Rosengart v. Laird

• Decision Date: 22 February 1972
• Docket Number: No. 71-298,71-298
• Citation: 405 U.S. 908,92 S.Ct. 931,30 L.Ed.2d 779
• Parties: Oliver A. ROSENGART v. Melvin R. LAIRD, Secretary of Defense, et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

405 U.S. 908

92 S.Ct. 931

30 L.Ed.2d 779

Oliver A. ROSENGART

v Melvin R. LAIRD, Secretary of Defense, et al.

No. 71-298.

Supreme Court of the United States

February 22, 1972

On petition for writ of certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted, the judgment is vacated and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for reconsideration in light of the suggestions of the Solicitor General and upon an independent examination of the entire record.

Mr. Justice WHITE, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE and Mr. Justice REHNQUIST concur, dissenting.

The Court vacates the judgment of the Court of Appeals and directs that the Court of Appeals consider the views of the United States presented in this case. Finding the suggestions of the United States unacceptable, I dissent from today's judgment.

In its memorandum filed October 13, 1971, in response to the petition for certiorari, the United States, asserted that in passing on petitioner's conscientious objector's claim the Army considered petitioner's opposition to war to be sincere and rejected the claim solely because peti- tioner's views did not qualify as religious under the standards of Welsh v. United States, 398 U.S. 333, 90 S.Ct. 1792, 26 L.Ed.2d 308 (1970). It was therefore error, the United States urged, for the Court of Appeals to have put aside the Welsh issue and to have affirmed the denial of habeas corpus on insincerity grounds after making an 'independent search of the administrative record' to discover a basis in fact for such a judgment.

These assertions were incredible. The Army Review Board, in its final order entered on September 10, 1970, denying the conscientious objector claim, unanimously found that '1LT Rosengart's purported conscientious objector beliefs are not truly held; and that any objection to war in any form he might sincerely hold is based soley on philosophical and sociological experiences.' The plain meaning of this order is that the Board both found that petitioner was not sincere and determined that his views were solely philosophical and sociological.

The Court of Appeals so read the Board's order, saying '[t]he Board found that any conscientious objection held by Rosengart was based solely on philosophical views and sociological experiences (a curious finding in light of Welsh) and that Rosengart's 'purported conscientious objector beliefs are not truly...