On the organization of a territory into a state, Congress may --
as it did by the Oklahoma Enabling Act -- transfer the jurisdiction
of general crimes committed in districts over which the United
States retains exclusive jurisdiction from territorial to federal
courts, and may extend such jurisdiction to crimes committed before
and after the Enabling Act.
See United States v. Brown, 74
F. 43.
Page 216 U. S. 457
A statute creating a court to take jurisdiction of crimes will
not be construed, if another construction is admissible, so as to
leave a judicial chasm, and so held that, under the Oklahoma
Enabling Act, the federal court had jurisdiction of certain
specified crimes committed after the Enabling Act was passed and
before the state was admitted.
The reason of a law as indicated by its general terms should
prevail over its letter when strict adherence to the latter will
defeat the plain purpose of the law.
The granting or denying of a new trial is a matter not
assignable as error.
Bucklin v. United States,
159 U. S. 682.
An assignment of error that is double is bad for that
reason.
Continuances are within the discretion of the trial court, and,
in the absence of gross abuse, the action of the lower court will
not be disturbed.
Assignments of error based on overruling objections to
sufficiency of the indictment and of admission of any evidence
because the indictment is bad cannot be made on writ of error for
the first time.
Assignments of error for rejection or admission of evidence
cannot be considered in absence of bill of exceptions.
Storm v.
United States, 94 U. S. 76.
The facts are stated in the opinion.
MR. JUSTICE LURTON delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a writ of error to a judgment of the Circuit Court of
the United States for the Western District of Oklahoma, upon a
Conviction in a capital case, sued out by the plaintiff in error,
the defendant below, by authority of the fifth section of the Act
of March 3, 1891, 26 Stat. 826, 827, c. 517.
The plaintiff in error, Silas Pickett, a negro, was indicted in
the District Court of the United States for the Western District of
Oklahoma for the murder of a negro known as Walter the Kid, within
the limits of the Osage Indian Reservation. The indictment was
remitted to the circuit court for the same
Page 216 U. S. 458
district, as required by § 1039, Revised Statutes. This murder
was charged as having been committed on October 14, 1907. The State
of Oklahoma was admitted to the Union on November 16, 1907. The
offense was therefore committed before its admission as a state,
and for that offense the plaintiff in error was, after such
admission, both indicted and convicted in a court of the United
States for the Western District of Oklahoma -- the Osage Indian
Reservation being within that district. The jurisdiction of the
court was challenged by motion to quash, by demurrer, and by motion
in arrest of judgment. Of course, if the offense was not one
against the United States, or not committed within the territorial
jurisdiction of the District Court for the Western District of
Oklahoma, the indictment would be bad, and the court which tried
and convicted the plaintiff in error without jurisdiction. But the
crime charged in this indictment was one against the United States.
By § 5339 of the Revised Statutes, as amended by the Act of January
15, 1897, 29 Stat. 487, c. 29, the crime of murder, when committed
within any "place or district or country under the exclusive
jurisdiction of the United States," is defined and the punishment
provided. This general law was, by § 2145, Rev.Stat., extended "to
the Indian country," when not within one or the other of the
exceptions of § 2146.
The averments of the indictment make it plain that the crime
charged was committed within a "place or district" at that time
exclusively under the jurisdiction of the United States, being
Indian country, not within any state. As it also averred that the
plaintiff in error was a negro, and not an Indian, and the person
slain a negro, and not an Indian, the exceptions made by § 2145,
Rev.Stat., do not apply.
The crime was charged to have been committed on October 14,
1907,a date subsequent to the Enabling Act of June 16, 1906, under
which, on November 20, 1907, Oklahoma was admitted to the
Union.
The jurisdiction of the district court of the United States,
exercised in respect to the indictment and trial of this
plaintiff
Page 216 U. S. 459
in error, depends upon the provisions of that Enabling Act. Such
a crime might have been prosecuted in the territorial court for the
proper district of the territory, sitting as a court of the United
States and administering the law of the United States in the
exercise of its jurisdiction conferred by Congress.
Ex Parte
Crow Dog, 109 U. S. 556;
Brown v. United States, 146 F. 975. But the function and
jurisdiction of such territorial courts would naturally terminate
upon the territory becoming a state, and therefore render necessary
some provision for the transfer of pending business and
jurisdiction in respect of local matters to state courts, and of
civil and criminal business and jurisdiction arising under the laws
of the United States to courts of the United States when they
should come into existence.
Forsyth v. United
States, 9 How. 571,
50 U. S.
576.
It was therefore altogether competent for Congress to provide,
as it did in the fourteenth section of this Enabling Act, for the
transfer of jurisdiction in respect of all crimes against the
United States -- for the act must be read as applying to crimes
under the general criminal law of the United States -- to the
federal Courts provided by the same act. If this could not be done,
the change from a territorial condition to that of a state would
operate as an automatic amnesty for crimes committed against the
general law of the United States within districts exclusively under
its jurisdiction, and not within the jurisdiction of any state, for
the courts of the state could not be empowered to prosecute crimes
against the laws of another sovereignty.
Martin v.
Hunter, 1 Wheat. 304,
14 U. S. 337.
The power to punish was not lost if the crime was one of the
character described, and the Enabling Act might well provide that
such crime, committed either before or a after the admission of the
state, might be prosecuted in the courts of the United States when
established within the new state. The subject is elaborately
considered and decided by District Judge Marshall in
United
States v. Baum, 74 F. 43.
Section 13 of the Enabling Act referred to provides "that the
state,
when admitted [italics ours], should be divided
into
Page 216 U. S. 460
two judicial districts," for the appointment of a district
judge, clerk, and marshal for each, and that the state should be
attached to the Eighth Judicial Circuit. It provides also for the
holding of regular terms of both the district and circuit courts,
with all the powers and jurisdiction of similar courts. The
fourteenth section was in these words:
"That all prosecutions for crimes or offenses hereafter
committed in either of said judicial districts as hereby
constituted shall be cognizable within the district in which
committed, and all prosecutions for crimes or offenses committed
before the passage of this act, in which indictments have not yet
been found or proceedings instituted, shall be cognizable within
the judicial district as hereby constituted in which such crimes or
offenses were committed."
There may be some doubt as to whether the section set out should
be construed as applying to crimes and offenses committed before
and after the passage of the Enabling Act, or only to such crimes
committed before and after the admission of the state. The
reference to "the passage of this act," in the second clause, would
tend to the first construction. But such a construction would leave
out of consideration the fact that neither the courts nor the
judicial districts referred to would exist until the admission of
the state, by the express terms of the preceding section, which
should be read in connection with the fourteenth section. No
construction should be adopted, if another equally admissible can
be given, which would result in what might be called a judicial
chasm. Under the first interpretation, crimes committed after the
passage of this Enabling Act could not be prosecuted until the
admission of the state, and the coming into existence of the courts
and judicial districts to which jurisdiction of such crimes was to
be transferred. If such crimes could only be prosecuted in courts
organized upon the admission of the state, there would be an
indefinite period during which such crimes might go unpunished. In
fact, there elapsed seventeen months between the date of this
Enabling Act and the admission of the state
Page 216 U. S. 461
and a consequent organization of the districts and courts to
which jurisdiction over such crimes was to be transferred. A
construction which might result in such deplorable consequences
should not be adopted if any more sensible meaning can be
reasonably given. The reason of the law, as indicated by its
general terms, should prevail over its letter, when the plain
purpose of the act will be defeated by strict adherence to its
verbiage. Applications of this general rule are shown in
Holy
Trinity Church v. United States, 143 U.
S. 457;
Lau Ow Bew v. United States,
144 U. S. 47,
144 U. S. 59;
United States v. Corbett, 215 U.
S. 233. The obvious intention was that this, like the
preceding section, should become effective upon the state being
admitted, and it should be read as applying to crimes and offenses
before and after such admission. But if the section be otherwise
construed, the district court had, in either case, jurisdiction
over this crime, for it was committed after the Enabling Act, and
whether it might have been prosecuted in a territorial court,
sitting as a court of the United States, before the admission of
the State of Oklahoma, is not here important. It was not so
prosecuted, and when the territory ceased to be a territory and
became a state, the jurisdiction of all such courts terminated, and
jurisdiction was properly transferred to the courts of the United
States having jurisdiction over the place of the crime.
There are a number of errors assigned. The first and tenth are
for error in denying a new trial. The granting or denying of a new
trial is a matter not assignable as error.
Bucklin v. United
States, 159 U. S. 682. The
second assignment is double, and therefore bad, but it is without
merit. The first error included is for overruling an objection to
being tried at Oklahoma City. No such objection is shown by the
record. The remainder is for denying a continuance. Continuances
are within the discretion of the court, and unless great abuse is
shown, the action of the court below will not be disturbed. As no
bill of exceptions was taken, we have no showing of abuse upon
which the action of this Court may be invoked.
Page 216 U. S. 462
The third and fourth errors assigned are for overruling an
objection made to the sufficiency of the indictment and to the
admission of any evidence because the indictment was bad. No such
objection is shown by the record. The indictment is not in form bad
nor vague, but charges the crime of murder with great
particularity. There seems to have been no reason for doubt as to
the crime charged. Besides, objections of this character cannot be
made upon writ of error for the first time.
Aside from the question of jurisdiction, considered heretofore,
the remaining assignments are for alleged errors in admitting or
rejecting evidence. But as no bill of exceptions was taken, these
assignments cannot be considered.
Storm v. United States,
94 U. S. 76.
Judgment affirmed.