditionally consented to must be deemed invalid. The fact that the evidence was discovered illegally and without a warrant does not mean that the evidence should not be deemed legal if a valid warrant is eventually presented.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
On October 12, 1964, Wainwright, a student at Tulane University Law School, was out walking around midnight. Two New Orleans Police Department officers stopped him because, in their opinion, he fitted the description of a man suspected of murder. Wainwright told the officers he had identification at home, but not on his person. The officers then asked Wainwright to remove this jacket so that they could search him for a tattoo that the suspected murdered had on his left arm. Wainwright ultimately refused to do so after trying to walk away and some mild verbal sparing. The officers then arrested him on a charge of vagrancy by loitering and frisked him. After Wainwright continued to refuse to remove his jacket at the police station, officers used force to remove it and discovered that he had no tattoo.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
In a per curiam opinion, the Court dismissed the writ of certiorari as improvidently granted.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
The petitioners were convicted of illegally passing national defense information to the Soviet Union; their cases were affirmed on appeal. The Supreme Court denied certiorari. In a petition for rehearing, the petitioners claimed that the government had relied on illegally obtained eavesdropping evidence to convict. The Court granted a rehearing and in a per curiam opinion vacated the appellate court judgment and remanded the case to the federal trial court for a rehearing.
The United States sought to modify the Supreme Court's order, urging that the eavesdropping evidence should be reviewed in camera by the trial judge who would then transmit only relevant evidence to the parties. The petitioners argued their opposition to the motion in the 1967 Term. The matter was reargued in the 1968 Term.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes and Yes. In a majority opinion speaking for himself and four other members of the Court, Justice Byron R. White held that "conversations as well as property are excludable from the criminal trial when they are found to be the fruits of an illegal invasion of the home." Moreover, continued White, "surveillance records as to which any petitioner has standing to object should be turned over to him without being screened in camera by the trial judge.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Jerry Douglas Mempa pleaded guilty to joyriding, and he was placed on probation for two years and the imposition of his sentence was deferred. Four months later, the county prosecutor moved to revoke Mempa’s probation based on his involvement in a burglary. During the revocation hearing, Mempa was not represented by counsel, nor was he asked if he wished to have counsel appointed for him. Mempa pled guilty to the burglary charge, and the court revoked Mempa’s probation and sentenced him to ten years in prison. Mempa petitioned the Washington Supreme Court for a writ of habeas corpus and claimed that he was denied his right to counsel during the proceedings revoking his probation. The Washington Supreme Court denied his petition.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice Thurgood Marshall delivered the opinion for the unanimous Court. The Court held that the legal right to counsel that the Sixth Amendment guarantees, as applied to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment, extends to the post-trial proceeding for revocation of probation and deferred sentencing. The right of counsel at this stage ensures that the conviction and sentence are read correctly without misinterpretation of record. Counsel also assists the defendant in asserting his rights, such as the right to appeal, at the deferred sentencing stage.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
A Connecticut district court convicted James Marchetti of willfully failing to register and pay an occupational tax for accepting wagers. Gambling and accepting wagers was illegal in Connecticut. Marchetti unsuccessfully attempted to arrest the judgment. He argued that the requirements to register and pay the tax violated his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the conviction.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. In a 7-1 decision, Justice John M. Harlan wrote for the majority reversing the lower court opinion. The Supreme Court held that the registration and occupational tax provisions were constitutional, but using the related information to prosecute someone did violate privilege. Marchetti’s claim of privilege was a proper defense and should have been sufficient to avoid conviction. Justice Earl Warren wrote a dissent stating that this decision frustrates the purpose of the tax and opens the door to many other similar challenges.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Gerald Waldron filed an anti-trust action against Cities Service Co. and six other large oil companies. Waldron sought treble damages alleging a conspiracy by the oil companies to boycott Iranian oil. The trial judge limited Waldron’s discovery to depositions of certain Cities employees. After an extended period of depositions, the trial judge granted Cities summary judgment because there was no material evidence that Cities took any part in the conspiracy. The court denied Waldron’s motion of additional discovery because the court felt it would be a fishing expedition and constitute harassment. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit Affirmed.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No, Yes. In a 5-3 decision, Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote for the opinion affirming the lower court decision. The Supreme Court held that Waldron failed to show that the additional discovery would have been fruitful, so he was not prejudiced by the limitations. Also, on the facts shown, summary judgment was proper. Waldron failed to produce any facts that raised a genuine issue for trial.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
David O'Brien burned his draft card at a Boston courthouse. He said he was expressing his opposition to war. He was convicted under a federal law that made the destruction or mutilation of drafts card a crime.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. The 7-to-1 majority, speaking through Chief Justice Earl Warren, established a test to determine whether governmental regulation involving symbolic speech was justified. The formula examines whether the regulation is unrelated to content and narrowly tailored to achieve the government's interest. "[W]e think it clear," wrote Warren," that a government regulation is sufficiently justified if it is within the constitutional power of the Government; if it furthers an important or substantial governmental interest; if the governmental interest is unrelated to the suppression of free expression; and if the incidential restriction on alleged First Amendment freedoms is not greater than is essential to the furtherance of that interest."


[Unknown Act > Facts]
James A. Watts, a schoolteacher in Alaska, held private conversations with other teachers to obtain their support to remove the superintendent from his position. His further language included words to the effect of ‘we are unable to get rid of the superintendent, so let’s get rid of the school board.’ The Seward School Board considered Watts' conduct to be “immoral,” defined as “conduct of the person tending to bring the individual concerned or the teaching profession into public disgrace or disrespect” under the relevant Alaska statute, so Watts was dismissed from his teaching job.
Watts' dismissal was upheld in both the Alaska Superior Court and the Alaska Supreme Court. The Alaska Supreme Court held that Watts' conduct “had a tendency to bring the teaching profession into public disgrace or disrespect.” Watts then filed a petition for a writ of certiorari and argued that his dismissal violated his First Amendment right because the school board was attempting to limit his freedom of political speech. He also argued a violation of his Fourteenth Amendment right because he should have the same equal protection for expression as any other private individual. After Watts filed his petition, Alaska amended the relevant state statute to reflect the rights of teachers to comment and criticize school administrators just as any private individual would have the right to do. Under the amended statute, Watts would not have been dismissed from his job.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. In a per curiam decision, the eight-justice majority held that the change in Alaska’s statute was directly relevant to this case. Therefore, it was necessary that the case be reversed and remanded to the Supreme Court of Alaska for further consideration.
While Justice William O. Douglas and Justice Hugo L. Black concurred with the reverse and remand decision in this case, they said they would have reversed the decision outright for reasons Justice Douglas stated in his concurring opinion in Pickering v. Board of Education of Township High School District. In that case, a teacher was dismissed from his job for sending a letter to a local newspaper criticizing financial decisions of the board and the superintendent of his school. In his opinion, Justice Douglas highlighted that it is not reason enough to limit free speech because words are “malicious” or have a “reckless disregard for the truth.”
Justice White dissented without writing a separate opinion.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Acting on a suspicion that Katz was transmitting gambling information over the phone to clients in other states, Federal agents attached an eavesdropping device to the outside of a public phone booth used by Katz. Based on recordings of his end of the conversations, Katz was convicted under an eight-count indictment for the illegal transmission of wagering information from Los Angeles to Boston and Miami. On appeal, Katz challenged his conviction arguing that the recordings could not be used as evidence against him. The Court of Appeals rejected this point, noting the absence of a physical intrusion into the phone booth itself. The Court granted certiorari.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. The Court ruled that Katz was entitled to Fourth Amendment protection for his conversations and that a physical intrusion into the area he occupied was unnecessary to bring the Amendment into play. "The Fourth Amendment protects people, not places," wrote Justice Potter Stewart for the Court. A concurring opinion by John Marshall Harlan introduced the idea of a 'reasonable' expectation of Fourth Amendment protection.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Dixie Power and Light Company provided service to several locations in Claiborne County, Tennesee, including the towns of Tazewell and New Tazewell. Kentucky Utilities Company (KU) held a non-exclusive county franchise to occupy county roads. In 1954, Dixie Power and Light transferred its assets to KU and dissolved, giving KU control over the vast majority of the market in Tazewell and New Tazewell.
The Tennessee Valley Authority Act of 1933, as amended in 1959, barred the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) from expanding its sales outside the area for which the TVA or its distributors were the primary source of power supply on July 1, 1957. On that date, the area of Claiborne County had 3,564 users of TVA power compared to 1,839 users of KU power; the towns of Tazewell and New Tazewell, however, had 28 TVA users and 561 KU users. KU’s retail rates for electricity in the towns were approximately two-and-one-half times higher than those offered by TVA. Citizens in Tazewell and New Tazewell responded to this rate disparity by demanding access to the TVA’s cheaper power. After three years of complaints, planning and consultations, the towns’ governments contracted to hook up a new municipal system to TVA’s power grid.
KU filed suit against TVA, the mayors of Tazewell and New Tazewell, and the Powell Valley Electric Cooperative, a TVA distributor. KU charged the defendants with conspiracy to destroy its business in Tazewell and asked the court to enjoin TVA from supplying power to the new municipal system. Shortly before trial, the TVA Board of Directors determined that TVA was the primary source of power for Claiborne County on July 1, 1957, and that Claiborne County was the relevant area for the purposes of the act. The district court upheld the board’s decision, but the Sixth Circuit United States Court of Appeals reversed. Comparing the number of customers served by KU and TVA in Tazewell and New Tazewell, the Sixth Circuit held that the two towns and KU’s original county road corridor were an ‘area’ for the purposes of the act and that TVA was barred from extending its service to that area.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes and yes. In a 6-1 decision written by Justice Hugo Black, the Court held that Kentucky Utilities Company had standing to sue because one legislative purpose of the Tennessee Valley Authority Act was to protect private power suppliers’ competitive interests. He noted that the petitioners conceded this point, and that congress was only able to secure funding for the TVA by agreeing to limit its territorial expansion, thereby also limiting unfair competition with private suppliers.
Justice Black further held that the courts should only set aside the TVA’s area determinations if those determinations lacked reasonable support in relation to the statutory purpose of controlling the TVA’s territorial expansion. Hence, the Court held that the Sixth Circuit should have upheld the TVA Board’s determination that Claiborne County was the relevant area under the act. Justice Black rejected KU’s argument that the act prohibited the TVA from extending its services to privately-served customers, noting that the act did not make the existence of a private supplier in an area an automatic bar to TVA expansion in that area. He also emphasized that Tazewell and New Tazewell were practically surrounded by areas already served by the TVA.
Finally, Justice Black rejected KU’s argument that the act prohibited the TVA from providing service to the area in question because KU was the primary supplier on July 1, 1957. Justice Black noted that the act only made the existence of a private supplier an absolute bar to TVA activity if the TVA’s activities extended up to five miles beyond the area it originally served. Given the TVA Board’s ruling that Tazewell and New Tazewell fell within TVA’s primary service area, this restriction did not apply.
Justice John Harlan dissented. He argued that Congress intended the TVA to limit the TVA Board’s discretion as to the expansion of its area of service. He noted that neither the statute nor the legislative history provided a formula for the precise measurement of the TVA’s service area, and that the Sixth Circuit’s emphasis on the number of customers served by TVA and KU in the villages on July 1, 1957 was a sensible and practical standard.
Justices William O. Douglas and Thurgood Marshall took no part in the consideration or decision of the case


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Police arrested Leroy Powell for public intoxication. He was tried, convicted, and fined $20 in the Corporation Court of Austin Texas. On appeal, Powell argued that criminal punishment for public intoxication is cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment, because he had chronic alcoholism. Under this theory, he appeared in public drunk as a compulsive symptom of the disease, not his own choice. The County court of Travis County held that alcoholism is not a defense to the charge and affirmed the conviction.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. Justice Thurgood Marshall, writing for a four justice plurality, affirmed the lower court. The plurality found that the record did not prove that alcoholics were totally unable to control their alcohol consumption. The law prohibiting public intoxication did not punish Powell for his alcoholism, but for his being drunk in a public location. Chief Justice Earl Warren, Justice Hugo L. Black, and Justice John M. Harlan joined in the plurality.
Justice Hugo L. Black concurred, writing that the Eighth Amendment does not require states to decide what part of a defendant’s personality is responsible for their actions. Justice John M. Harlan joined in this concurrence. Justice Byron R. White concurred in the judgment, writing that he would not punish a chronic alcoholic just for being drunk, but supports the punishment for being drunk in public. The record did not support the argument that Powell had no control over being in public.
Justice Abe Fortas dissented, writing that criminal penalties are not proper for people with conditions that they have no power to change. The record showed that Powell could not control the constant excessive consumption of alcohol and did not appear in public of his own volition. Justice William O. Douglas, Justice William J. Brennan, and Justice Potter Stewart joined in the dissent.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Sam Umans was a certified public accountant. Between 1959 and 1961, the Internal Revenue Service audited six couples represented by Umans. According to Louis R. Deitsch, an IRS employee, Umans approached Deitsch before each audit to “work something out together on it”. They agreed upon a disallowance for each audit and Umans gave Deitsch an envelope containing $50 for each case. Five other IRS employees described similar transactions between the years 1961 and 1963, wherein smaller disallowances were given during audits followed by cash payments to the auditing IRS employees.
Umans and the six IRS employees, including Deitsch, were indicted in August 1964. Umans was charged with aiding and abetting IRS employees in receiving illegal fees. He was also charged with giving money to government officials. On March 25, 1965, Umans and the six IRS employees were re-indicted. The grand jury additionally charged Umans with giving money to government officials with the intent to influence their actions. The evidence before the grand jury consisted solely of an IRS agent summarizing statements made by witnesses who would later testify at Umans’ trial. At trial, Umans requested access to statements made by the IRS employees that they took bribes from persons other than Umans; the court denied this request and sealed the documents in question. The government’s case was based almost entirely on the testimonies of three of the IRS employees, including that of Deitsch.
Judge Sterry R. Waterman, writing for a unanimous United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, held that the trial court improperly instructed the jury on the intent element of Umans’ charge for aiding and abetting IRS employees, but that this instruction was not in plain error. He held that the instruction was not sufficiently prejudicial, noting that it was not objected to at trial. Judge Waterman did, however, reverse the sentence for giving money to officials, holding that this sentence could not be concurrent with the sentence for giving money to officials with intent to influence their actions. He noted that the charges were identical but for the higher requirement of proof in the latter charge. Looking to the statute itself, Judge Waterman determined that Congress intended to make the charge for giving money to officials a lesser, included offense.
Judge Waterman held that the trial court properly excluded the IRS employees’ statements about taking bribes from other persons from the record. He reasoned that it would have been within the court’s discretion to prevent Umans from cross-examining the IRS employees on this subject for impeachment purposes, as the government did not broach the subject during the employees’ direct examination. Judge Waterman also held that the government properly indicted Umans with hearsay evidence, holding that this evidence was competent. He dismissed Umans’ concerns about inconsistencies between the evidence presented to the grand jury and evidence presented at trial. He noted that Umans had access to affadavits used by the government to indict him; thus, he could have objected to any inconsistencies at trial, but did not do so.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
In a per curiam opinion, the Court dismissed the United States’ writ of certiorari as improvidently granted without further comment.
Justice John Harlan would have granted certiorari to affirm the court of appeals' judgment for the reasons given by Judge Waterman in his opinion.
Justice Thurgood Marshall took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.
On December 18, 1967, the Court denied Umans petition for a rehearing, with Justice Marshall again taking no part in the consideration or decision of the petition.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Gary Duncan, a black teenager in Louisiana, was found guilty of assaulting a white youth by allegedly slapping him on the elbow. Duncan was sentenced to 60 days in prison and fined $150. Duncan's request for a jury trial was denied.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. In a 7-to-2 decision, the Court held that the Sixth Amendment guarantee of trial by jury in criminal cases was "fundamental to the American scheme of justice," and that the states were obligated under the Fourteenth Amendment to provide such trials. Petty crimes, defined as those punishable by no more than six months in prison and a $500 fine, were not subject to the jury trial provision.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Florence Flast and a group of taxpayers challenged federal legislation that financed the purchase of secular textbooks for use in religious schools. Flast argued that such use of tax money violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. A district court held that the federal courts should defer when confronted with taxpayer suits directed against federal spending programs.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
In an 8-to-1 decision, the Court rejected the government's argument that the constitutional scheme of separation of powers barred taxpayer suits against federal taxing and spending programs. In order to prove a "requisite personal stake" in such cases, taxpayers had to 1) establish a logical link between their status as taxpayers and the type of legislative enactment attacked, and 2) show the challenged enactment exceeded specific constitutional limitations imposed upon the exercise of Congressional taxing and spending power. The Court held that Flast had met both parts of the test.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Sam Ginsberg and his wife operated “Sam’s Stationary and Luncheonette” in Bellmore on Long Island in New York. They had a lunch counter that sold magazines, including some so-called “girlie” magazines. On October 18, 1965, a sixteen-year-old boy entered the store and purchased copies of “Sir” and “Mr. Annual”; the purchase was instigated by the boy’s parents to lay the grounds for Ginsberg’s prosecution. On October 26, 1965, Ginsberg sold the same minor copies of “Man to Man” and “Escapade” at the instigation of a police officer. All of the magazines in question contained pictures of nudes, and “Escapade” and “Mr. Annual” contained verbal descriptions and narrative accounts of sexual excitement and sexual conduct.
Section 484-h of New York’s Penal Law prohibited the sale to persons under seventeen years of age of 1) pictures of nudity or sexual conduct or 2) literature containing narrative accounts or sexual excitement, if these materials were “harmful to minors.” It defined “harmful to minors” as that quality of any description or representation of nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or sadomasochistic abuse that 1) predominantly appealed to the prurient, shameful or morbid interest of minors, 2) was patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community with respect to what was suitable material for minors, and 3) was utterly without redeeming social importance for minors.
Ginsberg was tried before a judge without a jury in Nassau County District Court and was found guilty on two counts of violating Section 484-h. The Appellate Term, Second Department of the New York Supreme Court affirmed his conviction.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No and no. In a 6-3 decision written by Justice William Brennan, the Court held that Section 484-h did not violate the First and Fourteenth Amendments as a restriction on expression. Justice Brennan wrote that obscenity was not within the area of protected speech or press. He acknowledged that the magazines were not obscene for adults, but emphasized that Section 484-h did not prohibit Ginsberg from selling the magazines in question to persons seventeen years of age or older.
Justice Brennan focused on Ginsberg’s argument that the scope of the constitutional freedom to read material concerned with sex did not depend upon whether that person was an adult or a minor. He rejected Ginsberg’s contention that Section 484-h was a violation of minors’ constitutionally protected freedoms, characterizing Section 484-h as New York’s attempt to adjust the assessment of obscenity in terms of the sexual interests of minors. Justice Brennan wrote that New York had an interest in the well-being of its children, and that this subject was within New York’s constitutional power of regulation.
Justice Brennan also held that Section 484-h was not unconstitutionally void for vagueness. He rejected Ginsberg’s argument that Section 484-h failed to give adequate notice of what was prohibited. The New York Court of Appeals previously read Section 484-h to prohibit knowingly selling obscene material to minors, and the Court also read a knowledge requirement into other similar state statutes. Justice Brennan also rejected Ginsberg’s argument that the statute was impermissibly vague, as Section 484-h expressly stated that a defendant must be acquitted if he proved that he made a reasonable bona fide attempt to ascertain the true age of the minor in question.
Justice Potter Stewart concurred. He argued that while the First Amendment protected men’s freedom to decide what they will read and listen to, government regulation could extend to settings where a person lacked the capacity to make a choice. New York was free to determine that children were not possessed of a full capacity for individual choice.
Justice William Douglas dissented, joined by Justice Hugo Black. He acknowledged that the act was not a violation of substantive due process under the Fourteenth Amendment, but disagreed that obscene material was excluded from First Amendment protection.
Justice Abraham Fortas dissented, arguing that the majority avoided the essence of the case’s problem by failing to define obscenity for the purposes of the censorship of material sold to minors.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Marvin Pickering, a school teacher, wrote a letter to the editor at the Lockport Herald complaining about a recently defeated school board proposal to increase school taxes. The letter complained about the board’s handling of past proposals and allocation of funds favoring athletics over academics. The school board felt the letter was “detrimental to the efficient operation and administration of the schools” and opted to terminate Pickering’s employment. Pickering sued in the Circuit Court of Will County alleging his letter was speech protected under the First Amendment. The court ruled in favor of the school board and the Supreme Court of Illinois affirmed.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote the 8-1 majority opinion holding that Pickering’s dismissal violated his First Amendment right to free speech. The Supreme Court noted that similar speech is not protected if it contains false statements knowingly or recklessly made. There was no evidence that Pickering’s statements were knowingly false or reckless.
Justice William O. Douglas concurred, but took an even broader view of protected free speech. Justice Hugo L. Black joined in the concurrence. Justice Byron R. White wrote a dissent, agreeing that the letter may be protected speech, but preferring to remand the case for further proceedings to decide whether the statements in the letter were knowingly or recklessly false.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
On June 27, 1962, Phil St. Amant, a candidate for public office, made a television speech in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. During this speech, St. Amant accused his political opponent of being a Communist and of being involved in criminal activities with the head of the local Teamsters Union. Finally, St. Amant implicated Herman Thompson, an East Baton Rouge deputy sheriff, in a scheme to move money between the Teamsters Union and St. Amant’s political opponent.
Thompson successfully sued St. Amant for defamation. Louisiana’s First Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, holding that Thompson did not show St. Amant acted with “malice.” Thompson then appealed to the Supreme Court of Louisiana. That court held that, although public figures forfeit some of their First Amendment protection from defamation, St. Amant accused Thompson of a crime with utter disregard of whether the remarks were true. Finally, that court held that the First Amendment protects uninhibited, robust debate, rather than an open season to shoot down the good name of anyone who happens to be a public servant.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. Justice Byron R. White wrote for an 8-1 majority. First, he reiterated the test established in New York Times v. Sullivan. That test required public officials bringing a defamation lawsuit to show that the statement in question was made with “malice” -- that is, with knowledge that the statement was false or with reckless disregard for whether it was false or not. Here, although the statements were false, Thompson did not present evidence that St. Amant ever entertained “serious doubts” about the truth of his statement. Without evidence of either knowledge or such serious doubts, a public official could not succeed on a defamation claim.
Justice Hugo L. Black and Justice William O. Douglas each concurred by reiterating their concurring opinions in New York Times v. Sullivan and Garrison v. Louisiana . In those concurring opinions, Justices Black and Douglas argued that defamation laws threaten robust speech and debate about public officials and public issues. Unless an individual engages in unprotected speech, such as obscenity or fighting words, neither the federal nor state governments should restrict speech.
Justice Abe Fortas dissented and argued that St. Amant acted with reckless disregard for the truth of his statements. He wrote that the First Amendment does not create a shelter for character assassination of public officials. Because St. Amant did not perform a good-faith check on the truth of his statement, Justice Fortas argued that the decision of the Louisiana Supreme Court should be affirmed.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
After following Nelson Sibron for several hours, and observing him talking with several narcotics addicts, NYC police officer Anthony Martinez stopped Sibron and questioned him. When Martinez said: "You know what I am after," Sibron began reaching into his pocket. Simultaneously, Martinez thrust his hand into Sibron's pocket and pulled out several heroin envelopes. Following his arrest for drug trafficking, Sibron sought to suppress the heroin evidence as the product of an unconstitutional stop-and-frisk search. When the Criminal Court of New York City denied his motion, Sibron appealed but suffered adverse rulings in the New York State appellate courts. On appeal, the US Supreme Court granted certiorari and heard Sibron's case together with a related case, Peters v. New York. John Peters appealed his arrest and conviction for intent to commit burglary after a stop-and-frisk search of his person revealed burglary tools.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
In an 8-to-1 decision, the Court began by noting that although states may grant police officers great latitude in making arrests, all search and seizures are subject to constitutional limitations. In Sibron's case, the Court noted that officer Martinez never actually heard any of the conversations between Sibron and the narcotics addicts. As such, the inference that Sibron engaged in narcotics trafficking merely because he spoke with drug addicts did not constitute probably cause for a warrantless search. Moreover, Martinez's actions could not be justified as a self-protective search for weapons since he admitted that he had no reason to suspect Sibron of concealment. With respect to Peters, the Court upheld his conviction since it flowed from a lawful stop-and-frisk search. The arresting officer observed Peters prowling furtively in a building hallway and had to chase him down before capture. Such suspicious conduct justified the ensuing stop-and-frisk search of Peter's person that, in turn, revealed the incriminating burglar tools.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Jones, a black man, charged that a real estate company in Missouri's St. Louis County refused to sell him a home in a particular neighborhood on account of his race.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
The Court sided with Jones and held that Section 1982 of the congressional act was intended to prohibit all discrimination against blacks in the sale and rental of property, including governmental and private discrimination. Furthermore, the Thirteenth Amendment's enforcement section empowered Congress to eliminate racial barriers to the acquisition of property since those barriers constituted "badges and incidents of slavery."


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Since 1958, Sunkist Growers, Inc. organized as an agricultural collective, and about 12,000 growers of citrus fruit belonged to this collective. Sunkist grouped these growers into local associations, each with a designated packing house for preparing fruit for market. Most of these associations were comprised entirely of fruit growers operating under a cooperative structure, but about five percent were corporate growers with their own packing houses. An additional fifteen percent of the associations were private for-profit corporations and partnerships; these associations operated by marketing contracts, not by the cooperative structure.
Sunkist controlled approximately seventy percent of all oranges produced in Southern California and Arizona. This control manifested in several ways. Each grower in a cooperative local association agreed to market all fruit through his association, to appoint the association as the marketing agent for all his fruit, and to contract with one packing house. While each association reserved the right to decide its prices and markets, Sunkist had sole discretion to pool products for exports, and could set maximum supplies for a given area.
The Capper-Volstead Act privileged collective activity in processing and marketing in the production of agricultural products. It was enacted to provide an exception to the Sherman Act’s prohibition against combinations in restraint of trade. Case-Swayne manufactured orange juice and other blended juices as an independent operator. It alleged that the Sunkist system was a conspiracy of trade in violation of the Sherman Act and sought treble-damages under the Clayton Act. The district court granted Sunkist’s motion for a directed verdict. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, reversed in part. It held that there was sufficient evidence for a jury to find that Sunkist engaged in monopolistic practices, but also held that the participation of non-producers in Sunkist’s system did not destroy its exempt status under the Capper-Volstead Act.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. In an 8-1 decision written by Justice Thurgood Marshall, the Court held that non-producers cannot legally participate in an agricultural collective organized under the Capper-Volstead Act. Justice Marshall looked to the legislative history of the act. While acknowledging that Congress’ principal concern was to prohibit predatory middlemen from participating in agricultural collectives, he noted that the act makes no mention of non-producers except with respect to cooperatives issuing capital stock. He rejected Sunkist’s argument that non-producers’ participation in the collective had no economic significance, pointing to the non-producers’ role in the control and policy making of Sunkist. The Court reversed the Ninth Circuit’s decision and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with its opinion.
Justice John Harlan concurred in part and dissented in part. While agreeing that congress did not intend that non-stock organizations with non-producer members should qualify for a Capper-Volstead antitrust exemption, he feared the possible effects of subjecting Sunkist to broad antitrust liability. He noted that the record contained no evidence that Sunkist intended to evade the act’s mandate. Justice Harlan would have held that Sunkist was not liable under the Sherman Act for past acts.
Justice Byron White concurred, joined by Justice Potter Stewart. He agreed that the scope of Capper-Volstead’s exemption was limited to the cooperative efforts of producers, but argued that Sunkist did not lose its antitrust immunity completely. He noted that the bulk of Sunkist’s local associations appear to qualify as exempt organizations, and that the improperly organized associations had no direct authority to conduct Sunkist’s affairs.
Justice William Douglas issued a dissenting opinion. He argued that the nature and extent of the non-producers’ participation in Sunkist had not been fully explored; thus, Justice Douglas would have reserved questions of the scope of Sunkist’s immunity for a later date.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
A 1965 amendment to New York's Education Law required public school boards to lend textbooks to elementary and secondary school students enrolled in private and parochial schools. The Board of Education for New York Central School District No. 1, contending that the law violated the Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment, filed suit against James Allen, Commissioner of Education, requesting a declaratory injunction to prevent enforcement of the statute. The trial court agreed with the board and found the statute unconstitutional. The Appellate Division reversed the ruling, finding that the boards lacked standing. On appeal, the New York Court of Appeals ruled the boards did have standing, but also found that, because the law's purpose was to benefit all students regardless of the type of school they attended, the law did not violate the First Amendment.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. In a 6-3 opinion authored by Justice Byron R. White, the Court applied the test constructed in Abington School District v. Schempp and found that, because the stated legislative purpose and necessary effects of the statute did not advance any one religion or religion in general, the law did not violate the First Amendment. Because the books were given to the students, rather than the parochial schools themselves, the Court reasoned, "the financial benefit is to parents and children, not schools."


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Terry and two other men were observed by a plain clothes policeman in what the officer believed to be "casing a job, a stick-up." The officer stopped and frisked the three men, and found weapons on two of them. Terry was convicted of carrying a concealed weapon and sentenced to three years in jail.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
In an 8-to-1 decision, the Court held that the search undertaken by the officer was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment and that the weapons seized could be introduced into evidence against Terry. Attempting to focus narrowly on the facts of this particular case, the Court found that the officer acted on more than a "hunch" and that "a reasonably prudent man would have been warranted in believing [Terry] was armed and thus presented a threat to the officer's safety while he was investigating his suspicious behavior." The Court found that the searches undertaken were limited in scope and designed to protect the officer's safety incident to the investigation.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
New Kent County had two schools that taught students elementary through high school. Prior to 1965, New Kent school taught all white students, while George W. Watkins school taught all African American students. After Brown v. Board of Education, the school district implemented a “freedom of choice” plan, where all students could choose which school they wanted to attend. While the school district did not prevent anyone from attending the school they wanted to, only a few African American students transferred to New Kent and no white students transferred to George W. Watkins. Several students and parents from the school district brought this action against the school district, arguing that the plan did not adequately integrate the school system. The district court upheld the plan. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed, but remanded the case for a more specific order concerning desegregation of teachers.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., writing for a unanimous court, reversed the court of appeals to the extent it affirmed the district court. The Supreme Court held that the “freedom of choice” plan was not a sufficient step to bring about a desegregated unitary school system. While the freedom of choice plan may work in some situations, school districts must provide a plan that works to dismantle the segregated system in their district.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
George William Bruton and William James Evans were tried together for robbing a jewelry store that also operated as a U.S. Postal Service contract station. At trial, the judge admitted in to evidence Evans’ confessions, made to the postal inspector and later to police. In the confession, Evans names Bruton as his accomplice. The judge instructed the jury to consider the confession for Evans’ guilt or innocence, but to disregard it as inadmissible hearsay for Bruton’s charges. The jury convicted both men. Evans and Bruton appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. That court set aside Evans’ conviction, finding that the confession to the postal inspector should not have been received into evidence. The court upheld Bruton’s conviction because the district court properly instructed the jury not to use the confession when considering Bruton’s charges.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., writing for a 6-2 majority, reversed the lower court. The Supreme Court held that Bruton was substantially prejudiced against because of the high risk that the jury considered Evans’ confession when deciding Bruton’s guilt. Admitting Evans’ confession into evidence violated Bruton’s Sixth Amendment right to cross-examination. This decision expressly overruled Delli Paoli v. United States. Justice Potter Stewart concurred, expressing that certain kinds of hearsay are so damaging that jurors cannot be trusted to give that evidence the minimal weight it deserves. Justice Hugo L. Black also concurred, writing that a jury instruction to use a confession as evidence against one defendant but not the other in the same trial is ineffective.
Justice Byron R. White dissented, stating that juries can be reasonably relied upon to follow jury instructions and disregard certain evidence. Justice John M. Harlan joined in the dissent. Justice Thurgood Marshall did not participate.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (Act) requires every employer to pay each of his employees engaged in commerce or in the production of goods for commerce a minimum hourly wage and a higher rate for exceeding a maximum number of hours per week. The Act excluded the federal government or any state government or political subdivision from the definition of "employer." In 1961, the Act was amended to include employees of any enterprise engaged in commerce or production of commerce, such as the operation of a hospital or any place that cares for the sick, a school, or an institution of higher education. The Act also removed the exemption for the state governments and their political subdivisions.
The state of Maryland and twenty-seven other states sued W. Willard Wirtz, the Secretary of Labor, to prevent the enforcement of the Act as it applied to schools and hospitals operated by states or their subdivisions. The states argued this expansion of the Act was unconstitutional because it violated the Commerce Clause and conflicted with the Eleventh Amendment's protection of states' sovereign immunity. A three-judge district court held that the extension of the Act's coverage to commercial enterprise and state institutions did not exceed Congress' powers under the Commerce Clause because it did not transgress the sovereignty of the states. However, the court declined to consider the Eleventh Amendment issue. Maryland appealed directly to the Supreme Court.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. Justice John Marshall Harlan, Jr. delivered the opinion of the 6-2 majority. The Court held that the inclusion of commercial enterprises is constitutional because otherwise commercial enterprises that utilize substandard wages and excessive hours would have an advantage over other companies. Substandard labor conditions also lead to labor disputes and strikes, which Congress wanted to avoid. Furthermore, the Court held that the Act did not interfere with states' sovereignty by telling them how to perform medical and educational functions; rather it subjected a state that employs people performing such functions to the same restrictions as other employers whose activities affect commerce. Therefore, the Court held that minimum wage amendments to the Fair Labor Standards Act extending to non-professional, non-executive and non-administrative employers of state public schools, hospitals, and related institutions was also constitutional.
Justice William O. Douglas wrote a dissenting opinion in which he argued that bringing employees of state-owned enterprises under the auspices of the Fair Labor Standards Act was an invasion of state sovereignty. Requiring states to pay employees minimum wage would force them to increase taxes, lower the standard of services in these institutions, reduce services in other government activities, and refrain from entering into new governmental fields needed for social change. The Act therefore affected the states fiscally and was a clear invasion of state sovereignty. Justice Potter Stewart joined the dissent.
Justice Thurgood Marshall took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Thompson was a pregnant, nineteen-year-old mother of one child who applied for assistance under the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program in Connecticut after having recently moved there from Massachusetts. Connecticut denied her aid since she did not satisfy the state's one-year residency requirement. This case was decided together with Washington v. Legrant and Reynolds v. Smith. In Washington, three people applied for and were denied AFDC aid on the ground that they had not resided in the District of Columbia for one year immediately preceding the filing of their application In Reynolds, two appellees, Smith and Foster, were denied AFDC aid on the sole ground that they had not been residents of Pennsylvania for at least a year prior to their applications as required by a Pennsylvania Welfare Code.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. The Court held that since the regulation touched "on the fundamental right of interstate movement," it must promote a compelling state interest. Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Washington DC, all failed to advance any compelling administrative or social reasons for their requirements. The goal of simply preventing indigents from moving to these states was constitutionally impermissible, argued Justice Brennan, given the value the United States has historically placed on the freedom to travel.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
On November 3, 1961 William L. Maxwell was arrested and charged with raping a woman in Hot Springs, Arkansas. The jury convicted him of rape but did not render a verdict of life imprisonment. Accordingly, the trial court imposed the death penalty, and the Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed. Maxwell sought a writ of habeas corpus in the district court and claimed that his conviction and punishment were unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because the jury had determined the guilt and the penalty in a single proceeding. Additionally, he argued that the jury was not given any standards or direction regarding the imposition of the death penalty or life imprisonment. The district court denied the writ, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the denial.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes, yes. In a per curiam opinion, the 7-1 majority held that the case should be remanded to the district court for consideration of whether the defendant's due process rights were violated. The Court compared the treatment of the jurors in this case to that in Witherspoon v. Illinois , a case in which the Court held the jury selection process violated the right to due process because some potential jurors were excluded from the jury simply for voicing general objections to, or religious beliefs against the death penalty. A potential jury member must have the ability to follow the instructions of the trial judge and consider all possible penalties. The Court held that further hearing on this matter was necessary before any further action could be taken, and that a local court would be better equipped to handle these issues.
Justice Hugo L. Black wrote a dissenting opinion in which he argued that potential jury members who are opposed to capital punishment may be properly disqualified from the jury in a capital case.
Justice Thurgood Marshall did not participate in the consideration or decision of the case.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Adam Clayton Powell pecked at his fellow representatives from his unassailable perch in New York's Harlem. Powell had been embroiled in controversy inside and outside Washington. When Powell failed to heed civil proceedings against him in New York, a judge held him in criminal contempt. His problems were only beginning. He won reelection in 1966 but the House of Representatives voted to exclude him.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. The Court noted that the proceedings against Powell were intended to exclude and not expel him from the chamber. That is an important distinction to recognize since the House does have the power under Article I, Section 5 to expel members. However, expulsion was not the purpose of the proceedings in this case. After analyzing the Framers' debates on this issue, Chief Justice Warren concluded that since Powell had been lawfully elected by his constituents and since he met the constitutional requirements for membership in the House, that the chamber was powerless to exclude him.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company operated in the “Official territory,” along with several other railroad companies (Northern lines). Aberdeen & Rockfish Railroad Company and several other railroad companies (Southern lines) operated within the “Southern territory." Beginning on July 17, 1947, the Northern lines tried to obtain new divisions of the freight rates that applied between the Official territory and Southern territory from the Interstate Commerce Commission. These proposed divisions would be based on actual, relative costs of service.
The Commission determined that the existing divisions violated the Interstate Commerce Act (ICA), which directed the Commission to set aside inequitable divisions of joint rates and to prescribe equitable divisions. In determining the relative costs that controlled the divisional formula, the Commission frequently relied on unadjusted average costs incurred by the railroads on the average of all traffic in their territories, and not on actual costs incurred by the Northern and Southern lines. The Commission found that the existing divisions violated the ICA because they allocated a lesser share of revenues to the Northern lines based on relative costs.
The Administrative Procedure Act required that courts set aside agency findings that are unsupported by substantial evidence. On appeal from the Commission’s decision, the district court set aside the Commission’s decision. It held that the Northern lines failed to prove that the Commission relied on substantial evidence about the relative costs of handling north-south freight traffic, noting that the burden of proof lay with the Northern lines. It also rejected the Commission’s finding that the divisions required adjustment due to the greater revenue needs of the Northern lines.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. In a unanimous decision written by Justice William O. Douglas, the Court held that the district court properly set aside the Commission’s ruling due to a lack of substantial evidence. Justice Douglas argued that deferring to the Commission’s decision -- despite the lack of solid evidence on record regarding North-South traffic -- would in effect give final deference to the Commission’s expertise and allow no room for review. He explored the Commission’s findings of fact, questioning the Commission’s seemingly contradictory conclusions about the effect of suburban passenger operations on freight service costs. Justice Douglas rejected the petitioners’ argument that these costs must be considered to keep railroads solvent because the present question was about costs, not revenue.
Justice Douglas acknowledged that the Northern lines generally return more empty shuttle boxcars per year than the Southern lines, and that Detroit requires shipments of 800,000 carloads of automobile parts each year. He pointed, however, to the Commission’s failure to clearly connect the costs associated with returning empty cars with this higher volume of traffic.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
The Secretary of the Interior is responsible for the maintenance of national parks and for providing the facilities necessary to allow the public to enjoy them. In the performance of this duty, the Office of the Secretary of the Interior contracted Universal Interpretive Shuttle Corp (UISC) to provide guided tours of the National Mall on minibuses that visitors may board and disembark at various sites. The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Commission (WMATC) sued to enjoin UISC from conducting tours without obtaining a certificate of convenience and necessity from the WMATC. The district court dismissed the suit, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed without opinion.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice Byron R. White delivered the opinion for the 6-2 majority. The Supreme Court held that Congress granted sole authority over contracts for services at national parks to the Secretary of the Interior. Any alternative interpretation of the statute would require a dual authority scheme that has no evidence of congressional intent.
In his dissent, Justice William O. Douglas wrote that the Supreme Court should not interfere in matters of local law in the District of Columbia. He argued that this case did not present a constitutional issue but rather an issue of local law that should not have been reviewed by the Supreme Court. Justice Potter Stewart joined in the dissenting opinion.
Justice Thurgood Marshall did not participate in the discussion or decision of this case.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
California's Criminal Syndicalism Act prohibited advocating, teaching, or aiding the commission of a crime or unlawful acts of violence or terrorism. John Harris, a socialist, was indicted under the statute. Harris claimed the law had a "chilling effect" on his freedom of speech. After a California state court upheld Harris' conviction, a federal district court struck down the Act because of vagueness and overbreadth.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
In an 8-to-1 decision, the Court held that "settled doctrines" of federalism narrowly confined the availability of injunctive relief against state criminal prosecutions. Specifically, the Court found that a federal court could not properly enjoin enforcement of a statute "solely on the basis of showing that the statute 'on its face' abridges First Amendment rights." The Court referred to "the basic doctrine of equity jurisprudence," under which federal courts were required to show proper respect for state functions and notions of comity.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Joyce Thorpe, a tenant at the federally subsidized McDougald Terrace, was evicted after being elected president of the building’s Parents Club. The Housing Authority gave no reason for the eviction. When Thorpe attempted to learn the reason, her requests went unanswered. The Housing Authority of the City of Durham obtained a court order to force Thorpe’s eviction. Thorpe argued that she was evicted because of her activity with the Parents Club, in violation of her First Amendment rights, but the state appeals court and the Supreme Court of North Carolina affirmed the eviction.
While the case was pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued a circular which stated that all evicted tenants should be informed of the reason for their eviction. The U.S. Supreme Court remanded the case to the Supreme Court of North Carolina for a ruling in accordance with the circular. The North Carolina court refused to apply the circular on the ground that it was to be applied prospectively. Throughout these proceedings, Thorpe remained in her apartment.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote for the unanimous majority, holding that the Housing Authority must follow the HUD circular procedure in Thorpe’s eviction. Since Thorpe had not physically been evicted from her apartment, the court saw no distinction between eviction proceedings that began after the circular was issued and Thorpe’s case. The Court also decided that the circular was mandatory, not advisory, and it was not an unconstitutional impairment of the Housing Authorities lease agreement. Justice Hugo L. Black wrote a special concurrence stating that because the Housing Authority admitted to following the circular nothing needed to be decided other than that the circular applied in this case.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Benton was charged with burglary and larceny in a Maryland court. A jury found him not guilty of larceny but guilty of burglary. He was sentenced to ten years in prison. He won his appeal on the grounds that the grand jury that indicted him and the petit jury that convicted him were selected unconstitutionally. The case was remanded and Benton chose to confront a new grand jury. It indicted him for larceny and burglary; the petit jury found him guilty of both charges. Benton then appealed arguing that that re-indicting him on the larceny charge after he had been acquitted amounted to double jeopardy. The Maryland Supreme Court affirmed, following the U.S. Supreme Court's Palko decision, which held that the double-jeopardy clause did not apply to state court criminal proceedings.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. The Court -- in a 7-2 decision -- overruled Palko, holding that the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment as applied to the states is an element of liberty protected by Due Process of the Fourteenth Amendment. As a result, Benton's larceny conviction was overturned. Justice Thurgood Marshall authored the majority opinion.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
In December 1965, a group of students in Des Moines held a meeting in the home of 16-year-old Christopher Eckhardt to plan a public showing of their support for a truce in the Vietnam war. They decided to wear black armbands throughout the holiday season and to fast on December 16 and New Year's Eve. The principals of the Des Moines school learned of the plan and met on December 14 to create a policy that stated that any student wearing an armband would be asked to remove it, with refusal to do so resulting in suspension. On December 16, Mary Beth Tinker and Christopher Eckhardt wore their armbands to school and were sent home. The following day, John Tinker did the same with the same result. The students did not return to school until after New Year's Day, the planned end of the protest.
Through their parents, the students sued the school district for violating the students' right of expression and sought an injunction to prevent the school district from disciplining the students. The district court dismissed the case and held that the school district's actions were reasonable to uphold school discipline. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the decision without opinion.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice Abe Fortas delivered the opinion of the 7-2 majority. The Supreme Court held that the armbands represented pure speech that is entirely separate from the actions or conduct of those participating in it. The Court also held that the students did not lose their First Amendment rights to freedom of speech when they stepped onto school property. In order to justify the suppression of speech, the school officials must be able to prove that the conduct in question would "materially and substantially interfere" with the operation of the school. In this case, the school district's actions evidently stemmed from a fear of possible disruption rather than any actual interference.
In his concurring opinion, Justice Potter Stewart wrote that children are not necessarily guaranteed the full extent of First Amendment rights. Justice Byron R. White wrote a separate concurring opinion in which he noted that the majority's opinion relies on a distinction between communication through words and communication through action.
Justice Hugo L. Black wrote a dissenting opinion in which he argued that the First Amendment does not provide the right to express any opinion at any time. Because the appearance of the armbands distracted students from their work, they detracted from the ability of the school officials to perform their duties, so the school district was well within its rights to discipline the students. In his separate dissent, Justice John M. Harlan argued that school officials should be afforded wide authority to maintain order unless their actions can be proven to stem from a motivation other than a legitimate school interest.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Section 2012 of the New York Education Law permitted school districts to limit eligible voters in school district elections to citizens owning or leasing taxable real property and parents of children enrolled in public schools. Union School District No. 15 applied these restrictions. On April 25, 1965, Morris H. Kramer, a resident of district 15 who resided with his parents and had no children, attempted to register for the local school district elections. His application was rejected for failure to comply with the restrictions. Kramer filed a class-action suit against the school board in federal court, claiming his constitutional rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment had been violated. The district court initially declined to hear his constitutional claims, but, on appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit directed the district court to hear Kramer's claim. On hearing the complaint, the court found no constitutional violation and denied Kramer's claim.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. In a 5-3 decision authored by Chief Justice Earl Warren, the Court accepted Kramer's argument that all district residents share substantial interest in school meeting decisions. While the statute purported to limit voting rights to those who were "primarily interested" in the election's outcome, the Court found the structure of the law too broad to achieve this goal. The Court concluded that such restrictions must be tailored to achieve the stated goal, and the current classifications "permit inclusion of many persons who have, at best, a remote and indirect interest in school affairs and, on the other hand, exclude others who have a distinct and direct interest in the school meeting decisions."


[Unknown Act > Facts]
After World War II, the United States made funds available through the ‘Marshall Plan’ to many countries to pay for commodities sold by American companies and shipped from the United States and other free-world sources. Congress made foreign aid funds available to bring commodities to the Republic of Korea, beginning with the Mutual Security Act of 1954.
In 1961, the Concentrated Phosphate Export Association (CPEA) organized to act as an export-selling agency for the concentrated phosphate products of its member corporations. CPEA organized under the Webb-Pomerene Act, which Congress passed to help American firms compete with foreign cartels. The process began when Congress allocated funds to various Agency for International Development (AID) programs. The United States thus directly financed the purchase of commodities allocated to Korea, approved via a complicated, tightly regulated application procedure. The United States assigned two of the CPEA contracts, and the Republic of Korea assigned the other nine, subject to detailed regulation by AID. The contracts only circulated in the United States.
The United States filed an action to enjoin price fixing and business allocation activities among the CPEA’s five major member corporations. The district court held that CPEA’s sales were ‘export trade’ for the purposes of the Sherman Act; hence, although CPEA conceded that its members were coordinating their sales actions, CPEA did not violate the Sherman Act. On January 1, 1967, the State Department amended its regulations to preclude Webb-Pomerene associations from bidding on contracts where the procurement was limited to United States suppliers; in response, the CPEA dissolved on December 28, 1967, despite the district court’s favorable ruling.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No and no. Justice Thurgood Marshall, writing for a 7-2 majority, held that the case was not moot. Although CPEA itself was no longer in operation in that form, the government sought injunctive relief against each of its individual members as well. Justice Marshall also noted that the new AID regulations did not apply to all contracts that the former members of CPEA might bid on. Moreover, the Court could not simply rely on the appellees’ statement that joint operations would no longer be economically advantageous.
Justice Marshall also held that the CPEA did not fall within the Webb-Pomerene Act’s ‘export trade’ exemption. He looked to the legislative history of the Act, noting that the Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission and the Act’s two main sponsors specified that the Webb-Pomerene Act was not intended to injure American consumers. Hence, Congress did not mean its exemption to insulate transactions initiated, controlled, and financed by the American government. Justice Marshall rejected the CPEA’s argument that they competed for contracts with foreign suppliers, noting that the governing statute required a preference for American procurement and that none of the major trading nations were allowed to compete for contracts.
Justice Byron White dissented, joined by Justice Potter Stewart. He argued that the goods sold by the CPEA were exported from the United States in any ordinary sense of the word ‘export’. He noted that AID regulations referred to receiving countries as ‘importers’ and to the transactions as ‘exports’.
Justice John Harlan took no part in the decision of the case.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Law enforcement officers, under the authority of a warrant, searched Stanley's home pursuant to an investigation of his alleged bookmaking activities. During the search, the officers found three reels of eight-millimeter film. The officers viewed the films, concluded they were obscene, and seized them. Stanley was then tried and convicted under a Georgia law prohibiting the possession of obscene materials.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
The Court held that the First and Fourteenth Amendments prohibited making private possession of obscene materials a crime. In his majority opinion, Justice Marshall noted that the rights to receive information and to personal privacy were fundamental to a free society. Marshall then found that "[i]f the First Amendment means anything, it means that a State has no business telling a man, sitting alone in his own house, what books he may read or what films he may watch. Our whole constitutional heritage rebels at the thought of giving government the power to control men's minds." The Court distinguished between the mere private possession of obscene materials and the production and distribution of such materials. The latter, the Court held, could be regulated by the states.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Voters and candidates in Mississippi and Virginia filed four separate cases seeking judgments that certain amendments to their states' election laws and procedures were subject to the pre-approval requirements of section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and hence were not enforceable until the state complied with the requirements. The district courts found that the Voting Rights Act did not apply to the voting changes in the four cases and dismissed the complaints. The voters and candidates filed direct appeals, and the cases were consolidated.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes, Yes, Yes. And Yes. The Supreme Court held that § 5 authorized a private right of action based on the remedial aims of the Voting Rights Act. The Court also interpreted the Act to provide that litigants bring these suits in their local district courts, and that three-judge district courts be convened (as was true at that time in constitutional challenges).
As to the substantive issue in the case, Chief Justice Earl Warren explained that the Voting Rights Act was "aimed at the subtle, as well as the obvious, state regulations which have the effect of denying citizens their right to vote because of their race." Therefore, the Court concluded that Congress intended that "all changes, no matter how small, be subjected to §5 scrutiny." The judgments were reversed, and all four cases were remanded to the district courts with instructions to issue injunctions restraining further enforcement of the enactments until such time as the states adequately demonstrated compliance with the approval requirements of the Act.
Justice John Marshall Harlan II, concurring in part and dissenting in part, argued that the language of § 5 referred only to laws by which voters registered to vote and had their ballots counted, and he therefore agreed that several of the disputed voting changes at issue were covered by the Act but disagreed as to several others. Justice Hugo Black dissented on the ground that § 5, in his view, is unconstitutional.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Plaintiffs, several African American residents of Chicago, sought declaratory and injunctive relief against a number of Officials of Cook County and Chicago for the enforcement of a number of Illinois Statutes and Chicago ordinances prohibiting mob action, resisting arrest, aggravated assault, aggravated battery, and intimidation. Plaintiffs contended that the officials violated Plaintiffs' First Amendment right to free speech by threatening enforcement of the statutes for the sole purpose of harassing and intimidating Plaintiffs. Plaintiffs filed the case in United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. A three-judge court upheld all of the statutes except for one subsection that prohibited "the assembly of 2 or more persons to do an unlawful act" and one subsection a statute that prohibited intimidating a person by threats to commit any criminal offense. The court enjoined the officials from enforcing these two subsections. Defendants appealed the decision as to the intimidation statute.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. In an 8-1 decision, Justice Hugo L. Black delivered the opinion of the Court. The Court held that Plaintiffs were not in danger of any irreparable injury from threatened use of the statute in question. The plaintiffs had never been arrested, prosecuted, or charged under the statute in question. Furthermore, the complaint did not mention any specific threats made by Defendant. It looked as though Plaintiffs had searched state statutes and city ordinances in order to pick out the ones that police could potentially use in bad-faith prosecutions. Justice Black held that it is not proper to block state criminal prosecutions based on speculation about the future. Justice Byron White and Justice Thurgood Marshall concurred in the result. Justice William O. Douglas dissented, saying that although the plaintiffs had not been prosecuted under the statute, officials were using it to harass the plaintiffs, causing irreparable injury.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Brandenburg, a leader in the Ku Klux Klan, made a speech at a Klan rally and was later convicted under an Ohio criminal syndicalism law. The law made illegal advocating "crime, sabotage, violence, or unlawful methods of terrorism as a means of accomplishing industrial or political reform," as well as assembling "with any society, group, or assemblage of persons formed to teach or advocate the doctrines of criminal syndicalism."


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
The Court's Per Curiam opinion held that the Ohio law violated Brandenburg's right to free speech. The Court used a two-pronged test to evaluate speech acts: (1) speech can be prohibited if it is "directed at inciting or producing imminent lawless action" and (2) it is "likely to incite or produce such action." The criminal syndicalism act made illegal the advocacy and teaching of doctrines while ignoring whether or not that advocacy and teaching would actually incite imminent lawless action. The failure to make this distinction rendered the law overly broad and in violation of the Constitution.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Sidney Street was a black veteran of World War II and a recipient of the Bronze Star. He held a position with the New York City Transit Authority and had no prior criminal record. On June 6, 1966, Street was in his Brooklyn apartment listening to the radio when he heard a news announcement that civil rights activist James Meredith had been shot by a sniper during his march through Mississippi.
Street went to a bureau drawer and removed an old 48-star American flag. He carried the flag to the intersection of Lafayette Avenue and St. James Place, one block from his residence. He laid a piece of paper on the sidewalk. Then, keeping the flag properly folded, he set it on fire with a match. He held the burning flag in hand as long as he could, then laid it on the paper so that it would not touch the sidewalk. When a police officer arrived, he found Street standing over the burning flag and talking to a small group of people. Street admitted that he burned the flag. The officer later testified that he heard Street shout, "If they did that to Meredith, we don't need an American flag."
The New York City Criminal Court charged Street with malicious mischief for willfully and unlawfully defiling, casting contempt upon, and burning an American flag. The allegation included Street's words at the scene of the flag burning. At trial, Street moved to dismiss the information on the grounds that Street engaged in a constitutionally protected act because the flag burning was a form of protest protected by the First Amendment. The court dismissed this motion; Street was convicted and given a suspended sentence. On appeal, the court affirmed Street's conviction without opinion. The New York Court of Appeals unanimously affirmed, holding that the flag burning was an act of incitement fraught with danger to the public peace.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. In a 5-4 decision written by Justice John Harlan, the Court held that the record lacked sufficient evidence to demonstrate that the trial court constitutionally convicted Street of flag burning. Justice Harlan first held that Street properly raised the issue of the constitutionality of the allegation's reference to Street's words. He applied the rule in Stromberg v. California, where the Court held that a conviction must be set aside if it could have been based on constitutionally protected speech; here, Justice Harlan could not determine from the record that Street's words were not an independent cause of his conviction.
Justice Harlan rejected the Court of Appeals' characterization of the flag burning as an act of incitement, holding instead that Street's conviction furthered no government interest. He declined to rule on the broader issue of the constitutionality of New York's flag burning statute. The Court reversed and remanded Street's case.
Chief Justice Earl Warren dissented. He rejected the majority's characterization of the allegation against Street, noting that New York made no attempt to prove that the crowd heard Street's words. He argued that Street was convicted for his act, not his words, and that the state only introduced evidence of his words to show his intent.
Justice Hugo Black dissented. He agreed with the Court of Appeals that Street's conviction rested entirely on the act of burning an American flag, and that the First and Fourteenth Amendments do not bar the states from prohibiting this act.
Justice Byron White dissented. He rejected both the majority's assumption that Street could have been convicted for speech alone and its proposition that the entire conviction must be reversed if the speech conviction was unconstitutional. He regarded the allegation as one that provided several means for conviction, and reasoned that there was sufficient evidence of Street's unlawful act on record.
Justice Abraham Fortas dissented. He focused on the unique legal history of the American flag, noting the peculiar obligations and restrictions wrapped up with ownership of an American flag.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
During his trial for armed robbery of a federally insured savings and loan association, Harold Kaufman admitted to the crime but unsuccessfully claimed insanity. He was convicted and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed. Kaufman then filed a post-conviction motion in district court challenging the evidence that proved his sanity. He alleged that the evidence was unlawfully seized in violation of the Fourth Amendment. The district court denied relief, holding that unlawful search and seizure was not an available attack in post-conviction proceedings. The Eighth Circuit affirmed.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice William J. Brennan, writing for a 5-3 majority, reversed and remanded. The Supreme Court held that Kaufman could challenge unlawfully seized evidence in a post-conviction proceeding. There was no need to show special circumstances. The fact that Kaufman admitted to the crime was irrelevant because he claimed an affirmative defense.
Justice Hugo L. Black dissented, arguing that prisoners can only challenge evidence post-conviction in special circumstances. The prisoner should have to cast some shadow of doubt on his guilt. Justice John M. Harlan wrote a separate dissent, writing that Kaufman did not show special circumstances, so should not be allowed to challenge the evidence post conviction. Justice Potter Stewart joined in the dissent. Justice Thurgood Marshall did not participate.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
To be placed on the ballot in a presidential election, Ohio law required a new political party obtain voter signatures totaling 15% of the number of ballots cast in the preceding gubernatorial election. Both the American Independent Party and the Socialist Labor Party sought ballot access in Ohio for the 1968 presidential election. The American Independent Party, formed by supporters of George C. Wallace, obtained the requisite number of signatures but failed to file its petition for ballot access prior to the February 7, 1968 deadline. The Socialist Labor Party, which until 1948 had been on the ballot, failed to collect enough signatures and was also kept off the ballot. The parties filed separate suits in U.S. District Court against several state officials, including Governor James A. Rhodes, contending that being kept off the ballot violated their rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The cases were consolidated, and the court ruled that each party must be given write-in access but did not require the state to print the parties' candidates' names on the ballot. The American Independent Party requested and was granted an injunction forcing the state to add the party's candidates to the ballot while the case was on appeal. The Socialist Labor Party filed a similar request, but did so much later, and was denied primarily to avoid confusion in requiring the reprinting of another set of ballots.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. In a 6-3 opinion authored by Justice Hugo L. Black, the Court found that Ohio failed to show a compelling interest in limiting the parties' ballot access. The Court concluded that Ohio's restrictions gave the two major parties a "total monopoly" and imposed a significant, unequal burden on minority groups. Given this fact, and the particular importance of the right to vote, Ohio's arguments that its restrictive policies maintained an orderly process and ensured an electoral victor would have at least 50% of the vote failed to meet the necessary standard of a compelling state interest. The Court struck down the Ohio restrictions and granted the American Independent Party full ballot access. To avoid confusion and a last-minute reorganization of the ballot, however, it denied the Socialist Labor Party such access for the 1968 election, in accordance with the injunctive order.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
A white supremacist organization held a public rally near a courthouse in Princess Anne, Maryland. During the rally, members of the organization made racist and derogatory speeches amplified over a public address system. Officials of Princess Anne and Somerset County obtained a restraining order to prevent the organization from reconvening the next day. The order was ex parte, so no notice was given to the organization. The order restrained the organization from holding rallies in the county for 10 days. At trial, the Circuit Court issued an injunction for another 10 months. On appeal the Maryland Court of Appeals affirmed the 10 day order, but reversed the 10 month injunction because the period of time was unreasonable and arbitrary.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No, Yes. In a unanimous decision, Justice Abe Fortas wrote the majority opinion. The Supreme Court held that the case was not moot because the 10-day order still plays a role in the white supremacist organization's continued efforts in the county. The order was set aside because there was no notice given to the organization and they were not given the opportunity to participate in the adversary proceeding. The Court did note that there may be a case where ex parte orders are allowed when one party can show that the other is unavailable or impossible to serve. The Court did not address the 10 month injunction because it had been reversed by the appeals court.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
In the spring of 1966, a series of armed robberies were committed in Mobile, Alabama. In two instances a gun was fired, and one person was injured when the bullet ricocheted off the floor. The petitioner, 27-year-old Edward Boykin, Jr., was arrested on five counts of robbery. He was provided with court-appointed counsel and pled guilty on all five counts. The judge did not ask Boykin whether he entered his plea knowingly and voluntarily, nor does the record show that Boykin was aware of his rights to trial by jury and to confront his accusers.
Pursuant to Alabama law, a jury trial determined Boykin’s punishment. Boykin did not testify and offered no evidence regarding his character. There was no evidence of a prior criminal record. The jury sentenced the petitioner to death on all five counts. The Supreme Court of Alabama affirmed the death sentence, but three justices dissented on the grounds that the record did not show the petitioner entered his plea knowingly and voluntarily.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes. Justice William O. Douglas delivered the opinion of the 6-2 majority. The Court held that a guilty plea is a confession, and the admissibility of a confession is contingent on the confirmation that it was made voluntarily. The waiver of several constitutional rights is involved in a guilty plea. A defendant’s silence is insufficient to show that he understood these rights and chose to waive them.
Justice John M. Harlan wrote a dissenting opinion where he argued that the Court wrongly and inconsistently followed a precedent that subjects state courts to a federal rule of evidence concerning guilty pleas; and that this rule has no basis in the Constitution. He also argued that the question was irrelevant, because the petitioner never claimed that his plea was made unknowingly or involuntarily. Justice Hugo L. Black joined in the dissent.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
The National Democratic Party of Alabama (NDPA) sought to place the names of minority candidates on the ballot for local and state-wide offices. Alabama election officials denied the NDPA request under the Alabama Corrupt Practices Act. The NDPA then brought suit in a special three-judge U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Alabama claiming constitutional violations. NDPA lost and appealed directly to the Supreme Court.
Initially, the Court heard arguments on October 18 in support of a temporary restraining order which it had granted on October 14. The day after oral argument, the Court granted the order and subsequently addressed the merits of the controversy on March 25.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
Yes and yes. In an opinion authored by Justice William O. Douglas, the Court acknowledged that "the regulation of corrupt practices in state and federal elections is an important governmental function, [but] we refuse to accept a reading of an Act which gives such a loose meaning to words and such discretionary authority to election officials as to cause Fifteenth and First Amendment rights to be subject to disparate treatment."
Justice Byron R. White, joined by Justice Potter Stewart, dissented in part, arguing that the district court should have had the opportunity to rule on the constitutionality of the Corrupt Practices Act.
Justice Hugo L. Black took no part in the consideration or decision in this case.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
George Samuels and several other defendants were indicted in state court on criminal anarchy charges, in violation of New York state law. The defendants filed for an injunction in federal court to prevent continuation of their case. They argued that the New York laws violated due process, First Amendment freedoms, and equal protection. The district court found the laws constitutional and refused to grant the injunction. The U.S. Supreme Court heard this case on direct appeal


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No decision. Justice Hugo L. Black, writing for the unanimous Court, affirmed the lower court. The Supreme Court held that the defendants would not suffer irreparable damages if the state trial continued. The Court also held that the district court should not have evaluated the case on the merits because of the pending statute court proceedings. Justice William O. Douglas concurred, writing that the New York laws were not obviously unconstitutional, so it was up to the state court to evaluate the matter. Justice Potter Stewart wrote a separate concurrence, emphasizing that the majority decision dealt only with the proper procedure for a federal court to follow when a criminal prosecution is pending in state court. Justice John M. Harlan joined in the concurrence. Justice William J. Brennan concurred in the result, stating that the defendants did not allege bad-faith harassment by the prosecution, so an injunction would be improper.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
The general Presbyterian Church (general church), and two local churches, Hull Memorial Presbyterian Church (Hull Church) and Eastern Heights Presbyterian Church, were in dispute over the control of properties used by the local churches in Savannah, Georgia. The local churches withdrew from the general church due to these conflicting views. In response, the general church took over the local churches’ property. Each of the local churches sued the general church for trespass on the disputed property. The general church argued that the civil courts don't have the power to determine whether the general church had departed from its faith and practice. The district court disagreed and concluded that, under Georgia law, the implied trust of local church property for the benefit of the general church was terminated because of the general church’s substantial departure from its doctrines. The Supreme Court of Georgia affirmed the judgment, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed the decision by agreeing with the general church that the First Amendment prevents civil courts from ruling on church doctrine issues.


[Unknown Act > Conclusion]
No. Justice William J. Brennan Jr. delivered the opinion of the 9-0 majority. The court held that civil courts do not have the authority to award property on the basis of the interpretation and significance that the civil courts have assigned to aspects of the church doctrine. Therefore, the Court held that the Georgia courts have violated the First Amendment.
Justice John M. Harlan wrote a concurring opinion in which he argued that the Fourteenth Amendment prevented civil courts from enforcing agreements that limit any religious organization’s use of property granted.


[Unknown Act > Facts]
Local police officers went to Chimel's home with a warrant authorizing his arrest for burglary. Upon serving him with the arrest warrant, the officers conducted a comprehensive search of Chimel's residence. The search uncovered a number of items that were later used to convict Chimel. State courts upheld the conviction.