Edgington v. United States

• Decision Date: 30 November 1896
• Docket Number: No. 336,336
• Parties: EDGINGTON v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

164 U.S. 361

17 S.Ct. 72

41 L.Ed. 467

EDGINGTON

v UNITED STATES.

No. 336.

November 30, 1896.

At the March term, 1895, in the district court of the United States for the Southern district of Iowa, Avington A. Edgington was tried and found guilty of the crime of making a false deposition, on April 13, 1894, in aid of a fraudulent pension claim on behalf of his mother, Jennie M. Edgington, claiming to be the widow of Francis M. Edgington.

The indictment was based on section 5438 of the Revised Statutes of the United States, and it was claimed, on behalf of the defendant, that that section had been repealed by the subsequent enactment of section 4746 of the Revised Statutes, and was no longer in force at the time the indictment was found. The motion to direct a verdict of not guilty for that reason was overruled, to which action of the court an exception was taken. Exceptions were also taken to the action of the court in excluding testimony as to the defendant's general reputation for truth and veracity, and to the instruction to the jury upon the testimony as to the good character of the defendant.

On April 30, 1895, judgment was pronounced against the defendant that he pay a fine of $1,500 and the costs, and that he stand committed to jail until said fine and costs should be paid. A writ of error was prayed for and allowed.

Smith McPherson, A. H. Garland, and R. C. Garland, for plaintiff in error.

Asst. Atty.

Gen. Whitney, for the United States.

Mr. Justice SHIRAS, after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court.

Section 5438 of the Revised Statutes makes it penal to make or cause to be made, for the purpose of obtaining or aiding to obtain payment or approval of any claim against the United States, any false deposition, knowing the same to contain any fraudulent or fictitious statement; and such offense is made punishable by imprisonment at hard labor for not less than one nor more than five years, or by fine of not less than $1,000 nor more than $5,000. The statute which was carried into this section of the Revised Statutes was enacted March 2, 1863. 12 Stat. 696.

Section 4746 is based on a statute passed March 3, 1873 (17 Stat. 575), and provides a penalty of a fine not exceeding $500, or of imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years, or of both, for every person who knowingly or willfully in any wise procures the making or presentation of any false or fraudulent affidavit concerning any claim for pension, or payment thereof, or pertaining to any other matter within the jurisdiction of the commissioner of pensions.

We are unable to accept the contention that the latter section is to be deemed a repeal of the former. Undoubtedly, there is some ground that is common to both. Thus, the procuring or causing to be made a false deposition or affidavit in promoting a fraudulent pension claim is made an offense by both statutes. But the earlier statute is wider in its scope, because not restricted to fraudulent pension claims, nor to merely procuring a false affidavit to be made. We think the offense charged in the persent indictment, of making a false deposition in aid of a fraudulent pension claim, is properly within section 5438, and not within section 4746, which is in terms applicable only to the offense of procuring another person to commit the offense.

We are constrained to sustain the assignments which complain of the exclusion of testimony offered to show defendant's general reputation for truth and veracity. It is not necessary to cite authorities to show that, in criminal prosecutions, the accused will be allowed to call witnesses to show that his character was such as would make it unlikely that he would be guilty of the particular crime with which he is charged. And as here the defendant was charged with a species of the crimen falsi, the rejected evidence was material and competent. This, indeed, is conceded in the brief for the government; but it is argued that, as the learned judge, in overruling the offer of the evidence, observed that the testimony might 'become proper later on,' he was merely passing on the order of proof, his discretion in respect to which is not reversible. It is possible, as suggested, that the judge thought that such evidence should not be offered until it appeared that the defendant had himself testified. But this would show a misconception of the reason why the evidence was competent. It was not intended to give weight to the defendant's personal testimony in the case, but to establish a general character inconsistent with guilt of the crime with which he stood charged; and the evidence was admissible, whether or not the defendant himself testified. When testimony, competent and material, has been offered and erroneously rejected, the error is not cured by a conjecture that, if offered at a subsequent period in the trial, the evidence might have been admitted. It should also be observed that, when a subsequent offer to the same effect was made, the judge rejected it without qualification.

There was likewise error in that portion of the charge in which the judge instructed the jury as to the effect that they should give to the testimony showing the defendant's good character.

It is proper to give the judge's own language:

'Some testimony has been given you touching the good character of the defendant. When a man is charged with crime, the courts of the United States permit this question of good character to be introduced to go to the jury. The theory, as I view it, is a wise one. If a man, in the community where...