Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/92384/lamar-vs-united-states
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 04:44:47+00:00

Document:
The circuit court of appeals has no power to compel a party, who has prosecuted both a direct appeal from this Court under § 238, Judicial Code, and a writ of error from the circuit court of appeals, to elect which method he will pursue, and, in default of his withdrawing the direct appeal, to dismiss the writ of error.
While the general rule, when this Court reverses a decision of the circuit court of appeals wholly on the question of its jurisdiction, is to remand the case to that court without passing upon the merits, this Court has the power to, and, in exceptional cases such as the present, will, determine the merits.
While a penal provision may not be enlarged by interpretation, it must not be so narrowed as to fail to give full effect to its plain terms, as made manifest by its text and context.
A member of the House of Representatives is an officer of the United States within the meaning of § 32 of the Penal Code.
Section 32 of the Penal Code prohibits and punishes the false assuming, with the intention to defraud, to be an officer or employee of the United States, and also the doing in the falsely assumed character of any overt act to carry out the fraudulent intent whether it would have been legally authorized had the assumed capacity existed or not.
The indictment in this case clearly charges the fraudulent intent under § 32 of the Penal Code, and is sufficient under § 1025, Revised Statutes.
criminality under § 32, Penal Code, and there was no error in refusing an instruction to acquit and in submitting the case to the jury.
There was no lack of jurisdiction of this case in the district court because the trial was presided over by a judge of a different district assigned to the court for trial conformably to the act of October 3, 1913, c. 18, 38 Stat. 203.
The facts, which involve the jurisdiction of this Court, and of the circuit court of appeals, the construction of § 32 of the Penal Code, and the power of assignment of a judge of one district to preside over the district court of another district under the Act of October 3, 1913, are stated in the opinion.
Charged in the trial court (Southern District of New York) by an indictment containing two counts with violating § 32 of the Penal Code, the petitioner was convicted, and, on December 3d 1914, sentenced to two years' imprisonment in the penitentiary. The trial was presided over by the District Judge of the Western District of Michigan, assigned to duty in the district conformable to the provisions of § 18 of the Judicial Code [36 Stat. 1089, chap. 231], as amended by the act of Congress of October 3, 1913 (c. 18, 38 Stat. 203). To the conviction and sentence in January following, error was directly prosecuted from this Court, the assignments of error assuming that there was involved not only a question of the jurisdiction of the court as a federal court, but also constitutional questions. For the purpose of the writ, one of the district judges of the Southern District of New York gave a certificate as to the existence and character of the question of jurisdiction, evidently with the intention of conforming to § 238 of the Judicial Code.
the ground that its prosecution was inconsistent with the writ sued out from this Court, entered an order providing for dismissal unless the plaintiff in error within ten days elected which of the two writs of error he would rely upon, and subsequently, before the expiration of the time stated, the court declined to comply with the request of the plaintiff in error that the questions at issue be certified to this Court. On October 29, 1915, the election required of the plaintiff in error not having been made, the writ of error was dismissed.
On January 31st, 1916, the writ of error prosecuted from this Court came under consideration as the result of a motion to dismiss, and finding that there was no question concerning the jurisdiction of the trial court within the intendment of the statute and no constitutional question, the writ was dismissed for want of jurisdiction. 240 U. S. 240 U.S. 60. Thereupon the plaintiff in error in the court below asked that the cause be reinstated and heard, and, upon the refusal of the request, an application was made to this Court for leave to file a petition for mandamus to compel such action, and, if not, for the allowance of a certiorari, and although the former application was denied, the case is here because of the allowance of the latter remedy.
not real, and therefore afforded no basis for the refusal of the court to determine the validity of the writ of error pending before it, and to decide the case if it deemed it had jurisdiction. Indeed, if it be conceded that the situation arising from the pendency of the two writs created doubt, that concession would not change the result, since we are of opinion that the power to have certified to this Court the jurisdictional or other questions as to which the doubt existed was the remedy created by the statute to meet such a situation, and to obviate the possibility of denying to the plaintiff in error the right to a review which, again, it must be borne in mind, the statute gave under one or the other of the two writs.
although it is now established that there was no foundation whatever for allowing it, and because of the resulting complexity of the question as to whether the jurisdiction of this Court had not attached to the subject matter and excluded the advisability, if not the power, on the part of the court below to certify to this Court the question of which writ of error was paramount when, of necessity, a certificate involving the solution of that question had already been made by the district judge. We therefore dispose of the merits, restating the case so far as may be essential.
"with intent to defraud either the United States or any person, shall falsely assume or pretend to be an officer or employee acting under the authority of the United States, or any Department, or any officer of the government thereof, and shall take upon himself to act as such, or shall in such pretended character demand or obtain from any person or from the United States, or any Department, or any officer of the government thereof any money, paper, document, or other valuable thing,"
"unlawfully, knowingly and feloniously did falsely assume and pretend to be an officer of the government of the United States, to-wit, a member of the House of Representatives of the Congress of the United States of America, that is to say, A. Mitchell Palmer, a member of Congress representing the Twenty-sixth District of the State of Pennsylvania, with the intent, then and there, to defraud Lewis Cass Ledyard,"
"and the said defendant, then and there, with the intent and purpose aforesaid, did take upon himself to act as such member of Congress against the peace,"
We consider the contentions relied upon for reversal separately.
1. It is insisted that no offense under the statute was stated in the indictment because a member of the House of Representatives of the United States is not an officer acting under the authority of the United States within the meaning of the provision of the Penal Code upon which the indictment was based. This contention is supported by reference to what is assumed to be the significance in one or more provisions of the Constitution of the words "civil officers," and reliance is specially placed upon the ruling made at an early day in the Blount case (Wharton's State Trials, p. 20) that a Senator of the United States was not a civil officer subject to impeachment within the meaning of § 4 of Article II of the Constitution. But, as previously held in sustaining the motion to dismiss the direct writ of error, the issue here is not a constitutional one, but who is an officer acting under the authority of the United States within the provisions of the section of the Penal Code under consideration? And that question must be solved by the text of the provision, not shutting out as an instrument of interpretation proper light which may be afforded by the Constitution, and not forgetting that a penal statute is not to be enlarged by interpretation, but also not unmindful of the fact that a statute, because it is penal, is not to be narrowed by construction so as to fail to give full effect to its plain terms as made manifest by its text and its context. United States v. Hartwell, 6 Wall. 385, 73 U. S. 395 ; United States v. Corbett, 215 U. S. 233 , 215 U. S. 242 -243.
we think is not the case -- all ground for doubt would be removed by the following considerations: (a) because, prior to and at the time of the original enactment in question, the common understanding that a member of the House of Representatives was a legislative officer of the United States was clearly expressed in the ordinary, as well as legal, dictionaries. See Webster, verbo "office;" Century Dictionary verbo "officer;" 2 Bouvier's Law Dict. 1897 ed. 540, verbo "legislative officers;" Black's Law Dict.2d ed. p. 710, verbo "legislative officer." (b) Because, at or before the same period in the Senate of the United States, after considering the ruling in the Blount case, it was concluded that a member of Congress was a civil officer of the United States within the purview of the law requiring the taking of an oath of office. (Cong.Globe, 38th Congress, 1st session, pt. 1, pp. 320-331). (c) Because also in various general statutes of the United States at the time of the enactment in question, a member of Congress was assumed to be a civil officer of the United States. Revised Statutes, §§ 1786, 2010, and subdivision 14 of § 563. (d) Because that conclusion is the necessary result of prior decisions of this Court, and harmonizes with the settled conception of the position of members of state legislative bodies as expressed in many state decisions. The Floyd Acceptances, 7 Wall. 666, 74 U. S. 676 ; Ex Parte Yarbrough, 110 U. S. 58 , 110 U. S. 64 ; Wiley v. Sinkler, 179 U. S. 58 , 179 U. S. 64 ; Swafford v. Templeton, 185 U. S. 487 , 185 U. S. 492 ; People v. Common Council, 77 N.Y. 503, 507-508; Morrill v. Haines, 2 N.H. 246; Shelby v. Alcorn, 36 Miss. 273, 291; Parks v. Soldiers' & Home, 22 Colo. 86, 96.
to limit the application of the clause as shown by its general language and as manifested by the remedial purpose which led to its enactment (Cong.Rec. vol. 14, pt. 4, p. 3263, 47th Cong.2d Sess.); (c) because to adopt a contrary view would be absolutely inharmonious with the context, since it would bring into play a conflict impossible of reconciliation. To make this clear, it is to be observed that the last clause of the section makes criminal the demanding or obtaining in the assumed capacity which the first clause prohibits, "from any person or from the United States, . . . any money, paper, document, or other valuable thing. . . ." We say which the first clause prohibits because there is no reexpression of the prohibition against assuming or pretending contained in the first clause except as that prohibition is carried over and made applicable to the second by the words "or shall in such pretended character demand," etc. As it is obvious that the acts made absolutely criminal by the second clause are acts which may or may not have been accomplished as the result of exerting in the pretended capacity an authority which there would have been a lawful right to exert if the character had been real, and not assumed, it results not only that the conflict which we have indicated would arise from adopting the construction claimed, but the error of such contention as applied to the first clause is conclusively demonstrated.
upon himself to act as such by visiting a named person for the purpose of carrying out the intended fraud, and, on the other hand, under the second clause of the section, with having, by means of the same false personation, obtained a sum of money. The case came here to review the action of the court below in sustaining a demurrer to the indictment as stating no offense because there was no authorized employee of the character which had been falsely assumed, and no legal authority, therefore, to have done the overt acts with which either count was concerned. The judgment was reversed under the express ruling that the existence of the office or the authority was not essential, as the assuming or pretending to be and act as an officer or employee of the United States was within the purview of the statute, and necessarily embraced within its prohibitions.
the case is clearly covered by § 1025, Revised Statutes. Connors v. United States, 158 U. S. 408 , 158 U. S. 411 ; Armour Packing Co. v. United States, 209 U. S. 56 , 209 U. S. 84 ; New York Central R. Co. v. United States, 212 U. S. 481 , 212 U. S. 497 ; Holmgren v. United States, 217 U. S. 509 , 217 U. S. 523 .
4. It is insisted that there was no proof whatever tending to show an intent to defraud or to establish criminality under the section relied upon, and therefore there should have been an instruction to acquit. Insofar as the proposition concerns the absence of proof of the doing of an overt act which was authorized by law, and therefore relates to the wrongful construction of the statute which we have previously pointed out, it is disposed of by what was said on that subject. As to the want of any evidence justifying the submission of the case to the jury on the question of the criminal intent relied upon or of the acts charged, we content ourselves with the statement that, after a close scrutiny of the record, we are of the opinion that the contention is wholly without merit and that the case was clearly one where the proof was of such a character as to justify its being submitted to the jury for its consideration.
Southern District of New York conformably to the statute (Oct. 3, 1913, c. 18, 38 Stat. 203), and that the effect of such assignment under the statute was virtually to destroy the Southern District of New York by creating a new district whose boundaries were undefined, thus violating the rights secured to the accused by the Sixth Amendment, since he was subjected to trial in a district not established when the offense with which he was charged was committed. In fact, the further contention is made that to assign a judge of one district and one circuit to perform duty in another district of another circuit was in substance to usurp the power of appointment and confirmation vested by the Constitution in the President and Senate. As to the first of these contentions, we think it suffices to say that it rests upon a construction of the words of the statute authorizing the assignment of a judge of one district and circuit to duty in another district and circuit which is wholly unfounded, and which rests upon a premise conflicting with the practice of the government under the Constitution substantially from the beginning. As to the second contention, we think merely to state it suffices to demonstrate its absolute unsoundness.
MR. JUSTICE McREYNOLDS took no part in the consideration or decision of this cause.

References: § 238
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 § 18
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 § 563
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 § 1025
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