Bouie v. City of Columbia

Bouie v. City of Columbia
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued October 14 – October 15, 1963 Decided June 22, 1964
Full case name	Simon Bouie and Talmadge J. Neal v. City of Columbia
Citations	378 U.S. 347 (more) 84 S. Ct. 1697, 12 L. Ed.2d 894 (1964)
Prior history	239 S.C. 570, 124 S.E.2d 332 (1962), upholding conviction for trespass
Holding
The State Supreme Court, in giving retroactive application to its new construction of the statute, deprived petitioners of their right to fair warning of a criminal prohibition, and thus violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Court membership
Chief Justice Earl Warren Associate Justices Hugo Black · William O. Douglas Tom C. Clark · John M. Harlan II William J. Brennan, Jr. · Potter Stewart Byron White · Arthur Goldberg
Case opinions
Majority	Brennan, joined by Warren, Clark, Stewart
Concurrence	Goldberg, joined by Warren
Concurrence	Douglas
Dissent	Black, joined by Harlan, White
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. XIV

Bouie v. City of Columbia, 378 U.S. 347 (1964), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that due process prohibits retroactive application of any judicial construction of a criminal statute that is unexpected and indefensible by reference to the law which has been expressed prior to the conduct in issue. This holding is based on the Fourteenth Amendment prohibition by the Due Process Clause against ex post facto laws.

On March 14, 1960, two African American students from Allen University conducted a sit-in demonstration by sitting down at a booth at the lunch counter restaurant in an Eckerd's drug store in Columbia, South Carolina. Policy at the store was to allow African Americans to shop anywhere in the store and to use any facilities with the exception of being served at the restaurant. After they sat down, an employee put up a "no trespassing sign," and the two students were asked to leave. The students were arrested on charges of breach of the peace and criminal trespass, but convicted only for trespass in violation of the state code. The trespass convictions were upheld by the South Carolina Supreme Court.

The majority opinion by Justice Brennan noted that the South Carolina trespass statute criminalized entry upon the lands of another after notice from an owner or tenant prohibiting such entry. The South Carolina Supreme Court, in upholding the convictions, had construed the statute as also covering the act of remaining on the premises of another after receiving notice to leave, a construction adopted in another case in 1961 and applied here. The Court stated that a judicial construction that has the effect of broadening the activities that constitute a crime and is applied retroactively operates precisely like an ex post facto law. As ex post facto application of criminal statutes violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Court reversed the convictions.