Source: http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/202/344/case.html
Timestamp: 2013-12-07 06:47:06
Document Index: 118964848

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1782', '§ 1782', '§ 1782', '§ 1782', '§ 1782', '§ 1782']

Burton v. United States - 202 U.S. 344 (1906) :: Justia US Supreme Court Center
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Burton v. United States - 202 U.S. 344 (1906)
Case	U.S. Supreme CourtBurton v. United States, 202 U.S. 344 (1906)Burton v. United StatesNo. 539Argued April 3, 4, 1906Decided May 21, 1906202 U.S. 344ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Where the indictment clearly discloses all the elements essential to the commission of the offense charged, and the averments are sufficient in Page 202 U. S. 345 the event of acquittal, to plead the judgment in lieu of a second prosecution for the same offense, the defendant is informed of the nature and cause of the accusation against him within the meaning of the Constitution and according to the rules of pleading, and in this case, the evidence was sufficient to justify the case's being sent to the jury, and the court below did not err in refusing to direct an acquittal, nor was there any error in the court's charge to the jury.
The facts are stated in the opinion. Page 202 U. S. 358
"SEC. 3929. The Postmaster General may, upon evidence satisfactory to him that any person or company is engaged in conducting any lottery, gift enterprise, or scheme for the distribution of money, or of any real or personal property by lot, chance, or drawing of any kind, or that any person or company is conducting any other scheme or device for obtaining money or property of any kind through the mails by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, instruct postmasters at any post office at which registered letters arrive directed to any such person or company, . . . whether such agent or representative is acting as an individual or as a firm, bank, corporation, or association of any kind, to return all such Page 202 U. S. 359 registered letters to the postmaster at the office at which they were originally mailed with the word 'fraudulent' plainly written or stamped upon the outside thereof, and all such letters so returned to such postmasters shall be by them returned to the writers thereof, under such regulations as the Postmaster General may prescribe. . . ."
"SEC. 4041. The Postmaster General may, upon evidence satisfactory to him that any person or company is engaged in conducting any lottery, gift enterprise, or scheme for the distribution of money or of any real or personal property by lot, chance, or drawing of any kind, or that any person or company is conducting any other scheme for obtaining money or property of any kind through the mails by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises, forbid the payment by any postmaster to said person or company of any postal money orders drawn to his or its order or in his or its favor, or to the agent of any such person or company, whether such agent is acting as an individual or as a firm, bank, corporation, or association of any kind, and may provide by regulation for the return to the remitters of the sums named in such money orders. . . ."
"SEC. 1782. No Senator, Representative, or Delegate, after his election and during his continuance in office, and no head of a department, or other officer or clerk in the employ of the government, shall receive or agree to receive any compensation whatever, directly or indirectly, for any services rendered, or to be rendered, to any person, either by himself or another, in relation to any proceeding, contract, claim, controversy, charge, accusation, arrest, or other matter or thing in which the United States is a party, or directly or indirectly interested, before any department, court-martial, bureau, officer, or any civil, military, or naval commission whatever. Every person offending against this section shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, Page 202 U. S. 360 and shall be imprisoned not more than two years, and fined not more than ten thousand dollars, and shall, moreover, by conviction therefor, be rendered forever thereafter incapable of holding any office of honor, trust, or profit under the government of the United States."
The plaintiff in error was indicted in the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Missouri for a violation of § 1782, the offense being alleged to have been committed at St. Louis. The accused was found guilty, and, on writ of error, the judgment was reversed by this Court, and a new trial ordered, upon the ground, among others, that, according to the facts disclosed in that case, the offense charged was not committed in the State of Missouri, where the accused was tried. Burton v. United States, 196 U. S. 283.
Subsequently, the defendant was tried under a new indictment (the present one) charging him with certain violations of § 1782. The indictment contained eight counts. Stating the case now only in a general way, the first, second, fourth, sixth, and eighth counts charged, in substance, that the defendant, a Senator of the United States, had agreed to receive compensation, namely, the sum of $2,500, for services to be rendered by him for the Rialto Grain & Securities Company, a corporation (to be hereafter called the Rialto Company) in relation to a proceeding, matter, and thing, in which the United States was interested, before the Post Office Department, those counts differing only as to the nature of the interest which the United States had in such proceeding, matter, and thing, some of the counts alleging that the United States was directly, others that it was indirectly, interested in such proceeding, matter, and thing. The third, fifth, and seventh counts charged that the defendant did receive compensation to the amount of $500 for the services alleged to have been so rendered by him, those three counts differing only as to the nature of the interest, whether direct or indirect, which the United States had in the alleged proceeding, matter, and thing before the Post Office Department. Page 202 U. S. 361
The defendant demurred to each count. The government at that stage of the prosecution dismissed the indictment as to the fourth and fifth counts, and the court overruled the demurrer as to all the other counts. The accused filed a plea in bar to the third and seventh counts. To that plea the government filed an answer, to which we will advert hereafter. A demurrer to that answer was overruled, and, defendant declining to plead further, the plea in bar was denied. He was then arraigned, tried, and found guilty on the first, second, third, sixth, seventh, and eighth counts. No judgment or sentence was pronounced on the first, second, and eighth counts because they covered the transaction and offense mentioned in the sixth count. And as the third count covered the transaction and offense embraced by the seventh count, no judgment or sentence was pronounced on it.
On the sixth count, the defendant was sentenced to be imprisoned for six months in the county jail and to pay a fine of $2,000; on the seventh, to be imprisoned for six months in the county jail and fined $500. It was declared or recited in the judgment on each of those counts that the accused, by his conviction, "is rendered forever hereafter incapable of holding any office of honor, trust, or profit under the government of the United States."
It will be well to bring out fully the allegations of the two counts upon which the sentences were based. They will show the nature of the proceeding, matter, or thing before the Post Office Department in respect of which the defendant was indicted.
The sixth count alleged that, on the eighteenth day of November, 1902, the defendant was a Senator of the United States from the State of Kansas, having been theretofore elected for a term of six years, expiring on the fourth day of March, 1907, and the Rialto Company was a corporation engaged in the business of buying, selling, and dealing in grain and securities, having its principal offices at the City of St. Louis, Missouri; that, before and on the above day, there was pending before Page 202 U. S. 362 the Post Office Department of the United States, and before the then Postmaster General of the said United States, a certain proceeding in which the United States was then indirectly interested for determining the question whether that corporation was engaged in conducting a scheme for obtaining money through the mails of the said United States by means of false and fraudulent pretenses, representations, and promises made by the said corporation, and whether the said Postmaster General should instruct the postmaster at the post office at St. Louis, the same then being a post office at which registered letters were then arriving, directed to the said corporation, to return all such letters to the postmasters at the several post offices at which they were or should thereafter be originally mailed, with the word "fraudulent" plainly written or stamped upon the outside thereof, to be by such postmasters returned to the writers thereof under the regulations of the said Post Office Department, and in the same manner to dispose of all other letters and matter sent by mail to the said post office directed to the said corporation,
"all of which the said Postmaster General might then have lawfully done, upon evidence satisfactory to him that the said corporation was engaged in conducting such a scheme to defraud as that in this count mentioned, and further that, before and on the day in this count first aforesaid, the facts pertaining to the questions in this count mentioned were under investigation by the said Post Office Department and the said Postmaster General and, on that day, were still undetermined by the said Postmaster General. And the grand jurors aforesaid, upon their oath aforesaid, do further present that the said Joseph Ralph Burton, Senator, as in this count of this indictment aforesaid, on the said eighteenth day of November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and two, after his said election as such Senator and during his continuance in office as such Senator at St. Louis, aforesaid, in the division and district aforesaid, then well knowing the proceedings in this count mentioned, in which the United States was then indirectly interested, to be, Page 202 U. S. 363 as it then still was, pending as last aforesaid, before the said Post Office Department and the said Postmaster General, and undetermined by the said Postmaster General, and then well knowing the character of that proceeding, and that the said United States was then indirectly interested in the same proceeding as last aforesaid, and then well knowing all the premises in this count set forth, unlawfully did agree with the said Rialto Grain & Securities Company, corporation as aforesaid, by and through its officers, agents, and attorneys, to receive directly from that corporation, through its officers, agents, and attorneys, certain other compensation, to-wit, the sum of $2,500, lawful money of the said United States, for certain services to be rendered by him, the said Joseph Ralph Burton, to the said corporation, in relation to the last-mentioned proceeding, in which the said United States was then indirectly interested as aforesaid, before the said Post Office Department and before the said Postmaster General, while the same proceeding was and should still be pending before the said Post Office Department and the said Postmaster General, and still undetermined by the said Postmaster General, and after his, the said Joseph Ralph Burton's, said election as such Senator, and during his continuance in office as such Senator -- that is to say, services consisting of his, the said Joseph Ralph Burton's, appearing before the said Post Office Department and before the said Postmaster General, the Chief Post Office Inspector, and the Assistant Attorney General for said Post Office Department, and other officers of said Post Office Department, as an agent of, and attorney for, the said corporation, and obtaining information for said corporation concerning said proceeding in this count mentioned, in which the United States was then indirectly interested, and by the influence of his presence and of his office as such Senator, and by statements, representations, and persuasion, inducing the said Postmaster General to believe that the said corporation was not conducting any such scheme to defraud as that last above mentioned, and to Page 202 U. S. 364 put a stop to any further investigation of the questions in this count mentioned by the said Post Office Department and by the said Postmaster General, and to refrain from determining the same adversely to the interests of the said corporation, and from instructing the said postmaster at the said post office at St. Louis aforesaid to return the registered letters, and other letters and matter sent by mail aforesaid to the postmasters at the post offices at which they were or should thereafter be originally mailed as aforesaid, with the word 'fraudulent' plainly written or stamped upon the outside thereof, as aforesaid, to be by such postmasters returned to the writers thereof as aforesaid, and also from forbidding the payment to the said corporation, by the said postmaster at the post office at St. Louis aforesaid, of postal money orders drawn to its order, or in its favor. And so the grand jurors aforesaid, upon their oath aforesaid, do say that the said Joseph Ralph Burton at the time and place, and in manner and form in this count of this indictment aforesaid, unlawfully did offend against § 1782 of the Revised Statutes of the said United States, against the peace and dignity of the said United States."
The seventh count alleged
"that, on the said twenty-sixth day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and three, the said Joseph Ralph Burton, then still being a Senator of the said United States for the said State of Kansas, as in the sixth count of this indictment set forth, and having, after his election as such Senator, and during his continuance in office, to-wit, on divers days between the said eighteenth day of November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and two, and the said twenty-sixth day of March, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and three, rendered the services in the said sixth count described, to the corporation in that count mentioned, before the Postmaster General of the said United States and before the said Post Office Department, and the same having been, as he, the said Joseph Ralph Burton, when so rendering the same, well knew, services in relation to the Page 202 U. S. 365 proceeding described in the said sixth count, in which the said United States was indirectly interested, pending, as he, the said Joseph Ralph Burton also well knew, before the said Post Office Department and Postmaster General, unlawfully did, after his said election and during his continuance in office at St. Louis aforesaid, in the said Eastern Division of the said Eastern District of Missouri, receive directly from the said corporation, through its officers, agents, and attorneys, certain compensation for the same services, that is to say $500, he, the said Joseph Ralph Burton, when so receiving such compensation for the said services, well knowing the same to have been services in relation to a proceeding pending before a department and before an officer of the government of the said United States, and well knowing the said proceeding to have been a proceeding in which the said United States was indirectly interested, and one pending before the said Post Office Department and Postmaster General, and undetermined by the said Postmaster General, as in the said sixth count is more fully set forth, against the peace and dignity of the said United States and contrary to the form of the statute of the same in such case made and provided."
Motions for new trial and in arrest of judgment having been denied, the case was brought here upon writ of error.
1. The first question to be considered is whether § 1782 is repugnant to the Constitution of the United States. This question has been the subject of extended discussion by counsel. But we cannot doubt the authority of Congress by legislation to make it an offense against the United States for a senator, after his election and during his continuance in office, to agree to receive or to receive compensation for services to be rendered or rendered to any person before a department of the government in relation to a proceeding, matter, or thing in which the United States is a party or directly or indirectly interested.
The principle that underlies § 1782 is not wholly new in our legislative history. For instance, by the Act of March 3, Page 202 U. S. 366 1863, 12 Stat. 765, c. 92, Rev.Stat. 1058, it was declared that members of Congress shall not practice in the Court of Claims. Later, Congress by statute declared that no member of or delegate to Congress shall, directly or indirectly, himself or by any other person in trust for him, or for his use or benefit, or on his account, undertake, execute, hold, or enjoy, in whole or in part, any contract or agreement made or entered into in behalf of the United States, by any officer or person authorized to make contracts on behalf of the United States, and every person violating this section was to be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and fined three thousand dollars. Rev.Stat. 3739.
Counsel for the accused insists that § 1782 is in conflict with the fundamental idea of the federal system -- namely, that the government is one
"of limited powers, with duties and restrictions imposed, and no authority is lodged anywhere to change those duties or restrictions, except the power reserved by the people."
The proposition here stated is certainly not to be disputed, for it is settled doctrine, as declared by Chief Justice Marshall and often repeated by this Court, that
Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 1 Wheat. 304, 14 U. S. 343. We do not, however, perceive that there has been in the statute before us any departure from that salutary doctrine.
It is said that the statute interferes or by its necessary operation will interfere with the legitimate authority of the Senate over its members in that a judgment of conviction under it may exclude a Senator from the Senate before his constitutional term expires, whereas, under the Constitution, a Senator is elected to serve a specified number of years, and the Senate is made by that instrument the sole judge of the qualifications of its members and, with the concurrence of two-thirds, may expel a Senator from that body. In our judgment, Page 202 U. S. 367 there in no necessary connection between the conviction of a Senator of a public offense prescribed by statute and the authority of the Senate in the particulars named. While the framers of the Constitution intended that each department should keep within its appointed sphere of public action, it was never contemplated that the authority of the Senate to admit to a seat in its body one who had been duly elected as a Senator, or its power to expel him after being admitted, should in any degree limit or restrict the authority of Congress to enact such statutes, not forbidden by the Constitution, as the public interests required for carrying into effect the powers granted to it. In order to promote the efficiency of the public service and enforce integrity in the conduct of such public affairs as are committed to the several departments, Congress, having a choice of means, may prescribe such regulations to those ends as its wisdom may suggest if they be not forbidden by the fundamental law. It possesses the entire legislative authority of the United States. By the provision in the Constitution that "all legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States" it is meant that Congress -- keeping within the limits of its powers and observing the restrictions imposed by the Constitution -- may, in its discretion, enact any statute appropriate to accomplish the objects for which the national government was established. A statute like the one before us has direct relation to those objects, and can be executed without in any degree impinging upon the rightful authority of the Senate over its members or interfering with the discharge of the legitimate duties of a Senator. The proper discharge of those duties does not require a Senator to appear before an executive department in order to enforce his particular views or the views of others in respect of matters committed to that department for determination. He may often do so without impropriety, and, so far as existing law is concerned, may do so whenever he chooses, provided he neither agrees to receive nor receives compensation for such services. Congress, when passing this statute, knew as indeed Page 202 U. S. 368 everybody may know, that executive officers are apt, and not unnaturally, to attach great, sometimes perhaps undue, weight to the wishes of Senators and Representatives. Evidently the statute has for its main object to secure the integrity of executive action against undue influence upon the part of members of that branch of the government whose favor may have much to do with the appointment to, or retention in, public position of those whose official action it is sought to control or direct. The evils attending such a situation are apparent, and are increased when those seeking to influence executive officers are spurred to action by hopes of pecuniary reward. There can be no reason why the government may not, by legislation, protect each department against such evils -- indeed, against everything, from whatever source it proceeds -- that tends or may tend to corruption or i