Anderson v. United States

• Decision Date: 18 October 1920
• Citation: 269 F. 65
• Parties: ANDERSON et al. v. UNITED STATES. [1]
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

269 F. 65

ANDERSON et al. v. UNITED STATES. ^[1]

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

October 18, 1920

Rehearing Denied January 17, 1921.

This case is a consolidation of writs of error sued out by the plaintiffs in error from the judgment against them upon a verdict of guilty under four counts of the indictment, the sufficiency of each of which to constitute a crime is challenged by the respective plaintiffs in error. If that contention be well founded, it is, of course, clear that the judgment must be reversed, whether or not we are at liberty to consider the bill of exceptions.

The first count alleges in effect the existence of a state of war between the United States and the Imperial German government and that in those circumstances the defendants, with other persons therein named and with others to the grand jurors unknown, throughout a certain designated period and within the jurisdiction of the court below, entered into a conspiracy to be force prevent, hinder, and delay the execution of certain specified laws of the United States, all of which laws were enacted in support and furtherance of the said war, and that throughout the said period and theretofore there existed a certain organization of persons under the name of 'Industrial Workers of the World, commonly called 'I.W.W.'s,' 'The One Big Union,' and 'O.B.U.'; that said organization during said period has been composed of a large number of persons, to wit 200,000 persons, distributed in all parts of the United States, being almost exclusively laborers in the many branches of industry necessary to the existence and welfare of the people of the United States and of their government among others the transportation, mining, meat-packing, canning, lumbering, and farming industries, and the live stock, fruit, vegetables, and cotton-raising industries; that said defendants during said period have been members of said organization, and among those known in said organization as 'Militant Members of the Working Class' and 'Rebels,' holding various offices, employments, and agencies therein; and that in their said membership, office, employments, and agencies said defendants during said period of time, with the special purpose of preventing and hindering and delaying the execution of said laws, severally have been actively engaged in managing and conducting the affairs of said association, propagating its principles by written, printed, and verbal exhortations, and accomplishing its objects, which are now here explained, and thereby and in so doing during said period, throughout the United States and in said division and district, have engaged in and have attempted to accomplish, and in part have accomplished, the objects of the unlawful and felonious conspiracy aforesaid.

'And the grand jurors aforesaid, upon their oaths aforesaid, do further present, that said organization, before and during said period of time, has been one for supposedly advancing the interests of laborers as a class (by members of said organization called 'the workers' and 'the proletariat'), and giving them complete control and ownership of all property, and of the means of producing and distributing property, through the abolition of all other classes of society (by the members of said organization designated as 'capitalists,' the 'capitalistic class,' 'the master class,' 'the ruling class,' 'exploiters of the workers,' 'bourgeois' and 'parasites'), such abolition to be accomplished, not by political action, or with any regard for right or wrong, but by the continual and persistent use and employment of unlawful, tortious, and forcible means and methods, involving threats, assaults, injuries, intimidations, and murders upon the persons, and the injury and destruction (known in said organization as 'sabotage,' 'direct action,' 'working on the job,' 'wearing the wooden shoes,' 'working the saboat,' and 'slowing down tactics') of the property, of such other classes, the forcible resistance to the execution of all laws, and finally the forcible revolutionary overthrow of all existing governmental authority, in the United States, use of which said first-mentioned means and methods was principally to accompany local strikes, industrial strikes, and general strikes of such laborers, and use of all of which said means and methods was to be made in reckless and utter disregard of the rights of all persons not members of said organization, and especially of the right of the United States to execute its above-enumerated laws, and with especial and particular design on the part of said defendants of seizing the opportunity presented by the desire and necessity of the United States expeditiously and successfully to carry on its said war, and by the consequent necessity for all laborers throughout the United States in said branches of industry to continue at and faithfully to perform their work for putting said unlawful, tortious, and forcible methods for accomplishing said object of said organization into practice, said defendants well knowing, as they have, during said period, well known and intended, that the necessary effect of their so doing would be, as it in fact has been, to hinder and delay and in part to prevent the execution of said laws above enumerated, through interference with the production and manufacture of divers articles, to wit, munitions, ships, fuel, subsistence supplies, clothing, shelter, and equipment required and necessary for the military and naval forces of the United States in carrying on said war, and of the materials necessary for such manufacture, and through interference with the procurement of such articles and materials, by the United States, through purchases, and through orders and contracts for immediate and future delivery thereof, between the United States and persons, firms, and corporations too numerous to be here named (if their names were known to said grand jurors), and through interference with and the prevention of the transportation of such articles and of said military and naval forces; and that said organization, as said defendants during said period of time have well known and intended, has also been one for discouraging, obstructing, and preventing the prosecution by the United States of said war between the United States and the Imperial German government, and preventing, hindering, and delaying the execution of said laws above enumerated, by requiring the members of said organization available for duty in said military and naval forces to fail to register, and to refuse to submit to registration and draft, for service in said naval and military forces, and to fail and refuse to enlist for service therein, and by inciting others so to do, notwithstanding the requirements of said laws in that behalf, and notwithstanding the patriotic duty of such members and others so to register and submit to registration and draft, and so to enlist, for service in said military and naval forces, and notwithstanding the cowardice involved in such failure and refusal, which last-mentioned object of said organization was also to be accomplished by the use of all the means and methods aforesaid as a protest against, and as a forcible means of preventing, hindering, and delaying, the execution of said laws of the United States, as well as by the forcible rescue and concealment of such of said members as should be proceeded against under those laws for such failure and refusal on their part, or sought for service or for enlistment and service in said military and naval forces.'

The indictment in its first count then set out a large number of overt acts, publications, and other matters alleged to have been committed, issued, and perpetrated by various ones of the alleged conspirators to effect and carry out the alleged conspiracy, the direct tendency of which was to show the conspiracies alleged, examples only of which acts, publications, and other such matters it is practically possible to set out in an opinion of reasonable length. Thus it was alleged in the first count, among other things, as follows:

'Said defendant William Hood, otherwise called Tim McCarthy, hereinabove named, on or about the 20th day of December, in the year of our Lord 1917, at Smart, in the county of Placer, in the Northern division of the Northern district of California, then and there being, did unlawfully, willfully, knowingly, and feloniously present and cause to be presented to a common carrier for shipment a package containing explosives, to wit, nine sticks of dynamite packed and incased in a wooden box, without having plainly marked on the outside of said package the contents thereof; that is to say: Said defendant, on or about the 20th day of December, in the year of our Lord 1917, at Smart, in the said county, division, district, and state aforesaid, then and there being, did present and cause to be presented to Wells Fargo & Co., a common carrier as aforesaid, for shipment from Smart, in the county of Placer, state of California, a package containing explosives, to wit, nine sticks of dynamite packed and incased in a wooden box consigned to Geo. Messingham, Sacramento, Cal., marked and designated only as follows: 'Handle with care. 1 Box Glassware.' * * * Said defendant William Hood, otherwise called Tim McCarthy, hereinabove named, on or about the 21st day of December, in the year of our Lord 1917, at Smart, in the county of Placer, in the Northern division of the Northern district of California, then and there being, did unlawfully, willfully, knowingly, and feloniously carry upon and in a vehicle controlled and operated by a common carrier engaged in interstate and foreign transportation, explosives, to wit, nine sticks of dynamite, under a false and deceptive marking,

...