Opinions
Opinions
Supreme Court
Sandra Day O'Connor served as a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1981 to 2006. This page lists the opinions she wrote during her time on the court.
Post Retirement Opinions
After her retirement from the Supreme Court, Sandra Day O'Connor continued to hear cases in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit as a designated judge.
Arizona Appellate Court Opinions
Sandra Day O'Connor served as a judge on the Arizona Court of Appeals from 1980 to 1981. This page lists the opinions she wrote during her time on the state bench.
Filters
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE WHITE and JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
I agree with the Court’s treatment of the appellant’s arguments based on United States v. Vuitch, 402 U. S. 62 (1971), and Patterson v. New York, 432 U. S. 197 (1977). Accordingly, I Join Parts I and II of the Court’s opinion.
I concur in the judgment of the Court insofar as it affirms the conviction. For reasons stated in my dissent in Akron v Akron Center for Reproductive Health, ante p. 462 U. S. 416, I do not agree that the constitutional validity of the Virginia mandatory hospitalization requirement is contingent in any way on the trimester in which it is imposed. Rather, I believe that the requirement in this case is not an undue burden on the decision to undergo an abortion.
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
In 1960, the Government of the Republic of Cuba established respondent Banco Para el Comercio Exterior de Cuba (Bancec) to serve as “[a]n official autonomous credit institution for foreign trade… with full juridical capacity… of its own….” Law No. 793, Art. 1 (1960), App. to Pet. for Cert.2d. In September, 1960, Bancec sought to collect on a letter of credit issued by petitioner First National City Bank (now Citibank) in its favor in support of a contract for delivery of Cuban sugar to a buyer in the United States. Within days after Citibank received the request for collection, all of its assets in Cuba were seized and nationalized by the Cuban Government. When Bancec brought suit on the letter of credit in United States District Court, Citibank counterclaimed, asserting a right to set off the value of its seized Cuban assets. The question before us is whether Citibank may obtain such a setoff, notwithstanding the fact that Bancec was established as a separate juridical entity. Applying principles of equity common to international law and federal common law, we conclude that Citibank may apply a setoff.
I
Resolution of the question presented by this case requires us to describe in some detail the events giving rise to the current controversy.
Bancec was established by Law No. 793, of April 25, 1960, as the legal successor to the Banco Cubano del Comercio Exterior (Cuban Foreign Trade Bank), a trading bank established
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case presents the issue whether the Fourth Amendment prohibits law enforcement authorities from temporarily detaining personal luggage for exposure to a trained narcotics detection dog on the basis of reasonable suspicion that the luggage contains narcotics. Given the enforcement problems associated with the detection of narcotics trafficking and the minimal intrusion that a properly limited detention would entail, we conclude that the Fourth Amendment does not prohibit such a detention. On the facts of this case, however, we hold that the police conduct exceeded the bounds of a permissible investigative detention of the luggage.
I
Respondent Raymond J. Place’s behavior aroused the suspicions of law enforcement officers as he waited in line at the Miami International Airport to purchase a ticket to New York’s La Guardia Airport. As Place proceeded to the gate for his flight, the agents approached him and requested his airline ticket and some identification. Place complied with the request and consented to a search of the two suitcases he had checked. Because his flight was about to depart, however, the agents decided not to search the luggage.
Prompted by Place’s parting remark that he had recognized that they were police, the agents inspected the address tags on the checked luggage and noted discrepancies in the two street addresses. Further investigation revealed that neither address existed, and that the telephone
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE STEVENS joins, concurring.
By its decisions today in this case and in Karcher v. Daggett, ante p. 462 U. S. 725, the Court upholds, in the former, the allocation of one representative to a county in a state legislative plan with an 89% maximum deviation from population equality and strikes down, in the latter, a congressional reapportionment plan for the State of New Jersey where the maximum deviation is 0.6984%. As a Member of the majority in both cases, I feel compelled to explain the reasons for my joinder in these apparently divergent decisions.
In my view, the “one-person, one-vote” principle is the guiding ideal in evaluating both congressional and legislative redistricting schemes. In both situations, however, ensuring equal representation is not simply a matter of numbers. There must be flexibility in assessing the size of the deviation against the importance, consistency, and neutrality of the state policies alleged to require the population disparities.
Both opinions recognize this need for flexibility in examining the asserted state policies. [ Footnote 2/1 ] In Karcher, New Jersey has not demonstrated that the population variances in congressional districts were necessary to preserve minority voting strength -the only justification offered by the State. Ante at 462 U. S. 742 -744. Here, by contrast, there can be no doubt that the population deviation resulting from the provision of one representative to Niobrara County is the
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE POWELL and JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, dissenting.
Today, the Court departs significantly from its prior decisions and holds that, before the State conducts any proceeding that will affect the legally protected property interests of any party, the State must provide notice to that party by means certain to ensure actual notice as long as the party’s identity and location are “reasonably ascertainable.” Ante at 462 U. S. 800. Applying this novel and unjustified principle to the present case, the Court decides that the mortgagee involved deserved more than the notice by publication and posting that were provided. I dissent because the Court’s approach is unwarranted both as a general rule and as the rule of this case.
I
In Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U. S. 306, 339 U. S. 314 (1950), the Court established that
[a]n elementary and fundamental requirement of due process in any proceeding which is to be accorded finality is notice reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to apprise interested parties of the pendency of the action and afford them an opportunity to present their objections.
We emphasized that notice is constitutionally adequate when “the practicalities and peculiarities of the case… are reasonably met,” id. at 339 U. S. 314 -315. See also Walker v. City of Hutchinson, 352 U. S. 112, 352 U. S. 115 (1956); Schroeder v. New York City, 371 U. S. 208, 371 U. S. 211 -212 (1962); Greene v. Lindsey, 456
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE BRENNAN and JUSTICE STEVENS join, dissenting.
The Special Master reasoned that Idaho was entitled to a “fair share” of the anadromous fish that are the subject of this dispute. Without quantifying that share, however, he rejected the claim that Washington and Oregon had mismanaged the fishery, Report of Special Master 30-34, concluding instead that they had acted in good faith, id. at 35, and that the relief requested by Idaho was unworkable, ibid. In reaching that conclusion, he refused to consider any evidence pertaining to years earlier than 1975 or to future developments. Id. at 25-26, 27.
The Court today overrules the exceptions to the report of the Special Master. I see substantial merit to several of the points raised by Idaho, and am persuaded that they require a remand to the Special Master for further proceedings. Accordingly, I dissent.
I
The Master properly concluded that “Idaho is entitled to its fair share of the fish.” Id. at 25. No one owns an individual fish until he reduces that fish to possession, Pierson v. Post 2 Am.Dec. 264 (N.Y. 1805), and, indeed, even the States do not have full-fledged “property” interests in the wildlife within their boundaries, see, e.g., Douglas v. Seacoast Products, Inc., 431 U. S. 265, 431 U. S. 284 (1977); Missouri v. Holland, 252 U. S. 416, 252 U. S. 434 (1920). Nonetheless, courts have long recognized the opportunity to fish as an interest of sufficient dignity and importance to warrant
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, concurring in the judgment.
For reasons given in Part I of the dissent by JUSTICE STEVENS, post at 463 U. S. 636 -639, I cannot agree with the limitations that JUSTICE WHITE’s opinion would place on the scope of equitable relief available to private litigants suing under Title VI. [ Footnote 3/1 ] Therefore, like the dissent, I would address two further questions: (1) whether proof of purposeful discrimination is a necessary element of a valid Title VI claim, and (2) if so, whether administrative regulations incorporating an impact standard may be upheld as within the agency’s statutory authority. My affirmative answer to the first question leads me to conclude that regulations imposing an impact standard are not valid. On that basis, I would affirm the judgment below.
Were we construing Title VI without the benefit of any prior interpretation from this Court, one might well conclude that the statute was designed to redress more than purposeful discrimination. Cf. University of California Regents v. Bakke, 438 U. S. 265, 438 U. S. 412 -418 (1978) (opinion of STEVENS, J.). In Bakke, however, a majority of the Court concluded otherwise. Id. at 438 U. S. 287 (opinion of POWELL, J.); id. at 438 U. S. 328 (opinion of BRENNAN, WHITE, MARSHALL, and BLACKMUN, JJ.). Like JUSTICE STEVENS, post at 463 U. S. 641 -642, I feel constrained by stare decisis to follow that interpretation of the statute. I part company with JUSTICE STEVENS’ dissent, however, when it concludes
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
The question presented by this case is whether the State of California may require a federally licensed Indian trader, who operates a general store on an Indian reservation, to obtain a state liquor license in order to sell liquor for off-premises consumption. Because we find that Congress has delegated authority to the States as well as to the Indian tribes to regulate the use and distribution of alcoholic beverages in Indian country, [ Footnote 1 ] we reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
I
The respondent Rehner is a federally licensed Indian trader [ Footnote 2 ] who operates a general store on the Pala Reservation in San Diego, Cal. The Pala Tribe had adopted a tribal ordinance permitting the sale of liquor on the reservation providing that the sales conformed to state law, and this ordinance was approved by the Secretary of the Interior. See 25 Fed.Reg. 3343 (1960). Rehner then sought from the State an exemption from its law requiring a state license for retail sale of distilled spirits for off-premises consumption. [ Footnote 3 ] When she was refused an exemption, Rehner filed suit seeking a declaratory judgment that she did not need a license from the State, and an order directing that liquor wholesalers could sell to her. The District Court granted the State’s motion to dismiss, ruling that Rehner was required to have a state license under 18 U.S.C. § 1161, which provides that liquor
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case requires us to consider the constitutionality under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of instructing a capital sentencing jury regarding the Governor’s power to commute a sentence of life without possibility of parole. Finding no constitutional defect in the instruction, we reverse the decision of the Supreme Court of California and remand for further proceedings.
I
On the night of June 2, 1979, respondent Marcelino Ramos participated in the robbery of a fast-food restaurant where he was employed as a janitor. As respondent’s codefendant placed a food order, respondent entered the restaurant, went behind the front counter into the work area, ostensibly for the purpose of checking his work schedule, and emerged with a gun. Respondent directed the two employees working that night into the restaurant’s walk-in refrigerator and ordered them to face the back wall. Respondent entered and emerged from the refrigerator several times, inquiring at one point about the keys to the restaurant safe. When he entered for the last time, he instructed the two employees to kneel on the floor of the refrigerator, to remove their hats, and to pray. Respondent struck both on the head and then shot them, wounding one and killing the other.
Respondent was charged with robbery, attempted murder, and first-degree murder. Defense counsel presented no evidence at the guilt phase of respondent’s trial, and the jury returned a verdict
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
In Terry v. Ohio, 392 U. S. 1 (1968), we upheld the validity of a protective search for weapons in the absence of probable cause to arrest because it is unreasonable to deny a police officer the right “to neutralize the threat of physical harm,” id. at 392 U. S. 24, when he possesses an articulable suspicion that an individual is armed and dangerous. We did not, however, expressly address whether such a protective search for weapons could extend to an area beyond the person in the absence of probable cause to arrest. In the present case, respondent David Long was convicted for possession of marihuana found by police in the passenger compartment and trunk of the automobile that he was driving. The police searched the passenger compartment because they had reason to believe that the vehicle contained weapons potentially dangerous to the officers. We hold that the protective search of the passenger compartment was reasonable under the principles articulated in Terry and other decisions of this Court. We also examine Long’s argument that the decision below rests upon an adequate and independent state ground, and we decide in favor of our jurisdiction.
I
Deputies Howell and Lewis were on patrol in a rural area one evening when, shortly after midnight, they observed a car traveling erratically and at excessive speed. [ Footnote 1 ] The officers observed the car turning down a side road, where it swerved off into a shallow ditch.
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, concurring.
This case requires us to determine whether Title VII prohibits an employer from offering an annuity plan in which the participating insurance company uses sex-based tables for calculating monthly benefit payments. It is important to stress that our judicial role is simply to discern the intent of the 88th Congress in enacting Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, [ Footnote 3/1 ] a statute covering only discrimination in employment. What we, if sitting as legislators, might consider wise legislative policy is irrelevant to our task. Nor, as JUSTICE MARSHALL notes, ante at 463 U. S. 1078 -1079, n. 4, do we have before us any constitutional challenge. Finally, our decision must ignore (and our holding has no necessary effect on) the larger issue of whether considerations of sex should be barred from all insurance plans, including individual purchases of insurance, an issue that Congress is currently debating. See S. 372, 98th Cong., 1st Sess. (1983); H.R. 100, 98th Cong., 1st Sess. (1983).
Although the issue presented for our decision is a narrow one, the answer is far from self-evident. As with many other narrow issues of statutory construction, the general language chosen by Congress does not clearly resolve the precise question. Our polestar, however, must be the intent of Congress, and the guiding lights are the language, structure, and legislative history of Title VII. Our inquiry is made somewhat easier by the fact that this Court, in
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
In § 244(a)(1) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (Act), 66 Stat. 214, as amended, 8 U.S.C. § 1254(a)(1), Congress provided that the Attorney General, in his discretion, may suspend deportation and adjust the status of an otherwise deportable alien who (1) “has been physically present in the United States for a continuous period of not less than seven years”; (2) “is a person of good moral character”; and (3) is “a person whose deportation would, in the opinion of the Attorney General, result in extreme hardship to the alien or to his spouse, parent, or child….” In this case, we must decide the meaning of § 244(a)(1)’s “continuous physical presence” requirement.
I
Respondent, a native and citizen of Thailand, first entered the United States as a nonimmigrant student in October, 1969. Respondent’s husband, also a native and citizen of Thailand, entered the country in August, 1968. Respondent and her husband were authorized to remain in the United States until July, 1971. However, when their visas expired, they chose to stay without securing permission from the immigration authorities.
In January, 1977, petitioner, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), [ Footnote 1 ] commenced deportation proceedings against respondent and her husband pursuant to § 241(a)(2) of the Act. See 8 U.S.C. § 1251(a)(2). Respondent and her husband conceded deportability and applied for suspension pursuant to § 244(a)(1). 8 U.S.C.
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
These consolidated cases present the question whether §§ 611-613A of the Internal Revenue Code (Code), 26 U.S.C. §§ 611-613A, entitle taxpayers to an allowance for percentage depletion on lease bonus or advance royalty income received from lessees of their oil and gas mineral interests.
I
A
Ever since enacting the earliest income tax laws, Congress has subsidized the development of our Nation’s natural resources. Toward this end, Congress has allowed holders of economic interests in mineral deposits, including oil and gas wells, to deduct from their taxable incomes the larger of two depletion allowances: cost or percentage. [ Footnote 1 ] Under cost depletion, taxpayers amortize the cost of their wells over their total productive lives. [ Footnote 2 ] Under percentage depletion, taxpayers deduct a statutorily specified percentage of the “gross income” generated from the property, irrespective of actual costs incurred. [ Footnote 3 ] Through these depletion provisions, Congress has permitted taxpayers to recover the investments they have made in mineral deposits and to generate additional capital for further exploration and production of the Nation’s mineral resources.
Taxpayers have historically preferred the allowance for percentage, as opposed to cost, depletion on wells that are good producers, because the tax benefits are significantly greater. Prior to 1975, it was well settled that taxpayers leasing their interests
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
These cases arise out of the Department of the Interior’s sale of oil and gas leases on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) off the coast of California. We must determine whether the sale is an activity “directly affecting” the coastal zone under § 307(C)(1) of the Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA). That section provides in its entirety:
Each Federal agency conducting or supporting activities directly affecting the coastal zone shall conduct or support those activities in a manner which is, to the maximum extent practicable, consistent with approved state management programs.
86 Stat. 1285, 16 U.S.C. § 1456(C)(1) (1982 ed.). We conclude that the Secretary of the Interior’s sale of Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas leases is not an activity “directly affecting” the coastal zone within the meaning of the statute.
I
CZMA defines the “coastal zone” to include state, but not federal, land near the shorelines of the several coastal States, as well as coastal waters extending “seaward to the outer limit of the United States territorial sea.” 16 U.S.C. § 1453(1) (1982 ed.). The territorial sea for States bordering on the Pacific Ocean or Atlantic Ocean extends three geographical miles seaward from the coastline. See 43 U.S.C. § 1301; United States v. California, 381 U. S. 139 (1965). Submerged lands subject to the jurisdiction of the United States that lie beyond the territorial sea constitute the “outer Continental Shelf.”
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
In Faretta v. California, 422 U. S. 806 (1975), this Court recognized a defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to conduct his own defense. The Court also held that a trial court may appoint “standby counsel” to assist the pro se defendant in his defense. Today we must decide what role standby counsel who is present at trial over the defendant’s objection may play consistent with the protection of the defendant’s Faretta rights.
I
Carl Edwin Wiggins was convicted of robbery and sentenced to life imprisonment as a recidivist. His conviction was set aside because of a defective indictment. When Wiggins was retried, he was again convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. Standby counsel were appointed to assist Wiggins at both trials. Wiggins now challenges counsel’s participation in his second trial.
Prior to the first trial, a hearing was held on Wiggins’ motion to proceed pro se. The court granted the motion, Record 4a, but simultaneously appointed two attorneys to act as standby counsel. Wiggins initially objected to their presence. Id. at 11a. Shortly thereafter, however, counsel asked Wiggins how they should conduct themselves at trial, and Wiggins expressly requested that they bring appropriate objections directly to the attention of the court, without first consulting him. Id. at 37a. After the trial, newly appointed counsel discovered that the original indictment was defective, and a new trial was granted.
On April
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE REHNQUIST joins, dissenting.
Section 2 of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) (also known as the United States Arbitration Act) provides that a written arbitration agreement
shall be valid, irrevocable, and enforceable, save upon such grounds as exist at law or in equity for the revocation of any contract. [ Footnote 2/1 ]
Section 2 does not, on its face, identify which judicial forums are bound by its requirements or what procedures govern its enforcement. The FAA deals with these matters in §§ 3 and 4. Section 3 provides:
If any suit or proceeding be brought in any of the courts of the United States upon any issue referable to arbitration… the court… shall on application of one of the parties stay the trial of the action until such arbitration has been had in accordance with the terms of the agreement. [ Footnote 2/2 ]…
Section 4 specifies that a party aggrieved by another’s refusal to arbitrate
may petition any United States district court which, save for such agreement, would have jurisdiction under title 28, in a civil action or in admiralty of the subject matter… for an order directing that such arbitration proceed in the manner provided for in such agreement. [ Footnote 2/3 ]…
Today, the Court takes the facial silence of § 2 as a license to declare that state as well as federal courts must apply § 2. In addition, though this is not spelled out in the opinion, the Court holds that, in enforcing this newly discovered
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, Circuit Justice.
Applicant, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (Secretary), requests that I issue a stay pending the filing and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari to review the per curiam judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in this case. The Court of Appeals’ judgment, affirming an order entered by the District Court for the Western District of Kentucky, requires the Secretary: (1) to promulgate regulations adopting a nationwide 180-day time limit for the rendering of decisions in disability benefit cases under Titles II and XVI of the Social Security Act, and (2) to promulgate regulations imposing a nationwide 90-day time limit for the rendering of decisions in disability termination cases under Title XVI of that Act. Although respondents requested only that the Secretary- immediately be required to provide hearings and appeals to Kentucky class members, the Court of Appeals affirmed the District Court’s order without limiting it in any way. The Secretary attests that the Solicitor! General has determined that a petition for a writ of certiorari will’be filed to seek review of this order. She further suggests that, in the meantime, it makes no sense to order her to impose nationwide time limits when this Court is about to address the propriety of a court’s imposing such deadlines in even one State in Heckler v. Day, No. 82-1371 (argued December 5, 1983). Accordingly, she seeks a stay from this Court.
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
The State of Minnesota authorizes its public employees to bargain collectively over terms and conditions of employment. It also requires public employers to engage in official exchanges of views with their professional employees on policy questions relating to employment but outside the scope of mandatory bargaining. If professional employees forming an appropriate bargaining unit have selected an exclusive representative for mandatory bargaining, their employer may exchange views on nonmandatory subjects only with the exclusive representative. The question presented in these cases is whether this restriction on participation in the nonmandatory subject exchange process violates the constitutional rights of professional employees within the bargaining unit who are not members of the exclusive representative and who may disagree with its views. We hold that it does not.
I
A
In 1971, the Minnesota Legislature adopted the Public Employment Labor Relations Act (PELRA), Minn.Stat. § 179.61 et seq. (1982), to establish “orderly and constructive relationships between all public employers and their employees….” § 179.61. The public employers covered by the law are, broadly speaking, the State and its political subdivisions, agencies, and instrumentalities. § 179.63. In its amended form, as in its original form, PELRA provides for the division of public employees into appropriate bargaining units and establishes a procedure, based
JUSTICE O’CONNOR delivered the opinion of the Court.
In Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. v. Risjord, 449 U. S. 368 (1981), the Court held that a pretrial denial of a motion to disqualify counsel in a civil case is not appealable prior to trial under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 as a final collateral order. The Court reserved the questions of the immediate appealability of pretrial denials of disqualification motions in criminal cases and of pretrial grants of disqualification motions in both criminal and civil cases. Id. at 372, n. 8. We decide today that a District Court’s pretrial disqualification of defense counsel in a criminal prosecution is not immediately appealable under 28 U.S.C. § 1291.
I
Petitioners are four police officers who formed a “grandpop” decoy squad in the Philadelphia Police Department. Petitioner Flanagan would pose as an aged derelict, a likely target for street criminals. When Flanagan gave the standard alarm, the other members of the decoy team would move in to make an arrest.
A federal grand jury in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania indicted petitioners in September, 1981. The indictment alleged that petitioners had conspired to make arrests without probable cause and had unlawfully arrested and abused eight people. One count of the indictment charged petitioners with conspiring to deprive citizens of their civil rights in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 241. The remaining 12 counts charged petitioners, in various combinations, with committing substantive civil rights
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE POWELL, and JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, concurring in the judgment.
The motion of South Carolina for leave to file a complaint in our original jurisdiction raises three questions. First, the Court must decide whether Congress intended, by the Tax Anti-Injunction Act, 26 U.S.C. § 7421(a), to bar nontaxpayers like the State of South Carolina from challenging the validity of federal tax statutes in the courts. Second, if the Act generally does bar such nontaxpayer suits, the Court must decide whether Congress intended, and if so whether the Constitution permits it, to bar us from considering South Carolina’s complaint in our original jurisdiction. Third, if Congress either did not intend, or constitutionally is not permitted, to withdraw this case from our original jurisdiction, the Court must decide whether South Carolina’s challenge to the constitutionality of § 103(j)(1) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, 26 U.S.C. § 103(j)(1) (1982 ed.), as added by § 310(b)(1) of the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982, Pub.L. 97-248, 96 Stat. 596, raises issues appropriate for original adjudication.
In answering the first question, the Court reaches the unwarranted conclusion that the Tax Anti-Injunction Act proscribes only those suits in which the complaining party, usually a taxpayer, can challenge the validity of a taxing measure in an alternative forum. The Court holds that suits by nontaxpayers generally are not barred. In my opinion,
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom JUSTICE BRENNAN, JUSTICE REHNQUIST, and JUSTICE STEVENS join, dissenting. The rule of lenity demands that “ambiguity concerning the ambit of criminal statutes should be resolved in favor of lenity.”Rewis v. United States,401 U. S. 808,401 U. S. 812 opinion cannot carry the weight the Court places on it, and there is good reason to reject the Court’s interpretation of the statute.(1971). The Court concludes that congressional intent to include persons like petitioners within the coverage of 18 U.S.C. § 201 is clear enough to make the rule of lenity inapplicable. The statutory language admits of the Court’s reading, and the case for that reading would be strong, though perhaps not persuasive, if § 201 were a civil statute. I differ with the Court in that I find the evidence of congressional intent too weak to meet the higher standard for resolving facial ambiguity against a defendant when interpreting a criminal statute. In my view, the evidence of intent offered by the Court’s
I
The language of § 201 and of its predecessors, as the Court’s opinion points out, is intentionally broad. But that fact merely creates the interpretive problem -it does not resolve it. Congress intended to carry forward the pre-1962 bribery statute when it enacted § 201, and it understood the coverage of the bribery law to be broad. See ante at 465 U. S. 491 -493, 465 U. S. 494 -495. Moreover, the purpose of the statute was undoubtedly to proscribe bribery of all those who
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, concurring.
I concur in both the result and reasoning of JUSTICE POWELL’s opinion for the Court. I write separately, however, just to make explicit what is implicit in the analysis of that opinion: that the Fifth Amendment provides absolutely no protection for the contents of private papers of any kind. The notion that the Fifth Amendment protects the privacy of papers originated in Boyd v. United States, 116 U. S. 616, 116 U. S. 630 (1886), but our decision in Fisher v. United States, 425 U. S. 391 (1976), sounded the death knell for Boyd. “Several of Boyd’s express or implicit declarations [had] not stood the test of time,” 425 U.S. at 425 U. S. 407, and its privacy of papers concept “ha[d] long been a rule searching for a rationale….” Id. at 425 U. S. 409. Today’s decision puts a long overdue end to that fruitless search.
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, concurring.
I concur in the opinion of the Court. I write separately to suggest a clarification of our Establishment Clause doctrine. The suggested approach leads to the same result in this case as that taken by the Court, and the Court’s opinion, as I read it, is consistent with my analysis.
I
The Establishment Clause prohibits government from making adherence to a religion relevant in any way to a person’s standing in the political community. Government can run afoul of that prohibition in two principal ways. One is excessive entanglement with religious institutions, which may interfere with the independence of the institutions, give the institutions access to government or governmental powers not fully shared by nonadherents of the religion, and foster the creation of political constituencies defined along religious lines. E.g., Larkin v. Grendel’s Den, Inc., 459 U. S. 116 (1982). The second and more direct infringement is government endorsement or disapproval of religion. Endorsement sends a message to nonadherents that they are outsiders, not full members of the political community, and an accompanying message to adherents that they are insiders, favored members of the political community. Disapproval sends the opposite message. See generally Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203 (1963).
Our prior cases have used the three-part test articulated in Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602, 403 U. S. 612 -613 (1971), as a guide to detecting these
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE JUSTICE POWELL, and JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, dissenting.
Under the Interboro doctrine, an individual employee is deemed to have engaged in “concerted activit[y],” within the meaning of § 7 of the National Labor Relations Act (Act), 29 U.S.C. § 157, if the right he reasonably and in good faith asserts is grounded in his employer’s collective bargaining agreement. [ Footnote 2/1 ] On this view, the reasonable, good faith assertion of a right contained in the collective bargaining agreement is said to be an extension of the concerted action that produced the agreement; alternatively, the reasonable, good faith assertion of the contract right is said to affect the rights of all the other employees in the workforce. See ante at 465 U. S. 829. Thus, if the employer “interfere[s] with, restrain[s], or coerce[s]” the employee in response to the latter’s assertion of the alleged contract right, the Interboro doctrine enables the employee to file a § 8(a)(1) unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board (Board). See 29 U.S.C. § 158(a)(1). Although the concepts of individual action for personal gain and “concerted activity” are intuitively incompatible, [ Footnote 2/2 ] the Court today defers to the Board’s judgment that the Interboro doctrine is necessary to safeguard the exercise of rights previously won in the collective bargaining process. Since I consider the Interboro doctrine to be an exercise in undelegated legislative
JUSTICE O’CONNOR, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE, JUSTICE POWELL, and JUSTICE REHNQUIST join, concurring in the judgment.
East Jefferson Hospital, a public hospital governed by petitioners, requires patients to use the anesthesiological services provided by Roux & Associates, as they are the only doctors authorized to administer anesthesia to patients in the hospital. The Court of Appeals found that this arrangement was a tie-in illegal under the Sherman Act. 686 F.2d 286 (CA5 1982). I concur in the Court’s decision to reverse, but write separately to explain why I believe the hospital-Roux contract, whether treated as effecting a tie between services provided to patients or as an exclusive dealing arrangement between the hospital and certain anesthesiologists, is properly analyzed under the rule of reason.
I
Tying is a form of marketing in which a seller insists on selling two distinct products or services as a package. A supermarket that will sell flour to consumers only if they will also buy sugar is engaged in tying. Flour is referred to as the tying product, sugar as the tied product. In this case, the allegation is that East Jefferson Hospital has unlawfully tied the sale of general hospital services and operating room facilities (the tying service) to the sale of anesthesiologists’ services (the tied services). The Court has on occasion applied a per se rule of illegality in actions alleging tying in violation of § 1 of the Sherman Act. International Salt Co. v. United