United States v. Tucker

• Decision Date: 05 May 1903
• Citation: 122 F. 518
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. TUCKER.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Western District of Kentucky

122 F. 518

UNITED STATES v. TUCKER.

United States District Court, W.D. Kentucky.

May 5, 1903

R. D Hill, U.S. Atty.

George W. Jolly, for defendant.

EVANS District Judge.

The indictment in this case contains two counts. In the first it is charged 'that heretofore, to wit, on the thirteenth day of May, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred, Ed. A Tucker, in the then district of Kentucky, and in what is now the Western District of Kentucky, and in the county of Ohio within said district, and at what is known as Lock Number Three, on Green river, and upon a certain tract of land upon which said lock was then and there and now is located, which land and which lock were then and there and now are the property of and owned by the United States, and upon which land and in and at which place thereon the United States then conducted and carried on and now conducts and carries on a part of its public business, to wit, the providing of locks and dams on said Green river for the safe and useful navigation thereof, and which land and lock had, before said 13th day of May, 1900, been duly purchased by and ceded to the United States with the consent of the Legislature of the state of Kentucky, and which were then and there and which are now under and within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States, as well by the said purchase and the consent of the Legislature of the state of Kentucky which was given thereto as by an express act of said Legislature in that behalf and ceding said jurisdiction, to wit, an act entitled 'An act to grant the consent of the state of Kentucky to the acquisition by the United States of certain lands within the commonwealth bordering on Green and Barren rivers for certain purposes,' and which act was approved February 20th, 1886 (1 Sess.Acts 1885-86, p. 11, c. 69), by the Governor of the said state, did unlawfully, willfully, and feloniously, and with malice aforethought, cut, strike and stab one John L Ewing with a knife with intention to kill him, the said Ewing, but from the wound so inflicted the said Ewing did not die. ' The second count, in which the place of the occurrence is described in the same language as in the first count, charges that the accused 'did willfully and unlawfully, in sudden heat and passion, and not in self-defense, cut, stab, and wound with a knife one John L. Ewing, without killing him.'

The defendant has filed a general demurrer to each count, and the court has very carefully considered the questions of law thereby raised. They are interesting and important, though not altogether new.

The seventeenth clause of section 8, art. 1, of the Constitution of the United States, provides that the Congress shall have power 'to exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such district (not exceeding ten miles square), as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dock-yards, and other needful buildings.'

For the purposes of this case, that provision would be expressed with perfect accuracy in this language, viz: 'The Congress shall have power to exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dock-yards, and other needful buildings.'

Assuming, in the consideration of the demurrer, that the averments of the indictment are true, it appears that the 'place' where the criminal acts are alleged to have been committed by the accused was on land then used for public governmental purposes; that the state's interest in the land had been ceded to the United States by the Legislature of Kentucky under an act approved February 20, 1886 (1 Sess.Acts 1885-86, p. 11, c. 69); and that in addition to this the Legislature of the state had, by the same enactment, in express terms, yielded to the United States jurisdiction over it. As this court must take notice of all laws, state and national, it judicially knows that the state of Kentucky by this legislation ceded the land to the United States; that it is the same land which the state had leased to the Green & Barren River Navigation Company by an act for the purpose approved March 9, 1868 (2 Sess.Acts. 1867-68, p. 599, c. 1165); and that the state had, by the act first above mentioned, authorized, and consented to the purchase by the government of the interest of all other persons in the property (see 1 Sess.Acts 1885-86, p. 11, c. 69).

The United States afterwards purchased the property of the Green & Barren River Navigation Company, including its interest in the land, under the provisions of the act of August 11, 1888, making appropriations for rivers and harbors (25 Stat. 416), and by this purchase, and the cession of the state of Kentucky under the act of February 20, 1886, the United States became the sole owner of the place in question and the structures thereon. Afterwards, by the act approved August 16, 1892, which is now embraced in the Kentucky Statutes as section 2376, the state of Kentucky enacted legislation as follows:

'That the commonwealth of Kentucky hereby consents to the acquisition by the United States of America of all lands and appurtenances in this commonwealth heretofore legally acquired, or that may be hereafter legally acquired, by purchase or condemnation, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dock-yards, and other needful buildings, including post-offices, custom-houses, and court-house; also lands for locks, dams and canals in improving the navigation of the rivers and waters within and on the borders of the commonwealth of Kentucky.'

1. It seems to the court that the power of Congress to exercise 'exclusive legislation' over the 'place' described in the indictment in this case is plainly deducible from the constitutional provision above quoted, when we assume to be true three essential facts stated in the indictment, viz: First, that the United States purchased the place in question; second, that this was done with the consent of the legislature of Kentucky; and, third, that the place was used for the public governmental purposes described in the indictment. If those three facts coexist, the plainly expressed constitutional provision, of its own force, gives Congress the power of exclusive legislation over that 'place.'

2. I think the ceding of the land by the state probably constituted a 'purchase' thereof by the United States, in the broad sense of that word. Bouvier's Law Dictionary. If, however, there was not, in the technical sense, a 'purchase,' but only a voluntary legislative cession or gift to the United States, not only of the legal title thereto, but also of jurisdiction over it, then, while there might be binding conditions annexed to such a cession, still the act of February 20, 1886, above referred to, is ample to maintain the exclusive right and power of the general government to legislate over the 'place' described in the indictment. The only right reserved to the state in the act of cession was that of serving thereon any process that might issue from its courts.

In the opinion of the court, both a purchase with the consent of the state and an express cession of jurisdiction are not necessary to the powers and rights of the government. Either will be sufficient if the place is owned by the United States and is actually used for governmental purposes. In this case, however, we find both.

Where there is a 'purchase' of property with the consent of the state legislature, exclusive jurisdiction follows and attaches by virtue of the constitutional provision itself, while in the case of express cession of jurisdiction to the United States by a legislative enactment for that purpose the jurisdiction of the United States over the place is derived from such legislative act, and not necessarily from the constitutional provision per se. In the various Kansas cases decided by the Supreme Court there was not a purchase by the United States of the place then in question (a government reservation) with the consent of the state of Kansas, because the United States had acquired title to all the vacant land in the territory of Kansas by the Louisiana Purchase, in 1803, over half a century before the state was created, in 1861. The land in question in those cases, the legal title to which was in the United States, was reserved from public sale and retained for governmental uses. But the state of Kansas, after its admission into the Union, did, by express legislation, cede jurisdiction over it, and this, coupled with ownership and use, was treated as entirely sufficient to bring it within the exclusive jurisdiction of Congress.

The authorities which clearly establish these general propositions are those of Ft. Leavenworth R.R. Co. v Lowe, 114 U.S. 525, 5 Sup.Ct. 995, 29 L.Ed. 264; Chicago R.I. & Pacific R.R. Co. v. McGlinn, 114 U.S. 542, 5 Sup.Ct. 1005, 29 L.Ed. 270; Benson v. United States, 146 U.S. 330, 13 Sup.Ct. 60, 36 L.Ed. 991; Palmer v. Barrett, 162 U.S. 402, 16 Sup.Ct. 837, 40 L.Ed. 1015; United States v....