Dickinson v. United States ( 1953 )

Mr. Justice Clark

delivered the opinion of the Court.

The principal and decisive issue before us is whether there was a basis in fact for denying Dickinson’s claim to a ministerial exemption under § 6 (g) of the Universal Military Training and Service Act, 62 Stat. 611, 50 U. S. C. App. § 456 (g).¹ After the selective service authorities denied his claim, Dickinson refused to submit to induction in defiance of his local board’s induction order. For this refusal he was convicted, in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California,² of violating § 12 (a)³ of the Act. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the conviction. 203 F. 2d 336. We granted certiorari. 345 U. S. 991.

Section 6 (g) is the source of the ministerial exemption. It provides, in pertinent part, that “Regular or duly ordained ministers of religion, as defined in this title, . . . shall be exempt from training and service (but not from registration) under this title.” Section 16 (g) embodies Congress’ definition of a “regular or duly-ordained minister of religion.”

“(1) The term 'duly ordained minister of religion’ means a person who has been ordained, in accordance with the ceremonial, ritual, or discipline of a church, religious sect, or organization established on the basis of a community of faith and belief, doctrines and practices of a religious character, to preach and to teach the doctrines of such church, sect, or organization and to administer the rites and ceremonies thereof in public worship, and who as his regular and customary vocation preaches and teaches the principles of religion and administers the ordinances of public worship as embodied in the creed or principles of such church, sect, or organization.

“(2) The term 'regular minister of religion’ means one who as his customary vocation preaches and teaches the principles of religion of a church, a religious sect, or organization of which he is a member, without having been formally ordained as a minister of religion, and who is recognized by such church, sect, or organization as a regular minister.

“(3) The term 'regular or duly ordained minister of religion’ does not include a person who irregularly or incidentally preaches and teaches the principles of religion of a church, religious sect, or organization and does not include any person who may have been duly ordained a minister in accordance with the ceremonial, rite, or discipline of a church, religious sect or organization, but who does not regularly, as a vocation, teach and preach the principles of religion and administer the ordinances of public worship as embodied in the creed or principles of his church, sect, or organization.”

Registrants who satisfy this definition are entitled to be classified IY-D. 32 C. F. R. § 1622.43.⁴

Dickinson, a Jehovah’s Witness, originally claimed IV-D in 1948, shortly after he registered under the Act. At that time he stated, in his classification questionnaire, that he was a "regular” but not an ordained minister, and was working 40 hours a week as a radio repairman. From other documents submitted to the board it appeared that he devoted an uncertain number of hours a week leading two Bible study groups and “several hours each week” preaching to the public. On these facts he was classified I-A in July 1950. The validity of this classification is not at issue.

What is at issue is the decision of Dickinson’s local board to continue him in I-A in September 1950 after he requested reclassification based on changed conditions in his vocation occurring subsequent to the filing of his questionnaire in 1948. Through his sworn testimony at a personal appearance before the board and subsequent letters to the selective service authorities, and through the affidavit of one C. David Easter, a “supervisor” for the Watch tower Bible and Tract Society in the San Francisco area, supplemented by three letters from the Society itself, Dickinson established the following uncon-tradicted facts.

In the Spring of 1949 Dickinson voluntarily left his 40-hour-a-week job as a radio repairman and was baptized, the mark of ordination to Jehovah’s Witnesses. In August 1949 he was enrolled by national headquarters of the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society and began his work as a full-time “pioneer” minister, devoting 150 hours each month to religious efforts. This shift in Dickinson’s activities occurred after February 1949 when selection under the Act was at a standstill, regular inductions having been halted.⁵ As of January-1950 Dickinson changed his residence in order to assume the role of “Company Servant” or presiding minister of the Coalinga, California, “Company,” which encompassed a 5,400-square-mile area. At that time he dedicated approximately 100 hours each month to actual pioneer missionary work — delivering public sermons, door-to-door preaching, conducting home Bible studies. In the remaining 50 hours devoted to religious activities each month, Dickinson studied, planned sermons and discourses, and wrote letters connected with his work. A substantial portion of this time was spent conducting three to four meetings each week of the “Company” or congregation at a public hall in Coalinga. Dickinson arranged for and presided over these meetings, usually delivering discourses at them. He also instructed prospective ministers in the proper delivery of sermons at the “Company’s” Theocratic Ministry School. Dickinson received no salary for his missionary or company servant work. He lived on $35 a month earned by a weekly average of five hours of radio repair work. This modest income, a low $15-17.50 a month rental for an apartment, self-performance of household tasks, and invitations to various private homes enabled Dickinson to subsist.

Despite this uncontroverted evidence of marked change in Dickinson’s activities, the local board continued him in I-A. This ruling was affirmed by the state and national appeal boards, and he was ordered to report for induction on July 16, 1951. Dickinson reported to the induction center but refused to submit to induction. His indictment and conviction followed.

At the outset it is important to underline an elemental feature of this case. The Universal Military Training and Service Act does not permit direct judicial review of selective service classification orders. Rather the Act provides, as did the 1917 and 1940 conscription Acts before it,⁶ that classification orders by selective service authorities shall be “final.” However, in Estep v. United States, 327 U. S. 114 (1946), a case arising under the 1940 Act, this Court said, at 122-123: “The provision making the decisions of the local boards ‘final’ means to us that Congress chose not to give administrative action under this Act the customary scope of judicial review which obtains under other statutes. It means that the courts are not to weigh the evidence to determine whether the classification made by the local boards was justified. The decisions of the local boards made in conformity with the regulations are final even though they may be erroneous. The question of jurisdiction of the local board is reached only if there is no basis in fact for the classification which it gave the registrant.”

The ministerial exemption, as was pointed out in the Senate Report accompanying the 1948 Act, “is a narrow one, intended for the leaders of the various religious faiths and not for the members generally.” S. Rep. No. 1268, 80th Cong., 2d Sess. 13. Certainly all members of a religious organization or sect are not entitled to the exemption by reason of their membership, even though in their belief each is a minister. Cf. Cox v. United States, 332 U. S. 442 (1947). On the other hand, a legitimate minister cannot be, for the purposes of the Act, unfrocked simply because all the members of his sect base an exemption claim on the dogma of its faith. That would leave a congregation without a cleric. Each registrant must satisfy the Act’s rigid criteria for the exemption. Preaching and teaching the principles of one’s sect, if performed part-time or half-time, occasionally or irregularly, are insufficient to bring a registrant under § 6 (g). These activities must be regularly performed. They must, as the statute reads, comprise the registrant’s “vocation.” And since the ministerial exemption is a matter of legislative grace, the selective service registrant bears the burden of clearly establishing a right to the exemption.⁷

We think Dickinson made out a case which meets the statutory criteria. He was ordained in accordance with the ritual of his sect and, according to the evidence here, he meets the vital test of regularly, as a vocation, teaching and preaching the principles of his sect and conducting public worship in the tradition of his religion. That the ordination, doctrines, or manner of preaching that his sect employs diverge from the orthodox and traditional is no concern of ours; of course the statute does not purport to impose a test of orthodoxy.

Why, then, was Dickinson denied IV-D? It may be argued that his five hours a week as a radio repairman supplied a factual basis for the denial. We think not. The statutory definition of a “regular or duly ordained minister” does not preclude all secular employment. Many preachers, including those in the more traditional and orthodox sects, may not be blessed with congregations or parishes capable of paying them a living wage. A statutory ban on all secular work would mete out draft exemptions with an uneven hand, to the detriment of those who minister to the poor and thus need some secular work in order to survive. To hold that one who supports himself by five hours of secular work each week may thereby lose an exemption to which he is otherwise entitled, would be to achieve a result that Congress so wisely avoided.

The court below in affirming the conviction apparently thought the local board was free to disbelieve Dickinson’s testimonial and documentary evidence even in the absence of any impeaching or contradictory evidence. The court manifested its own skepticism by pointing to Dickinson’s youth, the unorthodox method of ordination by baptism, the failure to present stronger documentary evidence from Watchtower Society leaders, and the customary claim of Jehovah’s Witnesses to ministerial exemptions. However, Dickinson’s claims were not disputed by any evidence presented to the selective service authorities, nor was any cited by the Court of Appeals. The task of the courts in cases such as this is to search the record for some affirmative evidence to support the local board’s overt or implicit finding that a registrant has not painted a complete or accurate picture of his activities. We have found none here.

Local boards are not courts of law and are not bound by traditional rules of evidence; they are given great leeway in hearing and considering a variety of material as evidence.⁸ If the facts are disputed the board bears the ultimate responsibility for resolving the conflict — the courts will not interfere. Nor will the courts apply a test of “substantial evidence.” However, the courts may properly insist that there be some proof that is incompatible with the registrant’s proof of exemption. The local board may question a registrant under oath, subpoena witnesses to testify, and require both registrant and witnesses to produce documents. 32 C. F. R. § 1621.15. The board is authorized to obtain information from local, state, and national welfare and governmental agencies. 32 C. F. R. § 1621.14. The registrant’s admissions, testimony of other witnesses, frequently unsolicited evidence from a registrant’s neighbors, or information obtained from other agencies may produce dissidence which the boards are free to resolve. Absent such admissions or other evidence, the local boards may call on the investigative agencies of the federal government, as they would if a registrant were suspected of perjury. But when the uncontroverted evidence supporting a registrant’s claim places him prima facie within the statutory exemption, dismissal of the claim solely on the basis of suspicion and speculation is both contrary to the spirit of the Act and foreign to our concepts of justice.

Reversed.

1 The title was changed from the "Selective Service Act of 1948" to the “Universal Military Training and Service Act” by 65 Stat. 75.

2 Petitioner waived trial by jury in accordance with Rule 23 of the Rules of Criminal Procedure.

3 “[A]ny . . . person . . . who . . . refuses . . . service in the armed forces ... or who in any manner shall knowingly fail or neglect or refuse to perform any duty required of him under or in the execution of this title, or rules, regulations, or directions made pursuant to this title . . . shall, upon conviction in any district court of the United States of competent jurisdiction, be punished by imprisonment for not more than five years or a fine of not more than $10,000, or by both such fine and imprisonment . . . .”

Dickinson was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment.

4 Formerly this regulation was numbered § 1622.19, 32 C. F. R. § 1622.19 (1949).

5 Regular inductions resumed in August 1950. Annual Report of the Director of Selective Service 90 (1952). Since induction was not an immediate threat when Dickinson changed his activities, the change itself would hardly show bad faith, if that were an issue. However, bad faith is not at issue in cases such as this.

6 40 Stat. 80 (1917), 54 Stat. 893 (1940).

7 See 32 C. F. R. § 1622.1 (c).

8 32 C. F. B.. § 1622.1 (c). See Lehr v. United States, 139 F. 2d 919, 922 (1944).