Hallinan's early successes in court included personal injury actions against the powerful Market Street Railway Company which ran most of the trolley lines on the streets of San Francisco and was a subsidiary of northern California rail interests. The rail company also owned the system whereby jurors' lists were kept and consulted by an appointed jury commissioner, in Hallinan's time an official of the railway, and he fought against this system for years before state law made the voter rolls the sole source of jurors. Hallinan's years as a lawyer led to his selection in 1949, with a partner James Martin McInnis, to defend Harry Bridges of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union on perjury charges arising from accusations that he had once been a Communist but had denied it. After the trial, Hallinan spent six months in McNeil Island Prison for a contempt citation during the high-profile Bridges trial. He was subsequently disbarred by the State Bar of California but fought his way back into the bar after his release from jail. Hallinan ran for President of the United States in the 1952 election, as the candidate for Henry Wallace's Progressive Party and was the third highest polling candidate in the election. In 1953, he and his wife, Vivian, were indicted on 14 counts of tax evasion. After a three week trial, on November 14, 1953, Vincent was convicted on five counts of tax evasion, for evading $36,739 in federal income taxes after he reported only 20% of his income from 1947 to 1950. On December 8, 1953, he was sentenced to 18 months and a fine of $50,000 plus costs. Vivian was acquitted. Vincent visited U-2 pilot Gary Powers in Moscow soon after Powers’ conviction in the Soviet Union for espionage. He encouraged Gary to "study the Communist form of government, stating it was a "remarkable system...realizing the American system had grave flaws", and if he were to study it Gary "would learn a great deal." In his 1963 autobiography, Hallinan claimed that he was prosecuted by the IRS for his political views, and that the government did not differentiate between tax avoidance and tax evasion. Also in his autobiography he argued for prison reform and in favor of treating drug addiction as a medical condition and providing clean maintenance drugs to addicts, and legalizing prostitution; and against laws forbidding private consensual sex, contraception and abortion, and against imperialism and American foreign policy. Hallinan was the father of writer Conn M. Hallinan, San Francisco attorney Patrick Hallinan, of politician Terence Hallinan and grandfather of several, including attorneys Brendan Hallinan, Neil Hallinan, and Kate Hallinan.
