Dennis v. United States

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Dennis v. United States

Argued December 4, 1950
Decided June 4, 1951


Full case name:	Eugene Dennis, et al. v. United States

Citations:	341 U.S. 494; 71 S. Ct. 857; 95 L. Ed. 1137; 1951 U.S. LEXIS 2407

Prior history:	Motion by co-defendant to dismiss attorney denied, 9 F.R.D. 367 (S.D.N.Y. 1949); defendants convicted, S.D.N.Y., 10-29-49; affirmed, 183 F.2d 201 (2nd Cir. 1950)

Subsequent history:	Rehearing denied, 342 U.S. 842 (1951); rehearing denied, 355 U.S. 936 (1958)

Holding

Defendants' convictions for conspiring to overthrow the U.S. government by force through their participation in the Communist Party were not in violation of the First Amendment.

Court membership

Chief Justice: Fred M. Vinson
Associate Justices: Hugo Black, Stanley Forman Reed, Felix Frankfurter, William O. Douglas, Robert H. Jackson, Harold Hitz Burton, Tom C. Clark, Sherman Minton

Case opinions

Plurality by: Vinson
Joined by: Reed, Burton, Minton
Concurrence by: Frankfurter
Concurrence by: Jackson
Dissent by: Black
Dissent by: Douglas
Clark took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.

Laws applied

U.S. Const. amend. I; 18 U.S.C. §§ 10, 11 (1946)

Dennis v. United States, 341 U.S. 494 (1951), was a United States Supreme Court case involving Eugene Dennis, general secretary of the Communist Party, USA and dealing with citizens' rights under the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

[edit] The case

George W. Crockett, Jr., Abraham J. Isserman and Harry Sacher argued the cause for petitioners. With them on the brief was Richard Gladstein.

Solicitor General Perlman and Irving S. Shapiro argued the cause for the United States. With them on the brief were Attorney General McGrath, Assistant Attorney General McInerney, Irving H. Saypol, Robert W. Ginnane, Frank H. Gordon, Edward C. Wallace and Lawrence K. Bailey.

Petitioners were indicted in July of 1948 for violating a provision of the Smith Act. Petitioners were found guilty by the trial court and the decision was affirmed by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. The Supreme Court granted writ of certiorari, but limited it to the following: 1. Whether section two or section three of the Smith Act violated the first Amendment. 2. Whether the same two sections violated the first and fifth amendments because of indefiniteness.

[edit] The judgment

Handed down as a 6-2 decision by the Court on June 4, 1951, the judgment and a plurality opinion was delivered by Chief Justice of the United States Fred Vinson, who was joined by Justices Stanley Forman Reed, Sherman Minton, and Harold H. Burton. Separate concurring opinions were delivered by Justices Felix Frankfurter and Robert H. Jackson. Justices Hugo Black and William O. Douglas wrote separate dissenting opinions. Justice Tom C. Clark did not participate in this case.

The Court ruled affirmed the conviction of the petitioner, a leader of the Communist Party in the United States. Dennis had been convicted of conspiring and organizing for the overthrow and destruction of the United States government by force and violence, under provisions of the Smith Act. In affirming the conviction, a plurality of the Court adopted Judge Learned Hand's formulation of the clear and present danger test:

In each case [courts] must ask whether the gravity of the "evil," discounted by its improbability, justifies such invasion of free speech as necessary to avoid the danger.

The dissenting opinions, Black and Douglas, expressed the hope that "in calmer times [not during war], when present pressures, passions and fears subside, this or some later Court will restore the First Amendment liberties to the high preferred place where they belong in a free society."