BLACK, J., dissenting. 347 U.S. the shipping industry the seamen served. It was such results that led to efforts to spread the cost of industrial accidents and disasters through insurance and workmen's compensation laws. Acting consistently with this broad trend in the law, Louisiana has tried to make certain that all liability insurance will get to those for whose protection it was purchased. And application of Louisiana's statute under the circumstances here is also in harmony with the humane policy of the maritime law. Seamen have traditionally been the wards of admiralty, and admiralty has been increasingly solicitous to provide compensation for accidents occurring in their dangerous work. Thus both the general trend of the law and the specific bent of admiralty support the policy of the people of Louisiana which permits recovery here. No language in the Limited Liability Act forbids it; the language of the McCarran Act should compel it. DOUGLAS, J., dissenting. LINEHAN ET AL. v. WATERFRONT COMMISSION OF NEW YORK HARBOR ET AL. NO. 557. APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK.* Decided April 12, 1954. The motions to affirm are granted and the judgments are affirmed. 116 F. Supp. 683 and 117 F. Supp. 308, affirmed. George A. Brenner for appellants. Nathaniel L. Goldstein, Attorney General of New York, Lawrence E. Walsh and Wendell P. Brown for appellees. Whitman Knapp was also for appellees in No. 558. PER CURIAM. The motions to affirm are granted and the judgments are affirmed. MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS, with whom MR. JUSTICE BLACK concurs, dissenting. This case illustrates what I fear is a growing practice of the Court of diluting the Act of Congress which gives us jurisdiction of appeals. 28 U. S. C. § 1253 et al. The Congress carved out a group of cases, of which this is one, that comes here as of right and is not dependent, as are petitions for certiorari, on a vote of four Justices out of nine for an adjudication by the Court on the merits of the controversy. In recent years the Court has more and more dismissed or affirmed appeals, with no opportunity *Together with No. 558, Staten Island Loaders, Inc. et al. v. Waterfront Commission of New York Harbor et al., also on appeal from the same court. 288037 O-54--33 DOUGLAS, J., dissenting. 347 U.S. of counsel to make oral argument and without any opinion by the Court. These appeals should not be added to that growing list. New York and New Jersey made a Compact, approved by Congress, for the regulation of employment on the waterfront of New York.* The agency through which the plan is effected is the Waterfront Commission, composed of one representative of New York and one of New Jersey. It has charge of the employment of all longshoremen. A longshoremen's register is established; and no one can be employed unless he is on the register. The Commission "may in its discretion" deny an applicant the right to register -if he has been convicted of treason, murder, manslaughter, illegal possession of firearms, possessing burglar's instruments, receiving stolen property, unlawful entry of a building, aiding an escape from prison, unlawfully possessing or distributing habitforming drugs, or -if he is a Communist or teaches the Communist creed, or -if in the judgment of the Commission, his presence on the waterfront would constitute "a danger to the public peace or safety." Two main questions are at once suggested. First, are the standards by which men are deprived of the right to work constitutional? This is a new question on which the Court has never ruled. May a state prescribe standards for employment that have no relevancy to the competency of the men to perform the work? Under this Compact a man who, in a reckless moment, runs over a person in his car and kills him and is convicted *See McKinney's N. Y. Unconsolidated Laws (Cum. Pamph. Jan. 1954), § 6700-aa et seq.; N. J. Stat. Ann. § 32:23; 67 Stat. 541. 439 DOUGLAS, J., dissenting. of manslaughter, apparently stands disqualified for employment. So does a Communist, whether he be of the cloak-and-dagger variety or a paler type. Are those criteria constitutional? An individual who is deprived of employment for such a reason could raise the question. But if the standard itself has no relevancy to the competency of men to do the work, why may not the Compact be tested at the very threshold? This is a substantial question which our cases do not answer. We write here on a slate that is fairly clean, except for remote analogies. Second, are these provisions of the Compact which disqualify men from employment unconstitutional as a bill of attainder? A few years ago Congress struck certain federal employees from the payroll because Congress thought they were "subversives." We held that that disqualification for employment without a judicial trial was a bill of attainder and therefore unconstitutional. United States v. Lovett, 328 U. S. 303. Here the state legislatures, with the approval of Congress, have not done precisely that. But they have come close to it by defining a proscribed class and barring them from employment-again without a judicial trial. Cf. Garner v. Los Angeles Board, 341 U. S. 716. Perhaps a way could be found to sustain all the challenged provisions of the Compact. Perhaps they could be so construed as to save any and all individual rights. But the motion to dismiss or affirm (26 pages long) and the reply to it (51 pages long) in No. 557 only stir these profound questions and do not put them at rest. The right to work-which goes to the very heart of our way of life—is at stake in these appeals. If we conclude that the Compact is constitutional, we should give our reasons so that all interests will be protected. Congress expected as much in all but frivolous cases coming here by appeal. BARSKY v. BOARD OF REGENTS OF THE APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS OF NEW YORK. No. 69. Argued January 4, 1954. Decided April 26, 1954. Pursuant to §§ 6514 and 6515 of the New York State Education Law, authorizing disciplinary action against any physician "convicted in a court of competent jurisdiction, either within or without this state, of a crime," appellant's license to practice as a physician was suspended for six months, because he had been convicted in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, under 2 U. S. C. § 192, of failing to produce before a Congressional Committee certain papers subpoenaed by that Committee. Held: The New York law, on its face or as so construed and applied, does not violate the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Pp. 443–456. (a) The decision of the highest state court that a violation of 2 U. S. C. § 192, though not a crime under New York law, was a "crime" within the meaning of § 6514-2 (b) of the State Education Law, is conclusive here. P. 448. (b) Section 6514-2 (b) is not unconstitutionally vague. P. 448. (c) The subsequent designation of certain other contempts of Congress as federal "crimes" (18 U. S. C. § 402) does not prevent a violation of 2 U. S. C. § 192 from being a "crime" within the meaning of the New York law. P. 449, n. 8. (d) The establishment and enforcement of standards of conduct within its borders relative to the health of its people is a vital part of a state's police power. P. 449. (e) The practice of medicine is a privilege granted by the State under its substantially plenary power to fix the terms of admission. P. 451. (f) A state's legitimate concern for maintaining high standards of professional conduct extends beyond initial licensing. P. 451. (g) The suspension of appellant's license because of his conviction in a foreign jurisdiction, for an offense not involving moral turpitude and not criminal under New York law, does not so far transcend the State's legitimate concern in professional standards as to violate the Fourteenth Amendment. Pp. 451-452. |