Feliciana sentinel. [volume] (St. Francisville, La.) 1877-1892, 1878-03-30

| from the shortness Of the period during
| which tho court held the case under con.
| stleration. A conviction that you will
| rect those errors if I am aLle to make
them apparent omboldens ,ne to lay bc
| fore you this application. .rg g., .
The constitution gives you an appel
! atejurisd;ction in criminal cases only up
Oh questions purely Of law. You cauno1
try an issne of fact. Whether particu
lar document is or is not q record is il
! every case necessarily, q question to b
settled by evidence, Take the document
Under discussion and suppose that on it,
face it should not appear to be n record
would not proof that it has been Offered
and received III, evidence. ina court OF
| Justice make it at once a public record
| and constitute its alteration Grim nn-
der the statutef Is not this too plain fdr
discussion? This question is settled III
the able opinion Of Chief Justice Parker
of tho Supreme Court of Massachusetts,
| ono Of the very first jurists of this cou,'-
| try and age. In the case Of Breen VS..
Woodbury.; reported in 1st Pickering,
| 365, the question arose as to whether a
particular instrument which was alleged
to have been forged and altered, was or
was not record-ju Just as that question
has arisen here-and the court says:
"a record IS conclusive evidence but
chat is or is not a record is matter Of eri-
denec and may be prored like other facts J;
otherwise there ,could be no remedy"
1t is evident that the judges charge to
the jury as to what constituted u record
and the means by which they were to
reach conclusion upon this point, was the
sole matter for rerie,o in this court. If the
charge upon that point was sufficient,
the finding Of the jury under it is beyond
Your reach, because it necessarily en-
braces an inquiry into the facts connect
cd with the document. No better illus
tration of the Importance of this pIinci-
pie could be found than that presented
by this very case. The jury reached the
conclusion that this paper was a record,
not only from what appeared upon its
face, but from the proof Of several wit.
ncsses, that this particular document had
been received by the board Of returning
officers as a record, acted upon by them
as such, yfalsifed as such, and finally car
rietl into their compilations as such, and
made, with other documents of the same
kind, the basis Of that gigantic fraud by
which the voice Of the people of this
great country was tushed, and tho will.
of four men enthroned at Washington.
fla document formidable enough to ac
complish all this evil is not a record,
what is i:
1t is useless to say that tho forgery of
these con ;olidatcd statements could
cause no injury. That forgery did cause
g, eat and irreparable injury, 1t not on
ly deprived Individuals Of rights, but i:
actually overthrow government which
had been elected by the people. All this
the jury knew, but you could not know
as q court, because, under the constitu-
tion, you cannot notice any matter of
fact in 81 criminal case. And from all
this it plainly appears that this court
ought not to have interfered with the
finding of the jury upon this point.
But assuming, for argument sake, that
the court had a right to pass upon this
question. The statute is, that any per-
son who shall utter and publish as true
any false, altered, forged or counterfeit
cd record with intent to defraud any per-
son shall, on conviction, etc.
The paper charged to have been alter
ed or falsifled is a paper which tue super
visor of1regist ration of every parish is
required to make after each election IN
the State. This officer is charged to re-
ceiyo from the commissioners OF election
at the different polling places their GER
tificates and returns. He is required to
examine these papers and report the re-
suite of the election in the parish at
large, in what is termed consolidated
statement in the act. Tho returns to
him and his consolidated statement he is
required to send to the Returning Board.
The fact that this consolidated state
ment has been altered and falsitied by
tho defendant has been established by
the verdict of the jury. The question is
| whether this paper comes within the
purview and scope of the statute!
At the common law, forgery consisted
of the altering Of writing traudulentiy
to injure another, the purpose being to
! give to tho writing IN operation which,
| in truth, it ought not to have. At the
| common law the counterfeiting or alter
| ing of any authentic matter OF a plbllc
nature was Il forgery, because all publIc
| matter which tho law requires to DC an-
thenticated if falsiiied OF co"hter1e!''"'
is presumptivcly pcrnicious, and tends
to the injury Of the commonwealth. Inc
instances put Of such papers are certlh-
| l,to do