Bowles v. United States

• Decision Date: 03 May 1943
• Docket Number: No. 589,589
• Parties: BOWLES v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

319 U.S. 33

63 S.Ct. 912

87 L.Ed. 1194

BOWLES

v UNITED STATES.

No. 589.

Argued April 14, 1943.

Decided May 3, 1943.

Rehearing Denied June 7, 1943.

See 319 U.S. 785, 63 S.Ct. 1323, 87 L.Ed. —-.

Mr. Osmond K. Fraenkel, of New York City, for petitioner.

Mr. Wendell Berge, Asst. Atty. Gen., for respondent.

PER CURIAM.

Petitioner has been convicted in the district court of violating § 11 of the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, 54 Stat. 885, 50 U.S.C.A. Appendix § 311, in that he failed to respond to an order of his draft board to report for induction into the Army. On the trial he set up as a defense that he was entitled to exemption from the draft as a conscientious objector under the provisions of § 5(g) of the Act, 50 U.S.C.A. Appendix § 305(g); that he had claimed his exemption before the local draft board which rejected it; that on his appeal to the appropriate appeal board, the Department of Justice, acting pursuant to § 5(g), had submitted to the board its advisory recommendation that petitioner's objection to military service be sustained, but that the appeal board, by reason of an erroneous interpretation of the statute, had rejected petitioner's claim of exemption.

In the course of the trial petitioner sought leave to inspect his entire Selective Service file, as he apparently is authorized to do by § 605.32 of the Selective Service Regulations. On objection of the Government, leave was denied by the district court. Petitioner has not presented this question for review by his petition for certiorari. The court also excluded evidence proffered by petitioner to show that the appeal board had rejected his appeal on the ground that, as he was not a member of a recognized religious organization opposed to participation in war, he was not entitled to exemption by the statute, which grants the exemption only to a person 'who, by reason of religious training and belief, is conscientiously opposed to participation in war in any form'. In particular the trial court excluded a letter to petitioner by the chairman of the appeal board which expressed the opinion that the statutory exemption applies only to members of a 'religious sect or cult that has as one of its canons a resistance to participation in activity of armed forces or participation in war'.

On appeal the circuit court of appeals affirmed, 131 F.2d 818. It thought that if the appeal board rejected the claim of exemption for the reasons asserted by petitioner, the board erroneously interpreted the statute. But the court held that such an error could not be set up as a defense to the indictment charging petitioner's failure to comply with the order to report for induction. The court suggested that petitioner's appropriate remedy was by petition for habeas corpus after the administrative appeal procedure provided by the Act had been concluded, and after he had submitted to induction. We granted certiorari, 318 U.S. 749, 63 S.Ct. 758, 87 L.Ed. —-, because of the public importance of the questions of law decided by the circuit court of appeals.

But it now appears from the proceedings in this Court that the judgment should be affirmed without decision of those questions. On the argument before us the Government, which in the district court had denied petitioner access to his Selective Service file, produced from the file, and tendered for our consideration (1) a copy of petitioner's appeal to the President from the action taken by the appeal board, (2) a copy of the decision on that appeal rendered by the Director of Selective Service, by authority of the President and pursuant to § 628.1 of the Selective Service Regulations, and (3) a copy of the letter of the draft board notifying petitioner that upon his appeal to the President his classification had been affirmed and that he would therefore be ordered to report for induction.

The decision of the Director, of which we take judicial notice, Caha v. United States, 152 U.S. 211, 221, 222, 14 S.Ct. 513, 516, 517, 38 L.Ed. 415; Thornton v. United States, 271 U.S. 414, 420, 46 S.Ct. 585, 586, 70 L.Ed. 1013; The Paquete Habana, 175 U.S. 677, 696, 20 S.Ct. 290, 298, 44 L.Ed. 320, antedated the order of the draft board directing petitioner to report for induction. The claim to exemption was rejected by the Director on the ground that in fact petitioner was not conscientiously opposed to military service, and that he was therefore not entitled to the benefit of the exemption prescribed by the Act. Before the local draft board issued its order to petitioner, the appeal board's determination, which he assails here, had been superseded by the action taken by the Director on the final appeal to the President. Hence the order rests on the Director's controlling determination of fact, adverse to petitioner's claim of conscientious objection to military service, and not on the alleged erroneous interpretation of the Act which petitioner urges as a...