United States v. Brewster

In United States v. Brewster, 408 U.S. 501, 524 (1972), the 6-3 U.S. Supreme Court held that:

“

the purpose of the Speech or Debate Clause is to protect the individual legislator, not simply for his own sake, but to preserve the independence and thereby the integrity of the legislative process. But financial abuses by way of bribes, perhaps even more than Executive power, would gravely undermine legislative integrity and defeat the right of the public to honest representation. Depriving the Executive of the power to investigate and prosecute and the Judiciary of the power to punish bribery of Members of Congress is unlikely to enhance legislative independence. Given the disinclination and limitations of each House to police these matters, it is understandable that both Houses deliberately delegated this function to the courts, as they did with the power to punish persons committing contempts of Congress. 2 U.S.C. § 194.

”

In a dissent by Justice Byron White, as joined by Justices William Douglas and William Brennan, Justice White observed:

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The majority agrees that in order to assure the independence and integrity of the legislature and to reinforce the separation of powers so deliberately established by the Founders, the Speech or Debate Clause prevents a legislative act from being the basis of criminal or civil liability. Concededly, a Member of Congress may not be prosecuted or sued for making a speech or voting in committee or on the floor, whether he was paid to do so or not. The majority also appears to embrace the holding in United States v. Johnson, 383 U.S. 169 (1966), that a Member of Congress could not be convicted of a conspiracy to defraud the Government where the purposes or motives underlying his conduct as a legislator are called into question. If one follows the mode of the majority's present analysis, the prosecution in Johnson was not for speaking, voting, or performing any other legislative act in a particular manner; the criminal act charged was a conspiracy to defraud the United States anterior to any legislative performance. To prove the crime, however, the prosecution introduced evidence that money was paid to make a speech, among other things, and that the speech was made. This, the Court held, violated the Speech or Debate Clause, because it called into question the motives and purposes underlying Congressman Johnson's performance of his legislative duties.

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United States v. Brewster, 408 U.S. 501, 552-53 (1972) (White, J., dissenting).