Today in Supreme Court History: April 4, 1861

4/4/1861: Justice John McLean dies.

Justice John McLean

Comments

[Dan Schiavetta]

Thompson v. Clark, 596 U.S. --- (decided April 4, 2022): To sue under §1983 in relation to a criminal proceeding (here, malicious prosecution), you first have to show that the case against you ended with a "favorable termination". The Court here holds that this simply means no conviction, and not some affirmative evidence of innocence (such as an acquittal) (here, the charges had been dismissed before trial without explanation).

O'Neil v. Vermont, 144 U.S. 323 (decided April 4, 1892): 55 years hard labor for illegally selling liquor for three years is "cruel and unusual punishment"

Logan v. United States, 144 U.S. 263 (decided April 4, 1892): can exclude in capital case jurors who have "scruples" about death penalty (even if not totally opposed) (overruled by Witherspoon v. Illinois, 1977)

Federal Labor Relations Authority v. Aberdeen Proving Ground, Dept. of the Army, 485 U.S. 409 (decided April 4, 1988): dismissing federal employees' failure to bargain suit because agency which issued regulation they wanted to bargain over had not responded (yet) that there was "no compelling need" for the regulation (issue was forced annual leave at Aberdeen Proving Ground for the days after Thanksgiving)

Kush v. Rutledge, 460 U.S. 719 (decided April 4, 1983): statute allowing suit for conspiracy to obstruct justice (42 U.S.C. §1985(2)) did not require showing of racial animus (white football player alleging players were intimidated against testifying for him in his suit alleging mistreatment and bad faith dealing after injury)

DeGregory v. New Hampshire, 383 U.S. 825 (decided April 4, 1966): First Amendment protected right to not answer questions in state investigation as to long-ago Communist Party activities (no Fifth Amendment privilege claimed)

United States v. Bramblett, 348 U.S. 503 (decided April 4, 1955): 18 U.S.C. §1001 (criminalizing false statements to the Government) not restricted to statements to executive branch employees (Congressman made false statement to House Disbursing Office about his girlfriend being on the payroll) (overruled by Hubbard v. United States, 1995)

The Blue Jacket, 144 U.S. 371 (decided April 4, 1892): another vessel collision case, in Puget Sound, where the two vessels saw the collision coming two and a half minutes before it happened and could not avoid it; Court holds that absence of lookout not relevant where a lookout wouldn't have made any difference

Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn, 563 U.S. 125 (decided April 4, 2011): taxpayers had no standing to contest tax credit for contributions to organizations providing scholarships to religious schools; unlike in Flast v. Cohen, where taxes paid were at issue, here the parents were free to spend their own money on the organizations (seems like a distinction without a difference to me; 5 - 4 decision; Kagan in dissent notes $350 million diverted thereby from state coffers)

Evenwel v. Abbott, 578 U.S. 54 (decided April 4, 2016): not a denial of Equal Protection to draw districts on basis of total voter population instead of voter-eligible population

[Dilan Esper]

I always thought Winn makes more sense as a merits decision than as a standing decision- of course, if Flast is correct (and TBC it might not be!), then the voucher system in Winn is not distinguishable as an expenditure of public money.

But on the merits, it doesn't violate the establishment clause to create school vouchers, any more than it violates the establishment clause to give loans and federal grants to students who attend Notre Dame.

[David Nieporent]

United States v. Bramblett, 348 U.S. 503 (decided April 4, 1955): 18 U.S.C. §1001 (criminalizing false statements to the Government) not restricted to statements to executive branch employees (Congressman made false statement to House Disbursing Office about his girlfriend being on the payroll) (overruled by Hubbard v. United States, 1995)

But Congress amended 18 U.S.C. § 1001 in 1996 to fix that.

Bramblett, as you note, was about the legislative branch. It said in dicta that the statute applied to executive, legislative, and judicial branches equally. Appellate courts then carved out an extra-statutory 'exception' for judicial proceedings. The Hubbard court took a long look originalist at it, said that the statute could not possibly be interpreted this way, and narrowed it to just the executive.

And so Congress broadened it again, but codified the judicial proceedings exception. (So you can be prosecuted for perjury but not § 1001 if you lie in court.)

[Dan Schiavetta]

thanks

[David Nieporent]

Evenwel v. Abbott, 578 U.S. 54 (decided April 4, 2016): not a denial of Equal Protection to draw districts on basis of total voter population instead of voter-eligible population

You mean total population, not total voter population.

[Dan Schiavetta]

yes, thanks. will correct.

[Dr. Ed 2]

"Thompson v. Clark, 596 U.S. — (decided April 4, 2022): To sue under §1983 in relation to a criminal proceeding (here, malicious prosecution), you first have to show that the case against you ended with a “favorable termination”. The Court here holds that this simply means no conviction, and not some affirmative evidence of innocence (such as an acquittal) (here, the charges had been dismissed before trial without explanation)."

Paging DA Bragg, Paging DA Bragg....

[not guilty]

Mr. Bragg does not have to worry about being sued for damages, no matter what the disposition of the case. Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U. S. 409 (1976), and its progeny afford absolute immunity to prosecutors for initiating and pursuing a criminal prosecution and in presenting the State's case.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Well then, Pandora’s Box has been opened: https://nypost.com/2023/04/03/alvin-braggs-indictment-of-donald-trump-might-open-a-pandoras-box-for-democrats/

“The [Clinton] foundation keeps offices in Little Rock, Ark., where new Pulaski County DA Will Jones is a Republican who last year beat a Soros-backed Democrat for the job. He might be able to get creative with a tax-fraud case against the Clintons, who have potentially stiffed local coffers of millions in corporate income and other taxes.”

And even more interesting:“Other red states that could manufacture indictments against Democrats include Florida and Tennessee, where President Biden’s brother Jimmy Biden has gotten into hot water for allegedly defrauding health-care companies (which he has denied).”

Indict President Biden — why not? DOJ policy doesn’t apply to state prosecutions, Spiro Agnew is the precedent on that.

And then go after Harris for her involvement in BLM -- fabricate something against her and jail her too...

[John F. Carr]

A red state prosecutor could indict Biden and Harris based on fabricated evidence without fear of liability under section 1983. That is not to say the prosecution would be totally without consequence.

[Krychek_2]

You just can't bear the thought of Trump being held accountable for his actions, can you?

[Dr. Ed 2]

How much are you willing to pay for that indictment?

There is talk of McCarthy refusing to raise the debt ceiling and shutting down the government until Trump is found innocent.

[Mr. Bumble]

Trump is innocent unless found guilty.

[Sarcastr0]

Innocent until proven guilty, and why would you charge an innocent man?

Incredible logic!

[Mr. Bumble]

"...and why would you charge an innocent man?"

If charging proved guilt why bother with a trial?

[Sarcastr0]

If only there were a middle ground between these two positions:

the one you took, and the one you say I took.

[Krychek_2]

McCarthy doesn't want Democrats to win back the House in a blowout in 2024, so I doubt he'll do that. But back to my original question: You just can't bear the thought of Trump being held accountable for his actions, can you?

[Dr. Ed 2]

If the RINOs ignore this, the Dems will win in a blowout.

And you do know the significance of April 4th -- it's when MLK2 was murdered.

[Frank Drackman]

Terrible about MLK, but what a great U2 song!

[Frank Drackman]

"There is talk"??? is that sort of like "People are saying"??

[Sarcastr0]

How much are you willing to pay for that indictment?

This is the wife-beater argument.

McCarthy shuts down the government, that is his choice and his agency; blaming Dems is just saying 'you're making me do this.'

Really, an argument that says more on the worldview of the arguer than anything about Trump, Dems, or even McCarthy.

[Krychek_2]

Further, the voters will know better than to blame the Democrats for McCarthy shutting down the government.

But since Ed seems so concerned about setting bad precedents, how about the bad precedent of allowing politicians to interfere with criminal investigations and prosecutions? That strikes me as a pretty bad precedent.

[Nige]

Isn't that obstruction of justice?

[not guilty]

"DOJ policy doesn’t apply to state prosecutions, Spiro Agnew is the precedent on that."

Uh, no. Spiro Agnew was prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice, not by Maryland prosecutors. The September 24, 1973 opinion of the Office of Legal Counsel took the position that, while the president is not amenable to criminal prosecution while he remains in office, the vice-president is subject to prosecution. https://irp.fas.org/agency/doj/olc/092473.pdf

[Nige]

Threatening reprisals? Completely given up on even pretending to uphold law and order, eh?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Rule of law died 4-4-23.

[Dr. Ed 2]

"Evenwel v. Abbott, 578 U.S. 54 (decided April 4, 2016): not a denial of Equal Protection to draw districts on basis of total voter population instead of voter-eligible population"

This is how illegal aliens vote -- they don't have to physically vote if they are counted in the districting.

[bernard11]

nor shall any State ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

To only count voter-eligible people would deny equal protection to those who can't vote.

[David Nieporent]

By Dr. Ed's logic, slaves were actually voting before the Civil War!

[Dr. Ed 2]

Why do you think the North insisted on the 3/5ths manner of counting?

[Frank Drackman]

it was the South who wanted them counted like everyone else.

[Dr. Ed 2]

RIGHT, and the North didn't want them counted at all.

Remember that it was one Congressman for every 10,000 counted.

[SRG]

The Blue Jacket reminds me of an English case where a construction worker died in a fall and wasn't wearing a safety harness, no harness being provided. His widow lost her wrongful death suit after it was successfully argued that the workers didn't wear safety harnesses even when provided.

[Frank Drackman]

Sort of a Schroedinger's Cat thing, they didn't wear the harness that wasn't provided.

[SRG]

If you are told that Thompson v Clark was decided 6-3, how difficult would it be to guess who two of the three dissenters were?

[Syd Henderson]

McLean served in Congress where he was succeeded by none other than future President William Henry Harrison (who I had no idea served in Congress) and who died on a different April 4. McLean was also Postmaster General under James Monroe and John Quincy Adams despite being a supporter of Calhoun and Jackson (both?). Despite that, he was anti-slavery and dissented in the Dred Scott case. An interesting life.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

This may have been a coincidence, but he also had Presidneitl ambiitions.

[bernard11]

You know, I wonder if Blackman is embarrassed about how badly captcrisis is showing him up in these posts.

Probably not.

[Sarcastr0]

Point is, it’s good.

Captcrisis became the change he wanted to see. And he takes an always thankful and cheery tone to all commenters adding factoids or corrections in these threads, and they have become generally notably more pleasant than the baseline.

Heck, dude shows me up.

[Mr. Bumble]

Different John McClane. Spelling counts.

[Dilan Esper]

So bye bye Miss American Pie... no wait, different McLean.

[Dan Schiavetta]

I got it wrong -- the Court dismissed the appeal because there was no federal question. I was misled by the headnotes. And by Field's dissent which talked about cruel and unusual, etc. Will correct it next time around (wherever that will be).

Thanks for causing me to look at it again.

[David Nieporent]

Yeah, I thought that sounded wrong; except in the context of the death penalty, SCOTUS has virtually never upheld a proportionality challenge under the 8th amendment. In 1980 they upheld a life sentence for passing a bad check because the defendant was a recidivist!

EDIT: Sorry, that was one of the prior offenses, along with credit card fraud. The check was for $28 (in 1969, so about 10x that today). The credit card fraud was $80. And then the third offense was theft by false pretenses for $120.

[Mr. Bumble]

I found how the sentence was arrived at to be interesting.
" The jury found the defendant guilty of 307 offenses, as of a second conviction for a like offense. He was fined $6,140, being $20 for each offense, and the costs of prosecution, $497.96, and ordered to be committed until the sentence should be complied with, and it was adjudged that, if the fine and costs, and 76 cents as costs of

Page 144 U. S. 324

commitment, aggregating $6.638.72, should not be paid before a day named, he should be confined at hard labor, in the house of correction, for 19,914 days, being, under a statute of the State, three days for each dollar of the $6,638. The facts of the case were contained in a written admission, and the defendant excepted because the court refused to hold that the facts did not constitute an offense. The case was heard by the Supreme Court of the State (58 Vermont 140), which held that there was no error. "
From Justia.https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/144/323/

[F.D. Wolf]

Justice Field’s dissent argued for the incorporation of the Eighth Amendment against the states, but also argued that the transactions were protected by the Commerce Clause, as the liquor had been purchased in New York (where it was legal), then shipped into Vermont (where it was illegal).

Justice Harlan (joined by Justice Brewer “in the main”) wrote a separate dissent in which he expressly agreed with Field on incorporation. He disagreed with Field on the transactions’ being legal under the Commerce Clause, but believed, contra the majority, that, nevertheless, that would raise a federal issue sufficient to grant the Court jurisdiction.

[Dr. Ed 2]

"Basing apportionment on total population, appellants contended, dilutes their votes in relation to voters in other Senate districts, in violation of the one-person, one-vote principle of the Equal Protection Clause"

What part of that do you not understand?

Illegal aliens dilute the votes of voters in communities without them, hence enabling the cities to outvote the rest of the state. Hence, mathematically, it doesn't matter if the illegals vote or not because their neighbors will vote the same way and will numerically have their votes.

[Frank Drackman]

States numbers of Representatives is based on the Census, which counts "Inhabitants" Moe-Ron

[John F. Carr]

There was a dollars-to-days conversion at least into the 1960s in some states. Under current precedent inability to pay should get you out of jail if payment would set you free.

[Mr. Bumble]

I believe this involved state legislative districts and not Congressional districts.

[F.D. Wolf]

To clarify, apparently the orders were filled in New York, then delivered to Vermont and paid for upon delivery. That seemed to raise the issue about whether the locale of the "purchase" was actually New York or Vermont, but those are issues of contract law which I have not studied in a long, long time.

[Dr. Ed 2]

“Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court.

 Texas, like all other States, draws its legislative districts on the basis of total population. Plaintiffs-appellants are Texas voters; they challenge this uniform method of districting on the ground that it produces un-equal districts when measured by voter-eligible population. Voter-eligible population, not total population, they urge, must be used to ensure that their votes will not be devalued in relation to citizens’ votes in other districts. We hold, based on constitutional history, this Court’s decisions, and longstanding practice, that a State may draw its legislative districts based on total population.”

What part of that do you not understand?

[F.D. Wolf]

Of course, illegal aliens are counted for the purpose of drawing districts. But so are other individuals who are ineligible to vote, including some 75 million children under the age of 18.

Another large group is prisoners, who for census purposes, are counted as living where they are (the prison), though some have advocated counting them at their previous residences. There was a case a while back IIRC in which one Iowa voting district where a prison was located only had some 55 eligible voters who essentially had the same voting power as 1200 voters in a typical district.

[Dan Schiavetta]

I got the summary wrong, as David Nieporent pointed out above. I should have said "total population instead of voter-eligible population".

[Frank Drackman]

and your side was outraged when Comey said Hilary Rodman SHOULDN'T be indicted

[not guilty]

SCOTUS held in Solem v. Helm, 463 U.S. 277 (1983), that a sentence for uttering a "no account" check for $100 -- life imprisonment without possibility of parole under South Dakota's recidivist statute because of the defendant's six prior felony convictions -- was unconstitutionally disproportionate under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.

[Mr. Bumble]

Seems like there are several things that should be fixed in the 7 years until the next census, but will they?

[Dan Schiavetta]

Counting prisoners (who can't vote) has the effect of giving undue weight to rural districts where the prisons are located. At least that's the case in New York, with a small number of white people (Republicans) getting seats in the legislature and not only that, but the prisons provide employment too, in areas where the economy has been depressed for years.

[Sarcastr0]

No, that's not something to fix. Laws effect the entire population, so the entire population should be counted.

Equal Protection addresses people, not voters.

[Frank Drackman]

Yes, he said she didn't deserve to be indicted when at least 1/2 the country thought she did (and probably most of the other 1/2)

[Dr. Ed 2]

People do go to prison for what she did -- just sayin...