Irvin v. Dowd (359 U.S. 394)/Dissent Frankfurter

by Felix Frankfurter

United States Supreme Court

359 U.S. 394

Irvin  v.  Dowd

 Argued: Jan. 15, 1959. --- Decided: May 4, 1959

Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER, dissenting.

The problem represented by this case is as old as the Union and will persist as long as our society remains a constitutional federalism. It concerns the relation of the United States and the courts of the United States to the States and the courts of the States. The federal judiciary has no power to sit in judgment upon a determination of a state court unless it is found that it must rest on disposition of a claim under federal law. This is so whether a state adjudication comes directly under review in this Court or reaches us by way of the limited scope of habeas corpus jurisdiction originating in a District Court. (Judicial power is not so restrictively distributed in other federalisms comparable to ours. Neither the Canadian Supreme Court nor the Australian High Court is restricted to reviewing Dominion and Commonwealth issues respectively. The former reviews decisions of provincial courts turning exclusively on provincial law and the latter may review state decisions resting exclusively on state law.) To such an extent is it beyond our power to review state adjudications turning on state law that even in the high tide of nationalism following the Civil War, this Court felt compelled to restrict itself to review of federal questions, in cases coming from state courts, by limiting broadly phrased legislation that seemingly gave this Court power to review all questions, state and federal, in cases jurisdictionally before it. It refused to impute to Congress such a 'radical and hazardous change of a policy vital in its essential nature to the independence of the State courts * * *.' Murdock v. City of Memphis, 20 Wall. 590, 630, 22 L.Ed. 429. This decision has not unjustifiably been called one of 'the twin pillars' (the other is Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 1 Wheat. 304, 4 L.Ed. 97) on which have been built 'the main lines of demarcation between the authority of the state legal systems and that of the federal system.' Hart, The Relations Between State and Federal Law, 54 Col.L.Rev. 489, 503-504.

Something that thus goes to the very structure of our federal system in its distribution of power between the United States and the States is not a mere bit of red tape to be cut, on the assumption that this Court has general discretion to see justice done. Nor is it one of those 'technical' matters that laymen, with more confidence than understanding of our constitutional system, so often disdain.

In view of so vital a limitation on our jurisdiction, this Court has, until relatively recently, been very strict on insisting on an affirmative showing on the record, when review is here sought, that it clearly appear that the judgment complained of rested on the construction of federal law and was not supportable on a rule of local law beyond our power to question. Particularly in cases where life or liberty is at stake, the Court has relaxed this insistence to the extent of giving state courts an opportunity to clarify a decision that could fairly be said to be obscure or ambiguous in establishing that it rested or could rest on an interpretation of state law. No doubt this procedure makes for delay in ultimate decision. But it ensures that there is no denial of the right to resort to this Court for the vindication of a federal right when a state court's adjudication leaves fair ground for doubt whether a federal right controlled the issue. Experience shows that this procedure for clarification at times establishes that it was, in fact, federal law on which the state decision rested, while in other instances the state court removed all doubt that state law supported its decision, and there was an end of the matter. Compare Whitney v. People of State of California, 274 U.S. 357, 47 S.Ct. 641, 71 L.Ed. 1095, and Herb v. Pitcairn, 324 U.S. 117, 65 S.Ct. 459, 89 L.Ed. 789, 325 U.S. 77, 65 S.Ct. 954, 89 L.Ed. 1483, with State Tax Commission of Utah v. Van Cott, 306 U.S. 511, 59 S.Ct. 605, 83 L.Ed. 950, and Van Cott v. State Tax Commission, 98 Utah 264, 96 P.2d 740; Minnesota v. National Tea Co., 309 U.S. 551, 60 S.Ct. 676, 84 L.Ed. 920, and National Tea Co. v. State, 208 Minn. 607, 294 N.W. 230; Williams v. State of Georgia, 349 U.S. 375, 75 S.Ct. 814, 99 L.Ed. 1161, and Williams v. State, 211 Ga. 763, 88 S.E.2d 376.

Even the most benign or latitudinarian attitude in reading state court opinions precludes today's decision. It is not questioned that the Indiana Supreme Court discussed two issues, one indisputably a rule of local law and the other a claim under the Fourteenth Amendment. That court discussed the claim under the Fourteenth Amendment rather summarily, after it had dealt extensively with the problem of local law. If the Indiana court's opinion had stopped with its lengthy discussion of the local law and had not gone on to consider the federal issue, prefacing its consideration with the introductory sentence that '(o)ur decision on the point under examination makes it unnecessary for us to consider the other contentions of the appellant; however, because of the finality of the sentence in the case we have reviewed the evidence to satisfy ourselves that there is no miscarriage of justice in this case. * * *' (Irvin v. State, 236 Ind. 384, 392 393, 139 N.E.2d 898, 902), it is inconceivable that, on the proceeding before us, we would entertain jurisdiction. What this Court is therefore saying, in effect, is that it interprets the discussion of the Fourteenth Amendment problem which follows the elaborate and potentially conclusive discussion of the state issue not as resting the case on two grounds, state and federal, but as a total abandonment of the state ground, a legal erasing of the seven-page discussion of state law. Concededly, if a state court rests a decision on both an adequate state ground and a federal ground, this Court is without jurisdiction to review the superfluous federal ground. For while state courts are subject to the Supremacy Clause of the United States Consitu tion (Art. VI, cl. 2), they are so subject only if that Clause becomes operative, and they need not pass on a federal issue if a relevant rule of state law can dispose of the litigation.

It may be that it is the unwritten practice of the Indiana Supreme Court to have an 'unnecessary' consideration of a federal issue wipe out or displace a prior full discussion of a controlling state ground. Maybe so. But it is surely not a self-evident proposition that discussion of a federal claim constitutes abandonment of a prior disposition of a case on a relevant and conclusive state ground. The frequency with which state court opinions indulge in the superfluity of dealing with a federal issue after resting a case on a state ground, affords abundant proof that we cannot take judicial notice of an inference that a federal question discussion following a state-ground disposition spells abandonment of the latter. Perhaps if counsel had documented such an Indiana practice, had supplied us with a basis for drawing that conclusion regarding the appropriate way of reading Indiana opinions, this Court itself would be entitled to find that such is the way in which Indiana decisions must be read. But we cannot extemporize the existence of such an Indiana practice as a basis for our jurisdiction. Restricted, as we are restricted, to the text of what the Supreme Court of Indiana wrote in 236 Ind. 384, 139 N.E.2d 898, in ascertaining what it is that the Indiana Supreme Court meant to do when it first enlarged upon a controlling state ground and then, ex gratia, dealt with an 'unnecessary' federal ground, we are not free to pluck from the air an undocumented state practice on the strength of which we are to ignore the bulk of the state court's opinion and treat it as though it had not been written or its significance had been discredited by the Indiana Supreme Court.

In the most compassionate mood, all we are entitled to do in a case like this, where life is at stake, is to afford an opportunity for the Indiana Supreme Court to tell us whether, in fact, it abandoned its state ground and rested its decision solely on the 'unnecessary' federal ground. Thus only could this Court acquire jurisdiction over the federal question. Such a remission to the Indiana Supreme Court, by an appropriate procedure, for a clarification of its intention in writing this double-barreled opinion would be in full accord with the series of cases in which the state court was given opportunity to clarify its purpose. To assume, as the Court does, that the Indiana Supreme Court threw into the discard an elaborately considered local law rule is, I most respectfully submit, to assume a jurisdiction that we do not have. This assumption of jurisdiction cannot help but call to mind the admonition of Benjamin R. Curtis, one of the notable members in the Court's history, that 'questions of jurisdiction were questions of power as between the United States and the several States.' 2 Cliff. 614 (1st Cir.).

With due regard to the limits of our jurisdiction there is only one other mode of reading the opinion of the Indiana Supreme Court, one other mode, that is, by which the meaning of its opinion is to be decided by that court and not this. That is the mode which my brother HARLAN has explicated, and it is entirely consistent with the governing considerations which I have tried to set forth for me also to join, as I do join, his dissenting opinion.

Mr. Justice HARLAN, whom Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER, Mr. Justice CLARK, and Mr. Justice WHITTAKER join, dissenting.

Although I agree that federal consideration of petitioner's constitutional claims is not foreclosed by the decision of the Supreme Court of Indiana, I think that the Court's disposition of the matter, which contemplates the overturning of petitioner's conviction without the necessity of further proceedings in the state courts if his constitutional contentions are ultimately federally sustained, rests upon an impermissible interpretation of the opinion of the State Supreme Court (236 Ind. 384, 139 N.E.2d 898), and that a different procedural course is required if state and federal concerns in this situation are to be kept in proper balance.

It is clear that the federal courts would be without jurisdiction to consider petitioner's constitutional claims on habeas corpus if the Supreme Court of Indiana rejected those claims because, irrespective of their possible merit, they were not presented to it in compliance with the State's 'adequate and easily-complied-with method of appeal.' Brown v. Allen, 344 U.S. 443, 485, 73 S.Ct. 397, 421, 97 L.Ed. 469. The first question that concerns us, therefore, is whether the state court's judgment affirming the conviction rests independently on such a state ground.

At the outset we must keep in mind several aspects of Indiana criminal procedure, and the manner in which petitioner's attorneys presented his appeal to the Indiana Supreme Court, all as noted in this Court's opinion. The procedural aspects are (1) that no appeal lies from an order denying a new trial as such, that kind of an order being reviewable only in connection with an appeal from the final judgment in the case; (2) an escapee, such as this petitioner was, has no standing to make a motion for a new trial, at least if he is at large throughout the period available for the making of such a motion, 236 Id., at pages 386-392, 139 N.E.2d at pages 898-901; and (3) an appellant must perfect his appeal by filing assignments of error and a transcript of the record. In the taking of petitioner's appeal from the judgment of conviction the only assignment of error filed related to the trial court's denial of the motion for a new trial. While that assignment was supported by a detailed specification of petitioner's constitutional claims, none of such claims was independently filed as an assignment of error.

Had the State Supreme Court declined without more to reach petitioner's constitutional contentions because (1) his motion for a new trial had been forfeited by reason of escape, and (2) such claims had not independently been assigned as error, the federal courts would not, as has been said, be entitled to consider them. The difficulty here is that the state court did not stop at this juncture, but, after pointing out that petitioner had assigned as error only the denial of his motion for a new trial and holding that such denial was not error because of petitioner's escape, went on to consider and find without merit petitioner's constitutional claims.

This Court infers from the fact that the Indiana court considered petitioner's constitutional contentions that its affirmance of his conviction rested entirely on the denial of those claims. It reads the state court's opinion as saying that although that court could under state law properly rest its affirmance of the conviction on petitioner's failure to assign as error anything but the denial of his motion for a new trial, which, as we have seen, was held to have been properly denied under the State's 'escapee' rule, it would not do so but would treat petitioner's constitutional claims as if they had themselves been presented as assignments of error, rather than only as grounds supporting the error assigned to the trial court's order denying a new trial. In think this reading of the state court's opinion defies its plain language.

The state court devotes no less than seven pages of its nine-page opinion to an exhaustive discussion of the rule of state law which requires denial of a new trial motion made by an escapee still at large. At the close of this discussion it says:

'The action upon which the appellant predicates error in this appeal is based solely upon the overruling of a motion for a new trial. There is no other error claimed. Since appellant had no standing in court at the time he filed a motion for a new trial the situation is the same as if no motion for a new trial had been filed, or he had voluntarily permitted the timeto expire for such filing. His letter reveals he was aware of this right, and had talked with his attorneys about a new trial and an appeal.

'No error could have been committed in overruling the motion for a new trial under the circumstances.

'Our decision on the point under examination makes it unnecessary for us to consider the other contentions of the appellant; however, because of the finality of the sentence in the case we have reviewed the evidence to satisfy ourselves that there is no miscarriage of justice in this case. * * *' 236 Ind., at pages 392-393, 139 N.E.2d at page 901.

The opinion then reviews the petitioner's constitutional contentions, and concludes with the statement:

'It does not appear from the record and argument had, that the appellant was denied due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment, or due course of law under the Bill of Rights, Const. art. 1, § 12, or that there was any miscarriage of justice when he was convicted and given the death penalty.' Id., 236 Ind. at page 394, 139 N.E.2d at page 902.

This Court's reading of the Indiana opinion makes the exhaustive discussion in that opinion of the status of an escapee under Indiana law entirely unnecessary and meaningless. While I agree with the Court that the Indiana Supreme Court reached a 'considered conclusion that the conviction resulting in the death sentence was not obtained in disregard of the protections secured to the petitioner by the Constitution of the United States,' it is fully apparent that the state court ultimately rested its judgment of affirmance squarely on the ground that the petitioner's sole assignment of error, the denial of his motion for a new trial, was without merit because he was an escapee when that motion was made, and when it was denied. The fact that the Indiana court also reached a conclusion that petitioner's claims of constitutional deprivation were not made out does not entitle us to ignore the fact that it was on a point of state procedure that it ultimately rested.

Nevertheless, I do not think that in the circumstances of this case the State's contention that the federal courts lack jurisdiction to deal with petitioner's constitutional points can be accepted. The State has conceded that its Supreme Court was empowered in its discretion to disregard the procedural defects in petitioner's appeal. That being so, the state court's constitutional discussion takes on, for me, a vital significance in connection with its procedural holding under state law, namely, that affirmance of petitioner's conviction was rested on this state ground only after the Indiana court, displaying a meticulous concern that state procedural requirements should not be allowed to work a 'miscarriage of justice,' particularly in view of 'the finality of the sentence,' had satisfied itself that petitioner's constitutional contentions were untenable. Such a reading of the state court's opinion is required to give meaning to its constitutional discussion, for if petitioner's procedural failures inexorably prevented the state appellate court from reaching his constitutional claims their discussion in its opinion would appear to have been wholly pointless. At the same time this view of the opinion deprives Indiana's procedural holding of vitality as a bar to consideration of petitioner's constitutional claims by the federal courts on habeas corpus, for the decision as to those claims was inextricably a part of that holding. I therefore think that the two courts below should have dealt with the merits of petitioner's constitutional points.

However, even were the federal courts ultimately to hold that petitioner was denied due process, it would not be within their province thereupon to order his release. At that point it would unmistakably be the prerogative of the Indiana Supreme Court to decide whether on different postulates of federal constitutional law it would nevertheless hold that under Indiana law petitioner would still be barred from bein he ard because of his failure to comply with the State's procedural rules. For just as it is the federal courts' responsibility and duty finally to decide the federal questions presented in this case, it belongs to the Indiana Supreme Court finally to decide the state questions presented in the light of federal decision as to the commands of the Fourteenth Amendment. Hence if petitioner ultimately prevails on his constitutional claims, further proceedings in the state courts will be unavoidable.

In this state of affairs I think our proper course should be to proceed ourselves to a decision of the constitutional issues, rather than remand the case to the Court of Appeals. If the judgment of the Indiana Supreme Court is potentially going to be called into question because of a federal court's conclusion that it is based in part on erroneous constitutional postulates, I believe that Indiana is entitled to have that conclusion authoritatively pronounced by this Court. Moreover, the District Court, and one judge of the Court of Appeals, have already given clear (and conflicting) statements of their views as to the merits of such issues. The questions have been exhaustively briefed and fully argued before us. And this course would avoid further protracted delay.

Were we to conclude that the Indiana Supreme Court was correct in its premise that petitioner's constitutional points are without merit, the judgment of the Court of Appeals dismissing the writ of habeas corpus should of course be affirmed. If, on the other hand, we should decide that petitioner was in fact deprived of due process at trial, I would hold the case and give petitioner a reasonable opportunity to seek, through such avenues as may be open to him, a determination by the Indiana Supreme Court as to whether, in light of such a decision, it would nevertheless hold that petitioner's failure to comply with the State's procedural rules required affirmance of his conviction. Cf. Patterson v. State of Alabama, 294 U.S. 600, 55 S.Ct. 575, 79 L.Ed. 1082; Williams v. State of Georgia, 349 U.S. 375, 75 S.Ct. 814, 99 L.Ed. 1161. Should no such avenues be open to petitioner in Indiana, it would then be time enough to decide what final disposition should be made of this case.

For these reasons I concur in the view that federal consideration of petitioner's constitutional claims is not precluded, and in all other respects dissent from the Court's opinion.

Notes