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De Novo Juries, Misdemeanor Counsel, and Other Problems: Changes Ahead for the Maine District Courts?
Get PDFThe Maine judicial system has two levels of criminal courts, the superior court having exclusive trial jurisdiction over felony prosecutions and the district court operating with concurrent trial jurisdiction for misdemeanors. The district court also processes the preliminary phases of felony cases; included in this function are bail hearings, initial appearances (arraignments), and preliminary hearings. To provide jury trials in misdemeanor prosecutions state law permits all district court convictions to be appealed to the superior court for trial de novo to a jury. The accepted reason for unlimited de novo trials is that the state constitution requires a jury in all criminal cases; initial processing through the district court is felt to be a device for sifting out the great bulk of cases, thereby preserving judicial resources of the superior court. In this manner the Maine system accommodates the individual\u27s right to jury trial and the state\u27s interest in allocating its judicial resources. But the balance thus struck may be the worst possible one for both the state and those accused of crime. On the one hand, cases which should never reach the superior court level—or perhaps any true court—are permitted to clog dockets, and on the other, individuals being prosecuted for serious crimes unfairly are denied an initial jury trial or, as a practical matter, may never receive the verdict of a jury. At the close of its last term the United States Supreme Court decided several cases which bode fundamental change for the Maine district court system. Almost certainly under the case of Baldwin v. New York, de novo procedures fall short of constitutional requirements. Thus, problems of jury trial are the major concern here
Advantages and Disadvantages—A Comparison of the Present Maine Law and the U3C
Get PDFThe Uniform Consumer Credit Code [U3C] is a statute which will be proposed to the Maine Legislature for enactment in the near future. Like its sister code, the Uniform Commercial Code [UCC], the U3C was drafted and is being supported by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws. Their hope is that the widespread acceptance of the UCC will lead to similar acceptance of the U3C. An understanding of the U3C requires an understanding of its drafting history and the motivations of the various pressure groups responsible for its drafting. The drafting history begins with the UCC, which contains almost no consumer protection provisions and was deliberately drafted not to contain any. Its proponents feared that such provisions would make nationwide enactment more difficult and they did not wish to undertake these difficulties. However, the Uniform Commissioners were aware of this lack of consumer protection in the UCC; and, with something akin to guilt feelings, they undertook to provide consumer protection legislation to supplement it. This article will describe the changes which will be made in the present Maine law by enactment of the U3C. Since most present Maine legislation has been enacted in response to particular problems, the article will be organized around the problems of the consumer credit marketplace. It will seek to evaluate the U3C by asking: What is the problem? What does the present Maine law do to alleviate the problem? What would the U3C do? Is the latter a better approach
Ransoming the Maine Environment
Get PDFThe call for natural resource conservation is widely heard today. Purity of air and water are goals that most persons seem to endorse, at least in the abstract. The dollar costs of governmental programs for achieving relatively clean air and water doubtless are high, making questions of who bears them important. Some recent decisions of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court suggest that in Maine the major costs will be paid by taxpayers at large rather than by individual resource users
Criminal Contempt in Maine: Constitutionally Protected or Neglected?
Get PDFThe power to punish contempt of court is an ancient power justified as inherent and necessary for the effective administration of justice. Because criminal contempts are willful challenges to the power of a court to maintain control over its proceedings, contempts are acts which serve to lessen the dignity and authority of the court. Certainly, the maintenance of decorum in the courtrooms is of paramount importance. Absent the ability to sanction willful disobedience, a court is powerless to enforce its decrees or control its proceedings. Yet it is a power readily open to abuse; application of this power must be strictly scrutinized. Despite the apparent need for the contempt power, it is a power that remains suspect. The need for the court to vindicate its authority is contrary to the constitutional rights of those facing contempt proceedings. Alleged contemners may risk imprisonment without notice or hearing. They may have no right to counsel and their case will not be heard by a jury. In short, contemners may be imprisoned without resort to the procedural guarantees held, in other contexts, to be essential to the due process of law. The traditional justifications for this anomalous result have been varied. Contempt has been considered by some courts an offense unique unto itself, to which constitutional safeguards do not apply. Other courts have viewed contempt as an offense that is criminal in nature but which is outside the scope of constitutional guarantees. Yet the sanctions that the contemners face are identical to those they would face in any other criminal proceeding. The United States Supreme Court has repeatedly addressed the problems surrounding the law of criminal contempt. The Court has held that when the sanction imposed would guarantee a defendant a jury trial in any other criminal proceeding, the same guarantee must be afforded the contemner. The federal constitutional right to a jury trial is guaranteed, however, only when an offense is serious. Therefore, the contemners\u27 right to a jury trial attaches only when the contempt is serious. The Maine Constitution, however, has been interpreted more liberally than the federal constitution on the issue of jury trials. The Law Court has held that the right to a trial by jury extends to all charged with criminal offenses, regardless of severity. In a separate series of cases, the Law Court has recognized the Supreme Court\u27s analysis that contempt is a crime to which the jury trial right may apply. Yet to date, the Law Court has not analyzed the effect of the concept of contempt as a crime against the backdrop of the expansive jury trial guarantees of the Maine Constitution. This Comment examines the logical conclusion stemming from the union of these two principles. Further, the Comment examines methods by which the courts may maintain an orderly flow of justice and, at the same time, may preserve rights guaranteed under the Maine Constitution to the contemner. In Maine, the alleged contemner should have the right to a jury trial
Fighting Words and the First Amendment in Maine: State v. John W.
Get PDFOn April 1, 1979, John W. was driving his car, accompanied by his sister Maria. The car was stopped by a police officer who requested John\u27s license and registration. Maria asked the officer why they had been stopped. When the officer remained silent, Maria became abusive and was arrested for disorderly conduct. John demanded to know what was going on. Ordered to get back into his car, John began shouting at the police: Hey, turn around and come back here; Hey, you fucking pig, you fuckin\u27 kangaroo; Fuck you. John was arrested and convicted in a juvenile proceeding of disorderly conduct, under section 501(2) of title 17-A, Maine Revised Statutes Annotated. Because section 501(2) punishes the use of words, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court in State v. John W. carefully analyzed this section of Maine\u27s disorderly conduct statute in light of the first amendment to the United States Constitution and its counterpart, Art. I, § 4 of the Maine Constitution. Partly as a result of this analysis, John\u27s conviction was overturned. The future constitutional validity of section 501(2) depends principally on whether the Maine court in John W. precluded the possibility of the section\u27s application to speech protected by the first amendment. Without such a limitation, the statute may be impermissibly broad, in light of recent Supreme Court rulings. Using the so-called overbreadth doctrine, the Supreme Court during the 1970\u27s overturned several disorderly conduct convictions because the statute involved had not been judicially interpreted to exclude constitutionally protected speech from its sweep. In order for the statute to pass constitutional muster, the Law Court must interpret it so that citizens have an objective and unambiguous standard for behavior. This Note will show that the opinion by Justice Roberts in John W., in its attempt to save the statute from constitutional infirmity, has made it difficult for police officers to determine when citizens should be arrested under section 501(2). As a result, an individual could be arrested and convicted for using constitutionally protected speech. This Note will also propose an amendment to section 501(2) designed to preclude the possibility that section 501(2) could be applied to constitutionally protected speech
Mental Abnormality in the Maine Criminal Code: Section 58 (1-A)
Get PDFThe law surrounding the insanity defense has always been complex and problematic. Since the promulgation of the M\u27Naghten test in 1843, courts and legislators have attempted to articulate a clear and easily understood definition of insanity. Legal scholars have created an overwhelming volume of literature on such important aspects of the defense as the role of psychiatrists in a jury trial, the appropriateness of the diminished capacity defense, and the constitutionality of imposing the burden of proving insanity on the defendant. Even the necessity of retaining the defense has been questioned. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court has recently confronted a new problem raised by the statutory synthesis of the legal doctrines relevant to the insanity defense. The remainder of this Comment will examine the historical development of the theories of mens rea and the insanity defense as it relates to the creation of section 58(1-A). Further discussion will focus on the procedures invoked when one introduces evidence of mental abnormality as well as on the constitutional issues generated by the enactment or possible repeal of section 58(1-A). This Comment contends that the structure of modern criminal codes and the implications of recent constitutional cases have resulted in a loss of harmony between the doctrines of mens rea and the insanity defense. Although once coordinated in order to allow the state to hold all defendants who committed a forbidden act, they now permit a loophole (section 58(1-A)) to exist through which Royal Burnham and other defendants may slip. An argument will be presented, however, that the interrelationship between these two criminal law theories and that of blameworthiness and punishment requires the inclusion of section 58(1-A) in the Maine Criminal Code. Finally, a brief review of various proposals for improving this area of the law and a possible solution for Maine will be presented
The International Legal Obligations of Signatories to an Unratified Treaty
Get PDFThere are currently two major international agreements of the United States which have been signed by the parties and transmitted by the President to the Senate for its advice and consent: the Treaty with the Soviet Union on the Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms, known as SALT II, and the Agreement with Canada on East Coast Fishery Resources and the accompanying Treaty to Submit to Binding Dispute Settlement the Delimitation of the Maritime Boundary in the Gulf of Maine Area. Both agreements were signed after lengthy and complex negotiations. Both agreements are extremely detailed and represent a delicate balancing of the interests of the nations involved. Already there have been considerable delays in the ratification of both agreements. Perhaps neither agreement will be ratified. The President, however, continues to insist that ratification of both agreements is in the national interest, and eventual favorable action on them is still possible. Most contemporary treaties provide that they will enter into force only upon ratification by the states that are to become parties to the agreement. There is growing agreement that general international law imposes on the signatories to an unratified treaty the obligation not to defeat the object and purpose of that treaty prior to its entry into force. Once viewed as a moral admonition this obligation has come increasingly to be regarded as legal in nature. The desirability of such a principle is of course evident. The long and complicated process of negotiation during which each state may have made numerous concessions should be protected, especially where a signed agreement is the result. Furthermore, during negotiations the states may have refrained from taking certain actions—heavy fishing of certain stocks or the development of new weapons systems for example—because negotiations were pending. This self-restraint in expectation of a binding agreement should be encouraged. It is the thesis of this Article that general international law imposes on the signatories to a treaty the obligation not to defeat the object and purpose of that treaty prior to its entry into force. Decisional law, state practice, and the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties all support this proposition. The obligation has a firm theoretical basis in the general principle of abuse of rights. Finally, after examining the existence and nature of the obligation, the Article concludes with a discussion of the content of the obligation and attempts to discern its contours and extent
Maine\u27s Actions to Try Title: A Historical Perspective
Get PDFActions to try title are commonly used by Maine lawyers to adjudicate real estate title conflicts. Though often time consuming, expensive, and complicated, such actions are necessary in any state that seeks to foster a stable, economically efficient real estate market. Actions to try title have been necessary in all states because no protective statutory scheme for land titles has ever succeeded in eliminating all title defects that interfere with quiet possession or salability. Maine is no exception. Until a more effective statutory scheme for securing titles and restoring land\u27s marketability becomes available, actions to try title will remain important to the real estate bar. In Maine, title may be established by any action in which proof of title is a required element. This Comment will analyze Maine\u27s three prevalent statutory actions to try title by tracing their historical development and suggesting how various features of the individual actions should be viewed from a modem perspective
The Unilateral Termination of Tribal Status: Mashpee Tribe v. New Seabury Corp.
Get PDFMashpee Tribe v. New Seabury Corp. is the first reported case in which a federal trial court decided the question of an Indian group\u27s existence as a tribe. In Mashpee, the issue of tribal existence arose as a defense to a claim brought by the Mashpee Indians for recovery of lands comprising most of the Town of Mashpee, Massachusetts. At the time of suit, these lands were held by a class of defendants who, according to the Mashpees\u27 complaint, held interests or title acquired without the consent of Congress in violation of the Nonintercourse Act. Based upon the jury verdicts, the district court dismissed the plaintiffs claim for lack of standing as a tribe of Indians entitled to protection under the Nonintercourse Act. On appeal of the judgment to the First Circuit, the dismissal was affirmed. Approving the standards utilized in jury instructions by the district court, the appeals panel ruled that a tribe can lose its status by a knowing and willing and voluntary abandonment or by a voluntary assimilation into the non-Indian community. This note will focus on the appellate court\u27s construction of the legal standards governing abandonment of tribal relations and assimilation of a tribe into the non-Indian community
Standing to Challenge Governmental Action
Get PDFPerhaps no inquiry reveals so much of a court\u27s sense of identity as does that into justiciability, a concept employed by courts to limit the availability of judicial redress when a litigant\u27s remedy more properly resides with another governmental body. When the subject-matter the litigant seeks to put in issue itself concerns governmental action or policy, the court must address a sensitive problem: to what extent might its resolution of the controversy intrude upon the policymaking function with which the legislative branch has been charged? Slow either to open themselves to claims they function anti-democratically” or to override the informed judgments of agencies whose expertise is bent towards effectuating legislative goals, courts burdened with today\u27s workloads show understandably little reluctance to dispose of such claims on the general ground of unsuitability for review. When a particular deficiency assigned speaks to the nature of the litigant rather than his claim, a court has defined the scope of its inquiry by reference to a discrete component of justiciability, the doctrine of standing. When it focuses upon the party seeking relief, a court inquires whether the party has established a sufficient personal stake in the controversy\u27s outcome to warrant judicial review. Satisfaction of the personal stake requirement ensures that the court\u27s adjudicative undertaking will go forward under the proper conditions: the parties will face each other with the concrete adverseness necessary for the sharp presentation of issues, and the court\u27s resolution of a particular dispute will guarantee that its substantive policymaking role is limited both in scope and frequency. With so many fundamental concerns of the adjudicative process implicated, it is not surprising that attempts at precise delineation of the contours and content of the personal stake concept have yielded elusive and controversial results. The federal courts have played the key role in developing the law of standing. Caught between their generic dispute-resolving impulse and the constitutional limitation that they treat only cases and controversies, they have looked primarily to the attributes of injury and legal interest in determining a plaintiff\u27s suitability. In the context provided by the increased demand on the federal courts that stems from modem resistance to governmental growth and by the availability of newer procedural forms, such as the declaratory judgment, that test settled notions of justiciability, one may trace the changing interplay of injury and legal interest. The result offers a backdrop against which the developing law of standing in Maine may profitably be viewed