Section 1: Judicial Power, Courts, Judges
Organization of Courts, Tenure, and Compensation of Judges The Constitution is almost completely silent concerning the organization of the federal judiciary. "That there should be a national judiciary was readily accepted by all."
But whether it was to consist of one high court at the apex of a federal judicial system or a high court exercising appellate jurisdiction over state courts that would initially hear all but a minor fraction of cases raising national issues was a matter of considerable controversy. The Virginia Plan provided for a "National judiciary [to] be established to consist of one or more supreme tribunals, and of inferior tribunals to be chosen by the National Legislature ...." In the Committee of the Whole, the proposition "that a national judiciary be established" was unanimously adopted, but the clause "to consist of One supreme tribunal, and of one or more inferior tribunals" was first agreed to, then reconsidered, and the provision for inferior tribunals stricken out, it being argued that state courts could adequately adjudicate all necessary matters while the supreme tribunal would protect the national interest and assure uniformity. Wilson and Madison thereupon moved to authorize Congress "to appoint inferior tribunals," which carried the implication that Congress could in its discretion either designate the state courts to hear federal cases or create federal courts. The word "appoint" was adopted and over the course of the Convention changed into phrasing that suggests something of an obligation on Congress to establish inferior federal courts.
The "good behavior" clause excited no controversy, while the only substantial dispute with regard to denying Congress the power to intimidate judges through actual or threatened reduction of salaries came on Madison's motion to bar increases as well as decreases.
One Supreme Court
The Convention left up to Congress decision on the size and composition of the Supreme Court, the time and place for sitting, its internal organization, save for the reference to the Chief Justice in the impeachment provision, and other matters. These details Congress filled up in the Judiciary act of 1789, one of the seminal statutes of the United States. By the Act, the Court was made to consist of a Chief Justice and five Associate Justices. The number was gradually increased until it reached a total of ten under the act of March 3, 1863. As one of the Reconstruction Congress' restrictions on President Andrew Johnson, the number was reduced to seven as vacancies should occur. The number actually never fell below eight before the end of Johnson's term, and Congress thereupon made the number nine.
Proposals have been made at various times for an organization of the Court into sections or divisions. No authoritative judicial expression is available, although Chief Justice Hughes in a letter to Senator Wheeler in 1937 expressed doubts concerning the validity of such a device and stated that "the Constitution does not appear to authorize two or more Supreme Courts functioning in effect as separate courts."
Congress has also determined the time and place of sessions of the Court. It utilized this power once in 1801 to change its terms so that for fourteen months the Court did not convene, so as to forestall a constitutional attack on the repeal of the Judiciary Act of 1801.
Congress also acted in the Judiciary Act of 1789 to create inferior courts. Thirteen district courts were constituted to have four sessions annually, and three circuit courts were established. The circuit courts were to consist of two Supreme Court justices each and one of the district judges, and were to meet twice annually in the various districts comprising the circuit. This system had substantial faults in operation, not the least of which was the burden imposed on the Justices, who were required to travel thousands of miles each year under bad conditions. Despite numerous efforts to change this system, it persisted, except for one brief period, until 1891. Since then, the federal judicial system has consisted of district courts with original jurisdiction, intermediate appellate courts, and the Supreme Court.
Abolition of Courts.-That Congress "may from time to time ordain and establish" inferior courts would seem to imply that the system may be reoriented from time to time and that Congress is not restricted to the status quo but may expand and contract the units of the system. But if the judges are to have life tenure what is to be done with them when the system is contracted? Unfortunately, the first exercise of the power occurred in a highly politicized situation, and no definite answer emerged. By the Judiciary Act of February 13, 1801, passed in the closing weeks of the Adams Administration, the districts were reorganized, and six circuit courts consisting of three circuit judges each were created. Adams filled the positions with deserving Federalists, and upon coming to power the Jeffersonians set in motion plans to repeal the Act, which were carried out. No provision was made for the displaced judges, apparently under the theory that if there were no courts there could be no judges to sit on them. The validity of the repeal was questioned in Stuart v. Laird, where Justice Paterson scarely noticed the argument in rejecting it.
Not until 1913 did Congress again utilize its power to abolish a federal court, this time the unfortunate Commerce Court, which had disappointed the expectations of most of its friends. But this time Congress provided for the redistribution of the Commerce Court judges among the circuit courts as well as a transfer of its jurisdiction to the district courts.
Diminution of Salaries.-"The Compensation Clause has its roots in the longstanding Anglo-American tradition of an independent Judiciary. A Judiciary free from control by the Executive and the Legislature is essential if there is a right to have claims decided by judges who are free from potential domination by other branches of government." Thus, once a salary figure has gone into effect, Congress may not reduce it nor rescind any part of an increase, although prior to the time of its effectiveness Congress may repeal a promised increase. This decision was rendered in the context of a statutory salary plan for all federal officers and employees under which increases went automatically into effect on a specified date. Four years running, Congress interdicted the pay increases, but in two instances the increases had become effective, raising the barrier of this clause.
Also implicating this clause was a Depression-era appropriations act reducing "the salaries and retired pay of all judges (except judges whose compensation may not, under the Constitution, be diminished during their continuance in office)," by a fixed amount. While this provision presented no questions of constitutionality, it did require an interpretation as to which judges were excepted. Judges in the District of Columbia were held protected by Article III, while, on the other hand, salaries of the judges of the Court of Claims, that being a legislative court, were held subject to the reduction.
In Evans v. Gore, the Court invalidated the application of the income tax law to a federal judge, over the strong dissent of Justice Holmes, who was joined by Justice Brandeis. This ruling was extended, in Miles v. Graham, to exempt the salary of a judge of the Court of Claims appointed subsequent to the enactment of the taxing act. Evans v. Gore was disapproved, and Miles v. Graham was in effect overruled in O'Malley v. Woodrough, where the Court upheld section 22 of the Revenue Act of 1932, which extended the application of the income tax to salaries of judges taking office after June 6, 1932. Such a tax was regarded neither as an unconstitutional diminution of the compensation of judges nor as an encroachment on the independence of the judiciary. To subject judges who take office after a stipulated date to a nondiscriminatory tax laid generally on an income, said the Court "is merely to recognize that judges are also citizens, and that their particular function in government does not generate an immunity from sharing with their fellow citizens the material burden of the government whose Constitution and laws they are charged with administering."
Formally overruling Evans v. Gore, the Court in United States v. Hatter reaffirmed the principle that judges should "share the tax burdens borne by all citizens." "[T]he potential threats to judicial independence that underlie [the Compensation Clause] cannot justify a special judicial exemption from a commonly shared tax." The Medicare tax, extended to all federal employees in 1982, is such a non-discriminatory tax that may be applied to federal judges, the Court held. The 1983 extension of a Social Security tax to then-sitting judges was "a different matter," however, because the judges were required to participate while almost all other federal employees were given a choice about participation. Congress did not cure the constitutional violation by a subsequent enactment that raised judges' salaries by an amount greater than the amount of Social Security taxes that they were required to pay.
Courts of Specialized Jurisdiction
By virtue of its power "to ordain and establish" courts, Congress has occasionally created courts under Article III to exercise a specialized jurisdiction. These tribunals are like other Article III courts in that they exercise "the judicial power of the United States," and only that power, that their judges must be appointed by the President and the Senate and must hold office during good behavior subject to removal by impeachment only, and that the compensation of their judges cannot be diminished during their continuance in office. One example of such courts was the Commerce Court created by the Mann-Elkins Act of 1910, which was given exclusive jurisdiction of all cases to enforce orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission except those involving money penalties and criminal punishment, of cases brought to enjoin, annul, or set aside orders of the Commission, of cases brought under the act of 1903 to prevent unjust discriminations, and of all mandamus proceedings authorized by the act of 1903. This court actually functioned for less than three years, being abolished in 1913, as was mentioned above.
Another court of specialized jurisdiction, but created for a limited time only, was the Emergency Court of Appeals organized by the Emergency Price Control Act of January 30, 1942. By the terms of the statute, this court consisted of three or more judges designated by the Chief Justice from the judges of the Untied States district courts and circuit courts of appeal. The Court was vested with jurisdiction and powers of a district court to hear appeals filed within thirty days against denials of protests by the Price Administrator and with exclusive jurisdiction to set aside regulations, orders, or price schedules, in whole or in part, or to remand the proceeding, but the court was tightly constrained in its treatment of regulations. There was interplay with the district courts, which were charged with authority to enforce orders issued under the Act, although only the Emergency Court had jurisdiction to determine the validity of such orders.
Other specialized courts are the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which is in many respects like the geographic circuits. Created in 1982, this court has exclusive jurisdiction to hear appeals from the United States Court of Federal Claims, from the Federal Merit System Protection Board, the Court of International Trade, the Patent Office in patent and trademark cases, and in various contract and tort cases. The Court of International Trade, which began life as the Board of General Appraisers, became the United States Customs Court in 1926, and was declared an Article III court in 1956, came to its present form and name in 1980. The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, staffed by federal judges from other courts, is authorized to transfer actions pending in different districts to a single district for trial.
To facilitate the gathering of foreign intelligence information, through electronic surveillance, search and seizure, as well as other means, Congress authorized in 1978 a special court, composed of seven regular federal judges appointed by the Chief Justice, to receive applications from the United States and to issue warrants for intelligence activities.
Even greater specialization was provided by the special court created by the Ethics in Government Act; the court was charged, upon the request of the Attorney General, with appointing an independent counsel to investigate and prosecute charges of illegality in the Executive Branch. The court also had certain supervisory powers over the independent counsel.
Legislative courts, so-called because they are created by Congress in pursuance of its general legislative powers, have comprised a significant part of the federal judiciary. The distinction between constitutional courts and legislative courts was first made in American Ins. Co. v. Canter, which involved the question of the admiralty jurisdiction of the territorial court of Florida, the judges of which were limited to a four-year term in office. Said Chief Justice Marshall for the Court: "These courts, then, are not constitutional courts, in which the judicial power conferred by the Constitution on the general government, can be deposited. They are incapable of receiving it. They are legislative courts, created in virtue of the general right of sovereignty which exists in the government, or in virtue of that clause which enables Congress to make all needful rules and regulations, respecting the territory belonging to the United States. The jurisdiction with which they are invested, is not a part of that judicial power which is defined in the 3rd article of the Constitution, but is conferred by Congress, in the execution of those general powers which that body possesses over the territories of the United States." The Court went on to hold that admiralty jurisdiction can be exercised in the States only in those courts which are established in pursuance of Article III, but that the same limitation does not apply to the territorial courts, for in legislating for them "Congress exercises the combined powers of the general, and of a state government."
Canter postulated a simple proposition: "Constitutional courts exercise the judicial power described in Art. III of the Constitution; legislative courts do not and cannot." A two-fold difficulty attended this proposition, however. Admiralty jurisdiction is included within the "judicial power of the United States" specifically in Article III, requiring an explanation how this territorial court could receive and exercise it. Second, if territorial courts could not exercise Article III power, how might their decisions be subjected to appellate review in the Supreme Court, or indeed in other Article III courts, which could exercise only Article III judicial power? Moreover, if in fact some "judicial power" may be devolved upon courts not having the constitutional security of tenure and salary, what prevents Congress from undermining those values intended to be protected by Article III's guarantees by giving jurisdiction to non-protected entities that, being subjected to influence, would be bent to the popular will?
Attempts to explain or to rationalize the predicament or to provide a principled limiting point have from Canter to the present resulted in "frequently arcane distinctions and confusing precedents" spelled out in cases comprising "landmarks on a judicial 'darkling plain' where ignorant armies have clashed by night." Nonetheless, Article I courts are quite usual entities in our judicial system.
Power of Congress Over Legislative Courts.-In creating legislative courts, Congress is not limited by the restrictions imposed in Article III concerning tenure during good behavior and the prohibition against diminution of salaries. Congress may limit tenure to a term of years, as it has done in acts creating territorial courts and the Tax Court, and it may subject the judges of legislative courts to removal by the President, or it may reduce their salaries during their terms. Similarly, it follows that Congress can vest in legislative courts nonjudicial functions of a legislative or advisory nature and deprive their judgments of finality. Thus, in Gordon v. United States, there was no objection to the power of the Secretary of the Treasury and Congress to revise or suspend the early judgments of the Court of Claims. Likewise, in United States v. Ferreira, the Court sustained the act conferring powers on the Florida territorial court to examine claims rising under the Spanish treaty and to report its decisions and the evidence on which they were based to the Secretary of the Treasury for subsequent action. "A power of this description," it was said, "may constitutionally be conferred on a Secretary as well as on a commissioner. But [it] is not judicial in either case, in the sense in which judicial power is granted by the Constitution to the courts of the United States."
Review of Legislative Courts by Supreme Court.-Chief Justice Taney's view, that would have been expressed in Gordon, that the judgments of legislative courts could never be reviewed by the Supreme Court, was tacitly rejected in De Groot v. United States, in which the Court took jurisdiction from a final judgment of the Court of Claims. Since the decision in this case, the authority of the Court to exercise appellate jurisdiction over legislative courts has turned not upon the nature or status of such courts but rather upon the nature of the proceeding before the lower court and the finality of its judgment. The Supreme Court will neither review the administrative proceedings of legislative courts nor entertain appeals from the advisory or interlocutory decrees of such a body. But in proceedings before a legislative court which are judicial in nature, admit of a final judgment, and involve the performance of judicial functions and therefore the exercise of judicial power, the Court may be vested with appellate jurisdiction.
The "Public Rights" Distinction.-A major delineation of the distinction between Article I courts and Article III courts was attempted in Murray's Lessee v. Hoboken Land & Improvement Co. At issue was a summary procedure, without benefit of the courts, for the collection by the United States of moneys claimed to be due from one of its customs collectors. It was objected that the assessment and collection was a judicial act carried out by non-judicial officers and thus invalid under Article III. Accepting that the acts complained of were judicial, the Court nonetheless sustained the act by distinguishing between any act, "which, from its nature, is the subject of a suit at the common law, or in equity, or admiralty," which, in other words, is inherently judicial, and other acts which Congress may vest in courts or in other agencies. "[T]here are matters, involving public rights, which may be presented in such form that the judicial power is capable of acting on them, and which are susceptible of judicial determination, but which congress may or may not bring within the cognizance of the courts of the United States, as it may deem proper." The distinction was between those acts which historically had been determined by courts and those which historically had been resolved by executive or legislative acts and comprehended those matters that arose between the government and others. Thus, Article I courts "may be created as special tribunals to examine and determine various matters, arising between the government and others, which from their nature do not require judicial determination and yet are susceptible of it. The mode of determining matters of this class is completely within congressional control."
Among the matters susceptible of judicial determination, but not requiring it, are claims against the United States, the disposal of public lands and claims arising therefrom, questions concerning membership in the Indian tribes, and questions arising out of the administration of the customs and internal revenue laws. Other courts similar to territorial courts, such as consular courts and military courts martial, may be justified on like grounds.
The "public rights" distinction appears today to be a description without a significant distinction. Thus, in Crowell v. Benson, the Court approved an administrative scheme for determination, subject to judicial review, of maritime employee compensation claims, although it acknowledged that the case involved "one of private right, that is, of the liability of one individual to another under the law as defined." This scheme was permissible, the Court said, because in cases arising out of congressional statutes, an administrative tribunal could make findings of fact and render an initial decision on legal and constitutional questions, as long as there is adequate review in a constitutional court. The "essential attributes" of decision must remain in an Article III court, but so long as it does, Congress may utilize administrative decision-makers in those private rights cases that arise in the context of a comprehensive federal statutory scheme. That the "public rights" distinction marked a dividing line between those matters that could be assigned to legislative courts and to administrative agencies and those matters "of private right" that could not be was re- asserted in Marathon, but there was much the Court plurality did not explain.
The Court continued to waver with respect to the importance to decision-making of the public rights/private rights distinction. In two cases following Marathon, it rejected the distinction as "a bright line test," and instead focused on "substance"-i.e., on the extent to which the particular grant of jurisdiction to an Article I court threatened judicial integrity and separation of powers principles. Nonetheless, the Court indicated that the distinction may be an appropriate starting point for analysis. Thus, the fact that private rights traditionally at the core of Article III jurisdiction are at stake leads the Court to "searching" inquiry as to whether Congress is encroaching inordinately on judicial functions, while the concern is not so great where "public" rights are involved.
However, in a subsequent case, the distinction was pronounced determinative not only of the issue whether a matter could be referred to a non-Article III tribunal but whether Congress could dispense with civil jury trials. In so doing, however, the Court vitiated much of the core content of "private" rights as a concept and left resolution of the central issue to a balancing test. That is, "public" rights are, strictly speaking, those in which the cause of action inheres in or lies against the Federal Government in its sovereign capacity, the understanding since Murray's Lessee. However, to accommodate Crowell v. Benson, Atlas Roofing, and similar cases, seemingly private causes of action between private parties will also be deemed "public" rights, when Congress, acting for a valid legislative purpose pursuant to its Article I powers, fashions a cause of action that is analogous to a common- law claim and so closely integrates it into a public regulatory scheme that it becomes a matter appropriate for agency resolution with limited involvement by the Article III judiciary. Nonetheless, despite its fixing by Congress as a "core proceeding" suitable for an Article I bankruptcy court adjudication, the Court held the particular cause of action at issue was a private issue as to which the parties were entitled to a civil jury trial (and necessarily which Congress could not commit to an Article I tribunal, save perhaps through the consent of the parties.
Constitutional Status of the Court of Claims and the Court of Customs and Patent Appeals.-Though the Supreme Court for a long while accepted the Court of Claims as an Article III court, it later ruled that court to be an Article I court and its judges without constitutional protection of tenure and salary. Then, in the 1950s, Congress statutorily declared that the Court of Claims, the Customs Court, and the Court of Customs and Patent Appeals were Article III courts, a questionable act under the standards the Court had utilized to determine whether courts were legislative or constitutional. But in Glidden Co. v. Zdanok, five of seven participating Justices united to find that indeed the Court of Claims and the Court of Customs and Patent Appeals, at least, were constitutional courts and their judges eligible to participate in judicial business in other constitutional courts. Three Justices would have overruled Bakelite and Williams and would have held that the courts in question were constitutional courts. Whether a court is an Article III tribunal depends largely upon whether legislation establishing it is in harmony with the limitations of that Article, specifically, "whether . . . its business is the federal business there specified and its judges and judgments are allowed the independence there expressly or impliedly made requisite." When a court is created "to carry into effect [federal] powers . . . over subject matter . . . and not over localities," a presumption arises that the status of such a tribunal is constitutional rather than legislative. The other four Justices expressly declared that Bakelite and Williams should not be overruled, but two of them thought the two courts had attained constitutional status by virtue of the clear manifestation of congressional intent expressed in the legislation. Two Justices maintained that both courts remained legislative tribunals. While the result is clear, no standard for pronouncing a court legislative rather than constitutional has obtained the adherence of a majority of the Court.
Status of Courts of the District of Columbia.-Through a long course of decisions, the courts of the District of Columbia were regarded as legislative courts upon which Congress could impose nonjudicial functions. In Butterworth v. United States ex rel. Hoe, the Court sustained an act of Congress which conferred revisory powers upon the Supreme Court of the District in patent appeals and made its decisions binding only upon the Commissioner of Patents. Similarly, the Court later sustained the authority of Congress to vest revisory powers in the same court over rates fixed by a public utilities commission. Not long after this the same rule was applied to the revisory powers of the District Supreme Court over orders of the Federal Radio Commission. These rulings were based on the assumption, express or implied, that the courts of the District were legislative courts, created by Congress in pursuance of its plenary power to govern the District of Columbia. In dictum in Ex parte Bakelite Corp., while reviewing the history and analyzing the nature of the legislative courts, the Court stated that the courts of the District were legislative courts.
In 1933, nevertheless, the Court, abandoning all previous dicta on the subject, found the courts of the District of Columbia to be constitutional courts exercising judicial power of the United States, with the result that it assumed the task of reconciling the performance of nonjudicial functions by such courts with the rule that constitutional courts can exercise only the judicial power of the United States. This task was accomplished by the argument that in establishing courts for the District, Congress is performing dual functions in pursuance of two distinct powers, the power to constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court, and its plenary and exclusive power to legislate for the District of Columbia. However, Article III, § 1, limits this latter power with respect to tenure and compensation, but not with regard to vesting legislative and administrative powers in such courts. Subject to the guarantees of personal liberty in the Constitution, "Congress has as much power to vest courts of the District with a variety of jurisdiction and powers as a State legislature has in conferring jurisdiction on its courts."
In 1970, Congress formally recognized two sets of courts in the District, federal courts, district courts and a Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, created pursuant to Article III, and courts equivalent to state and territorial courts, created pursuant to Article I. Congress' action was sustained in Palmore v. United States. When legislating for the District, the Court held, Congress has the power of a local legislature and may, pursuant to Article I, § 8, cl. 17, vest jurisdiction to hear matters of local law and local concerns in courts not having Article III characteristics. The defendant's claim that he was denied his constitutional right to be tried before an Article III judge was denied on the basis that it was not absolutely necessary that every proceeding in which a charge, claim, or defense based on an act of Congress or a law made under its authority need be conducted in an Article III court. State courts, after all, could hear cases involving federal law as could territorial and military courts. "[T]he requirements of Article III, which are applicable where laws of national applicability and affairs of national concern are at stake, must in proper circumstances give way to accommodate plenary grants of power to Congress to legislate with respect to specialized areas having particularized needs and warranting distinctive treatment."
Bankruptcy Courts.-After extended and lengthy debate, Congress in 1978 revised the bankruptcy act and created as an "adjunct" of the district courts a bankruptcy court composed of judges, vested with practically all the judicial power of the United States, serving for 14-year terms, subject to removal for cause by the judicial councils of the circuits, and with salaries subject to statutory change. The bankruptcy courts were given jurisdiction over all civil proceedings arising under the bankruptcy code or arising in or related to bankruptcy cases, with review in Article III courts under a clearly erroneous standard. In a case in which a claim was made against a company for breaches of contract and warranty, purely state law claims, the Court held unconstitutional the conferral upon judges not having the Article III security of tenure and compensation of jurisdiction to hear state law claims of traditional common law actions of the kind existing at the time of the drafting of the Constitution. While the holding was extremely narrow, a plurality of the Court sought to rationalize and limit the Court's jurisprudence of Article I courts. According to the plurality, as a fundamental principle of separation of powers, the judicial power of the United States must be exercised by courts having the attributes prescribed in Article III. Congress may not evade the constitutional order by allocating this judicial power to courts whose judges lack security of tenure and compensation. Only in three narrowly circumscribed instances may judicial power be distributed outside the Article III framework: in territories and the District of Columbia, that is, geographical areas in which no State operated as sovereign and Congress exercised the general powers of government; courts martial, that is, the establishment of courts under a constitutional grant of power historically understood as giving the political branches extraordinary control over the precise subject matter; and the adjudication of "public rights," that is, the litigation of certain matters that historically were reserved to the political branches of government and that were between the government and the individual. In bankruptcy legislation and litigation not involving any of these exceptions, the plurality would have held, the judicial power to process bankruptcy cases could not be assigned to the tribunals created by the act.
The dissent argued that, while on its face Article III provided for exclusivity in assigning judicial power to Article III entities, the history since Canter belied that simplicity. Rather, the precedents clearly indicated that there is no difference in principle between the work that Congress may assign to an Article I court and that which must be given to an Article III court. Despite this, the dissent contended that Congress did not possess plenary discretion in choosing between the two systems; rather, in evaluating whether jurisdiction was properly reposed in an Article I court, the Supreme Court must balance the values of Article III against both the strength of the interest Congress sought to further by its Article I investiture and the extent to which Article III values were undermined by the congressional action. This balancing would afford the Court, the dissent believed, the power to prevent Congress, were it moved to do so, from transferring jurisdiction in order to emasculate the constitutional courts of the United States.
Again, no majority could be marshaled behind a principled discussion of the reasons for and the limitation upon the creation of legislative courts, not that a majority opinion, or even a unanimous one, would necessarily presage the settling of the law. But the breadth of the various opinions not only left unclear the degree of discretion left in Congress to restructure the bankruptcy courts, but also placed in issue the constitutionality of other legislative efforts to establish adjudicative systems outside a scheme involving the creation of life-tenured judges.
Congress responded to Marathon by enactment of the Bankruptcy Amendments and Federal Judgeship Act of 1984. Bankruptcy courts were maintained as Article I entities, and overall their powers as courts were not notably diminished. However, Congress did establish a division between "core proceedings," which bankruptcy courts could hear and determine, subject to lenient review, and other proceedings, which, though initially heard and decided by bankruptcy courts, could be reviewed de novo in the district court at the behest of any party, unless the parties consented to bankruptcy-court jurisdiction in the same manner as core proceedings. A safety valve was included, permitting the district court to withdraw any proceeding from the bankruptcy court on cause shown. Notice that in Granfinanciera, S.A. v. Nordberg, the Court found that a cause of action founded on state law, though denominated a core proceeding, was a private right.
Agency Adjudication.-The Court in two decisions following Marathon involving legislative courts clearly suggested that the majority was now closer to the balancing approach of the Marathon dissenters than to the position of the Marathon plurality that Congress may confer judicial power on legislative courts in only very limited circumstances. Subsequently, however, Granfinanciera, S.A. v. Nordberg, a reversion to the fundamentality of Marathon, with an opinion by the same author, Justice Brennan, cast some doubt on this proposition. In Thomas v. Union Carbide Agric. Products Co., the Court upheld a provision of the pesticide law requiring binding arbitration, with limited judicial review , of compensation due one registrant by another for mandatory sharing of registration information, the right arising from federal statutory law. And in CFTC v. Schor, the Court upheld conferral on the agency of authority, in a reparations adjudication under the Act, also to adjudicate "counterclaims" arising out of the same transaction, including those arising under state common law. Neither the fact that the pesticide case involved a dispute between two private parties nor the fact that the CFTC was empowered to decide claims traditionally adjudicated under state law proved decisive to the Court's analysis.
In rejecting a "formalistic" approach and analyzing the "substance" of the provision at issue in Union Carbide, Justice O'Connor's opinion for the Court pointed to several considerations. The right to compensation was not a purely private right, but "bears many of the characteristics of a 'public' right," since Congress was "authoriz[ing] an agency administering a complex regulatory scheme to allocate costs and benefits among voluntary participants in the program." Also important was not "unduly constrict[ing] Congress in its ability to take needed and innovative action pursuant to its Article I powers;" arbitration was "a pragmatic solution to [a] difficult problem." The limited nature of judicial review was seen as a plus in the sense that "no unwilling defendant is subjected to judicial enforcement power;" on the other hand, availability of limited judicial review of the arbitrator's findings and determination for fraud, misconduct, or misrepresentation, and for due process violations, preserved the "'appropriate exercise of the judicial function."' Thus, the Court concluded, Congress in exercise of Article I powers "may create a seemingly 'private' right that is so closely integrated into a public regulatory scheme as to be a matter appropriate for agency resolution with limited involvement by the Article III judiciary."
In Schor, the Court described Art. III, § 1 as serving a dual purpose: to protect the role of an independent judiciary and to safeguard the right of litigants to have claims decided by judges free from potential domination by the other branches of government. A litigant's Article III right is not absolute, the Court determined, but may be waived. This the litigant had done by submitting to the administrative law judge's jurisdiction rather than independently seeking relief as he was entitled to and then objecting only after adverse rulings on the merits. But the institutional integrity claim, not being personal, could not be waived, and the Court reached the merits. The threat to institutional independence was "weighed" by reference to "a number of factors." The conferral on the CFTC of pendent jurisdiction over common law counterclaims was seen as more narrowly confined than was the grant to bankruptcy courts at issue in Marathon, and as more closely resembling the "model" approved in Crowell v. Benson. The CFTC's jurisdiction, unlike that of bankruptcy courts, was said to be confined to "a particularized area of the law;" the agency's orders were enforceable only by order of a district court, and reviewable under a less deferential standard, with legal rulings being subject to de novo review; and the agency was not empowered, as had been the bankruptcy courts, to exercise "all ordinary powers of district courts."
Granfinanciera followed analysis different from that in Schor, although it preserved Union Carbide through its concept of "public rights." State law and other legal claims founded on private rights could not be remitted to non-Article III tribunals for adjudication unless Congress in creating an integrated public regulatory scheme has so taken up the right as to transform it. It may not simply relabel a private right and place it into the regulatory scheme. The Court is hazy with respect to whether the right itself must be a creature of federal statutory action. The general descriptive language suggests that, but in its determination whether the right at issue in the case, the recovery of preferential or fraudulent transfers in the context of a bankruptcy proceeding, is a "private right," the Court seemingly goes beyond this point. Though a statutory interest, the actions were identical to state-law contract claims brought by a bankrupt corporation to augment the estate. Schor was distinguished solely on the waiver part of the decision, relating to the individual interest, without considering the part of the opinion deciding the institutional interest on the merits and utilizing a balancing test.
Thus, while the Court has made some progress in reconciling its growing line of disparate cases, doctrinal harmony has not yet been achieved.
Noncourt Entities in the Judicial Branch
Passing on the constitutionality of the establishment of the Sentencing Commission as an "independent" body in the judicial branch, the Court acknowledged that the Commission is not a court and does not exercise judicial power. Rather, its function is to promulgate binding sentencing guidelines for federal courts. It acts, therefore, legislatively, and its membership of seven is composed of three judges and three nonjudges. But the standard of constitutionality, the Court held, is whether the entity exercises powers that are more appropriately performed by another branch or that undermine the integrity of the judiciary. Because the imposition of sentences is a function traditionally exercised within congressionally prescribed limits by federal judges, the Court found the functions of the Commission could be located in the judicial branch. Nor did performance of its functions contribute to a weakening of the judiciary, or an aggrandizement of power either, in any meaningful way, the Court observed.
Characteristics and Attributes of Judicial Power
Judicial power is the power "of a court to decide and pronounce a judgment and carry it into effect between persons and parties who bring a case before it for decision." It is "the right to determine actual controversies arising between diverse litigants, duly instituted in courts of proper jurisdiction." Although the terms "judicial power" and "jurisdiction" are frequently used interchangeably and jurisdiction is defined as the power to hear and determine the subject matter in controversy between parties to a suit or as the "power to entertain the suit, consider the merits and render a binding decision thereon," the cases and commentary support, indeed require, a distinction between the two concepts. Jurisdiction is the authority of a court to exercise judicial power in a specific case and is, of course, a prerequisite to the exercise of judicial power, which is the totality of powers a court exercises when it assumes jurisdiction and hears and decides a case.
Judicial power confers on federal courts the power to decide a case, to render a judgment conclusively resolving a case. Judicial power is the authority to render dispositive judgments, and Congress violates the separation of powers when it purports to alter final judgments of Article III courts. After the Court had unexpectedly fixed on a shorter statute of limitations to file certain securities actions than that believed to be the time in many jurisdictions, and after several suits that had been filed later than the determined limitations had been dismissed and had become final because they were not appealed, Congress enacted a statute which, while not changing the limitations period prospectively, retroactively extended the time for suits dismissed and provided for the reopening of the final judgments rendered in the dismissals of suits.
Holding the statute invalid, the Court held it impermissible for Congress to disturb a final judgment. "Having achieved finality, . . . a judicial decision becomes the last word of the judicial department with regard to a particular case or controversy, and Congress may not declare by retroactive legislation that the law applicable to that very case was something other than what the courts said it was." On the other hand, the Court ruled in Miller v. French that the Prison Litigation Reform Act's automatic stay of ongoing injunctions remedying violations of prisoners' rights did not amount to an unconstitutional legislative revision of a final judgment. Rather, the automatic stay merely alters "the prospective effect" of injunctions, and it is well established that such prospective relief "remains subject to alteration due to changes in the underlying law."
Included within the general power to decide cases are the ancillary powers of courts to punish for contempts of their authority, to issue writs in aid of jurisdiction when authorized by statute, to make rules governing their process in the absence of statutory authorizations or prohibitions, to order their own process so as to prevent abuse, oppression, and injustice, and to protect their own jurisdiction and officers in the protection of property in custody of law, to appoint masters in chancery, referees, auditors, and other investigators, and to admit and disbar attorneys.
"Shall Be Vested".-The distinction between judicial power and jurisdiction is especially pertinent to the meaning of the words "shall be vested" in § 1. Whereas all the judicial power of the United States is vested in the Supreme Court and the inferior federal courts created by Congress, neither has ever been vested with all the jurisdiction which could be granted and, Justice Story to the contrary, the Constitution has not been read to mandate Congress to confer the entire jurisdiction it might. Thus, except for the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, which flows directly from the Constitution, two prerequisites to jurisdiction must be present: first, the Constitution must have given the courts the capacity to receive it, and, second, an act of Congress must have conferred it. The fact that federal courts are of limited jurisdiction means that litigants in them must affirmatively establish that jurisdiction exists and may not confer nonexistent jurisdiction by consent or conduct.
Finality of Judgment as an Attribute of Judicial Power
Since 1792, the federal courts have emphasized finality of judgment as an essential attribute of judicial power. In that year, Congress authorized Revolutionary War veterans to file pension claims in circuit courts of the United States, directed the judges to certify to the Secretary of War the degree of a claimant's disability and their opinion with regard to the proper percentage of monthly pay to be awarded, and empowered the Secretary to withhold judicially certified claimants from the pension list if he suspected "imposition or mistake." The Justices then on circuit almost immediately forwarded objections to the President, contending that the statute was unconstitutional because the judicial power was constitutionally committed to a separate department and the duties imposed by the act were not judicial, and because the subjection of a court's opinions to revision or conrol by an officer of the executive or the legislature was not authorized by the Constitution. Attorney General Randolph, upon the refusal of the circuit courts to act under the new statute, filed a motion for mandamus in the Supreme Court to direct the Circuit Court in Pennsylvania to proceed on a petition filed by one Hayburn seeking a pension. Although the Court heard argument, it put off decision until the next term, presumably because Congress was already acting to delete the objectionable features of the act, and upon enactment of a new law the Court dismissed the action. Hayburn's Case has been since followed, so that the Court has rejected all efforts to give it and the lower federal courts jurisdiction over cases in which judgment would have been subject to exective or legislative revision. Thus, in a 1948 case, the Court held that an order of the Civil Aeronautics Board denying to one citizen air carrier and granting to another a certificate of convenience and necessity for an overseas and foreign air route was not reviewable. Such an order was subject to review and confirmance or revision by the President, and the Court decided it could not review the discretion exercised by him in that situation; the lower court had thought the matter could be handled by permitting presidential review of the order after judicial review, but this the Court rejected. "[I]f the President may completely disregard the judgment of the court, it would be only because it is one the courts were not authorized to render. Judgments within the powers vested in courts by the Judiciary Article of the Constitution may not lawfully be revised, overturned or refused faith and credit by another Department of Government," More recently, the Court avoided a similar situation by a close construction of a statute.
Award of Execution - The adherence of the Court to this proposition, however, has not extended to a rigid rule formulated by Chief Justice Taney, given its fullest expression in a post-humously-published opinion. In Gordon v. United States, the Court refused to hear an appeal from a decision of the Court of Claims; the act establishing the Court of Claims provided for appeals to the Supreme Court, after which judgments in favor of claimants were to be referred to the Secretary of the Treasury for payments out of the general appropriation for payment of private claims. But the act also provided that no funds should be paid out of the Treasury for any claims “till after an appropriation therefor shall be estimated by the Secretary of the Treasury.” The opinion of the Court merely stated that the implication of power in the executive officer and in Congress to revise all decisions of the Court of Claims requiring payment of money denied that court the judicial power from the exercise of which “alone” appeals could be taken to the Supreme Court.
In his posthumously-published opinion, Chief Justice Taney, because the judgment of the Court of Claims and the Supreme Court depended for execution upon future action of the Secretary and of Congress, regarded any such judgment as nothing more than a certificate of opinion and in no sense a judicial judgment. Congress could not therefore authorize appeals to the Supreme Court in a case where its judicial power could not be exercised, where its judgment would not be final and conclusive upon the parties, and where processes of execution were not awarded to carry it into effect. Taney then proceeded to enunciate a rule which was rigorously applied until 1933: the award of execution is a part and an essential part of every judgment passed by a court exercising judicial powers and no decision was a legal judgment without an award of execution. The rule was most significant in barring the lower federal courts from hearing proceedings for declaratory judgments and in denying appellate jurisdiction in the Supreme Court from declaratory proceedings in state courts. But, in 1927, the Court began backing away from its absolute insistence upon an award of execution. Unanimously holding that a declaratory judgment in a state court was res judicata in a subsequent proceeding in federal court, the Court admitted that "[w]hile ordinarily a case or judicial controversy results in a judgment requiring award of process of execution to carry it into effect, such relief is not an indispensable adjunct to the exercise of the judicial function." Then, in 1933, the Court interred the award-of-execution rule in its rigid form and accepted an appeal from a state court in a declaratory proceeding. Finality of judgment, however, remains the rule in determination of what is judicial power without regard to the demise of Chief Justice Taney's formulation.
Ancillary Powers of Federal Courts
The Contempt Power
Categories of Contempt.-Crucial to an understanding of the history of the law governing the courts' powers of contempt is an awareness of the various kinds of contempt. With a few notable exceptions, the Court has consistently distinguished between criminal and civil contempts on the basis of the vindication of the authority of the courts on the one hand and the preservation and enforcement of the rights of the parties on the other. A civil contempt has been traditionally viewed as the refusal of a person in a civil case to obey a mandatory order. It is incomplete in nature, may be purged by obedience to the court order, and does not involve a sentence for a definite period of time. The classic criminal contempt is one where the act of contempt has been completed, punishment is imposed to vindicate the authority of the court, and a person cannot by subsequent action purge himself of such contempt. In International Union, UMW v. Bagwell, the Court formulated a new test for drawing the distinction between civil and criminal contempts, which has important consequences for the procedural rights to be accorded those cited. Henceforth, the imposition of non-compensatory contempt fines for the violation of any complex injunction will require criminal proceedings. This case, as have so many, involved the imposition of large fines (here, $52 million) upon a union in a strike situation for violations of an elaborate court injunction restraining union activity during the strike. The Court was vague with regard to the standards for determining when a court order is "complex" and thus requires the protection of criminal proceedings. Much prior doctrine remains, however, as in the distinction between remedial sanctions, which are civil, and punitive sanctions, which are criminal, and between in-court and out-of-court contempts. In the case of Shillitani v. United States, the defendants were sentenced by their respective District Courts for two years imprisonment for contempt of court; the sentence contained a purge clause providing for the unconditional release of the contemnors upon agreeing to testify before a grand jury. On appeal, the Supreme Court held that the defendants were in civil contempt, notwithstanding their sentence for a definite period of time, on the grounds that the test for determining whether the contempt is civil or criminal is what the court primarily seeks to accomplish by imposing sentence. Here, the purpose was to obtain answers to the questions for the grand jury, and the court provided for the defendants' release upon compliance; whereas, "a criminal contempt proceeding would be characterized by the imposition of an unconditional sentence for punishment or deterence." The issue of whether a certain contempt is civil or criminal can be of great importance as demonstrated in the dictum of Ex parte Grossman, in which Chief Justice Taft, while holding for the Court on the main issue that the President may pardon a criminal contempt, noted that he may not pardon a civil contempt. Notwithstanding the importance of distinguishing between the two, there have been instances where defendants have been charged with both civil and criminal contempt for the same act.
A second but more subtle distinction, with regard to the categories of contempt, is the difference between direct and indirect contempt-whether civil or criminal in nature. Direct contempt results when the contumacious act is committed "in the presence of the Court or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice;" indirect contempt is behavior which the Court did not itself witness. The nature of the contumacious act, i.e., whether it is direct or indirect, is important because it determines the appropriate procedure for charging the contemnor. As will be evidenced in the following discussion, the history of the contempt powers of the American judiciary is marked by two trends: a shrinking of the court's power to punish a person summarily and a multiplying of the due process requirements that must otherwise be met when finding an individual to be in contempt.
The Act of 1789 - The summary power of the courts of the United States to punish contempts of their authority had its origin in the law and practice of England where disobedience of court orders was regarded as contempt of the King himself and attachment was a prerogative process derived from presumed contempt of the sovereign. By the latter part of the eighteenth century, summary power to punish was extended to all contempts whether committed in or out of court. In the United States, the Judiciary Act of 1789 in section 17 conferred power on all courts of the United States "to punish by fine or imprisonment, at the discretion of said courts, all contempts of authority in any cause or hearing before the same." The only limitation placed on this power was that summary attachment was made a negation of all other modes of punishment. The abuse of this extensive power led, following the unsuccessful impeachment of Judge James H. Peck of the Federal District Court of Missouri, to the passage of the Act of 1831 limiting the power of the federal courts to punish contempts to mis-behavior in the presence of the courts, "or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice," to the misbehavior of officers of courts in their official capacity, and to disobedience or resistance to any lawful writ, process or order of the court.
An Inherent Power.-The validity of the act of 1831 was sustained forty-three years later in Ex parte Robinson, in which Justice Field for the Court expounded principles full of potentialities for conflict. He declared: "The power to punish for contempts is inherent in all courts; its existence is essential to the preservation of order in judicial proceedings, and to the enforcement of the judgments, orders, and writs of the courts, and consequently to the due administration of justice. The moment the courts of the United States were called into existence and invested with jurisdiction over any subject, they became possessed of this power." Expressing doubts concerning the validity of the act as to the Supreme Court, he declared, however, that there could be no question of its validity as applied to the lower courts on the ground that they are created by Congress and that their "powers and duties depend upon the act calling them into existence, or subsequent acts extending or limiting their jurisdiction." With the passage of time, later adjudications, especially after 1890, came to place more emphasis on the inherent power of courts to punish contempts than upon the power of Congress to regulate summary attachment.
By 1911, the Court was saying that the contempt power must be exercised by a court without referring the issues of fact or law to another tribunal or to a jury in the same tribunal. In Michaelson v. United States, the Court intentionally placed a narrow interpretation upon those sections of the Clayton Act relating to punishment for contempt of court by disobedience of injunctions in labor disputes. The sections in question provided for a jury upon the demand of the accused in contempt cases in which the acts committed in violation of district court orders also constituted a crime under the laws of the United States or of those of the State where they were committed. Although Justice Sutherland reaffirmed earlier rulings establishing the authority of Congress to regulate the contempt power, he went on to qualify this authority and declared that "the attributes which inhere in the power [to punish contempt] and are inseparable from it can neither be abrogated nor rendered practically inoperative." The Court mentioned specifically "the power to deal summarily with contempt committed in the presence of the courts or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice," and the power to enforce mandatory decrees by coercive means. This latter power, to enforce, the Court has held, includes the authority to appoint private counsel to prosecute a criminal contempt. While the contempt power may be inherent, it is not unlimited. In Spallone v. United States, the Court held that a district court had abused its discretion by imposing contempt sanctions on individual members of a city council for refusing to vote to implement a consent decree remedying housing discrimination by the city. The proper remedy, the Court indicated, was to proceed first with contempt sanctions against the city, and only if that course failed should it proceed against the council members individually.
First Amendment Limitations on the Contempt Power.- The phrase "in the presence of the Court or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice" was interpreted so broadly in Toledo Newspaper Co. v. United States as to uphold the action of a district court judge in punishing a newspaper for contempt for publishing spirited editorials and cartoons on questions at issue in a contest between a street railway company and the public over rates. A majority of the Court held that the test to be applied in determining the obstruction of the administration of justice is not the actual obstruction resulting from an act, but "the character of the act done and its direct tendency to prevent and obstruct the discharge of judicial duty." Similarly, the test whether a particular act is an attempt to influence or intimidate a court is not the influence exerted upon the mind of a particular judge but "the reasonable tendency of the acts done to influence or bring about the baleful result . . . without reference to the consideration of how far they may have been without influence in a particular case." In Craig v. Hecht, these criteria were applied to sustain the imprisonment of the comptroller of New York City for writing and publishing a letter to a public service commissioner which criticized the action of a United States district judge in receivership proceedings. The decision in the Toledo Newspaper case, however, did not follow earlier decisions interpreting the act of 1831 and was grounded on historical error. For these reasons, it was reversed in Nye v. United States, and the theory of constructive contempt based on the "reasonable tendency" rule was rejected in a proceeding wherein defendants in a civil suit, by persuasion and the use of liquor, induced a plaintiff feeble in mind and body to ask for dismissal of the suit he had brought against them. The events in the episode occurred more than 100 miles from where the court was sitting and were held not to put the persons responsible for them in contempt of court. Although Nye v. United States was exclusively a case of statutory construction, it was significant from a constitutional point of view because its reasoning was contrary to that of earlier cases narrowly construing the act of 1831 and asserting broad inherent powers of courts to punish contempts independently of, and contrary to, congressional regulation of this power. Bridges v. California was noteworthy for the dictum of the majority that the contempt power of all courts, federal as well as state, is limited by the guaranty of the First Amendment against interference with freedom of speech or of the press.
It is now clearly establihsed that courtroom conduct to be punishable as contempt "must constitute an imminent, not merely a likely, threat to the administration of justice. The danger must not be remote or even probable; it must immediately imperil." Craig v. Harney, 331 U.S. 367 , 376 (1947); In re Little, 404 U.S. 553 , 555 (1972).
A series of cases involving highly publicized trials and much news media attention and exploitation, however, caused the Court to suggest that the contempt and other powers of trial courts should be utilized to stem the flow of publicity before it can taint a trial. Thus, Justice Clark, speaking for the majority in Sheppard v. Maxwell, noted that "[i]f publicity during the proceedings threatens the fairness of the trial, a new trial should be ordered. But we must remember that reversals are but pallatives; the cure lies in those remedial measures that will prevent the prejudice at its inception. Neither prosecutors, counsel for defense, the accused, witness, court staff nor law enforcement officers coming under the jurisdiction of the court should be permitted to frustrate its function. Collaboration between counsel and the press as to information affecting the fairness of a criminal trial is not only subject to regulation, but is highly censurable and worthy of disciplinary measures." Though the regulation the Justice had in mind was presumably to be of the parties and related persons rather than of the press, the potential for conflict with the First Amendment is obvious as well as is the necessity for protection of the equally important right to a fair trial.
Due Process Limitations on Contempt Power: Right to Notice and to a Hearing versus Summary Punishment.-Included among the notable cases raising questions concerning the power of a trial judge to punish summarily for alleged misbehavior in the course of a trial is Ex parte Terry, decided in 1888. Terry had been jailed by the United States Circuit Court of California for assaulting in its presence a United States marshal. The Supreme Court denied his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. In Cooke v. United States, however, the Court remanded for further proceedings a judgment sentencing to jail an attorney and his client for presenting the judge a letter which impugned his impartiality with respect to their case, still pending before him. Distinguishing the case from that of Terry, Chief Justice Taft, speaking for the unanimous Court, said: "The important distinction . . . is that this contempt was not in open court.... To preserve order in the court room for the proper conduct of business, the court must act instantly to suppress disturbance or violence or physical obstruction or disrespect to the court when occurring in open court. There is no need of evidence or assistance of counsel before punishment, because the court has seen the offense. Such summary vindication of the court's dignity and authority is necessary. It has always been so in the courts of the common law and the punishment imposed is due process of law."
As to the timeliness of summary punishment, the Court at first construed Rule 42(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, which was designed to afford judges clearer guidelines as to the exercise of their contempt power, in Sacher v. United States, as to allow "the trial judge, upon the occurrence in his presence of a contempt, immediately and summarily to punish it, if, in his opinion, delay [would] prejudice the trial.... [On the other hand,] if he believes the exigencies of the trial require that he defer judgment until its completion he may do so without extinguishing his power." However, subsequently, interpreting the due process clause and thus binding both federal and state courts, the Court held that, although the trial judge may summarily and without notice or hearing punish contemptuous conduct committed in his presence and observed by him, if he does choose to wait until the conclusion of the proceeding he must afford the alleged contemnor at least reasonable notice of the specific charge and opportunity to be heard in his own defense. Apparently, a "full scale trial" is not contemplated. observed that although its rule conceivably encourages a trial judge to proceed immediately rather than awaiting a calmer moment, "[s]ummary convictions during trials that are unwarranted by the facts will not be invulnerable to appellate review." Codispoti v. Pennsylvania, 418 U.S. 506 , 517 (1974).
Curbing the judge's power to consider conduct as occurring in his presence, the Court, in Harris v. United States, held that summary contempt proceedings in aid of a grand jury probe, achieved through swearing the witness and repeating the grand jury's questions in the presence of the judge, did not constitute contempt "in the actual presence of the court" for purposes of Rule 42(a); rather, the absence of a disturbance in the court's proceedings or of the need to immediately vindicate the court's authority makes the witness' refusal to testify an offense punishable only after notice and a hearing. Moreover, when it is not clear the judge was fully aware of the contemptuous behavior when it occurred, notwithstanding the fact it occurred during the trial, "a fair hearing would entail the opportunity to show that the version of the event related to the judge was inaccurate, misleading, or incomplete."
Due Process Limitations on Contempt Power: Right to Jury Trial.-Originally the right to a jury trial was not available in criminal contempt cases. But in Cheff v. Schnackenberg, it was held that when the punishment in a criminal contempt case in federal court is more than the sentence for a petty offense, the Court drew the traditional line at six months, a defendant is entitled to trial by jury. Although the ruling was made pursuant to the Supreme Court's supervisory powers and was thus inapplicable to state courts and presumably subject to legislative revision, two years later the Court held that the Constitution did require jury trials in criminal contempt cases in which the offense was more than a petty one. Whether an offense is petty or not is determined by the maximum sentence authorized by the legislature or, in the absence of a statute, by the sentence actually imposed. Again the Court drew the line between petty offenses and more serious ones at six months imprisonment. Although this case involved an indirect criminal contempt, willful petitioning to admit to probate a will known to be falsely prepared, the majority in dictum indicated that even in cases of direct contempt a jury will be required in appropriate instances. "When a serious contempt is at issue, considerations of efficiency must give way to the more fundamental interest of ensuring the even-handed exercise of judicial power." Presumably, there is no equivalent right to a jury trial in civil contempt cases, although one could spend much more time in jail pursuant to a judgment of civil contempt than would be the case with most criminal contempts. The Court has, however, expanded the right to jury trials in federal civil cases on nonconstitutional grounds.
Due Process Limitations on Contempt Powers: Impartial Tribunal.-In Cooke v. United States, Chief Justice Taft uttered some cautionary words to guide trial judges in the utilization of their contempt powers. "The power of contempt which a judge must have and exercise in protecting the due and orderly administration of justice and in maintaining the authority and dignity of the court is most important and indispensable. But its exercise is a delicate one and care is needed to avoid arbitrary or oppressive conclusions. This rule of caution is more mandatory where the contempt charged has in it the element of personal criticism or attack upon the judge. The judge must banish the slightest personal impulse to reprisal, but he should not bend backward and injure the authority of the court by too great leniency. The substitution of another judge would avoid either tendency but it is not always possible. Of course, where acts of contempt are palpably aggravated by a personal attack upon the judge in order to drive the judge out of the case for ulterior reasons, the scheme should not be permitted to succeed. But attempts of this kind are rare. All of such cases, however, present difficult questions for the judge. All we can say upon the whole matter is that where conditions do not make it impracticable, or where the delay may not injure public or private right, a judge called upon to act in a case of contempt by personal attack upon him, may, without flinching from his duty, properly ask that one of his fellow judges take his place." Cornish v. United States, 299 F. 283, 285; Toledo Newspaper Co. v. United States, 237 F. 986, 988. "The case before us is one in which the issue between the judge and the parties had come to involve marked personal feeling that did not make for an impartial and calm judicial consideration and conclusion, as the statement of the proceedings abundantly shows."
Sacher v. United States grew out of a tempestuous trial of eleven Communist Party leaders in which Sacher and others were counsel for the defense. Upon the conviction of the defendants, the trail judge at once found counsel guilty of criminal contempt and imposed jail terms of up to six months. At issue directly was whether the contempt charged was one which the judge was authorized to determine for himself or whether it was one which under Rule 42(b) could only be passed upon by another judge and after notice and hearing, but behind this issue loomed the applicability and nature of due process requirements, in particular whether the defense attorneys were constitutionally entitled to trial before a different judge. A divided Court affirmed most of the convictions, set aside others, and denied that due process required a hearing before a different judge. "We hold that Rule 42 allows the trial judge, upon the occurrence in his presence of a contempt, immediately and summarily to punish it, if, in his opinion, delay will prejudice the trial. We hold, on the other hand, that if he believes the exigencies of the trial require that he defer judgment until its completion, he may do so without extinguishing his power .... We are not unaware or unconcerned that persons identified with unpopular causes may find it difficult to enlist the counsel of their choice. But we think it must be ascribed to causes quite apart from fear of being held in contempt, for we think few effective lawyers would regard the tactics condemned here as either necessary or helpful to a successful defense. That such clients seem to have thought these tactics necessary is likely to contribute to the bar's reluctance to appear for them rather more than fear of contempt. But that there may be no misunderstanding, we make clear that this Court, if its aid be needed, will unhesitatingly protect counsel in fearless, vigorous and effective performance of every duty pertaining to the office of the advocate on behalf of any person whatsoever. But it will not equate contempt with courage or insults with independence. It will also protect the processes of orderly trial, which is the supreme object of the lawyers calling."
In Offutt v. United States, acting under its supervisory powers over the lower federal courts, the Court set aside a criminal contempt conviction imposed on a lawyer after a trial marked by highly personal recriminations between the trial judge and the lawyer. In a situation in which the record revealed that the contumacious conduct was the product of both lack of self-restraint on the part of the contemnor and a reaction to the excessive zeal and personal animosity of the trial judge, the majority felt that any contempt trial must be held before another judge. This holding that when a judge becomes personally embroiled in the controversy with an accused he must defer trial of his contempt citation to another judge, founded on the Court's supervisory powers, was constitutionalized in Mayberry v. Pennsylvania, in which a defendant acting as his own counsel engaged in quite personal abuse of the trial judge. The Court appeared to leave open the option of the trial judge to act immediately and summarily to quell contempt by citing and convicting an offender, thus empowering the judge to keep the trial going, but if he should wait until the conclusion of the trial he must defer to another judge.
Contempt by Disobedience of Orders.-Disobedience of injunctive orders, particularly in labor disputes, has been a fruitful source of cases dealing with contempt of court. In United States v. United Mine Workers, the Court held that disobedience of a temporary restraining order issued for the purpose of maintaining existing conditions, pending the determination of the court's jurisdiction, is punishable as criminal contempt where the issue is not frivolous but substantial. Second, the Court held that an order issued by a court with jurisdiction over the subject matter and person must be obeyed by the parties until it is reversed by orderly and proper proceedings, even though the statute under which the order is issued is unconstitutional. Third, on the basis of United States v. Shipp, it was held that violations of a court's order are punishable as criminal contempt even though the order is set aside on appeal as in excess of the court's jurisdiction or though the basic action has become moot. Finally, the Court held that conduct can amount to both civil and criminal contempt, and the same acts may justify a court in resorting to coercive and punitive measures, which may be imposed in a single proceeding.
Contempt Power in Aid of Administrative Power.-Proceedings to enforce the orders of administrative agencies and subpoenas issued by them to appear and produce testimony have become increasingly common since the leading case of ICC v. Brimson, where it was held that the contempt power of the courts might by statutory authorization be utilized in aid of the Interstate Commerce Commission in enforcing compliance with its orders. In 1947 a proceeding to enforce a subpoena duces tecum issued by the Securities and Exchange Commission during the course of an investigation was ruled to be civil in character on the ground that the only sanction was a penalty designed to compel obedience. The Court then enunciated the principle that where a fine or imprisonment imposed on the contemnor is designed to coerce him to do what he has refused to do, the proceeding is one for civil contempt. Notwithstanding the power of administrative agencies to cite an individual for contempt, however, such bodies must be acting within the authority that has been lawfully delegated to them.
Frankfurter. For delegations of the subpoena power to administrative agencies and the use of judicial process to enforce them, see also McCrone v. United States, 307 U.S. 61(1939); Endicott Johnson Corp. v. Perkins, 317 U.S. 501 (1943); Oklahoma Press Pub. Co. v. Walling, 327 U.S. 186 (1946).
Sanctions Other Than Contempt
Long recognized by the courts as inherent powers are those authorities that are necessary to the administration of the judicial system itself, of which the contempt power just discussed is only the most controversial. Courts, as an independent and coequal branch of government, once they are created and their jurisdiction established, have the authority to do what courts have traditionally done in order to accomplish their assigned tasks. Of course, these inherent powers may be limited by statutes and by rules, but, just as was noted in the discussion of the same issue with respect to contempt, the Court asserts both the power to act in areas not covered by statutes and rules and the power to act unless Congress has not only provided regulation of the exercise of the power but also unmistakably enunciated its intention to limit the inherent powers.
Thus, in the cited Chambers case, the Court upheld the imposition of monetary sanctions against a litigant and his attorney for bad-faith litigation conduct in a diversity case. Some of the conduct was covered by a federal statute and several sanction provisions of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, but some was not, and the Court held that, absent a showing that Congress had intended to limit the courts, they could utilize inherent powers to sanction for the entire course of conduct, including shifting attorney fees, ordinarily against the American rule. In another case, a party failed to comply with discovery orders and a court order concerning a schedule for filing briefs. The Supreme Court held that the attorney's fees statute did not allow assessment of such fees in that situation, but it remanded for consideration of sanctions under both the Federal Rule and the trial court's inherent powers, subject to a finding of bad faith. But bad faith is not always required for the exercise of some inherent powers. Thus, courts may dismiss an action for an unexplained failure of the moving party to prosecute it.
Power to Issue Writs: The Act of 1789
From the beginning of government under the Constitution of 1789, Congress has assumed, under the necessary and proper clause, its power to establish inferior courts, its power to regulate the jurisdiction of federal courts and the power to regulate the issuance of writs. The Thirteenth section of the Judiciary Act of 1789 authorized the circuit courts to issue writs of prohibition to the district courts and the Supreme Court to issue such writs to the circuit courts. The Supreme Court was also empowered to issue writs of mandamus "in cases warranted by the principles and usages of law, to any courts appointed, or persons holding office, under the authority of the United States." Section 14 provided that all courts of the United States should "have power to issue writs of scire facias, habeas corpus, and all other writs not specially provided for by statute, which may be necessary for the exercise of their respective jurisdiction, and agreeable to the principles and usages of law." Although the Act of 1789 left the power over writs subject largely to the common law, it is significant as a reflection of the belief, in which the courts have on the whole concurred, that an act of Congress is necessary to confer judicial power to issue writs. Whether Article III itself is an independent source of the power of federal courts to fashion equitable remedies for constitutional violations or whether such remedies must fit within congressionally authorized writs or procedures is often left unexplored. In Missouri v. Jenkins, for example, the Court, rejecting a claim that a federal court exceeded judicial power under Article III by ordering local authorities to increase taxes to pay for desegregation remedies, declared that "a court order directing a local government body to levy its own taxes" is plainly a judicial act within the power of a federal court. In the same case, the Court refused to rule on "the difficult constitutional issues" presented by the State's claim that the district court had exceeded its constitutional powers in a prior order directly raising taxes, instead ruling that this order had violated principles of comity.
Common Law Powers of District of Columbia Courts.- That portion of § 13 of the Judiciary Act of 1789 which authorized the Supreme Court to issue writs of mandamus in the exercise of its original jurisdiction was held invalid in Marbury v. Madison, as an unconstitutional enlargement of the Supreme Court's original jurisdiction. After two more futile efforts to obtain a writ of mandamus, in cases in which the Court found that power to issue the writ had not been vested by statute in the courts of the United States except in aid of already existing jurisdiction, a litigant was successful in Kendall v. United States ex rel. Stokes, in finding a court that would take jurisdiction in a mandamus proceeding. This was the circuit court of the United States for the District of Columbia, which was held to have jurisdiction, on the theory that the common law, in force in Maryland when the cession of that part of the State that became the District of Columbia was made to the United States, remained in force in the District. At an early time, therefore, the federal courts established the rule that mandamus can be issued only when authorized by a constitutional statute and within the limits imposed by the common law and the separation of powers.
Habeas Corpus: Congressional and Judicial Control.-The writ of habeas corpus has a special status because its suspension is forbidden, except in narrow circumstances, by Article I, § 9, cl. 2. The writ also has a venerable common law tradition, long antedating its recognition in the Judiciary Act of 1789, as a means of "reliev[ing] detention by executive authorities without judicial trial." Nowhere in the Constitution, however, is the power to issue the writ vested in the federal courts. Could it be that despite the suspension clause restriction Congress could suspend de facto the writ simply by declining to authorize its issuance? Is a statute needed to make the writ available or does the right to habeas corpus stem by implication from the suspension clause or from the grant of judicial power? Since Chief Justice Marshall's opinion in Ex parte Bollman, it has been generally accepted that "the power to award the writ by any of the courts of the United States, must be given by written law." The suspension clause, Marshall explained, was an "injunction," an "obligation" to provide "efficient means by which this great constitutional privilege should receive life and activity; for if the means be not in existence, the privilege itself would be lost, although no law for its suspension should be enacted."