Jenkins v. McKeithen/Concurrence Black

by Hugo Black

United States Supreme Court

395 U.S. 411

Roderick JENKINS, Appellant,  v.  John Julien McKEITHEN, GOVERNOR OF LOUISIANA, et al.

No. 548.  Argued: March 25, 1969. --- Decided: June 9, 1969. — Rehearing Denied: October 13, 1969.

Mr. Justice BLACK, concurring.

In concur in the Court's judgment and in much of what is said in the prevailing opinion. I cannot agree, however, to reaffirming Hannah v. Larche, 363 U.S. 420, 80 S.Ct. 1502, 4 L.Ed.2d 1307. I joined the dissent of Mr. Justice DOUGLAS in the Hannah case and still adhere to that dissent. The Louisiana law here, like the federal law considered in the Hannah case, is, in my judgment, nothing more nor less than a scheme for a nonjudicial tribunal to charge, try, convict, and punish people without courts, without juries, without lawyers, without witnesses-in short, without any of the procedural protections that the Bill of Rights provides. The Louisiana law is reminiscent of the old Parliamentary and Ecclesiastical Commission trials which took away the liberty of John Lilburne and his contemporaries without due process of law-that is, without giving them the benefit of a trial in accordance with the law of the land. For these reasons I believe that the Louisiana law denies due process of law.

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