| CITES
BY TOPIC: national domain |
U.S. v. State of Cal., 332 U.S. 19, 67 S.Ct. 1658 (U.S. 1947)
Second. It is contended that we should dismiss this action on the
ground that the Attorney General has not been granted power either
to file or to maintain it. It is
*27
not denied that Congress has given a very broad authority to the
Attorney General to institute and conduct litigation in order to
establish and safeguard government rights and properties.FN3 The argument is that Congress has for a long period of years acted
in such a way as to manifest a clear policy to the effect that the
states, not the Federal Government, have legal title to the land
under the three-mile belt. Although Congress has not expressly declared
such a policy, we are asked to imply it from certain conduct of
Congress and other governmental agencies charged with responsibilities
concerning the national
domain.
And, in effect, we are urged to infer that Congress has by implication
amended its long-existing statutes which grant the Attorney General
broad powers to institute and maintain court proceedings in order
to safeguard national interests.
FN3 5 U.S.C. ss 291, 309, 5 U.S.C.A.
ss 291, 309; United States v. San Jacinto Tin Co., 125 U.S. 273, 279, 284,
8 S.Ct. 850, 854, 856, 31 L.Ed. 747; Kern River Co. v. United States, 257 U.S. 147, 154, 155, 42
S.Ct. 60, 62, 63, 66 L.Ed. 175; Sanitary District of Chicago v. United States, 266 U.S. 405,
425, 426, 45 S.Ct. 176, 178, 179, 69 L.Ed. 352; see also In re Debs, 158 U.S. 564, 584, 15 S.Ct. 900, 906, 39 L.Ed. 1092; United States v. State of Oregon, 295 U.S. 1, 24, 55 S.Ct. 610,
619, 79 L.Ed. 1267; United States v. State of Wyoming, 323 U.S. 669, 65 S.Ct. 34,
89 L.Ed. 543; 331 U.S. 440, 67 S.Ct. 1319.
**1663 [5] An Act passed by Congress
and signed by the President could, of course, limit the power previously
granted the Attorney General to prosecute claims for the Government. For Article IV, s 3, Cl. 2 of the Constitution vests in Congress
‘Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations
respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United
States.’ We have said that the constitutional power of Congress
in this respect is without limitation. United States v. City and County of San Francisco, 310 U.S. 16,
29, 30, 60 S.Ct. 749, 756, 757, 84 L.Ed. 1050. Thus
neither the courts nor the executive agencies, could proceed contrary
to an Act of Congress in this congressional area of national power.
[U.S. v. State of Cal., 332 U.S. 19, 67 S.Ct. 1658 (U.S.
1947)]
Hodges v. U.S., 203 U.S. 1, 27 S.Ct.
6 (U.S. 1906)
These views were explicitly referred to and reaffirmed in the recent
case of Clyatt v. United States, 197 U. S. 207, 49 L. ed. 726, 25 Sup. Ct.
Rep. 429. That was an indictment against a single individual
for having unlawfully and knowingly returned, forcibly and against
their will, two persons from Florida to Georgia, to be held in the
latter state in a condition of peonage, in violation of the statutes
of the United States (Rev. Stat. 1990, 5526, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901,
pp. 1266, 3715). A person arbitrarily or forcibly held against his
will for the purpose of compelling him to render personal services
in discharge of a debt is in a condition of peonage. It was not
claimed in that case that peonage was sanctioned by or could be
maintained under the Constitution or laws either of Florida or Georgia. The argument there on behalf of the accused was, in part,
that the 13th Amendment was directed solely against the states and
their laws, and that its provisions could not be made applicable
to individuals whose illegal conduct was not authorized, permitted,
or sanctioned by some act, resolution, order, regulation, or usage
of the state. That argument was rejected by every member of this
court, and we all agreed that Congress had power, under the 13th
Amendment, not only to forbid the existence of peonage, but to make
it an offense against the United States for any person to
hold, arrest, return, or cause to be held, arrested or returned,
or who in any manner aided in the arrest or return, of another person,
to a condition of peonage. After quoting the above sentences from
the opinion in the Civil Rights Cases, Mr. Justice Brewer, speaking
for the court, said: ‘Other authorities to the same effect might
be cited. It is not open to doubt that Congress may enforce the
13th Amendment by direct legislation, punishing the holding of a
person in slavery or in involuntary servitude, except as a punishment
for crime. In the exercise of that power Congress has enacted these
sections denouncing peonage, and punishing one who holds another
in that condition of involuntary servitude.
*34 This legislation is not
limited to the territories or other parts of the strictly
national domain,
but is operative in the states and wherever the sovereignty of the
United States extends. We entertain no doubt of the validity of
this legislation, or of its applicability to the case of any
person holding another in a state of peonage, and this whether there
be municipal ordinance or state law sanctioning such holding. It
operates directly on every citizen of the republic, wherever his
residence may be.’ The Clyatt Case proceeded upon the
ground that, although the Constitution and laws of the state might
be in perfect harmony with the 13th Amendment, yet the compulsory
holding of one individual by another individual for the purpose
of compelling the former, by personal service, to discharge his
indebtedness to the latter, created a condition of involuntary servitude
or peonage, was in derogation of the freedom established by that
Amendment, and, therefore, could be reached and punished by the
nation. Is it consistent
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with the principle upon which that case rests to say that an organized
body of individuals who forcibly prevent free citizens, solely because
of their race, from making a living in a legitimate way, do not
infringe any right secured by the national Constitution, and may
not be reached or punished by the nation? One who is shut
up by superior or overpowering force, constantly present and threatening,
from earning his living in a lawful way of his own choosing, is
as much in a condition of involuntary servitude as if he were forcibly
held in a condition of peonage. In each case his will is enslaved,
because illegally subjected, by a combination that he cannot resist,
to the will of others in respect of matters which a freeman is entitled
to control in such way as to him seems best. It would seem
impossible, under former decisions, to sustain the view that a combination
or conspiracy of individuals, albeit acting without the sanction
of the state, may not be reached and punished by the United States,
if the combination and conspiracy has for its object, by force,
to prevent or burden the free exercise or enjoyment
*35 of a right or privilege created or secured by the Constitution or
laws of the United States.
[Hodges v. U.S., 203 U.S. 1, 27 S.Ct. 6 (U.S. 1906)]
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