United States v. Pitt

• Decision Date: 27 July 1944
• Docket Number: No. 8665.,8665.
• Citation: 144 F.2d 169
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. PITT.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

144 F.2d 169 (1944)

UNITED STATES v. PITT.

No. 8665.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Argued July 10, 1944.

Decided July 27, 1944.

Hayden Covington, of Brooklyn, N. Y., for appellant.

Vincent E. Hull, Asst. U. S. Atty., of Newark, N. J., for appellee.

Before BIGGS, GOODRICH, and McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judges.

BIGGS, Circuit Judge.

The appellant, Lester Vernon Pitt, was found guilty on an indictment charging him with failure to obey an order of his Local Board directing him to appear and be inducted for training and service in the United States Army. Instead of reporting for induction as ordered, Pitt went to the Fort Dix Induction Center and left there a letter stating that he would not submit to induction. Earlier, on the same day, he had delivered a similar letter to his Local Board. Both letters stated that Pitt was a minister of religion, a member of the sect known as Jehovah's Witnesses, and therefore entitled to exemption from training and service under the provisions of Section 5(d) of the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 as amended, 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix § 305.

Pitt's course was patterned closely on that of Billings. See Billings v. Truesdell, 321 U.S. 542, 64 S.Ct. 737. Pitt asserts that since he had taken a preinduction physical examination now required by the regulations and had received a certificate of fitness showing that he was acceptable for the armed forces, the letter left by him at the Induction Center was the equivalent of Billings' refusal to take the oath of induction. On this interpretation of the Billings decision he contends that the Act is unconstitutional for the reasons hereinafter stated and that he may test its constitutionality and the legality of the action of his Local Board without submitting himself to induction; that he was entitled in effect to try in the court below the sufficiency of the evidence on which his Board classified him as I-A; that his status as a minister of religion should have been determined by the trial judge in the first instance; that, at the least, he was entitled to the opportunity to prove to the jury that he was a minister of religion and that the evidence which he could have presented on this point, if the court had permitted it, would have demonstrated overwhelmingly the justice of his claim to a ministerial status; that thereupon he would have become entitled either to a directed verdict or to acquittal by the jury. He contends finally that he was entitled to prove to the jury as a defense to the indictment the good faith of his belief that as a minister of religion he was exempt from training and service. We may sum up his contentions by stating that he asserts that his Local Board and his Appeal Board in finding him not to be a minister of religion and classifying him I-A disregarded the evidence, and that therefore he was denied due process of law by his Local Board, by his Appeal Board, and by the trial court in that that tribunal did not afford him an opportunity for a judicial review of his classification.

The complete file of the Local Board as to Pitt was introduced into evidence. It shows that Pitt claimed to be a conscientious objector and adverse to any service, whether of a military or a nonmilitary nature. He later abandoned this assertion, stating that he was not a conscientious objector. He asserted that he was entitled to the classification of IV-D as a regular minister of religion. It shows that the Board classified him as a minister of religion upon certification by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, Incorporated, that Pitt was a "pioneer." It discloses also that at or about the times that Pitt claimed to be serving as a pioneer or as a minister of religion he was pursuing various secular occupations. These included working as a salesman, operating a filling station and driving a taxicab for hire. The file also demonstrated that Pitt ceased his secular occupation and his work as a "minister of religion", in fact all work of any kind, shortly after he had been classified IV-D as a minister of religion by his Local Board; that he was then removed from the roll of pioneers by the Watchtower Society at his own suggestion but that he did not inform the Board of his change of status. The file shows also that he was then supported in large part by his wife who worked first as a waitress in a diner and later in a munitions plant; that he asserted that he ceased all work because he had asthma which rendered it necessary for him to rest; that physical examinations showed him to be fit for military service. The file shows that Pitt claimed also to be suffering from a ruptured umbilicus and from bronchitis, conditions not apparent from the physical examinations referred to. It appears also from the Board's file that Pitt subsequently sought and again obtained from the Watchtower Society the status of a pioneer, but that he did not seek to regain that status until his Board discovered that he was no longer on the pioneer roll and had called him in for questioning. It appears from the transcript of Pitt's hearings before the Board that he was an evasive witness and quite lacking in candor.

The selective service agencies rejected Pitt's claim that he was entitled to be classified IV-D as a minister of religion and both his Local Board and his Board of Appeal classified him finally as I-A. The Appeal Agent also in effect rejected his assertion that he was a minister of religion. The actions of these selective service agencies find full support in the evidence which was before them. It is clear also that the Local Board acted fairly and impartially, gave Pitt a full and fair hearing, did not act capriciously or arbitrarily, carefully weighed the evidence relating to his case and accorded him every substantive and procedural right conferred by the Act. Cf. United States v. Peterson, D.C., 53 F.Supp. 760. The Board of Appeal and the Appeal Agent also gave Pitt every right which the Act afforded him.

The appellant contends, however, that the Act is unconstitutional because it does not provide a judicial review of his classification. Conversely, therefore, he objects to the provisions of Section 10 of the Act, 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix, § 310, which provide that the local boards (subject to appeals to the appeal boards and to the President if the decision of an appeal board is not unanimous pursuant to Section 628.2 of the Regulations) shall have the power to determine the right of registrants to exemption from training or service. Section 10 also provides expressly that "The decisions of the local boards shall be final * * *" subject to the appeals referred to. These are the provisions which Pitt in effect attacks and which he asserts deny him due process of law.

Though the Act was held to be constitutional by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in United States v. Herling, 120 F.2d 236, and by this court in United States v. Lambert, 123 F.2d 395, both courts bottoming their decisions on The Selective Draft Law Cases, 1918 (Arver v. United States), 245 U.S. 366, 38 S.Ct. 159, 62 L.Ed. 349, L.R.A.1916C, 361, Ann.Cas.1918B, 856, and on numerous other authorities, we think it is desirable to discuss the particular constitutional issue which Pitt raises.

Section 1(a) of the Act, 50 U.S. C.A.Appendix, § 301(a), consists of a declaration by Congress "* * * that it is imperative to increase and train the personnel of the armed forces of the United States." By Section 1(b) Congress "* * * further declares that in a free society the obligations and privileges of military training and service should be shared generally in accordance with a fair and just system of selective compulsory military training and service." The truth of these declarations is self-evident. As was stated by Mr. Justice Black in Falbo v. United States, 320 U.S. 549, 551, 64 S.Ct. 346, 347, the Selective Training and Service Act was intended and designed by Congress to provide men for the armed forces without delay. This does not mean that the Constitution was suspended for the duration of the emergency, but that the conditions which faced the United States at the time the Act was passed must play a cogent part in determining any question relating to its constitutionality. The means embodied in the Act for the raising of armed forces for the national defense bear a real and...