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242 U.S. 468

37 S. Ct. 208

61 L. Ed. 441

Docket No. 47.

William Berry v. Rudolph Davis

Supreme Court of the United States

Submitted October 26, 1916.

Decided January 15, 1917.

Supreme Court of the United States · decided 1917-01-15

<p>APPEAL PROM THE DISTRICT COURT OP THE UNITED STATES POR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OP IOWA.</p> <p>The case is stated in the opinion.</p>

2 counsel of record

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““This pro forma action, the supreme court at Washington by vacating and the Wisconsin supreme court by so-called reversing, under the circumstances, surely has not erased and annihilated our supreme court’s decision in the Beloit Case on the merits. “Said the supreme court of the United States in Berry v. Davis, 242 U. S. 468, 470 , 61 L. Ed. 441 , 442: “ ‘An appeal was taken to this court in 1914. In 1915 the act of 1913 was repealed, and the substituted act does not apply to the plaintiff. . . . Therefore, upon the precedents we are not called upon to consider the propriety of the action of the district court, but the proper course is to reverse the decree and remand the cause, with directions that the bill be dismissed without costs to either party.’ ””

quoted by 1 later decision, including Dean Milk Co. v. City of Madison

Relies on Mills v. Green · United States of America v. Hamburg-Amerikanische Packetfahrt-Actien Gesellschaft No 289 Hamburg-Amerikanische Packetfahrt-Actien Gesellschaft · Jones v. Montague

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Reversed · 9–0 · Decided 1917-01-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 108 later decisions (30 by the Supreme Court) — most recently February 2016 · most notably United States v. Munsingwear, Inc. (1950), Poe v. Ullman (1961)

47 federal appellate · 5 district · 13 state decisions

27019171920193019401950196019701980199020002010decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Mr. George Cosson, Attorney General of Iowa, and Mr. Ross R. Mowry for appellants.

No appearance for appellee.

Mr. Justice Holmes delivered the opinion of the court:

¶1

This is a bill to enjoin the State Board of Parol and the warden and physician of the state penitentiary at Fort Madison from performing vasectomy upon the plaintiff, the defendant in error, in pursuance of an Iowa statute approved April 19, 1913. 35 G. A. chap. 187, § 1. Supplement to Code 1913, chap. 19-B, § 2600-p. This act, among other things, directed the operation to be performed upon convicts in the penitentiary who had been twice convicted of felony, and on February 14, 1914, the board had ordered it, upon the ground that the plaintiff had been twice so convicted. The bill was filed on March 11, 1914. On April 15, 1914, following an opinion of the Attorney General that both felonies must have been committed after the passage of the act, the order was laid on the table, and the warden and physician made affidavits, filed on April 22, that the operation would not be performed by them. Nevertheless, three judges, disregarding the foregoing opinion and action, proceeded to issue a preliminary injunction as prayed in the bill. 216 Fed. 413.

¶2

An appeal was taken to this court in 1914. In 1915 the Act of 1913 was repealed, and the substituted act does not apply to the plaintiff. Supplemental Supplement to the Code of Iowa, 1915, chap. 19-B, § 2600-s1. All possibility or threat of the operation has disappeared now, if not before, by the act of the state. Therefore, upon the precedents we are not called upon to consider the propriety of the action of the district court, but the proper course is to reverse the decree and remand the cause, with directions that the bill be dismissed without costs to either party. United States v. Hamburg-Amerikanische Packetfahrt-Actien Gesellschaft, 239 U. S. 466, 475, 478, 60 L. ed. 387, 391, 392, 36 Sup. Ct. Rep. 212; Jones v. Montague, 194 U. S. 147, 153, 48 L. ed. 913, 915, 24 Sup. Ct. Rep. 611; Dinsmore v. Southern Exp. Co. 183 U. S. 115, 120, 46 L. ed 111, 113, 22 Sup. Ct. Rep. 45; Mills v. Green, 159 U. S. 651, 658, 40 L. ed. 293, 295, 16 Sup. Ct. Rep. 132.

¶3

Decree reversed. Bill to be dismissed without costs to either party.

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