United States v. Ingham

• Citation: 97 F. 935
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. INGHAM et al.
• Decision Date: 18 November 1899
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

97 F. 935

UNITED STATES v. INGHAM et al.

United States District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania.

November 18, 1899

James M. Beck, U.S. Atty., and Francis F. Kane, Asst. U.S. Atty.

Albert S. L. Shields, for defendants.

MCPHERSON District Judge.

I have considered with care the motions in arrest of judgment and for a new trial, but without being able to adopt the defendants' views upon either motion. It is unnecessary to elaborate the reasons that oppose these views, or to discuss the numerous cases that have been cited upon the one side and the other in the learned and exhaustive briefs of counsel, but I may indicate briefly the grounds of the refusal.

1. I agree that McManus was not an 'officer' of the United States, but I am satisfied that he was a 'person acting for or on behalf of the United States in an official function, under or by authority of a department or office of the government thereof,' and that he held a 'place of trust or profit,' within the meaning of section 5451 of the Revised Statutes.

The phrase 'official function,' taken in connection with the other language of the section, is, I think, of broader scope than the defendants' counsel is willing to admit. His position is that no one can exercise an official function unless he be an 'officer' of the United States; and if this argument is to prevail, the two provisions of the section are identical in meaning, although it is clear that congress supposed the words to be descriptive of two distinct classes of persons. This result is to be avoided if a fair and reasonable construction will lead to a different conclusion. In my opinion, such a construction is obvious and relieves the case in hand from difficulty. The 'official function' spoken of is not necessarily a function belonging to an office held by the person acting on behalf of the United States; it may also be a function belonging to an office held by his superior, which function has been committed to the subordinate (whether he be also an officer, or a mere employe) for the purpose of being executed. Thus-- turning to the facts of the present case-- it is an official function of the secretary of the treasury to detect and suppress certain crimes, and by his authority lawfully exercised, the execution of this function has been (at least in part) intrusted to the secret-service operatives, who thereupon act on behalf of the United States as his subordinates or employes. The law lays the function upon him; but, as he cannot do the work alone, he is, of necessity, permitted to appoint others to share in the labor and in this particular such appointees stand in his...