336
Stevens, J., dissenting
The Court interpreted the right to interstate travel more generously in Griffin. It wrote:
"Under these allegations it is open to the petitioners to prove at trial that they had been engaging in interstate travel or intended to do so, that their federal right to travel interstate was one of the rights meant to be disto find a specific intent requirement for actions under 42 U. S. C. § 1983. See Monroe, 365 U. S., at 187; see also id., at 206-207 (Frankfurter, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). Section 1983, like § 1985(3), was enacted as part of the Ku Klux Act of 1871 and provides for civil enforcement of federal rights. The pattern is clear: The criminal statutes, 18 U. S. C. § 241 and 18 U. S. C. § 242, require specific intent to violate a right; the civil statutes, 42 U. S. C. § 1983 and 42 U. S. C. § 1985(3), do not.
The Court's repeated invocation of the word "aim" simply does not support its attempt to manufacture a specific intent requirement out of whole cloth. As the Court observes, Carpenters v. Scott, 463 U. S. 825 (1983), uses the expression "aimed at," id., at 833. Carpenters does not relate this phrase to a specific intent requirement, nor does it in any other way suggest that an action under § 1985(3) requires proof of specific intent. Griffin also uses the phrase "aim at"; there, the Court states: "The conspiracy, in other words, must aim at a deprivation of the equal enjoyment of rights secured by the law to all." 403 U. S., at 102 (emphasis added). Unlike Carpenters, Griffin does discuss whether § 1985(3) requires specific intent. In the footnote appended to the very sentence that contains the phrase "aim at," the Court explains: "The motivation aspect of § 1985(3) focuses not on scienter in relation to deprivation of rights but on invidiously discriminatory animus." 403 U. S., at 102, n. 10. Today, in insisting that § 1985(3) requires specific intent to violate a right, the Court contradicts Griffin and finds that one of the mental elements of § 1985(3) does relate to "scienter in relation to deprivation of rights." In seeking to justify this departure from precedent, the Court describes the passage in Griffin that includes this Court's only discussion of specific intent in relation to § 1985(3) as "supremely" irrelevant, ante, at 276, n. 6. I gather this means that only the Supreme Court could find it irrelevant; lower courts have been more reluctant to ignore Griffin's plain language, see Fisher v. Shamburg, 624 F. 2d 156, 158, n. 2 (CA10 1980); Cameron v. Brock, 473 F. 2d 608, 610 (CA6 1973); Azar v. Conley, 456 F. 2d 1382, 1385-1386 (CA6 1972); Weiss v. Patrick, 453 F. Supp. 717, 723 (R. I.), aff'd, 588 F. 2d 818 (CA1 1978), cert. denied, 442 U. S. 929 (1979).
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