THE FIFTH AMENDMENT

JUDGMENTS & PROPHECIES

Pundit ARTHUR KROCK in the NEW YORK TIMES:

THE Fifth Amendment stands in need of defenders because of the motives for which it has been invoked on many occasions in recent times. This may have given a widespread impression that the principal effect of the Fifth is to stand between wrongdoers and their just punishment. But the courts have made it plain that the Fifth Amendment cannot successfully be invoked merely because social discredit and persecution may be the consequence of testimony. That is why Prof. Edward S. Corwin was able to make the following statement of fact in his annotations of the Constitution: "The privilege exists solely for the protection of the witness himself, and may not be claimed for the benefit of third parties" (i.e., acknowledged Communists may not refuse to name others known to them if that information is sought in the pursuance of a valid judicial or legislative objective).

This protection of the individual was an outgrowth of the inquisitions of ecclesiastical courts in England in the sixteenth century. It was a protest against tyranny, and Virginia made the Fifth part of the price of ratifying the Constitution because history has demonstrated that the need for the protection is abiding. And history has also demonstrated that, however this section of the amendment may be misused, its necessity to a free society remains paramount.

WASHINGTON POST AND TIMES HERALD:

DAVE BECK sought a foxhole and dug his grave. To invoke the Fifth Amendment does not warrant an automatic presumption of law violation. But the purpose of the amendment is to save a man's neck, not his reputation. Mr. Beck's action could not save him from the disgrace of running to cover behind a personal shield when the management of his union is under grave attack. The truth is that Mr. Beck is in a predicament in which silence may be even more damaging than candor would have been.

A plea of possible self-incrimination should not lead automatically to dismissal of anyone from his job. But this case certainly necessitates a thorough investigation within the trade union family. His only alternative to prolonged humiliation is a quick resignation. In this free country no man accused of taking $320,000 from funds entrusted to his care in a worthy cause can admit that an explanation might incriminate him, and still retain his trust.

Pennsylvania Lawyer EDWARD DUMBAULD in THE BILL OF RIGHTS AND WHAT IT MEANS TODAY (to be published this month by the University of Oklahoma):

THE Fifth Amendment serves as an effective barrier against inquisitorial practices. American principles of fair play discountenance attempts to condemn a person by compelling him to disclose his own transgressions. Law enforcement agencies should be encouraged to gather independent evidence by exercising an appropriate degree of resourcefulness and industry. One should always feel uneasiness when people are penalized for exercising a privilege which a venerated provision of the Constitution affords them.

The privilege against self-incrimination in the Fifth Amendment is just as much a part of the Constitution as the provisions prescribing how members of Congress shall be chosen. If every person who utilized those provisions of the Constitution by becoming a candidate for Congress were to be subjected to penalties such as loss of employment, public ignominy, refusal of a passport, and similar disabilities, the unsoundness of such a policy would be obvious to all. Yet public opinion is apparently willing to tolerate legislation and practices inflicting those consequences upon persons who similarly utilize another portion of the Constitution. This is as irrational as if a university were to expend great effort and sacrifice in establishing a magnificent library; but then were to expel any student who read a book.

NEW YORK POST:

DAVE BECK has as much right as another American to invoke the Fifth Amendment. His action in doing so is no proof of guilt. The trouble with Beck's protestations of innocence is that he has already admitted a moral offense so vast that anything else is anticlimax; long before he took the stand in Washington, he had confessed that he borrowed more than $300,000 (without interest) from his union's treasury for personal investments. His inability to recognize that there was anything wrong with the act is perhaps the most damning indictment of all. While Beck's performance drew the headlines, a Washington jury found newspaperman Seymour Peck guilty of contempt of Congress [See PRESS]. Ex-Communist Peck had freely testified to his own past deeds but declined to name other men he had known in the same net. In the end, the courts may decide that Beck's silence is technically less vulnerable to punishment than Peck's. The reverse distinction is palpably clear in moral terms. Beck remained silent to guard his neck; Peck risked his neck to prevent capricious injury to other persons. Although the irony of the distinction may elude the Senate and the courts, it is surely one that the press--and the public--ought to cherish and defend.

WALL STREET JOURNAL :

NOT so long ago a parade of witnesses before a Congressional investigating committee were using the Fifth Amendment to avoid answering questions about their past Communist activities. Afterwards a number of those witnesses suffered a loss in public esteem. In a few cases they suffered concrete injury because their former employers didn't want to employ them any longer. At this there were loud outcries from a number of people who consider themselves "liberals." They complained that the investigating committee had done a dastardly thing simply by asking the questions.

The only outcry we have heard this time about the dastardly action of the committee has come from Dave Beck. Mr. Beck has the right to avoid incriminating himself by his own testimony just as do those asked about subversive activities. We would oppose, as we have opposed in the past, any effort to weaken that right. But Mr. Beck does not have a good reputation guaranteed by the Constitution. That is something a man has to guard for himself.

Los ANGELES TIMES:

DAVE BECK, who claimed the privileges of the Fifth Amendment more than 50 times before the Senate Racket Committee, bitterly criticized Fifth Amendment takers in 1948, when he was a regent of the University of Washington. Some teachers at the university refused to answer at a Washington legislative investigation of un-American activities, and Beck said: "I have no time for that group of individuals who hide behind every technicality--technicalities which they would destroy--to hide their subversive thinking."

We protest there is no inconsistency here. When Beck condemned the Fifth Amendment refugees on the Washington faculty, he was not denying their right to refuse to incriminate themselves; he condemned their presence on the faculty. Similarly, Beck is unquestionably within his rights in taking refuge. But just as the teachers forfeited their right to teach, does not Beck forfeit his right to head a great labor organization? By his own standards, he should quit that job at once.

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