Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee

• Decision Date: 19 December 1958
• Citation: 108 So.2d 729
• Parties: Theodore R. GIBSON, Ruth Perry, Vernell Albury and Grattan E. Graves, Jr., Appellants, v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee. Anna ROSENBLATT, Appellant v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee. Edward T. GRAHAM Appellant, v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee. Bertha TEPLOW, Appellant, v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

Page 729

108 So.2d 729

Theodore R. GIBSON, Ruth Perry, Vernell Albury and Grattan E. Graves, Jr., Appellants, v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee.

Anna ROSENBLATT, Appellant v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee.

Edward T. GRAHAM Appellant, v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee.

Bertha TEPLOW, Appellant, v. FLORIDA LEGISLATIVE INVESTIGATION COMMITTEE, Appellee.

Supreme Court of Florida.

Dec. 19, 1958.

Rehearing Denied Jan. 28, 1959.

Robert L. Carter, New York City, and G. E. Graves, Miami, for Theodore R. Gibson, Ruth Perry, Vernell Albury & Grattan E. Graves, Jr., appellants.

Robert J. Ramer, Miami, for Anna Rosenblatt and Bertha Teplow, appellants.

Tobias Simon and Howard W. Dixon, Miami, for Edward T. Graham, appellant.

Mark R. Hawes, Tampa, for appellees.

THORNAL, Justice.

We are here confronted by four separate appeals seeking review of a group of orders entered by one of the Circuit Judges of the Eleventh Judicial Circuit. By the orders each of the appellants was directed to appear before the appellee Florida Legislative Investigation Committee on August 11, 1958, and answer certain questions propounded by the Committee or else suffer the penalties of contempt of court with appropriate punishment. Certain appellants were directd to respond to a subpoena duces tecum by producing various records.

We are called upon to determine the nature and scope of the legislative power to investigate, and the pertinency of certain questions propounded to the appellants. We must consider the state and federal constitutional problems presented by a claimed right of privacy and association, and an asserted privilege against self-incrimination.

The appellee Committee was created by Chapter 57-125, Laws of Florida 1957. In the early part of 1958 the Committee was in the process of conducting an investigation to determine the existence or non-existence of so-called subversive activities in and against the State of Florida. They subpoenaed certain persons including all of the appellants who allegedly are members of the Miami Branch of the National Association for Advancement of Colored People, hereinafter referred to as NAACP. Some of the appellants were officers, others were directors, and others were merely members. The Committee also issued a subpoena duces tecum to certain of the appellants directing them to produce the membership lists, books and records of NAACP. At a Committee hearing held February 26 and 27, 1958, the several appellants declined to answer certain questions for stated reasons which we will discuss later. Those who were summoned to do so likewise declined to produce the membership records of NAACP. In each instance the counsel for the Committee propounded the question, the witness declined to answer it, the Chairman of the Committee directed the witness to answer, and the witness again declined. The Committee itself then approved the action of the Chairman and directed its counsel to petition the Circuit Court for an order compelling answers and directing the production of the member ship lists. Section 3, Chapter 57-125, Laws of Florida 1957. Emspak v. United States, 349 U.S. 190, 75 S.Ct. 687, 99 L.Ed. 997. The Circuit Judge issed a show cause order to each of the appellants. After a full hearing, the Judge directed the appellants to answer certain questions. He directed three of the appellants to respond to the subpoena duces tecum requiring the production of records. His order provided that upon the failure of the witnesses to answer the questions or produce the membership lists, 'then he (or she) shall be in contempt of this court and shall be punished accordingly.' The appellants now seek reversal of the orders applicable to them respectively for various reasons hereafter noted.

The contentions of the several appellants vary somewhat according to the nature of the inquiries propounded to them and the reasons given for their refusal to answer. We will discuss these in our consideration of the problems presented by the separate groups of appellants. In addition we will also dispose of the contention that the membership list of the Miami Branch, NAACP, should not be produced pursuant to the subpoena duces tecum.

Basic Constitutional Principles Involved.

The broad but vital principles of constitutional law asserted by the appellants will require cautious analysis when related to the situation presented by these appeals. We are currently passing through what appears to be a period of transition in the application of established constitutional principles. While vocally constitutional herence to the biblical admonition that we 'remove not the ancient landmark(s),' Deuteronomy 19:14, some admittedly sincere jurists, with the support of many equally sincere political scientists, have, in our view, undertaken to transplant many of the ancient landmarks of constitutional law. The result we think has been an application of these traditional concepts to situations for which they were never intended or, in other respects, a failure to apply them to situations for which they were intended.

In our effort to resolve some of these difficult and troublesome constitutional problems, we have reminded ourselves that it might be well to note the admonition of Section 15, Declaration of Rights of Virginia, which antedated our Declaration of Independence. In the cited document, the author George Mason, who was regarded as one of the most astute and farsighted of the architects of our government, suggested:

'XV. That no free government, or the blessings of liberty can be preserved to any people but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality and virtue, and by frequent recurrence to fundamentl principles.' (Emphasis added.)

In similar fashion the authors of the Declaration of Rights of Massachusetts in Article 18 of that document stated:

'A frequent recurrence to the fundamental principles of the constitution, and a constant adherence to those of piety, justice, moderation, temperance, industry, and frugality, are absolutely necessary to preserve the advantages of liberty, and to maintain a free government.' M.G.L.A.Const. pt. 1, art. 18. (Emphasis added.)

In recurring to certain fundamental principles the instant record invites our attention to two concepts of our constitutional democracy which we deem basic to our consideration of the problems presented and the ultimate solution thereof.

The first of these simply is that under the Bill of Rights incorporated in the Constitution of the United States, an individual citizen, regardless of race or creed, is entitled to enjoy certain inalienable rights which cannot be denied to him except in a proper case by due and orderly process of law. While recognizing the rights of the individual, we must of necessity at times reconcile the enjoyment of those rights with the sovereign prerogatives of the state. If and when the two come into conflict in a particular case, it often becomes a judicial responsibility to determine which shall be subordinated to the other under controlling provisions of the organic law.

The second basic principle to which we must here recur is a recognition of those aspects of our governmental structure which have produced a federalism of separate states. Consistent with the above mentioned tendencies in some quarters, we deem it appropriate to recall that American federalism is a co-ordinate union of divided sovereignties. E pluribus unum. If it be true, as our own State Constitution reminds us, that 'All political power is inherent in the people', Section 2, Declaration of Rights of Florida, F.S.A., it is equally fundamental that the powers enjoyed by the federal government are those only which are specifically defined in the Constitution of the United States supplemented by those powers essentially implicit in the ones specified. In equal measure powers not so delegated to the federal government nor prohibited to the states were, by the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, expressly reserved to the respective states or to the people thereof. It might be well to recall that the Federal Constitution was ratified by conventions of the individual states as separate sovereignties representing the people of each particular state. Madison, Federalist 39. At no time did the people of all of the states as one composite nationwide electorate ever pass on the organic document. See also Florida Law Journal, Vol. XVIII, No. 3, p. 65, 'Counter-Revolution-An Estimate of the Situation' by R. C. Alley.

In approaching our discussion of the legal questions presented by the instant record, we do so in the belief that certain tendencies toward paternalistic nationalism, which we think we detect in the opinions of some courts and the philosophies of some leaders of government, are, in our humble view at least, inconsistent with these traditional concepts of our constitutional democracy.

Rather than call upon the pristine exponents of the concept such as Jefferson, Madison, Mason and others of their colonial political persuasion, let us look to the most consecrated judicial advocate of centralized nationalism. In Barron, for Use of Tiernan v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, 7 Pet. 243, 250, 8 L.Ed. 672, 675, Chief Justice John Marshall wrote:

'But it is universally understood, it is a part of the history of the day, that the great revolution which established the constitution of the United States, was not effected without immense opposition. Serious fears were extensively entertained that those powers which the patriot statesmen, who then watched over the interests of our country, deemed essential to union, and to the attainment of those invaluable objects for which union was sought, might be exercised in a manner dangerous to liberty. In almost every convention by which the constitution was adopted, amendments to guard against the abuse of power...