thus punishing a member of an identifiable group
without a determination of guilt at any time.
B. Laws Not Bills of Attainder
Nixon v. Administrator of General Services, 433 U.S.
425 (1977). Congress passed a law, the Presidential
Recordings and Materials Preservation Act, which
deprived Richard Nixon, by name, of his presidential
papers and put them into the custody of the General
Services Administration. Held: The Act was not a bill of
attainder because: 1) while the Act refers to Richard
Nixon by name, he constitutes a “legitimate class of one”;
and 2) the act was not punitive.
In re Disciplinary Proceedings Against Schmidt, 79 N.J.
344 (1979). A New Jersey law provided that an applicant
for a liquor license could not be disqualified or
discriminated against due to conviction for a crime,
unless the crime adversely affected the business for which
the license was sought. Pflaumer, sole stockholder and
president of defendant corporation, had pled guilty to
transporting improperly labeled beer as a result of which
defendant’s corporation lost its liquor license. Held: a
statutory exclusion made on the basis of prior criminal
conviction is no further implication of guilt than the
original criminal conviction.
Matter of Corruzzi, 95 N.J. 557 (1984). The New
Jersey Legislature amended the statute mandating
judicial removal, N.J.S.A. 2A:1B-5, to permit the
Supreme Court to continue withholding judge’s salaries
pending completion of removal actions, beyond the 90-
day period under prior statute. Defendant, a judge
removed from office for accepting bribes, challenged the
statute as a bill of attainder. Held: the mere fact that the
judge’s case prompted the Legislative action does not
invalidate the statute as a bill of attainder.
Selective Service Systems v. Minnesota Public Interest
Research Group, 468 U.S. 841 (1984). Congress passed
a law which denied financial assistance to male college
students who fail to register for the draft, but provided a
hearing to determine whether applicant had registered.
The United States Supreme Court established the
following three-part test to determine if a statute is a bill
of attainder: (1) whether the challenged statute falls
within the historical meaning of legislative punishment;
(2) whether the statute, ‘viewed in terms of the type of
severity of burdens imposed, reasonably can be said to
further nonpunitive legislative purposes’; and (3)
whether the legislative record ‘evinces a congressional
intent to punish.’ Id. at 643. Held: Statute does not
meet the above criteria and, therefore, is not a bill of
attainder.
Coalition of New Jersey Sportsmen, Inc. v. Whitman, 44
F.Supp.2d 666, 692-693 (D.N.J. 1999). New Jersey’s
assault firearms ban does not constitute a bill of attainder.Doe v. Poritz, 142 N.J. 1, 76-77 (1995). New
Jersey’s Registration and Community Notification Laws
(N.J.S.A. 2C:7-1 to -5 and N.J.S.A. 2C:7-6 to -11,
respectively), requiring certain convicted sex offenders to
register with law enforcement authorities and providing
for notice of the presence of such offenders in the
community, do not violate the Bill of Attainder Clause.
See also Artway v. Attorney General of New Jersey, 876
F.Supp. 666, 683-684 (D.N.J. 1995).State v. Bey, 129 N.J. 557, 619 (1992). In 1985, the
Legislature amended N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3c(4)(a) (the “prior
murder” aggravating factor provision of the New Jersey
Death Penalty Statute) to allow the State to introduce, at
a penalty phase trial, a prior murder conviction still on
appeal. Held: The statute, as amended, does not
constitute a bill of attainder. Although the amendment
was a response to decisions affecting two particular
defendants, including defendant Bey, it changed the law
for all capital defendants and did not affect legislative
determinations of guilt for any particular defendant or
group of defendants.Ayers v. New Jersey Department of Corrections, 251 N.J.
Super. 223, 229-230 (App. Div. 1991). Forfeiture of
public employment as a result of a criminal conviction,
pursuant to N.J.S.A. 2C:51-2, is not a bill of attainder.United States ex rel. Conklin v. Beyer, 678 F.Supp.
1109 (D.N.J. 1988). While in prison, petitioner was
charged and found guilty of stabbing another inmate at
the prison. After a disciplinary hearing, a parole board
hearing officer imposed a one-month extension on
petitioner’s parole ineligibility. Subsequently,
petitioner was found guilty of other disciplinary charges,
including possession of a weapon and threatening. After
another disciplinary hearing, the parole board extended
petitioner’s parole ineligibility for six more months.
Petitioner argued that a parole board’s decision to
increase a parole ineligibility period violates the
Constitution as a bill of attainder. In rejecting this
argument, the court noted that the parole board does not
take action until guilt has been established at a
disciplinary proceeding, and that “the parole board does
not find petitioner guilty again in its proceedings.”