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Statement About Signing an Act on Reform of Criminal Procedures in Federal Courts.

February 25, 1933

THE PRESIDENT said:

"I have signed with great satisfaction the bill, S. 4020, to transfer to the Supreme Court of the United States the authority to prescribe rules of practice and procedure to be followed by the lower Federal courts in criminal cases after verdict. It represents the recommendations of myself and the Attorney General over the past 4 years. It realizes, in part, a quarter of a century of demands for reform in Federal criminal procedure. It should prevent well-endowed criminals, who have been convicted by juries, from delaying punishment by years of resort to sharp technicalities of judicial procedure. It will increase the respect for law."

Note: As enacted, the bill (S. 4020) is Public, No. 371 (47 Stat. 904), approved February 24, 1933.

On the same day, the White House issued a text of Attorney General William D. Mitchell's letter, dated February 24, on the reform of criminal procedures in Federal courts.

Herbert Hoover, Statement About Signing an Act on Reform of Criminal Procedures in Federal Courts. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/208155

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