contempt proceedings
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 284 U.S. 421 - Blackmer v. United States · 1932Most cited · 851 citing opinions
proceedings to punish such offenses have been regarded as sui generis and not 'criminal prosecutions' within the Sixth Amendment or common understanding
How the Supreme Court has restated “contempt proceedings”
Each Supreme Court definition of “contempt proceedings,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “contempt proceedings”
Court decisions citing the 3 opinions that defined “contempt proceedings” — 1,574 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 3 definitions, chronological · 1907–1932
- ORIGINAL
Proceedings for contempt may be divided into those which have for their purpose the vindication of the authority and dignity of the court, and those seeking to punish parties guilty of a disregard of such orders as are remedial in their character, and intended to enforce the rights of private parties, to compel obedience to orders and decrees made to enforce their rights, and to give them a remedy to which the court deems them entitled. ... the one class is criminal and punitive in its nature, in which the government and the public are interested, and the other civil, remedial, and coercive in its character, in which those chiefly concerned are individuals whose private rights and remedies are undertaken to be protected and enforced.
classification
Contempt proceedings are sui generis because they are not hedged about with all the safeguards provided in the bill of rights for protecting one accused of ordinary crime from the danger of unjust conviction. This is due, of course, to the fact that for years before the American Constitution, courts had been held to be inherently empowered to protect themselves and the function they perform by summary proceeding without a jury to punish disobedience of their orders and disturbance of their hearings.