United States v. Starn

• Decision Date: 24 July 1883
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of New Jersey
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. STARN.

17 F. 435

UNITED STATES v. STARN.

United States District Court, D. New Jersey.

July 24, 1883

A. Q Keasbey, U.S. Dist. Atty., for the United States.

S. H Grey and Thos. B. Harned, for defendant.

NIXON J.

The defendant is indicted under section 5485 of the revised Statutes. The first count of the indictment charges that being the agent of one Benjamin Barnes in procuring his pension, he demanded and received from the said Benjamin a compensation for his services, in prosecuting said claim greater than was provided in the title of the Revised Statutes of the United States pertaining to pensions. The motion is to quash the said count, on the ground that when the alleged offense was committed, to-wit, on May 1, 1880, there was no provision in the title of the Revised Statutes pertaining to pensions, limiting the fee which an agent or attorney might lawfully demand and receive for his services in a pension case.

On the third of March, 1873, the congress of the United States passed an act to revise, consolidate, and amend the laws relating to pensions. 17 St.at Large, 566. By the thirty-first section it was enacted in substance: (1) That no agent or attorney, or other person, instrumental in prosecuting any claim for pension, shall demand or receive any other compensation for his services, in prosecuting a claim for pension, than such as the commissioner of pensions shall direct to be paid to him, not exceeding $25; (2) that any such person who shall directly or indirectly contract for, demand, or receive any greater compensation for his services than is hereinbefore provided, or who shall wrongfully withhold from a pensioner the whole or any part of the pension allowed and due such pensioner, shall be deemed guilty of a high misdemeanor, and, upon conviction thereof, shall, for every such offense, be fined not exceeding $500, or imprisoned at hard labor not exceeding two years, or both, at the discretion of the court; (3) and if any guardian, having the charge and custody of the pension of his ward, shall embezzle the same, or fraudulently convert it to his own use, he shall be punished by fine not exceeding $2,000, or imprisonment at hard labor for a term not exceeding five years, or both, at the discretion of the court. When the commissioners appointed to revise and consolidate the statute laws of the United States (see 14 St. 74) came to this section they thought proper to subdivide it into three sections, and to place them in different parts of the Revision. The first part thereof appears under the title pertaining to pensions, and is section 4785 of the Revised Statutes. The second division was set in the sixth chapter of the title relating to crimes, and is section 5485; and the third is printed under both these titles, being numbered in the one, section 4783, and in the other, section 5486.

The commissioners were authorized, in the second section of the law appointing them, in the performance of their duties, to make such alterations as they deemed necessary to amend the imperfections of the original text. They hence inserted in section 5485, in lieu of the words of the former law, 'than is hereinbefore provided,' the phrase, 'than is provided in the title pertaining to pensions;' referring, doubtless, to section 4785.

The law thus stood until June 20, 1878, when a new act was passed entitled 'An act relating to claim agents and attorneys in pension cases,' (20 St. 243,) by the provisions of which it was made unlawful for any one to demand or receive for his services in a pension case a greater sum than $10; the second section expressly repealing section 4785 of the Revised Statutes. This enactment and repeal, upon its face, seems to have rendered it unlawful, under the provisions of the Statutes at Large, to demand or receive more than $10 for services in procuring a pension; to have removed all limits to charges in such cases from the sections of the title pertaining to pensions; and to have left standing a penalty for the violation of a section which was no longer in force. On March 3, 1881, (1 Supp.Rev.St. 602,) the congress enacted that 'the provisions of section 5485 of the Revised Statutes shall be applicable to any person who shall violate the provisions of an act entitled 'An act relating to claim agents and attorneys in...