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HUMAN TRAFFICKING AND SMUGGLING (continued)

Peonage (continued)

Case Law Interpreting Section 1581
Turner v. Unification Church, 473 F. Supp. 367 (D.R.I. 1978).
While McNabb Associates, P.C. does not deal with civil litigation, Turner is still a good case to look in interpreting section 1581. The plaintiff in Turner attempted to create a civil cause of action from the criminal statute 18 U.S.C. §1581, claiming that she had been held in a condition of peonage. However, her complaint failed to show that she was being held in peonage, "[i].e., performing compulsory service based upon the indebtedness of the peon to the master." Turner at 375 (emphasis added). Indebtedness is an indispensable element of peonage, and without some proof of it, the provisions of section 1581 cannot apply. Id.

Furthermore, the court found that no federal civil cause of action could arise under 18 U.S.C. §1581 because there was no apparent Congressional intent that there should be a civil cause of action for peonage, and furthermore, "[c]onsidering the explicit state and federal civil causes of action that may be available to [plaintiff]," it was appropriate to relegate her to those remedies. Id. at 376. There is likely still no civil remedy under section 1581. When Congress enacted 18 U.S.C. §1595, they explicitly created a civil remedy only for violations of sections 1589, 1590, and 1591. If state action is involved, the plaintiff may be able to make a 42 U.S.C. §1983 claim, but otherwise, there is no specific provision for a civil action under section 1581.

42 U.S.C. §1994
Before moving onto other discussions of forced labor and the ancillary statutes that involve forced labor, 42 U.S.C. §1994, the Anti-Peonage Act which works in conjunction with 18 U.S.C. §1581, needs to be discussed because there is some apparent controversy about whether or not state action is required.

Section 1994 established that the "holding of any person to service or labor under the system known as peonage is abolished and forever prohibited in any Territory or State of the United States." Furthermore, any law established to maintain or enforce peonage is null and void.

Case Law Interpreting Section 1994
The Supreme Court of the United States has held that there does not need to be state action to prosecute a peonage case. See United States v. Gaskin, 320 U.S. 527, 528 (1944) ("The Act was passed … to implement the Thirteenth Amendment and is directed at individuals whether or not acting under color of law or ordinance."), and Clyatt v. United States, 197 U.S. 207, 218 (1905) (Congress may enforce the Thirteenth Amendment by direct legislation, operative wherever the sovereignty of the United States extends, being valid and applicable "to the case of any person holding another in a state of peonage, ... whether there be ... state law sanctioning such holding."). In civil cases, however, where the plaintiff attempts to make a section 1983 civil rights claim, courts have interpreted section 1994 to mean that a person must show some state responsibility for the abuse complained of. See Craine v. Alexander, 756 F.2d 1070, 1074 (5th Cir. 1985) (unsuccessful plaintiff cited no law, resolution, or regulation of state as being source of the alleged peonage); Likewise, prisoners who are forced into labor cannot raise section 1983 claims, and such conditions do not violate the Thirteenth Amendment. Ali v. Johnson, 259 F.3d 317, 318 (5th Cir. 2001).

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