United States v. Bridges

93 F. Supp. 989, 1950 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2456
District Court, N.D. California·Decided August 7, 1950·Published·Cited by 4 cases

Opinion

HARRIS, District Judge.

The United States Government has moved this Court to revoke the order made on April 10, 1950, admitting the defendant Harry Bridges to- bail. The order was made after his conviction of a violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 88, now 18 United States Code Annotated, Section 371, in that he was found guilty, after trial by jury, of conspiring with Henry Schmidt and J. R. Robertson to defraud the United States in petitioning for and obtaining naturalization; also of a violation of Title 8, United States Code, Section 746(a), subdivision (1), now 18 United States Code Annotated, Section 1015(a), in that he knowingly gave a false statement under oath in the naturalization proceeding.

The -basis for the prosecution was that Bridges lied when, under oath, he denied his membership in the Communist Party. Thereafter, on June the 20th, 1950, this Court, on motion of the United States Government and after a full and complete hearing thereon, duly revoked, set aside and declared void the order admitting Mr. Bridges to citizenship.

The present motion is made upon the ground that Mr. Bridges has pursued and will continue to pursue a -course of conduct and activity dangerous to the public welfare, safety and national security of the United States.

The affidavit, in support of the motion, of John H. McGowan, Investigator for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, has been received and considered by this Court.

The defendant, Mr. Bridges, has filed a motion to dismiss and a motion to strike.

The primary contention -advanced in the motion is that the incidents complained of by the Government, and the conduct of Mr. Bridges, fall within the or-bit of the Constitutional guarantee of the First Amendment, which safeguards the right of freedom of speech and expression as contained in the Bill of Rights.

The Court has also received the oral testimony of the defendant, Mr. Bridges, in attempted explanation of his conduct. The basic contention of the defendant is, as set forth in his notice of motion and as more particularly amplified in the arguments, that the burden is on the Government to show that the Court committed error when, on April 10, 1950, Bridges was admitted to -bail; and that the Court is now foreclosed from inquiry into Bridges’ conduct since that time. The theory espoused is referred to either as an estoppel or under the doctrine of res adjudicata. Such, of course, is not and cannot be the legal posture of this case.

Rule 46(a)(2), Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, 18 U.S.C.A., provides: “The court or the judge or justice allowing bail may at any time revoke the order admitting the defendant to bail.”

A man who has been found guilty in the District Court has no absolute or constitutional right to bail after conviction and pending" appeal. He has a right only to apply for bail. After the conviction of Mr. Bridges, the Court in the exercise of discretion permitted him to remain at large on bail. In view of, and in the light of his conduct and the events transpiring since the Court’s initial determination, the Government now contends that the order should be revoked.

It is not claimed, then — or now — that there was error implicit in the original order admitting him to bail; rather, that he has, in effect, constituted himself an [991]*991agent and spokesman for the Communists in uniformly and vigorously opposing measures that would tend to aid or help our embattled troups on the Korean front.

Under the circumstances, the Court’s duty is clear and involves the weighing of the conduct of Mr. Bridges against the welfare of the people of the United States of America, and the determination should be made as best affects justice between the Government and the defendant.

In this connection Mr. Justice Cardozo, in Snyder v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 291 U.S. 97, 54 S.Ct. 330, 338, 78 L.Ed. 674, a Supreme Court decision said: “But justice, though due to the accused, is due, to the accuser also. The concept of fairness must not be strained till it is narrowed to a filament. We are to keep the balance true.”

I am satisfied to a moral certainty and beyond a reasonable doubt that Harry Bridges was and is a member of the Communist Party. The jury in the principal trial came to that inevitable conclusion after months of evidence and argument, and after a review of his career since on or about 1933. I am also led to believe from the extensive proceedings before me involving this defendant that he is probably one of the most potent figures in the Communist Party in America today. As such a member, he is an agent dedicated to execute the Communist program, both nationally and internationally. As such agent, his allegiance is not and can not be to the United States of America-niotwithstanding his plaint to the contrary and his studied misconceptions as to his loyalty.

His conduct since the inception of the recent hostilities in Korea, as well as his equivocal testimony in this proceeding, are of such nature as to justify this Court in concluding that when the welfare of this country and its armed forces are at stake, as opposed to a Communist regime, that his loyalty is and must be with the Communists.

In American Communications Ass’n, C. I. O. v. Douds, 339 U.S. 382, 70 S.Ct. 674, 698, Mr. Justice Jackson of the United States Supreme Court said: “American Communists, like Communists elsewhere in the world, place Moscow’s demand above every patriotic interest.”

And in speaking of the Communists’ “somersault”, in World War II, he said, during the course of the same opinion: “ * * * the Communists in this country made an abrupt and fierce reversal and were unconscionable in their demands that American soldiers, whose equipment they had delayed and sabotaged, be sacrificed in a premature second front to spare Russia. American Communists, like Communists elsewhere in the world, placed Moscow’s demand above every patriotic interest.”

I am inclined to observe that the same attitude of the American Communists prevails today in these trying, tragic times. Mr. Bridges has spearheaded, since his release on bail, and within recent date, a serious opposition to security measures, including a “Security Conference Statement of Policy,” which was designed to protect the People of San Francisco, its ports and the welfare of our armed forces. In my opinion, such opposition was taken by him solely for the purpose of protecting the Communist party and his Communist cohorts within the union, and not for the benefit of the rank and file or the country as a whole.

Of equal significance was his refusal to disavow affiliation in and with the World Federation of Trade Unions, an international organization which he admits — and yesterday admitted in consequence of my questions — is controlled and dominated by Communists.

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United States v. Bridges, 93 F. Supp. 989, 1950 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2456 (N.D. Cal. 1950).

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