Younger v. Harris/Concurrence Brennan

MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN, with whom MR. JUSTICE WHITE and MR. JUSTICE MARSHALL join, concurring in the result.

I agree that the judgment of the District Court should be reversed. Appellee Harris had been indicted for violations of the California Criminal Syndicalism Act before he sued in federal court. He has not alleged that the prosecution was brought in bad faith to harass him. His constitutional contentions may be adequately adjudicated [p57] in the state criminal proceeding, and federal intervention at his instance was therefore improper.

Appellees Hirsch and Dan have alleged that they "feel inhibited" by the statute and the prosecution of Harris from advocating the program of the Progressive Labor Party. Appellee Broslawsky has alleged that he "is uncertain" whether, as an instructor in college history, he can, under the statute, give instruction relating to the Communist Manifesto and similar revolutionary works. None of these appellees has stated any ground for a reasonable expectation that he will actually be prosecuted under the statute for taking the actions contemplated. The court below expressly declined to rely on any finding


 * that . . . Dan, Hirsch or Broslawsky stand[s] in any danger of prosecution by the [State], because of the activities that they ascribed to themselves in the complaint. . . . [p58]

281 F.Supp. 507, 516. It is true, as the court below pointed out, that "[w]ell-intentioned prosecutors and judicial safeguards do not neutralize the vice of a vague law," Baggett v. Bullitt, 377 U.S. 360, 373 (1964), but still there must be a live controversy under Art. III. No threats of prosecution of these appellees are alleged. Although Dan and Hirsch have alleged that they desire to advocate doctrines of the Progressive Labor Party, they have not asserted that their advocacy will be of the same genre as that which brought on the prosecution of Harris. In short, there is no reason to think that California has any ripe controversy with them. See Golden v. Zwickler, 394 U.S. 103 (1969); Perez v. Ledesma, post, p. 93 (BRENNAN, J., concurring and dissenting).