Singleton v. State

• Decision Date: 17 November 1896
• Citation: 38 Fla. 297,21 So. 21
• Parties: SINGLETON v. STATE.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

21 So. 21

38 Fla. 297

SINGLETON v. STATE.

Florida Supreme Court

November 17, 1896

Error to circuit court, Hillsborough county; Barron Phillips Judge.

Harry Singleton was convicted of murder, and brings error. Reversed.

Syllabus by the Court

SYLLABUS

1. The twelfth section of article 4 of the constitution of 1885 conferred power upon the governor, justices of the supreme court, and attorney general, or a major part of them, of whom the governor shall be one, to permanently remit fines and forfeitures, to commute punishment and grant pardons after conviction, in all cases except treason and impeachment subject to such regulations as may be prescribed by law relative to the manner of applying for pardons; and the pardoning power thus conferred is exclusive, and cannot be exercised by the legislature.

2. By the amendment of section 12, art. 4, adopted this year, the secretary of state, comptroller, and commissioner of agriculture take the places of the justices of the supreme court, as members of the board of pardons.

3. A full pardon of an offense not only blots out the crime committed, but removes all punishment and disabilities resulting from the conviction. When extended to a convict in prison, it relieves him, and removes his disabilities; and when granted after his time of imprisonment has expired, it removes all that is left of the consequences of conviction,--his disabilities.

4. By statute the conviction of the crime of larceny in the courts of this state disqualifies the convict as a witness, and his pardon for this offense has the effect to restore his competency to testify as a witness.

5. An act of the legislature provided that a party who had been convicted of the crime of larceny should be restored to civil rights. Held, without deciding whether a restoration to civil rights would include the restoration of competency as a witness, lost by reason of the conviction of the crime, that before the party could testify it must have such effect, and so construed, it was not competent for the legislature to so enact.

6. An accused is entitled to be tried by an impartial jury, and, when it is made to appear to the trial judge that a fair and impartial trial cannot be had in the county where the offense was committed, he should direct that the accused be tried in another county. This is a matter left largely to the discretion of the trial court, and its ruling on such matters will not be disturbed, unless it appear, from the facts presented, that the court acted unfairly, and committed a palpable abuse of sound discretion.

COUNSEL Wall & Stevens, for plaintiff in error.

William B. Lamar, Atty. Gen., for the State.

OPINION

MABRY C.J.

The plaintiff in error was indicted, tried, and convicted of murder in the first degree, and from the sentence of the court imposing the death penalty a writ of error has been sued out.

An error was committed during the progress of the trial of the cause that will necessitate a reversal of the judgment rendered against the accused. The state introduced as a witness one Howard Bishop, who testified to material and damaging facts against the accused. It is not deemed necessary to set out the testimony of the witness, as there can be no doubt that it bore directly upon defendant's guilt, was calculated to influence the jury, and, if improperly admitted, was harmful, and cannot be considered otherwise than as reversible error. An objection was made to Bishop's testifying on the ground that he had been convicted in a court in this state of the crime of larceny and, under the statute, he was not a competent witness. It was conceded that the witness Howard Bishop had been convicted at the spring term, 1889, of the circuit court for Marion county, of the crime of larceny, and was sentenced to six months' imprisonment in the jail of said county; but, to remove and obviate the objection on account of this conviction, the state offered in evidence and read to the court Acts 1895, c. 4457, entitled 'An act to restore Howard Bishop, late of Marion county, Florida, to civil rights.' In the preamble to this act the conviction and sentence of Bishop, in the Marion county circuit court, for the larceny of a watch, is recited; also that, about a year subsequent to the conviction, it was established to the satisfaction of the party to whom the watch belonged that Bishop was not guilty of the crime for which he had been convicted, and for the last five years he had lived in the city of Tampa, served on the police force of the city, and had conducted himself uprightly as a man and officer. The provision of the act is 'that the said Howard Bishop be and is hereby restored to civil rights.' Section 1096 of the Revised Statutes provides that persons convicted in any court in this state of murder, perjury, piracy, forgery, larceny, robbery, arson, sodomy, or buggery shall not be competent witnesses. The constitution provides (section 11, art. 4) that 'the governor shall have power to suspend the collection of fines and forfeitures, and grant reprieves for a period not exceeding sixty days, for all offenses, except in cases of impeachment. In cases of conviction for treason he shall have power to suspend the execution of sentence until the case shall be reported to the legislature at its next session, when the legislature shall either pardon, direct the execution of the sentence, or grant a further reprieve; and if the legislature shall fail or refuse to make disposition of such case, the sentence shall be enforced at such time and place as the governor may direct.' Provision is also made in the section for reports to the legislature by the governor of the fines or forfeitures remitted, or reprieves, pardons, or commutations granted. The twelfth section of the same article, as it stodd when the act of 1895, supra, was passed, provided that 'the governor, justices of the supreme court, and attorney general, or a major part of them, of whom the governor shall be one, may, upon such conditions, and with such limitations and restrictions as they may deem proper, remit fines and forfeitures, commute punishment and grant pardons after conviction, in all cases except treason and impeachment, subject to such regulations as may be prescribed by law relative to the manner of applying for pardons.' Under the amendment to this section, adopted this year, the secretary of state, comptroller, and commissioner of agriculture take the places of the justices of the supreme court. Article 2 of the constitution divides the powers of government into three departments,--legislative, executive, and judicial,--and provides that no person properly belonging to one of the departments shall exercise any powers appertaining to either of the others, except in cases expressly provided for by the constitution. In the distribution of the powers of government the framers of our constitution had the right to lodge the pardoning power where they saw proper in the departments of government. We know, from judicial history, that the pardoning power was a part of the royal prerogative in England; and Chief Justice Marshall, in speaking for the court, in U.S. v. Willson, 7 Pet. 150, says: 'As this power has been exercised from time immemorial by the executive of that nation whose language is our language, and to whose judicial institutions ours bear a close resemblance, we adopt their principles respecting the operation and...