Whitney v. California (1927)
Monday, December 7, 2009 at 8:22PM Read the opinion here.
Issue. Did application of California's Criminal Syndicalism Act to an individual who was part of an organization that called for the violent overthrow of the Government, but the individual did not subscribe to that belief, violate that individual's Constitutional rights?
Background. Anita Whitney was convicted under the Criminal Syndicalism Act for organizing and assisting in organizing, and was, is and knowingly become a member of an organization [organized] to advocate, teach, aid and abet criminal syndicalism. Whitney was part of the Communist Labor Party. At the Party's convention, she advocated a moderate goal of achieving the Party's goals through traditional political processes. The Party, however, adopted a more militant program. Whitney remained a member of the Party but she testified that she never intended for the party to "be an instrument of terrorism or violence."
Whitney appealed her conviction but the Supreme Court affirmed.
Court's Analysis. The Court refused to overturn the jury's verdict. The jury, based on the evidence presented at trial, decided that Whitney violated the law and evidence of her benign intentions was weighed by the jury and they still found against her. The Court went on to affirms its decision in Gitlow:
[The Act] as applied in this case [is not] repugnant to the due process clause as a restraint of the rights of free speech, assembly, and association. That [a state] may punish those who abuse [freedom of speech] by utterances inimical to the public welfare, tending to incite to crime, disturb the public peace, or endanger the foundations of organized government and threaten its overthrow by unlawful means is not open to question.
The Act, thus, is not an unreasonable or arbitrary exercise of the police power of the State which can punish those who join an organization menacing the peace and welfare of the State.
Afterword. This case is no longer good law. It is another one of those cases where the Supreme Court allowed the State to take action against the communist threat (the "red menace").