Braden v. Com.
| Decision Date | 22 June 1956 |
| Citation | 291 S.W.2d 843 |
| Parties | Carl BRADEN, Appellant, v. COMMONWEALTH of Kentucky, Appellee. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court — District of Kentucky |
Robert W. Zollinger, Louis Lusky, Louisville, for appellant.
Jo M. Ferguson, Atty. Gen., Robert F. Matthews, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., A. Scott Hamilton, Com. Atty., Louisville, Carl C. Ousley, Jr., Lawrence E. Higgins, Asst. Com. Attys., Louisville, for appellee.
The indictment in this case charged appellant, Carl Braden, and four other persons named therein, with knowingly and feloniously advocating by word or writing the expediency of physical violence to bring about a political revolution to change or modify the government, Constitution and laws of the United States and of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, contrary to the statutes in such cases made and provided and against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Upon a separate trial Carl Braden was convicted and his punishment fixed at a fine of $5,000 and imprisonment for 15 years in the penitentiary. He appeals.
While this appeal was pending the United States Supreme Court handed down on April 2, 1956, an opinion in the case of Com. of Pa. v. Nelson, 350 U.S. 497, 76 S.Ct. 477, 100 L.Ed. ----. Petition for rehearing was overruled on May 14, 1956, 76 S.Ct. 785, 100 L.Ed. ----. In that opinion the United States Supreme Court affirmed the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in setting aside the conviction of Nelson on an indictment charging him with sedition both against the United States and the State of Pennsylvania. Com. v. Nelson, 377 Pa. 58, 104 A.2d 133. The opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States quoted from the opinion of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania to the effect that in Nelson's trial in Pennsylvania the only evidence introduced of seditious acts was of ones directed against the United States.
The Pennsylvania statute, 18 P.S. Sec. 4207, appears in an appendix to the opinion of the Supreme Court. An examination of this statute shows it to be quite similar to our KRS 432.030, as well as KRS 432.040. Both the Pennsylvania statute and our statutes make it a felony to advocate the overthrow of the government of the United States or of the State by force and violence. In affirming the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, which set aside Nelson's conviction, the United States Supreme Court wrote that Congress by the Smith Act of 1940, as amended in 1948, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2385, as well as by other security acts passed by the Congress, showed an intention to occupy the field in prosecutions for sedition. We quote from the opinion of the United States Supreme Court [350 U.S. 497, 76 S.Ct. 481]:
'We examine these Acts only to determine the congressional plan. Looking to all of them in the aggregate, the conclusion is inescapable that Congress has intended to occupy the filed of sedition. Taken as a whole, they evince a congressional plan which makes it reasonable to determine that no room has been left for the States to supplement it. Therefore,...
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Braden v. United States
...this Court's decision in Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Nelson, 350 U.S. 497, 76 S.Ct. 477, 100 L.Ed. 640. See Braden v. Commonwealth of Kentucky, Ky., 291 S.W.2d 843. For the prosecution's version of this case, see the testimony of the State Attorney General and the Commonwealth Attorney ......
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Dombrowski v. Pfister
...Communist activity has been sustained. See, for example, Commonwealth v. Gilbert, 1956, 334 Mass. 71, 134 N.E.2d 13; Braden v. Commonwealth, 1953, 291 S.W.2d 843 (Kentucky); Commonwealth v. Hood, 1956, 334 Mass. 76, 134 N.E.2d 12; Commonwealth v. Dolsen, 1957, 183 Pa.Super. 339, 132 A.2d 69......
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