Where the Circuit Court enters an order requiring a party
violating an injunction order to pay a fine of which three-fourths
is to go to the complainant as compensation for expenses incurred
in prosecuting the contempt proceedings, and one-fourth to the
United States, the punitive feature of the order is dominant, and
fixes its character for purposes of review.
An order adjudging a party in contempt for violating an
injunction is remedial when its purpose is to indemnify the injured
suitor, or coercively to secure obedience to a mandate in his
behalf, and is punitive when its purpose is to vindicate the
authority of the court.
Gompers v. Bucks Stove & Range
Co., 221 U. S. 418.
Whether contempt proceedings at the instance of the injured
party, resulting in the offending party's being adjudged to pay a
fine, a part of which goes to the injured suitor and a part to the
United States, is erroneous in its entirety, or only as to the
portion of the fine going to the United States, will not be
determined on an application for mandamus to compel the circuit
court of appeals to take jurisdiction of an appeal; the court will
only determine whether the order is reviewable.
If an order of the circuit court adjudging defendant in contempt
and to pay a fine is remedial, it is interlocutory, and only
reviewable upon appeal from the final decree; if, however, the
order is punitive, it is final and reviewable on writ of error, and
the circuit court of appeals should take jurisdiction.
Matter
of Christensen Engineering Co., 194 U.
S. 458.
If the circuit court of appeals refuses to take jurisdiction of
a writ of error to review an order of contempt made by the circuit
court the punitive feature of which is dominant, the remedy is by
writ of mandamus from this Court to compel the circuit court of
appeals to take jurisdiction.
The facts are stated in the opinion.
Page 223 U. S. 640
MR. JUSTICE VAN DEVANTER delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a petition for a writ of mandamus commanding the Circuit
Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit to reinstate and take
jurisdiction of a writ of error dismissed by it. The facts are
these: during the pendency, in a circuit court of the United
States, of a suit in equity to which the petitioners were parties
defendant, they were charged by the complainant with having
willfully violated an interlocutory injunction theretofore granted
in the suit at the instance and for the benefit of the complainant,
and at the hearing upon that complaint were by the court adjudged
guilty of contempt of its authority and ordered unconditionally to
pay into its registry, within five days, fines of $1,000, $2,000,
and $500, respectively, each fine, when paid, to go three-fourths
to the complainant, "as compensation in part for the expenses
incurred in prosecuting these contempt proceedings," and one-fourth
to the United States. With the purpose of securing a review of the
order, the petitioners sued out a writ of error from the circuit
court of appeals, and when the writ came on for hearing, that court
dismissed it upon the ground that the order, rightly considered,
was remedial, not punitive, and was merely interlocutory, and
reviewable only upon an appeal from the final decree. 187 F.
398.
We are not now concerned with whether the proceedings resulting
in the order were such as to admit of the imposition of punitive,
as distinguished from compensatory, fines, or whether, if the
proceedings were not of that character, the order was erroneous in
its entirety, or only
Page 223 U. S. 641
as to so much of the fines as was to go to the United States,
and therefore we pass what is said in that connection in the briefs
and come at once to the only question presented for decision, which
is whether the order was open to review upon a writ of error. The
answer turns upon the character of the order. If it was remedial,
it was merely interlocutory, and reviewable only upon an appeal
from the final decree; but, if it was punitive, it was a final
judgment, criminal in its nature, and reviewable upon a writ of
error, without awaiting the final decree. Such an order against an
offending suitor is deemed remedial when its purpose is to
indemnify the injured suitor or coercively to secure obedience to a
mandate in his behalf, and is deemed punitive when its purpose is
to vindicate the authority of the court by punishing the act of
disobedience as a public wrong. As was said in
Gompers v.
Buck's Stove & Range Co., 221 U.
S. 418,
221 U. S. 441:
"It is not the fact of punishment, but rather its character and
purpose, that often serve to distinguish between the two classes of
cases." And again, p.
221 U. S.
448:
"The classification, then, depends upon the question as to
whether the punishment is punitive, in vindication of the court's
authority, or whether it is remedial, by way of a coercive
imprisonment or a compensatory fine payable to the
complainant."
Applications of this test are shown in several adjudged cases in
this Court, among them being
Worden v. Searls,
121 U. S. 14;
Doyle v. London Guarantee Co., 204 U.
S. 599;
Ex Parte Heller, 214 U.
S. 501;
Gompers v. Buck's Stove & Range Co.
supra, and
In re Christensen Engineering Co.,
194 U. S. 458. In
the last case, the defendant in a suit in equity in a circuit court
was found guilty of contempt in disobeying an interlocutory
injunction, and ordered to pay a fine of $1,000, one-half to go to
the complainant and the other half to the United States. A writ of
error whereby it was sought to have the order reviewed in the
Circuit Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Page 223 U. S. 642
was dismissed by that court for the same reason that was
assigned for the dismissal in the present case. A petition for a
writ of mandamus, commanding the reinstatement of the writ of
error, was then presented to this Court, and, upon full
consideration of the prior cases, was held to be well grounded. In
that connection, it was said:
"These authorities show that when an order imposing a fine for
violation of an injunction is substantially one to reimburse the
party injured by the disobedience, although called one in a
contempt proceeding, it is to be regarded as merely an
interlocutory order, and to be reviewed only on appeal from the
final decree. In the present case, however, the fine payable to the
United States was clearly punitive and in vindication of the
authority of the court, and, we think, as such, it dominates the
proceeding and fixes its character. Considered in that aspect, the
writ of error was justified, and the circuit court of appeals
should have taken jurisdiction."
That case differs from this only in that the portion of the fine
made punitive was there one-half, while here it is one-fourth; but
this, in our opinion, does not take this case out of the principle
applied in that, which is that the punitive feature of the order is
dominant, and fixes its character for purposes of review.
We accordingly hold that the writ of error should be reinstated,
and, as it is evident from the return that this will be done on the
expression of our opinion, our order will be,
Petitioners entitled to mandamus.
