United States v. Cox

WISDOM, Circuit Judge

(concurring specially):

Too many opinion-writers are like too many cooks. I brave the danger of spoiling our broth only because the savory aroma of the competing dish the dissenters offer conceals its indigestible ingredients.

The dissenters show judicial craftsmanship of the highest order in writing persuasively about “the traditional sphere” of the grand jury while not turning up one case holding that a court may compel a prosecutor to prepare and sign a bill of indictment requested by a grand jury. Not one case in all the *186 years between 1166 and 1965! I submit that the result reached in the dissent is the product of a misunderstanding of the historical meaning of “presentment and indictment”, a failure to give effect to the difference between the sword and the shield of the grand jury, 1

2 and an abstract approach that disregards the factual setting in which the issue is presented.

Nothing in the position of any of the judges in the majority “ignores” or tends to diminish the purely inquisitorial role of the federal grand jury. 8 But when that role goes beyond inquiry and report and becomes accusatorial, no aura of traditional or constitutional sanctity surrounds the grand jury. The Grand Jury earned its place in the Bill of Rights by its shield, not by its sword.

I.

The Fifth Amendment requires the grand jury’s “presentment or indictment” as a prerequisite to trial for a “capital, or otherwise infamous crime”. This language provides no aid and comfort to the notion that either the grand jury or the court has the power to compel prosecution once the grand jury has exercised its accusatorial function. “In fact, confusion reigns as to just what a [federal] grand jury can do. Federal statutes are silent on the relationship which is to exist between a federal grand jury, the district court which summons it, and the United States attorney’s office in the district. From 1789 to the present, Congress has made no definitive statement concerning grand jury powers.” 3 There is, however, “every reason to believe that our constitutional grand jury was intended to operate substantially like its English progenitor”. 4

Historians usually trace the English grand jury back to the Assize of Clarendon issued by Henry II in 1166, based not on Anglo-Saxon antecedents but on Norman-French inquests. 5 The function of the early grand juries was “to dis *187 cover and present facts in answer to enquiries addressed to them by the King”. 6 The primary purpose was to furnish the King with the names of those who were defamed by common repute, fama publica, an institution historically analogous to the infamia 7 in Roman law, both of which add content to the meaning of the phrase “infamous crimes” in the Fifth Amendment. 8 The “whole principle” of the early grand jury “was to get information useful to the Crown from those most likely to have it — the principle of the ancient inquisition.” 9 This ordeal by trial avoided private prosecution by “appeal” and enabled the Crown to discover criminals who would have escaped prosecution by private parties, thereby providing another source of revenue from fines and forfeitures as well as improving the machinery for preserving law and order. The procedure was for the benefit of the Crown.

From its beginning until its abolition by Parliament in 1933, 10 the English common law presenting jury could act on its own knowledge, or on the information of others, or on the Crown’s written bill of indictment. But only when this bill was preferred to the grand jury by the Crown and endorsed as a “true bill” was the accusation known as an indictment. This was the accepted usage when the Fifth Amendment was adopted. Blackstone explained:

“A presentment, generally taken, is a very comprehensive term; including not only presentments properly so called, but also inquisitions of office, and indictments by a grand jury. A presentment, properly speaking, is the notice taken by a grand jury of any oifence from their own knowledge or observation, without any bill of indictment laid before them at the suit of the king. As, the presentment of a nuisance, a libel, and the like; upon which the officer of the court must afterwards frame an indictment, before the party present *188 ed can be put to answer it. * * * An indictment is a written accusation of one or more persons of a crime or misdemeanor, preferred to, and presented upon oath by, a grand jury. * * * When the grand jury have heard the evidence, if they think it a groundless accusation, they used formerly to endorse on the back of the bill, ‘ignoramus;’ or, we know nothing of it; intimating, that though the facts might possibly be true, that truth did not appear to them: but now, they assert in English, more absolutely, ‘not a true bill;’ or (which is the better way) ‘not found;’ and then the party is discharged without, farther answer. * * * If they are satisfied of the truth of the accusation, they then endorse upon it, ‘a true bill,’ antiently, ‘bitta vera.’ The indictment is then said to be found, and the party stands indicted.” Blackstone’s Commentaries, Vol. IV, C. XXIII, pp. 301, 302, 305. (Italics supplied by the Editor, St. George Tucker, in the First American edition, 1803).

The Fifth Amendment, therefore, does not offer a grand jury a choice between presentment or indictment. Unless there is a bill of indictment preferred to the grand jury at the instance of the Government, there can be no indictment. It is entirely in the hands of the Government whether to submit an accusation to the grand jury leading to presentment in the form of an indictment and serving as the initial pleading in a criminal prosecution. ,

Professor Orfield finds the distinctions between indictment and presentment “confusing” as, no doubt, they are — today. His explanation of the terms is substantially similar to Blackstone’s:

“Both indictment and presentment are ‘presented’ to the court. Both are accusations. The presentment, however, is made by the grand jury. An indictment, on the other hand, is someone else’s accusation which has been drawn up into a bill of indictment and preferred to the grand jury, who examine the evidence in support of it and then find it to be a true bill. In finding an indictment the grand jury is playing the role of a prosecutor. For that reason a presentment must be drawn up into a bill of indictment and resubmitted to the grand jury.” Orfield, Criminal Procedure from Arrest to Appeal, 157 (1947); 11

Professor Orfield concedes that there may be some argument that the Fifth Amendment uses the term “presentment” as an alternative for “indictment”. However, he writes:

“[I]f the term [“presentment”] is used in the Fifth Amendment with the meaning it had when the Constitution was adopted, it means a statement of facts by grand jurors upon which an indictment would be subsequently framed by a United States attorney, or it may mean an accusation by the grand jurors upon presentment of facts to them by a special prosecutor acting for a private individual. But it is no longer used in the federal courts because of the constant availability of a United States attorney to assist the grand jury and because of the decline of prosecution by private individuals.” Ibid. 158. (Emphasis supplied.)

Criminal presentment based on the grand jury’s own knowledge or on knowledge furnished by others may be in disuse in federal courts, but it has not been read out of the Constitution. Hale v. Henkel, 1906, 201 U.S. 43, 62 , 26 S.Ct. 370 , 50 L.Ed. 652 . 12 See also Blair v. United States, 1919, 250 U.S. 273, 280 , *189 39 S.Ct. 468 , 63 L.Ed. 979 and Sullivan v. United States, 1954, 348 U.S. 170, 173 , 75 S.Ct. 182 , 99 L.Ed. 210 ; Kuh, The Grand Jury “Presentment”; Foul Blow or Fair Play, 55 Col.L.Rev. 1103 (1955).

Presentment is a natural corollary to the grand jury’s inquisitorial power, either for an inquisition of office or for a prosecutory purpose. Its use here would not accomplish its prosecutory purpose, because the Attorney General still could decline to submit a bill of indictment to the grand jury. On the other hand, in this case a presentment in open court with an appropriate minute entry would meet many of the objections to the government’s position raised in the dissenting opinion and Judge Brown’s opinion. Subject to the qualification that the United States Attorney is bound by his instructions from the Attorney General not to prosecute Goff and Kendrick, and therefore could not draw bills indicting them, I see no objection to his rendering other services within his ordinary duties as the legal advisor to the jury. Aborting of the criminal presentment would, in effect, convert it into the familiar inquisition of office “employed for centuries to designate the findings of a grand jury with respect to derelictions in matters of public concern, particularly of officials, which may fall short of being criminal offenses”. 13 This use of presentment would be in accord with the established procedure in the common law and with the original understanding of the framers. I consider it preferable to the placebo the Government suggests: an indictment (which is not an indictment) to lie fallow until some day another Attorney General might or might not come along to vitalize it.

“ ‘If the grand jury * * * from the examination of witnesses, know of any offense committed in the county, for which no indictment is presented to them, it is their duty either to inform the officer who prosecutes for the state, of the nature of the offense, and desire that an indictment for it be laid before them, or, if they do not, or, if no such indictment be given them, it is their duty to give such information of it to the court; stating, without any particular form, the facts and circumstances which constitute the offense. This is called a presentment.’ ”

In sum, there is nothing in my view or in that of the other judges in the majority that would, as the dissenting judges assert, authorize Government counsel to “radically reduce the powers of the grand jury”. The grand jury nevr had a plenary power to indict. It had a limited power to indict — after accusation by the Crown or the Government in the form of a bill of indictment preferred to the grand jury. The common law oath of a grand juror, as Justice Vanderbilt has pointed out, “says not a single word about indictments; on the contrary, at common law the grand jury swore to ‘diligently inquire and true presentments make’. See Shaftesbury Trial, 8 St.Tr. 759.” 14 The oath a federal grand juror takes today is identical with the common law oath in its avoidance of any reference to “indictment”.

The decision of the majority does not affect the inquisitorial power of the grand jury. No one questions the jury’s plenary power to inquire, to summon and interrogate witnesses, and to present either findings and a report or an accusation in open court by presentment.

Finally, the decision does not affect the power of the grand jury to shield suspected law violators. By refusing to indict, the grand jury has the unchal *190 lengeable power to defend the innocent from government oppression by unjust prosecution. And it has the equally unchallengeable power to shield the guilty, should the whims of the jurors or their conscious or subconscious response to community pressures induce twelve or more jurors to give sanctuary to the guilty.

II.

Because recognition of the grand jury’s shield-like function is lodged in the Bill of Rights, the bedrock of básic rights, it is fair to say that national policy favors a liberal construction of the power of the grand jury to protect the individual against official tyranny. No such policy favors the grand jury in its accusatorial role. Accordingly, we look for and should expect to find a check on its unjust accusations similar to the grand jury’s check on the government’s unjust accusations.

If there is one aspect of the doctrine of Separation of Powers that the Founding Fathers agreed upon, it is the principle, as Montesquieu stated it: “To prevent the abuse of power, it is necessary that by the very disposition of things, power should be a check to power”. 15 Taking their institutions as they found them, the framers wove a web of checks and balances designed to prevent abuse of power, regardless of the age, origin, and character of the institution. At the same time, the framers were too sophisticated to believe that the three branches of government were absolutely separate, air-tight departments. 16 It does not matter, therefore, whether the grand jury is regarded as an arm of the court, as the Federal Grand Jury Handbook states, 17 or is regarded as a sui generis institution derived from the people. What does matter is that the power of the executive not to prosecute, and therefore not to take steps necessarily leading to prosecution, is the appropriate curb on a grand jury in keeping with the constitutional theory of checks and balances. Such a check is especially necessary, if there is any question of the grand jury’s and the district court’s being in agreement; if they differ, of course the district court may dismiss the grand jury. The need is rendered more acute if there is a possibility that community hostility against the suspected offenders, individually or as a race, may jeopardize justice before the petit jury. In short, if we give the same meaning to “presentment or indictment” that Madison and others gave to these terms when Madison introduced the Bill of Rights in the First Congress, the grand jury provision in the Bill of Rights cuts both ways: it prevents harassment and intimidation and oppression through unjust prosecution — by the Grand Jury or by the Government.

III.

The prosecution of offenses against the United States is an executive function within the exclusive prerogative of the Attorney General. “There shall be at the seat of government an executive department to be known as the Department of Justice, and an Attorney General, who shall be the head thereof.” 5 U.S.C. § *191 291 . That official, the chief law-enforcement officer of the Federal Government is “the hand of the president in taking care that the laws of the United States in protection of the interests of the United States in legal proceedings and in the prosecution of offenses be faithfully-executed.” Ponzi v. Fassenden, 1922, 258 U.S. 254, 262 , 42 S.Ct. 309, 311 , 66 L.Ed. 607 . He “has the authority, and it is made his duty, to supervise the conduct of all suits brought by or against the United States”, including the authority “to begin criminal prosecution”. United States v. San Jacinto Tin Co., 125 U.S. 273, 278-279 , 8 S.Ct. 850 , 31 L.Ed. 747 . He “is invested with the general superintendence of all such suits, and all the district attorneys who do bring them in the various courts in the country are placed under his immediate direction and control.” Id., p. 279, 8 S.Ct. at p. 853 , and see In re Neagle, 135 U.S. 1, 66 , 10 S.Ct. 658 , 34 L.Ed. 55 .

“[T]he district attorney has absolute control over criminal prosecutions, and can dismiss or refuse to prosecute, any of them at his discretion. The responsibility is wholly his.” United States v. Woody, D.C.Mont.1924, 2 F.2d 262 . The determination of whether and when to prosecute “is a matter of policy for the prosecuting officer and not for the determination of the courts”. District of Columbia v. Buckley, 1942, 75 U.S.App.D.C. 301 , 128 F.2d 17 . As another court has stated it:

“All of these considerations point up the wisdom of vesting broad discretion in the United States Attorney. The federal courts are powerless to interfere with his discretionary power. The Court cannot compel him to prosecute a complaint, or even an indictment, whatever his reasons for not acting. The remedy for any dereliction of his duty lies, not with the courts, but, with the executive branch of our government and ultimately with the people.” Pugach v. Klein, S.D.N.Y.1961, 193 F.Supp. 630, 635 .

“Congress, well aware of this discretion has never challenged its existence.” Schwartz, Federal Criminal Jurisdiction and Prosecutors’ Discretion, 13 L. & Cont. Prob. 64, 83 (1948). 18

In the Confiscation Cases, 7 Wall. 454 , 19 L.Ed. 196 (1868) the Supreme Court, over the objection of informers entitled to fees, allowed the Attorney General, in his discretion, to dismiss libels for the criminal condemnation of certain vessels under a statute permitting the seizure and condemnation of property knowingly used to aid insurrection against the United States. The statute made it the duty of the President to see to it that such property was seized and condemned. The Court relied not only upon the statutory authority of the Attorney General to control all prosecutions and civil actions brought by or against the United States, but also upon common law principles:

“Public prosecutions, until they come before the court to which they are returnable, are within the exclusive direction of the district attorney, *192 * * * Settled rule is that those courts will not recognize any suit, civil or criminal, as regularly before them, if prosecuted in the name and for the benefit of the United States, unless the same is represented by the district attorney, or some one designated by him to attend to such business in his absence, as may appertain to the duties of his office.”

The functions of prosecutor and judge are incompatible. In United States v. Thompson, 1920, 251 U.S. 407 , 40 S.Ct. 289 , 64 L.Ed. 333 , for example, the Supreme Court reversed a lower court for attempting to prevent a United States Attorney from instituting criminal prosecution by resubmitting the matter to a grand jury. The Court’s decision was expressly based upon “the absolute right of the United States to prosecute,” and upon “the right of the Government to initiate prosecutions for crime”, a right not subject to control by judicial discretion. 251 U.S. at 412-413, 415 . Similarly, the Court has held that a district court was without jurisdiction to refuse to issue a warrant of arrest upon an indictment by a grand jury upon the application of the United States Attorney, because such refusal would bar “ ‘the absolute right of the United States to prosecute’ ” and would bar “the lawful authority of the United States Attorney.” Ex parte United States, 1932, 287 U.S. 241 , 53 S.Ct. 129 , 77 L.Ed. 283 .

In Goldberg v. Hoffman, 7 Cir. 1955, 225 F.2d 463 , a petition for mandamus was filed against the Attorney General, an Assistant Attorney General, and the United States Attorney, to compel them to relieve the petitioner of an indictment. The Court of Appeals dismissed as to the Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General for lack of jurisdiction:

“Our adjudication of the issues raised must be guided by considerations inherent in the well-settled principle of the separation of the powers vested in the three branches of government, which is the keynote of our constitutional mandate. We must bear in mind that the United States Attorney is an officer of the executive branch responsible primarily to the President, and, through him, to the electorate, and that the remedy sought against Tieken is a broad one, to-wit, a direct mandate from this court compelling him to take, or refrain from taking, a specific course of action with respect to the indictment pending against petitioner. More specifically, we are asked to review the exercise of administrative discretion, overrule the decision of the executive and direct the course which that discretion must take. We think such judicial control of an executive officer is beyond the power of this court.” 225 F.2d at 464 .

See also Moses v. Kennedy, D.C.1963, 219 F.Supp. 762 , appeal pending.

In United States v. Brokaw, S.D.Ill. 1945, 60 F.Supp. 100 the court denied a motion for leave to file a petition as amicus curiae asking the court to enter an order directing the United States Attorney to show cause why an order of nolle prosequi should not be vacated and the cause reinstated and set for trial. The court said:

“That the United States District Attorney in his capacity as the public prosecutor in his district is clothed with the power and charged with the duties of the Attorney General in England under the common law is generally recognized and supported by the Federal courts. United States v. Thompson, 1920, 251 U.S. 407 , 40 S.Ct. 289 , 64 L.Ed. 333 ; * * He is the representative of the public in whom is lodged a discretion which is not to be controlled by the courts, or by an interested individual, or by a group of interested individuals who seek redress for wrongs committed against them by use of the criminal process. In United States v. Thompson, supra, the Supreme Court held that the Federal courts have no power to control the initia *193 tion of criminal proceedings, that being the prerogative and duty of the United States District Attorney.”

Thus, “courts generally refuse to order the prosecutor to initiate a prosecution on the ground that it is a discretionary act which may not be compelled by mandamus.” Note, Prosecutor’s Discretion, 103 Pa.L.Rev. 1057, 1058 (1955).

Rule 48(a) does not directly apply to the present case, because there has been no indictment, information, or complaint, but since the rule preserves the prosecutor’s discretion to dismiss a complaint before indictment, the drafters of the Rules must have intended to preserve the discretion not to prosecute. In this case, the prosecutor cannot move to dismiss; there is nothing to dismiss. What he can do, however, is to refuse to prepare and sign the indictment. Under this theory, Rule 7 (c), requiring that the indictment be signed by the United States Attorney, preserves the prosecutor’s traditional discretion as to whether to initiate prosecution.

The reason for vesting discretion to prosecute in the Executive, acting through the Attorney General is twofold. First, in the interests of justice and the orderly, efficient administration of the law, some person or agency should be able to prevent an unjust prosecution. The freedom of the petit jury to bring in a verdict of not guilty and the progressive development of the law in the direction of making more meaningful the guarantees of an accused person’s constitutional rights give considerable protection to the individual before and after trial. They do not protect against a baseless prosecution. This is a harassment to the accused and an expensive strain on the machinery of justice. The appropriate repository for authority to prevent a baseless prosecution is the chief law-enforcement officer whose duty, unlike the grand jury’s duty, is to collect evidence on both sides of a case.

“The power to determine whether a case shall be prosecuted to a conclusion must, of course, be lodged somewhere, and by common law the district attorney is made its repository. By no statute has Congress deprived him of it, in ordinary criminal cases. It is assumed he will exercise his power under a heavy sense of duty to enforce the law, to prosecute offenders, and to protect society, and with wisdom and justice.” United States v. Woody, U.C.Mont.1924, 2 F.2d 262 .

Second, when, within the context of law-enforcement, national policy is involved, because of national security, conduct of foreign policy, or a conflict between two branches of government, the appropriate branch to decide the matter is the executive branch. The executive is charged with carrying out national policy on law-enforcement and, generally speaking, is informed on more levels than the more specialized judicial and legislative branches. In such a situation, a decision not to prosecute is analogous to the exercise of executive privilege. The executive’s absolute and exclusive discretion to prosecute may be rationalized as an illustration of the doctrine of separation of powers, but it would have evolved without the doctrine and exists in countries that do not purport to accept this doctrine. 19

IV.

This brings me to the facts. They demonstrate, better than abstract principles or legal dicta, the imperative necessity that the United States, through its Attorney General, have uncontrollable discretion to prosecute.

The crucial fact here is that Goff and Kendrick, two Negroes, testified in a suit by the United States against the Registrar of Clarke County, Mississippi, and the State of Mississippi, to enforce the voting rights of Negroes under the Fourteenth Amendment and the Civil Rights Act. United States v. Ramsey, 5 Cir. 1964, 331 F.2d 824 ; rev’d on reh’g, 331 F.2d 838 .

*194 Goff and Kendrick testified that some seven years earlier at Stonewall, Mississippi, the registrar had refused to register them or give them application forms. They said that they had seen white persons registering, one of whom was a B. Floyd Jones. Ramsey, the registrar, testified that Jones had not registered at that time or place, but had registered the year before in Enterprise, Mississippi. He testified also that he had never discriminated against Negro applicants for registration. 20 Jones testified that he was near the registration table in Stonewall in 1955, had talked with the registrar, and had shaken hands with him. The presiding judge, Judge W. Harold Cox, stated from the bench that Goff and Kendrick should be “bound over to await the action of the grand jury for perjury”. 21

In January 1963 attorneys of the Department of Justice requested the Federal Bureau of Investigation to investigate the possible perjury. The FBI completed a full investigation in March 1963 and referred the matter to the Department’s Criminal Division. In June 1963 the Criminal Division advised the local United States Attorney, Mr. Hauberg, that the matter presented “no basis for a perjury prosecution”. Mr. Hauberg informed Judge Cox of the Department’s decision. Judge Cox stated that in his view the matter was clearly one for the grand jury and that he would be inclined, if necessary, to appoint an outside attorney to present the matter to the grand jury. (I find no authority for a federal judge to displace the United States Attorney by appointing a special prosecutor.) On receiving this information, the Criminal Division again reviewed its files and concluded that the charge of perjury could not be sustained. General Katzen-bach, then Deputy Attorney General, after reviewing the files, concurred in the Criminal Division’s decision. In September 1963 General Katzenbach called on Judge Cox as a courtesy to explain why the Department had arrived at the conclusion that no perjury was involved. Judge Cox, unconvinced, requested the United States Attorney to present to the grand jury the Goff and Kendrick cases, which he regarded as cases of “palpable perjury”.

*195 In October 1963 Goff and Kendrick were arrested, jailed for two days, and placed on a $3,000 bond for violations of State law for falsely testifying in federal court. After their indictment by a state grand jury, the Department of Justice filed suit against the State District Attorney, United States v. Warner, (Civ. No. 1219, S.D.Miss.), seeking to enjoin the state prosecution on the grounds that: (1) the States have no authority to prosecute for alleged perjury committed while testifying in a federal court; (2) the purpose and effect of the State’s prosecution was to threaten and intimidate Goff and Kendrick and to inhibit them and other Negroes from registering to vote. See United States v. Wood, 5 Cir. 1961, 295 F.2d 772 ; Harvey v. State of Mississippi, 5 Cir. 1965, 340 F.2d 263 . The district court (per Mize, J.) ruled in favor of the United States, citing In re Loney, 1890, 134 U.S. 372 , 10 S.Ct. 584 , 33 L.Ed. 949 , and 42 U.S.C. § 1971 (b) prohibiting intimidation for the purpose of interfering with voting rights.

The Federal Grand Jury, originally convened on September 9, 1963, was reconvened on September 21, 1964. September 28, 1964, the Foreman of the Grand Jury advised the Government Attorney who was presenting matters to the Grand Jury that Judge Cox had asked the Foreman to hear several witnesses. September 29, 1964, Mr. Riddell, attorney for the Registrar, and the district attorney for the Second Circuit District for the State of Mississippi, Mr. Holle-man, came to the courthouse to appear before the Grand Jury. Judge Mize, in a special charge to the Grand Jury stated • — in open court — that Judge Cox had informed him, before leaving for his vacation, that:

“ * * * he wanted the Grand Jury to call before it Mr. Boyce Hol-leman of Gulfport, Mississippi and Mr. Talley [sic] Riddell of Quitman, Mississippi as witnesses, because it was his impression that they had some matters that ought to be investigated at least and that they should be permitted to appear.”

Judge Mize stated that he was not familiar with the matters “other than just what Judge Cox requested me to do, to see to it that these two witnesses had an opportunity to appear' before the Grand Jury.” Judge Mize advised the Grand Jury that they had a right to hear the testimony of Messrs. Riddell and Hol-leman, but requested them not to do so until October 21, 1964, the day after Judge Cox was to return from his vacation.

October 20 Mr. Katzenbach talked with Judge Cox by telephone, reiterating the Department’s position. He also instructed Mr. Hauberg not to prepare or sign indictments. October 22 the foreman of the grand jury in open court informed Judge Cox that Mr. Hauberg had declined to assist in preparing true bills. The United States Attorney stated that “the Department of Justice and the United States felt as if that the law and the fact was not sufficient to constitute perjury and that an indictment thereon would be no good.” Judge Cox said:

“I here and now order and direct you to disregard your instructions from the Department of Justice and to prepare true bills or no bills as this Grand Jury may direct you to do and to sign those bills or no bills, as the Grand Jury may decide under penalty of contempt, * *

Judge Cox recessed court for one hour. During this recess Mr. Hauberg and Mr. Katzenbach conferred by telephone; the Attorney General directed the United States Attorney not to prepare or sign perjury indictments of Goff and Kendrick. Court reopened. Mr. Hauberg respectfully declined to comply with the court’s order. Judge Cox forthwith adjudged him “guilty of civil contempt”, ordered him confined to a jail in Hinds: County, ordered the issuance of a citation to the Acting Attorney General to-appear before the court to show cause why he should not be held in contempt; and stayed the order for a period of five days. *

*196 Against the backdrop of Mississippi versus the Nation in the field of civil rights, we have a heated but bona fide difference of opinion between Judge Cox and the Attorney General as to whether two Negroes, Goff and Kendrick, should be prosecuted for perjury. Taking a narrow view of the case, we would be justified in holding that the Attorney General’s implied powers, by analogy to the express powers of Rule 48(a), give him discretion to prosecute. Here there was a bona fide, reasonable exercise of discretion made after a full investigation and long consideration of the case— both sides of the case, not just the evidence tending to show guilt. If the grand jury is dissatisfied with that administrative decision, it may exercise its inquisitorial power and make a presentment in open court. 22 It could be said, that is all there is to the case. But there is more to the case.

This Court, along with everyone else, knows that Goff and Kendrick, if prosecuted, run the risk of being tried in a climate of community hostility. They run the risk of a punishment that may not fit the crime. The Registrar, who provoked the original litigation, runs no risk, notwithstanding the fact that the district court, in effect, found that Ramsay did not tell the truth on the witness stand. In these circumstances, the very least demands of justice require that the discretion to prosecute be lodged with a person or agency insulated from local prejudices and parochial pressures. This is not the hard case that makes bad law. This is the type of case that comes up, in one way or another, whenever the customs, beliefs, or interests of a region collide with national policy as fixed by the Constitution or by Congress. It is not likely that the men who devised diversity jurisdiction expected to turn over to local juries the discretionary power to bring federal prosecutions. This case is unusual only for the clarity with which the facts, speaking for themselves, illuminate the imperative necessity in American Federalism that the discretion to prosecute be lodged in the Attorney General of United States.

The decision not to prosecute represents the exercise of a discretion analogous to the exercise of executive privilege. As a matter of law, the Attorney General has concluded that there is not sufficient evidence to prove perjury. As a matter of fact, the Attorney General has concluded, as he pleaded in United States v. Warner, that trial for perjury would have the effect of inhibiting not only Goff and Kendrick but other Negroes in Mississippi from registering to vote. There is a conflict, therefore, between society’s interest in law enforcement (diluted in this case by the Attorney General’s conclusion that the evidence does not support the charge of guilt) and the national policy, set forth in the Constitution and the Civil Rights Acts, of outlawing racial discrimination. It is unthinkable that resolution of this important conflict affecting the whole Nation should lie with a majority of twenty-three members of a jury chosen from the Southern District of Mississippi. The nature of American Federalism, looking to the differences between the Constitution and the Articles of Confederation, requires that the power to resolve this question lie in the unfettered discretion of the President of United States or his deputy for law enforcement, the Attorney General.

My memory, too, goes back to the days, pointedly referred to by the dissenters, when we had “an Attorney General suspected of being corrupt.” But I am not aware that we have had more lawless Attorneys General than lawless juries.'^

. The Federal Grand Jury Handbook, p. 8, describes the functions of the Grand Jury in these words:

“The Grand Jury is both a sword and a shield of justice — a sword because it is the terror of criminals, a shield because it is the protection of the innocent against unjust prosecution. But these important powers obviously create equally grave responsibilities to see that such powers are in no wise perverted or abused. With its almost limitless powers, a Grand Jury might, unless motivated by the highest sense of justice, find indictments not warranted by the evidence and thus become a source of oppression to our citizens.”

. The encomia addressed to the inquisitorial role of the grand jury properly apply to the traditional common law jury or a jury in those States still giving the jury a free rein in the exercise of its inquisitorial power. Federal grand juries, as distinguished from State grand juries, do not have the power of the latter to investigate public institutions or the actions of public officials, where they have no reason to believe that a crime has been committed. Compare United States v. Smyth, D.C.N.D.Cal.1952, 104 F.Supp. 283 and Application of United Electrical Radio & Machine Workers of America, D.C.S.D.N. Y.1953, 111 F. Supp. 858 with State of Florida ex rel. Brautigam v. Interim Report of ' Grand Jury, Fla.1957, 93 So.2d 99 . Investigations by Congress and the administrative agencies lessen the need for federal juries to investigate corruption in public office. The Attorney General’s tight control over local United States attorneys lessens the likelihood of a United States attorney’s failing to investigate and prosecute in the proper case.

. Comment, Powers of Federal Grand Juries, 4 Stan.L.Rev. 69 (1951). See also, Dression & Cohen, The Inquisitorial Functions of Grand Juries, 41 Yale L.J. 687 (1932).

. Costello v. United States, 1956, 350 U.S. 359, 362 , 76 S.Ct. 406, 408 , 100 L.Ed. 397 ; Russell v. United States, 1962, 369 U.S. 749 , 82 S.Ct. 1038 , 8 L.Ed.2d 240 .

In 1951 Senator Nixon introduced a bill (S. 2086, 82d Cons., 1st Sess.) defining the powers of the grand jury and providing for the appointment of a special counsel to assist any grand jury desiring to investigate any criminal action on its own initiative. The bill died in the Judiciary Committee.

. Stephen, A History of the Criminal Law of England (1883), 185-186, 252-254; 1 Holdsworth, History of English *187 Laws (1956), 312-323; 2 Pollock and Maitland, History of English Law Before The Time of Edward I (1959), 642-647; Plucknett, History of the Common Law (1956), 111-120.

. Holdsworth, supra, n. 5, 321.

. The Roman infamia was: “ * * * a moral censure pronounced by a competent authority in the State on individual members of the community, as a result of certain actions which they had committed, or certain modes of life which they had pursued, this censure involving disqualification for certain rights both in public and in private law.” Greenidge, Infamia (1897), 37.

. Eranklin, ■ Infamy and Constitutional Civil Liberties, 14 Law.G.Rev. 1 (1954); Eranklin, Roman Law and The Constitution, 38 Tul.L.Rev. 621, 623-26, 641 (1964).

- Plucknett, supra, 126.

. Great law reformers have criticized the grand jury as an anachronism in a modern government and as subject to abuse because of its secrecy. Most of the criticism has been directed at the grand jury’s inquisitorial power. And most of the criticism came before the totalitarian movement of recent years. Jeramy Bentham, 3 Rationale of Judicial Evidence c. 15, § II; Edward Livingston, Complete Works (1873) I— 372, 11-249-250; Pound & Frankfurter, Criminal Justice in Cleveland (1922) 176, 211-212, 248; Wayne Morse, A Survey of the Grand Jury System, 10 Ore.L.Rev. 101, 239 (1931); Pound, Criminal Justice in American (1930) 109, 186; Moley, Politics and Criminal Prosecution (1929), 127-128; Wiekersham Commission, Report on Prosecution of the National Commission on Law Observance and Enforcement (1931) 34, 125; Willoughby, Principles of Judicial Administration, (1929) 180-194. Section 113 of the A.L.I. Code of Criminal Procedure provides that all offenses heretofore required to be prosecuted by indictment may be prosecuted either by indictment or information. In 10 states the Constitution allows the legislature to modify or abolish the grand jury. Senator, then Professor, Morse found that in 1931 twenty-six states did not require indictment by the grand jury. Model Code of Criminal Procedure, Appendix 414r-31. But see Dression, Erom Indictment to Information, 42 Yale L.J. 163 (1932); Younger, The Grand Jury Under Attack, 46 Journ. Crim.L.C. & P.S. 26, 215 (1955); Hall, Analysis of Criticism of the Grand Jury, 22 J.Crim.L. 692, 699-700 (1932).

. Similarly, Wharton states: “In its stricter meaning a presentment has been said to be an accusation by the grand . jury sua sponte, made ex mero moto, whereas an indictment is a written accusation, preferred to the grand jury and presented upon oath at the instance of the Government.” 4 Wharton, Criminal Procedure (1957) § 1713, p. 471.

. In Hale v. Henkel, 1906, 201 U.S. 43 , 26 S.Ct. 370 , Hale was called to testify before a grand jury, refused to do so, *189 and was adjudged in contempt. He argued, in seeking release from custody on habeas corpus, that the grand jury was powerless to make any inquiry in his case since it was not acting pursuant to a particular charge. (There was no question of prosecutor’s non-cooperation in that case; there simply was no formal charge prior to the grand jury’s investigation.) The following language of the Court carries a strong implication that the prosecutor is entitled to refuse to prepare a bill of indictment:

. In re Presentment By Camden County Grand Jur. 1952, 10 N.J. 23 , 89 A.2d 416 , 423.

. Ibid. 89 A.2d at 426.

. Montesquieu, The Spirit of Laws (Edinburgh, 1772) Bk. XI, O. IV.

. Madison, for example, wrote in No. 47 of the Federalist: “[I]t may clearly be inferred that, in saying, ‘There can be no liberty where the legislative and executive powers are united in the same person, or body of magistrates,’ or, ‘if the power of judging be not separated from the legislative and executive powers,’ he (Montesquieu) did not mean that these departments ought to have no partial agency in, or no control over, the acts of each other. His meaning, as his own words import, and still more conclusively as illustrated by the example in his eye, can amount to no more than this, that where the whole power of one department is exercised by the same hands which possess the whole power of another department, the fundamental principles of a free constitution are subverted.”

. Federal Grand Jury Handbook, p. 9.

See, In re Presentment by Grand Jury of Ellison, D.C.D.Del. 1942, 44 F.Supp. 375 , aff’d 133 F.2d 903 , cert. den’d In re Ellison, 318 U.S. 791 , 63 S.Ct. 995 , 87 L.Ed. 1157 .

. Schwartz points up his comment with this significant illustration: “In the hearing on the confirmation of Attorney General Jackson as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, the nomination was attacked because of Jackson’s failure to prosecute Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen for criminal libel on Senator Tyd-ings. Jackson had taken the position that it was the policy of the Department of Justice to avoid the criminal libel laws when the courts were open to the injured party in civil proceedings, and that prosecutions of this character would tend to impair freedom of the press. (Emphasis supplied.) ' Republican Senator (now Mr. Justice) Burton stated:

“ ‘The prosecuting attorney, being charged, as he is charged, with the great responsibility of deciding under the laws of the United States, the laws under which he is serving, whether a case should be prosecuted, owes a duty to himself, his community, and the Constitution to decide whether the ease should be prosecuted. * * * In my judgment the Attorney General was within his rights when he declined to prosecute, and in stating the grounds as he did state them under the circumstances.’ ”

13 L. & Const.Prob. at 83.

. “Hobbes told us long ago, and everybody now understands that there must be a supreme authority, a conclusive power, in every state on every point somewhere.” Bagehot, The English Constitution (1872) p. 248.

. Judge Cox found “as a fact from the evidence that negro citizens have been discriminated against by the registrar”, although he found also that there was “no pattern or practice of discrimination”. In its original opinion in the Ramsey case this Court noted the “testimony which witness by witness convicts Ramsey of palpable discrimination.” United States v. Ramsey, 5 Cir. 1964, 331 F.2d 824, 826 . In his opinion Judge Rives noted that “This case reveals gross and flagrant denials of the rights of Negro citizens to vote.” 331 F.2d at 833 . And on rehearing, this Court ruled that the finding that “there was no pattern or practice in the discrimination by the Registrar” was “clearly erroneous.” 331 F.2d at 838 . No one has suggested that Mr. Ramsey may have been guilty of perjury.

. When counsel-for the State, Mr. Rid-dell, completed Mr. Ramsey’s direct examination, and before his cross-examination, respondent Judge W. Harold Cox, who was presiding, stated:

“I want to hear from the government about why this Court shouldn’t require this Negro Reverend W. G. Goff and his companion Kendrick to show cause why they shouldn’t be bound over to await the action of the grand jury for -perjury. I want to hear from you on that.

“I think they ought to be put under about a $3,000.00 bond each to await the action of a grand jury. Unless I change my mind that is going to be the order.

“BY MR. STERN [Government counsel] : I will be happy to reconcile their testimony.

“BY THE COURT: I just want these Negroes to know that they can’t come into this Court and swear to something as important as that was and is and get by with it. I don’t care who brings them here.

“BY MR. STERN: I understand.

“BY THE COURT: Yes sir. And I mean that for whites alike, but I am talking about the case at hand. I just don’t intend to put up with perjury. That is something I will not tolerate, All right.”

. Younger points out, however, that every known instance of an impasse after presentment was resolved by political action. In one instance Theodore Roosevelt, then governor of New York, removed a district attorney from office who had refused to prosecute. Younger, The People’s Panel: The Grand Jury in The United States, 1634 — 1941, at 188-90 (1963).