United States v. Sheldon
| Decision Date | 26 February 1817 |
| Citation | 4 L.Ed. 199,15 U.S. 119,2 Wheat. 119 |
| Parties | The UNITED STATES v. SHELDON |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
THIS cause was argued by the Attorney General, for the United States, and by Mr. Hopkinson, for the defendant.
The defendant, George Sheldon, was indicted in the circuit court for the district of Vermont, for transporting, over land, in November, 1813, a certain number of fat oxen, cows, steers, and heifers, from a place in the United States to the province of Lower Canada. A special verdict was found which submitted to the court the questions, whether living fat oxen, cows, steers, and heifers, are articles of provision and munitions of war, and whether driving living fat oxen, cows, steers, and heifers, on foot, is a transportation thereof, within the true intent and meaning of the act of Congress then in force. The judges being opposed in opinion upon both these questions, the cause comes before this court upon a certificate of such disagreement.
This indictment was founded on the act of the 6th of July, 1812; the second section of which declares 'that if any citizen of the United States, or person inhabiting the same, shall transport, or attempt to transport, over land or otherwise, in any waggon, cart, sleigh, boat, or otherwise, naval or military stores, arms or munitions of war, or any articles of provision from the United States to Canada, &c., the waggon, cart, sleigh, boat, or the thing by which the said articles are transported, or attempted to be transported, together with the articles themselves, shall be forfeited; and the person aiding, or privy to the same, shall forfeit to the United States a sum equal in value to the waggon, &c. or thing by which the said articles were transported, and shall moreover be considered as guilty of a misdemeanor and liable to fine and imprisonment.'
In answer to the first question submitted to this court, we are unanimously of opinion that living fat oxen, &c. are articles of provision and munitions of war, within the true intent and meaning of the above-recited act.
The second question is attended with much more difficulty: Is the driving of living fat oxen, &c. a transportation of them within the true intent and meaning of the law?
There is no doubt but that the word transport, correctly interpreted as well as in its ordinary acceptation, means to carry, to convey; and in this sense it seems to a majority of the court the legislature intended to use it....
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