Thornton v. United States, 255

• Court: U.S. Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: TAFT
• Citation: Thornton v. United States, 271 U.S. 414, 46 S.Ct. 585, 70 L.Ed. 1013 (1926)
• Decision Date: 01 June 1926
• Docket Number: No. 255,255
• Parties: THORNTON et al. v. UNITED STATES

271 U.S. 414

46 S.Ct. 585

70 L.Ed. 1013

THORNTON et al.

v UNITED STATES.

No. 255.

Argued April 20, 1926.

Decided June 1, 1926.

Messrs. Lee W. Branch, of Quitman, Ga., and E. K. Wilcox, of Valdosta, Ga., for petitioners.

[Syllabus from page 415 intentionally omitted] Mr. Gardner P. Lloyd, of New York City, for the United States.

[Argument of Counsel from page 416 intentionally omitted] Mr. Chief Justice TAFT delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case comes here by certiorari from the Circuit Court of Appeals of the Fifth Circuit, 267 U. S. 589, 45 S. Ct. 354, 69 L. Ed. 801. The judgment is one of conviction of the petitioners under an indictment found in the District Court for the Southern District of Georgia, charging the petitioners and 16 others with the crime of conspiracy under section 37 of the Criminal Code (Comp. St. § 10201) to commit the offense against the United States denounced in section 62 of the same Code (Comp. St. § 10230). Section 62 punishes any one who shall assault or interfere with an employee of the Bureau of Animal Industry of the Agricultural Department in the execution of his duties or on account of his execution of them, and who shall use a deadly weapon in resisting any such employee in such execution. The indictment was demurred to, and the demurrer was overruled. The defendants were tried and found guilty. On writ of error the Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment. 2 F.(2d) 561.

The first count of the indictment charged that the defendants conspired to deter and prevent certain employees of the Bureau of Animal Industry from discharging their duties in supervising the dipping of, and causing to be dipped, cattle in order to prevent the spread of splenetic fever among them, and to eradicate the cattle fever tick, and that for this purpose the defendants used deadly weapons and killed one such employee and wounded others, all in the county of Echols, Ga. The second count charged that the conspiracy was directed, not only to the use of force against the employees themselves, but also to the dynamiting of spray pens and dipping vats used by such employees in their duties in causing the dipping of the cattle and the supervision thereof.

Under the Act of May 29, 1884, 23 Stat. 31, c. 60, a Bureau of Animal Industry was organized in the Department of Agriculture. It is made th duty of the bureau by section 1 (Comp. St. § 850), to investigate and report upon the condition of the domestic animals, their protection and use, to inquire into and report the causes of contagious, infectious and communicable diseases among them and to collect information on the subject. By section 2 (Comp. St. § 8690) it is authorized to employ experts. By section 3 (Comp. St. § 8691), it is made the duty of the Commissioner of Agriculture to prepare such rules and regulations as may be deemed necessary for the supervision and effective suppression and extirpation of such diseases, and to certify such rules and regulations to the executive authorities of each state and territory, and invite them to co-operate in the execution and enforcement of the act. Whenever the plans and methods are accepted by any state or territory, in which such diseases are declared to exist, and the state or territory has adopted plans and methods for the suppression and extirpation of the diseases, and those plans shall be accepted by the Commissioner of Agriculture, and whenever a Governor or other properly constituted authority of a state signifies his readiness to co-operate for the extinction of such disease in conformity with the act, the Commissioner is authorized to expend so much of the money appropriated as may be necessary in such investigation and in such disinfection and quarantine measures as may be necessary to prevent the spread of the disease from one territory or state into another.

By an Act of February 9, 1889, 25 Stat. 659, c. 122 (Comp. St. § 789 et seq.), the Department of Agriculture was made an executive department of the government under a Secretary of Agriculture, who was vested with all the authority conferred by the Act of May 29, 1884, supra, on the Commissioner of Agriculture. By Act of February 2, 1903, 32 Stat. 791, c. 349 (Comp. St. §§ 8698-8700), the Secretary of Agriculture was authorized and directed from time to time to make regulations concerning the exportation and transportation of live stock from any place within the United States where he had reason to believe a contagious cattle disease existed into and through any other state or territory as he might deem necessary and all such rules and regulations were to have the force of law. Whenever any inspector or assistant inspector of the Bureau of Animal Industry issued a certificate showing that the officer had inspected any cattle or other live stock to be transported from one locality to another and had found them free from Texas or splenetic fever infection or other disease, it was provided that the cattle might be shipped, driven or transported from one state or territory to another without further inspection, but that such animals should at all times be under the control and supervision of the bureau for the purposes of such inspection, and that the Secretary might make regulations to prevent the introduction or dissemination of contagion from one state to another.

By Act of March 3, 1905, 33 Stat. 1264, c. 1496 (Comp. St. § 8701 et seq.), the Secretary is authorized and directed to quarantine any state or territory, or any portion of any state or territory when he shall determine the fact that cattle or other live stock therein are affected with any communicable disease. Section 2 of that act (Comp. St. § 8702) prohibits the transportation, delivery for transportation, or driving on foot from any quarantined state or territory into any other state or territory, cattle or live stock except as provided in the act. Sections 3 and 4 (Comp. St. §§ 8703, 8704) give the Secretary authority to make rules and regulations for the inspection, disinfection, certification, treatment, handling and method and manner of delivery and shipment of cattle or other live stock from a quarantined state into any other state when the public safety will permit, but prohibits such movement in manner or method or under conditions other than those prescribed by the Secretary.

Under date of June 15, 1916, various regulations were issued by the Secretary of Agriculture. They are not printed in the record, but they are matters of which we may take judicial notice. Caha v. United States, 152 U. S. 211, 14 S. Ct. 513, 38 L. Ed. 415. Under the regulations when the Secretary determines that cattle in any state or territory are affected with a contagious disease, and he thinks a quarantine should be established, a rule is to be issued giving notice of the fact, to forbid the interstate movement of live stock from the quarantined area to be prescribed. Regulation 2 provides that cattle of the quarantined area exposed to or infected with ticks which have been properly dipped twice with a certain solution and in the proper way under the supervision of an inspector of the Bureau, may be moved interstate for any purpose when the inspector certifies them to be free of infection from splenetic fever: Provided that the conditions are such that the cattle may be moved to the free area without exposure to infection. The cattle are to be accompanied by a statement of dipping by the inspector supervising the same at the point of origin, and showing the...