Temple v. United States

• Decision Date: 13 March 1967
• Docket Number: No. 928,928
• Citation: 87 S.Ct. 1024,386 U.S. 961,18 L.Ed.2d 110
• Parties: Elam Reamuel TEMPLE, petitioner, v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

386 U.S. 961

87 S.Ct. 1024

18 L.Ed.2d 110

Elam Reamuel TEMPLE, petitioner,

v UNITED STATES.

No. 928.

Supreme Court of the United States

March 13, 1967

John W. Hinsdale, for petitioner.

Solicitor General Marshall, Assistant General Vinson and Beatrice Rosenberg, for the United States.

Petition for writ of certiorari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

Denied.

Dissenting opinion by Mr. Justice BLACK with whom Mr. Justice DOUGLAS joins:

Under 18 U.S.C. § 401(1) a court may punish as contempt 'misbehavior of any person in its presence or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice.' We held in In re Michael, 326 U.S. 224, 66 S.Ct. 78, 90 L.Ed. 30, that this contempt power, limited as Congress intended it to be, could not be used to punish a person merely for committing perjury in the court's presence without the additional showing that an actual obstruction of justice was caused thereby. Accord, Ex parte Hudgings, 249 U.S. 378, 39 S.Ct. 337, 63 L.Ed. 656; see In re McConnell, 370 U.S. 230, 234, 236, 82 S.Ct. 1288, 8 L.Ed.2d 434; cf. Cammer v. United States, 350 U.S. 399, 76 S.Ct. 456, 100 L.Ed. 474; Brown v. United States, 356 U.S. 148, 153, 78 S.Ct. 622, 2 L.Ed.2d 589.

Petitioner, an attorney, represented a plaintiff in a lawsuit against the Government in federal district court. When he failed to file a brief within the time specified by the court's pretrial order, the Government moved to dismiss his client's complaint for want of prosecution. The District Judge refused to do so upon petitioner's representation in his belated brief and in open court that the delay was due to illness on his part. The court went on to hear the case on its merits and, after a trial which lasted only an hour, rendered judgment for the Government. A year later, petitioner was charged with contempt of court under § 401(1) for having misrepresented to the judge that he was ill. Tried summarily by that same judge without a jury, petitioner was convicted and sentenced to six months' imprisonment. Though the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded for a new trial on grounds not here material, it flatly held, with little discussion and no citation to authority, that 'lying to a judge is certainly misbehavior in the court's presence and therefore punishable under § 401.' 349 F.2d 116, 117. Petitioner was retried summarily before a different judge and again convicted of contempt of court, apparently on the basis of the Court of Appeals prior holding that 'lying to a judge' in and of itself constitutes contempt.

Since there is nothing in this record to suggest that either the Government attempted to prove or the trial judge found that petitioner's misrepresentation actually obstructed the administration of justice, his conviction on its face runs counter to In re Michael. There is not a vestige of evidence to support it. Cf. Thompson v. City of Louisville, 362 U.S. 199, 80 S.Ct. 624, 4 L.Ed.2d 654. Nevertheless, the Court of Appeals refused to reverse this...