Caven v. Clark
| Decision Date | 19 June 1948 |
| Citation | 78 F. Supp. 295 |
| Parties | CAVEN et al. v. CLARK et al. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of Arkansas |
Smith & Sanderson, Arnold & Arnold, Alston & Woods, Will Steel, T. B. Vance and Gene Rowlette, all of Texarkana, Ark., for plaintiffs.
Shaver, Stewart & Jones, and Bert B. Larey, all of Texarkana, Ark., and Johnson & Johnson, of Ashdown, Ark., for the moving defendants.
This matter comes on for hearing upon motion of the defendants to dismiss the plaintiffs' complaint as amended.
It is alleged by the plaintiffs, G. T. Caven and nineteen others, in their original complaint that they are citizens and qualified electors of Miller County, Arkansas, in the Fourth Congressional District of Arkansas, and that as such they desire to cast their votes for the candidates of their choice in the approaching Democratic Congressional Primary Elections without having their votes impaired, diminished, diluted, or destroyed by the illegal casting of ballots by persons not entitled to vote in said elections; that certain of the defendants, namely, Clark, Helms, Scoggins, Dunn and Brackett, have conspired to control the 1948 Democratic Primary Elections to be held in Miller County, Arkansas, in July and August, 1948, including the Congressional Primary, and in furtherance of said alleged conspiracy have illegally procured the issuance of a large number of poll tax receipts, expiring October 1, 1948, and have unlawfully paid the poll taxes for a large number of persons, and have unlawfully obtained receipts therefor, in a total amount of 2,502, with the intent of using the same in the control of said elections, and that unless the plaintiffs are given by this court the relief prayed for in said complaint, that said alleged illegal poll tax receipts will be used in casting the votes of the persons named therein, and that thereby said elections will be controlled and the effect of the votes of the plaintiffs accordingly diminished; and, among other things, they pray for the following relief:
(1) For an interlocutory order requiring the defendants above named to show cause why they should not be required to deposit in the office of the Clerk of this Court the poll tax receipts referred to in the complaint and listed in exhibits thereto.
(2) For a mandatory injunction requiring the defendant Ell Westbrook, Miller County Clerk, to purge the records of Miller County, Arkansas, of the names shown on said poll tax receipts.
(3) For a mandatory injunction requiring the defendants Beall, Smith and Richards, as Election Commissioners of Miller County, Arkansas, to recall the poll tax books issued in said county and strike therefrom the names appearing on the poll tax receipts above referred to.
Simultaneously with the filing of their original complaint, the plaintiffs filed a motion for leave to take the depositions of certain of the defendants before the joining of issue, and a hearing was had thereon in due course. The motion was resisted by the defendants and at the hearing the defendants filed a motion to dismiss the plaintiffs' complaint for want of jurisdiction, and for other reasons. In an oral opinion, the court overruled the plaintiffs' motion to take depositions, on the ground that the rights asserted by the plaintiffs in their complaint were purely political rights, and that he had grave doubt as to the jurisdiction of a court of equity to grant the injunctive relief prayed for in the complaint, and in this connection the court in his oral opinion referred to the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Giles v. Harris, 189 U.S. 475, 23 S.Ct. 639, 47 L.Ed. 909. The court also stated that even if the facts alleged constituted grounds for equity jurisdiction, he still had serious doubt as to his power to adjudicate the rights of the holders of the 2,502 poll tax receipts above referred to in an action wherein they were not made defendants. The court at the time, however, declined to pass upon the defendants' motion to dismiss and asked that it be submitted on written briefs.
Subsequent to the hearing on the motion to take depositions before the joining of issue, the plaintiffs filed an amendment to their complaint and brought in as parties defendant herein 67 of the 2,502 persons listed in the original complaint as holders of invalid poll tax receipts, and alleged that the character of the rights of the plaintiffs sought to be enforced against all of the 2,502 persons is several, and that there are common questions of law and fact involved affecting said rights and their enforcement, and that common relief is sought; that it is impracticable to bring in all of said persons as parties defendant, and that the naming of said 67 as such will fairly insure the adequate representation of all of said persons. Service has been had upon 42 of these 67 defendants.
In the amendment to their complaint, the plaintiffs ask for the relief originally prayed for, and in addition thereto ask for a declaratory judgment under the provisions of 28 U.S.C.A. § 400:
(A) Declaring and adjudicating the right of plaintiffs to cast their ballots in the approaching Congressional Primaries without having the effect thereof diminished and diluted by the casting of the ballots of the 2,502 persons named in the original complaint;
(B) Declaring and adjudicating the illegality of the inclusion of the names of said 2,502 persons in the poll tax list published by the Election Commissioners; and
(C) Declaring and adjudicating that said 2,502 persons are not entitled prima facie to vote in said elections.
To the complaint as amended the defendants have renewed their motion to dismiss. They set out numerous grounds for dismissal, but in view of the conclusion that we have reached, we find it necessary to discuss one ground only, namely, whether this court has equitable jurisdiction to grant an injunction or to render a declaratory judgment in protection of the political rights set up by the plaintiffs.
Under the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States in the cases of In re Sawyer, 124 U.S. 200, 8 S.Ct. 482, 31 L.Ed. 402, Giles v. Harris, supra, Lane v. Wilson, 307 U.S. 268, 59 S.Ct. 872, 83 L.Ed. 1281, and Colegrove v. Green, 328 U.S. 549, 66 S.Ct. 1198, 90 L.Ed. 1432, we are satisfied that this court has no such jurisdiction.
It cannot be questioned that the rights asserted by the plaintiffs are political rights. Political rights, as defined by Bouvier, who bases his distinctions on Blackstone,
In Re Sawyer, supra, the Supreme Court said, quoting from Kerr on Injunctions, and Sheridan v. Colvin, 78 Ill. 237:
Civil rights (which rights are referred to by the Supreme Court in the foregoing quotation) Davis v. Wilson, 183 Ark. 271, 276, 35 S.W.2d 1020, 1023; 7 Words & Phrases, Perm.Ed., 340; 1 Bla.Com. 124-139.
For a full discussion of the distinctions between political rights and civil rights, and for citation of numerous cases on the point that the right to vote is a political right, see the opinion of the three-judge federal district court in Blackman v. Stone, D.C., S.D.Ill., 17 F.Supp. 102.
Giles v. Harris, supra 189 U.S. 475, 23 S.Ct. 640, was a bill in equity brought by a colored man in a Circuit Court of the United States, on behalf of himself "and on behalf of more than five thousand negroes, citizens of the county of Montgomery, Alabama, similarly situated and circumstanced as himself," against the board of registrars of that county. The prayer of the bill was that the defendants be required to enroll upon the voting lists the names of the plaintiff and of all other qualified members of his race who applied for registration before a certain date, and were refused. The plaintiff alleged that he had applied to the board for registration as a voter, but was refused arbitrarily on the ground of his color, together with large numbers of other qualified Negroes, while all white men were registered, and that the same thing had been done all over the State of Alabama. The question of equity jurisdiction was raised by the circuit judge before whom the case was pending, and that question alone was certified to the Supreme Court of the United States. The Supreme Court held that a federal court of equity had no jurisdiction to grant the relief prayed for. The plaintiff contended that the court had jurisdiction by reason of one of the federal statutes upon which the plaintiffs in the instant case rely, 8 U.S. C.A. § 43, which reads as follows: "Every person who, under color of any statute, * * * of any State or Territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States * * * to the deprivation of any rights, * * * secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress."
The Court, in referring to this contention, said: ...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Altman v. Cooper
...stating the foregoing facts). 1. It has long been the general rule in this State, as well as in many other jurisdictions, Caven v. Clark, D.C., 78 F.Supp. 295, 302, that 'Elections belong to the political branch of the government, and courts of equity will not interfere to protect a purely ......
- Barnsdall Oil Co. v. Willis, 128 Civil.