Takeaway
In short, Patterson reflects the Court's pre-incorporation view that states retained broad power to punish criticism thought to obstruct pending judicial proceedings, even when the criticism was alleged to be true.
Thomas M. Patterson published newspaper articles and a cartoon criticizing the Colorado Supreme Court while election-related cases were still subject to motions for rehearing. The publications suggested that the court had acted unconstitutionally and as part of a partisan scheme to remove elected Democratic officeholders and install Republican candidates, including the governor.
Colorado proceeded against Patterson for contempt, alleging that the publications impugned the court's motives and conduct in pending cases and were intended to interfere with the impartial administration of justice. Patterson admitted publishing the material but denied contempt. He asserted that the cases were no longer pending except for the remaining period to seek rehearing, defended the truth of his accusations, and claimed a constitutional right to prove that truth.
The Colorado Supreme Court rejected Patterson's objections and, on the basis of his answer, entered judgment finding him in contempt and imposing a fine. Patterson sought review in the United States Supreme Court, invoking the Fourteenth Amendment and arguing that the contempt judgment violated freedom of speech and of the press.
Issue #1
Whether the Fourteenth Amendment permitted the Supreme Court to reexamine Colorado's application of state procedural law, including whether the contempt information required a supporting affidavit and whether the underlying cases remained pending.
Holding
No. Those questions were matters of Colorado law and did not, by themselves, present a federal constitutional issue for Supreme Court review.
Reasoning
The Due Process Clause does not incorporate every particular requirement of a state constitution or state procedural law and make a state court's application of those requirements reviewable as a federal question. Thus, Patterson's claim that the information initially lacked an affidavit raised only an issue of local law.
Colorado also could decide for itself when a case remained pending for purposes of contempt. The State could treat a case as pending while a petition for rehearing remained possible, or while the court retained power to modify its judgment, without violating the federal Constitution.
Issue #2
Whether a state court's alleged departure from its own earlier precedents violated the Fourteenth Amendment.
Holding
No. A state court's legal decision does not ordinarily violate due process merely because it is erroneous or departs from prior state decisions.
Reasoning
Patterson argued that the Colorado Supreme Court had abandoned settled precedents to achieve a partisan result. The Court held that disagreement with a state court's interpretation or change of its own law ordinarily does not create a federal constitutional claim.
There is no general constitutional right to have judicially adopted legal propositions remain permanently unchanged. Even a mistaken or sharp departure from earlier state precedent is not, without exceptional circumstances, a deprivation of due process.
Issue #3
Whether Colorado could punish Patterson's publications as contempt on the asserted ground that they interfered with the administration of justice.
Holding
Yes. The record did not show that Colorado had arbitrarily treated innocent conduct as contempt, and the definition of contempt was generally a question of state law.
Reasoning
Patterson's answer did more than offer a benign reading of the articles and cartoon: it elaborated the accusations against the court and maintained that he had acted from a public duty to expose an alleged political scheme. In that context, the Court found no basis to conclude that the State had arbitrarily seized upon innocent expression as a pretext for punishment.
What conduct constitutes contempt, as well as the period during which contempt may occur, is ordinarily governed by local law. The federal Constitution would be implicated only by an extreme case in which plainly innocent conduct were arbitrarily punished, and Patterson had not established such a case.
Issue #4
Whether the federal Constitution gave Patterson a right to prove the truth of his criticisms of the Colorado Supreme Court and barred contempt punishment for their publication.
Holding
No. Even assuming that the Fourteenth Amendment protected speech and press freedoms against state action, those protections did not prevent subsequent punishment for publications that a court found obstructive of pending judicial proceedings.
Reasoning
The Court expressly declined to decide whether the Fourteenth Amendment contained a protection of speech and press equivalent to the First Amendment's restriction on Congress. It assumed that proposition in Patterson's favor, but concluded that his claim would still fail.
In the Court's view, the central historical function of constitutional press protections was to forbid prior restraints on publication, not to forbid every later punishment for expression deemed harmful to the public welfare. Under the traditional law of criminal libel, truth did not necessarily bar subsequent punishment.
That principle applied even more strongly to contempt. A publication accusing a witness in a pending case of perjury could obstruct justice even if the accusation were true, because verdicts must rest on evidence and argument presented in court rather than outside influence. The same concern could apply to public attacks on a court's reasoning or motives while a matter remained before it.
Once a case is over, judges may be criticized like other public officials. But a court may punish publications concerning matters still before it when it reasonably regards them as tending to interfere with the judicial process.
Issue #5
Whether due process barred the Colorado Supreme Court from adjudicating contempt based on publications attacking the court itself.
Holding
No. Contempt power serves an impersonal institutional interest in protecting the administration of justice, and Patterson received notice and an opportunity to be heard.
Reasoning
Although the publications personally criticized the Colorado justices, contempt is punished to protect the judicial process rather than to vindicate private feelings. A litigant cannot obtain immunity from the proper tribunal simply by coupling allegedly obstructive conduct with a personal attack on the judges.
The Court also emphasized that Patterson had his day in court and an opportunity to answer the charge. Its examination of the record revealed no violation of a right secured by the federal Constitution, so it dismissed the writ of error.