Brede v. Powers, 45

• Decision Date: 22 October 1923
• Docket Number: No. 45,45
• Parties: BREDE v. POWERS, U. S. Marshal, Eastern District of New York
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

263 U.S. 4

44 S.Ct. 8

68 L.Ed. 132

BREDE

v POWERS, U. S. Marshal, Eastern District of New York.

No. 45.

Argued Oct. 4, 1923.

Decided Oct. 22, 1923.

Messrs. Otho S. Bowling, of New York City, and Morris Kamber, of Brooklyn, N. Y., for appellant.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 5-9 intentionally omitted] The Attorney General, for respondent.

Mr. Justice McKENNA delivered the opinion of the Court.

Dismissal of a writ of habeas corpus is assailed by this appeal. It was issued to review the legality of a conviction upon information and a sentence of imprisonment upon it. In detail of the grounds and justification of it, the charge of the petition is that appellant was proceeded against in the District Court upon an information charging him with a violation of section 21, title 2, of the Act of Congress of October 28, 1919, the National Prohibition Act (41 Stat. 314), and convicted on the 17th day of June, 1920, and sentenced to pay a fine of $500 and be imprisoned for 60 days. In execution of the sentence it is alleged that he was committed to the custody of the appellee, he being the United States marshal for the Eastern district of New York.

The further allegation of the petition is that the court 'never acquired jurisdiction of the pretended criminal action upon which, in form, it tried and condemned' him, 'for the reason that the crime of which' he 'was charged and for which said court sought to try and condemn' him 'is an infamous crime within the meaning of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States and no presentment or indictment of a grand jury charging same, was ever filed or presented.'

After hearing, the writ was discharged and appellant was remanded to the custody of the marshal to serve his sentence under the commitment, which was to the county jail of Essex county, New Jersey.

Is the contention of appellant justified, in that his was a conviction and commitment of an infamous crime? It is upon this contention that his petition rests.

It has been decided that a crime takes on the quality of infamy if it be one punishable by imprisonment at hard labor or in a penitentiary, and must be proceeded against upon presentment or indictment of a grand jury. Ex parte Wilson, 114 U. S. 417, 5 Sup. Ct. 935, 29 L. Ed. 89; Mackin v. United States, 117 U. S. 348, 6 Sup. Ct. 777, 29 L. Ed. 909; United States v. Moreland, 258 U. S. 433, 42 Sup. Ct. 368, 66 L. Ed. 700, 24 A. L. R. 992. And such is the quality of the crime and the procedure against it, if the statute authorizes the court to condemn to such punishment. See, also, In re Bonner, 151 U. S. 242, 14 Sup. Ct. 323, 28 L. Ed. 149; In re Mills, 135 U. S. 263, 10 Sup. Ct. 762, 34 L. Ed. 107.

Or to put it as counsel puts it:

'The construction of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution is this: An infamous crime is one that carries infamous punishment; the test does not depend upon the punishment that ultimately happens to be inflicted, but upon the punishment the court has power to inflict.'

To show the pertinence of the test and its adaptation to the case, it is the contention of the appellant that the court had power, and only power, to sentence him to imprisonment in a penal institution of New York, and that by the law of the state, by federal statute made applicable to federal prisoners therein, imprisonment is at hard labor.

The argument by which the contention is attempted to be sustained is somewhat strained. It rests upon the power the statutes give to the courts to specify the places of imprisonment, which began, it is said, in 1789. By a Resolution then passed, the state Legislatures were recommended to receive and keep prisoners committed under the authority of the United States 'under the like penalties as in the case of prisoners committed under the authority of such states respectively. * * *' 1 Stat. 96.

The purpose thus expressed was in substance repeated subsequently, and sections 5537 and 5538 of the Revised Statutes (Comp. St. §§ 10521, 10522), reproducing a resolution adopted in 1821 (3 Stat. 646), sections 5542 and 5548 (Comp. St. §§ 10528, 10549), reproducing 4 Stat. 118, § 15, and 4 Stat. 777, § 5, are cited. Sections 5546 and 5541 (Comp. St. §§ 10547, 10527) are also cited; they having their origin in 13 Stat. 74, § 1 and 500, § 3.

It is provided in sections 5537 and 5538, where a state does not allow the use of its jails to United States prisoners, the marshal under direction of the court may hire or procure a temporary jail, and that the marshal shall make provisions for the safe-keeping of prisoners until permanent provision for that purpose is made by law.

By section 5542, where the sentence is imprisonment to hard labor, the court may direct its execution 'within the district or state where such court is held.'

Section 5548 provides that, where punishment for an offense is by fine or imprisonment, it may be executed in any house of correction or house of reformation for juvenile delinquents 'within the state or district where' such court is held.

Section 5546 provides that the place of imprisonment, where there may be no penitentiary or jail suitable for the confinement of convicts or available therefor, may be in some suitable jail or penitentiary in a convenient state or territory to be designated by the Attorney General, and power to changes is given to the Attorney General.

The provisions of these sections seem adaptive to all imprisonments and to all grades of crime; in other words, have an adaptive and harmonious relation, and such relation they were declared to have in In re Karstendick, 93 U. S. 396, 23 L. Ed. 889. Appellant, however, contends that section 5546 may be treated as a proviso of sections 5541 and 5542, and that the latter sections 'define the only instances in which a United States court...