Pierce Butler

“ The statute does not declare every member to be a 'gangster' or punishable as such. Under it, no member is a gangster or offender unless convicted of being a disorderly person or of crime as specified. It cannot be said that the court intended to give 'gangster' a meaning broad enough to include anyone who had not been so convicted or to limit its meaning to the field covered by the words that it found in a dictionary, 'roughs, hireling criminals, thieves, or the like'. ”

“ If actual membership is required, that status must be established as a fact, and the word 'known' would be without significance. If reputed membership is enough, there is uncertainty whether that reputation must be general or extend only to some persons. And the statute fails to indicate what constitutes membership or how one may join a 'gang'.
The challenged provision condemns no act or omission; the terms it employs to indicate what it purports to denounce are so vague, indefinite and uncertain that it must be condemned as repugnant to the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. ”

“ The latter interpretation would include some obviously not within the statute and would exclude some plainly covered by it.
The lack of certainty of the challenged provision is not limited to the word 'gang' or to its dependent 'gangster'. Without resolving the serious doubts arising from the generality of the language, we assume that the clause 'any person not engaged in any lawful occupation' is sufficient to identify a class to which must belong all capable of becoming gangsters within the terms of the provision. ”