Hawes v. State of Georgia

Decision Date27 February 1922
Docket NumberNo. 95,95
Citation66 L.Ed. 431,258 U.S. 1,42 S.Ct. 204
PartiesHAWES v. STATE OF GEORGIA
CourtU.S. Supreme Court

Mr. Marion Smith, of Atlanta, Ga., for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Justice McKENNA delivered the opinion of the Court.

Indictment against Hawes under the law of Georgia for the offense of knowingly permitting certain persons to locate and have on his premises apparatus for distilling and manufacturing prohibited liquors and beverages.

A verdict of guilty was rendered. A motion for new trial was made and denied, which action and the judgment of the trial court were affirmed on appeal by the Supreme Court of the state.

The act of the state (Acts Ex. Sess. 1917, p. 7) upon which the indictment was based made it unlawful, among other things, 'to distill, manufacture or make any alcoholic spirits, vinous or malted liquors or intoxicating beverages' in the state.

Section 22 of the act provides that, when any apparatus used for such purposes——

'is found or discovered upon said premises the same shall be prima facie evidence that the person in actual possession had knowledge of the existence of the same, and on conviction therefor, shall be punished as prescribed in section 16 of this act, the burden of proof in all cases being upon the person in actual possession to show the want of knowledge of the existence of such apparatus on his premises.'

The trial court instructed the jury that Hawes was charged with knowing who had the apparatus upon the premises of which he was in possession or who operated it, and that under the act the burden was upon him to show the want of knowledge, and, further, that all that the state had to show was that the apparatus was on the premises, and, 'when the state shows that, stopping there, that makes out a prima facie case against defendant, and you should find the defendant guilty as charged in the indictment,' unless he show that it, the apparatus, was there without his consent and knowledge.

The charge was made the basis of a motion for new trial on the ground that it was offensive to the due process clause of the Constitution of the United States and also of the Constitution of Georgia. The same grounds were assigned in the Supreme Court of the state on appeal from the order and judgment denying the motion for new trial.

In the Supreme Court the specific error against the charge of the court was that it cast upon Hawes the burden of 'showing the want of knowledge of the existence of the apparatus on his premises, and in fine his innocence of the crime with which he is charged,' he 'claiming that this was an unreasonable and arbitrary exercise of its power by the Legislature of the state of Georgia.'

And this is the assignment here; in other words, that section 22 creates a presumption of guilty knowledge from the finding of the apparatus upon premises occupied by him, and that both the trial court and the Supreme Court of Georgia enforced this statutory presumption, and the same therefore entered into his conviction, and that the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States was thereby violated.

In aid of his contention and in emphasis of the effect of the statute against him, Hawes points out that a defendant in a criminal case is not allowed to testify as a witness, that he has only the right to make a statement not under oath, and that husband and wife are not competent or compellable to give evidence in any criminal proceeding for or against each other.1

It has been decided, as counsel concede, that the Legislature may make one fact prima facie evidence of another, and it is certainly within the established power of a state to prescribe the evidence which is to be received in the courts of its own government. Adams v. New York, 192 U. S. 585, 588, 24 Sup. Ct. 372, 48 L. Ed. 575.

In Hawkins v. Bleakly, 243 U. S. 210, 214, 37 Sup. Ct. 255, 257 (61 L. Ed. 678, Ann. Cas. 1917D, 637) it is said:

'The establishment of presumptions, and of rules respecting the burden of proof, is clearly within the domain of the state governments, and...

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