1. The Revised Statutes of the United States must be accepted as
the law on the subjects which they embrace as it existed on the
first day of December, 1873. When their meaning is plain, the court
cannot recur to the original statutes to see if errors were
committed in revising them, but it may do so when necessary to
construe doubtful language used in the revision.
2. Sec. 4820 of the Revised Statutes admits of no other
reasonable construction than that only the invalid pensioners who
had not contributed to the funds of the Soldiers' Home were bound
to surrender to it their pensions while receiving its benefits.
There is no occasion, therefore, to look at the preexisting law on
the subject.
Charles Bowen filed in the court below his petition alleging
that the United States unlawfully withheld from him $270, being the
amount due him from Sept. 13, 1876, when he was admitted as an
inmate of the "Soldiers' Home," to Dec. 4, 1877, upon his pension
theretofore granted, by reason of a wound received by him in the
military service of the United States.
That court found the following facts:
1. The claimant was a private in Company B, Third Regiment
United States Infantry, from the 9th of March, 1861, to the 9th of
March, 1864, and during that time, under the provisions of sec. 7
of the Act of March 3, 1859, 11 Stat. 434, there was deducted from
his pay the sum of $4.57.
2. An invalid pension was granted to him March 13, 1865, at $8
per month, commencing March 9, 1864, by certificate No. 39,050; the
monthly rate of such pension was increased from $8 to $15, Jan. 21,
1867, to commence June 6, 1866; and from $15 to $18, July 8, 1876,
to commence June 4, 1872.
3. On the 13th of September, 1876, he was admitted as an inmate
of the Soldiers' Home, and his pension from that date to the 4th of
December, 1877, to wit, the sum of $264.60, was regularly paid to
the treasurer of that institution.
The court found as a conclusion of law that the claimant should
recover the sum of $264.60. Judgment in his favor having been
rendered therefor, the United States appealed.
Page 100 U. S. 509
The fifth section of the Act entitled "An Act to found a
military asylum for the relief and support of invalid and disabled
soldiers of the Army of the United States," approved March 3, 1851,
9 Stat. 595, provides
"That any pensioner on account of wounds or disability incurred
in the military service, although he may not have contributed to
the funds of the institution, shall be entitled to all the benefits
herein provided, upon transferring his pension to said asylum for
and during the period that he may voluntarily continue to receive
such benefits."
The Act of March 3, 1859, making appropriations for the support
of the army for the year ending June 30, 1860, 11
id. 431,
changes the name of the institution to "Soldiers' Home," and the
sixth section declares that
"All pensioners, on account of wounds or disability incurred in
the military service, shall transfer and surrender their pensions
to the institution, for and during the time they may remain
therein, and voluntarily continue to receive its benefits."
Sec. 4820 of the Revised Statutes provides that
"The fact that one to whom a pension has been granted for wounds
or disability received in the military service has not contributed
to the funds of the Soldiers' Home shall not preclude him from
admission thereto, but all such pensioners shall surrender their
pensions to the Soldiers' Home during the time they remain therein
and voluntarily receive its benefits. "
Page 100 U. S. 511
MR. JUSTICE MILLER delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is an appeal from a judgment of the Court of Claims in
favor of appellee for $264.60, for pension money withheld by the
government.
The action of the government officers in that respect was
founded on their opinion that Bowen, who was cared for in the
Soldiers' Home, belonged to the class who, by sec. 4820 of the
revision, surrendered their pensions while inmates of the home.
That section enacts that
"The fact that one to whom a pension has been granted for wounds
or disability received in the military service has not contributed
to the funds of the Soldiers' Home shall not preclude him from
admission thereto. But all such pensioners shall surrender their
pensions to the Soldiers' Home during the time they remain there
and voluntarily receive its benefits. "
Page 100 U. S. 512
Bowen was the recipient of an invalid pension but he had
contributed to the funds of the Soldiers' Home, and the single
question in the case is whether that fact withdraws him from the
clause which requires pensioners to surrender their pensions to the
home while inmates of it.
If the qualifying word such is restricted to pensioners
described in the sentence which immediately precedes it, then Bowen
does not belong to that class, and is not bound to surrender his
pension. There is no other class of pensioners described in that
section to whom the word such can refer than those who have not
contributed to the funds of the home, and Bowen does not belong to
that class. The history of the institution affords good reason for
that interpretation. The Soldiers' Home was bought and built, and
is supported now very largely, by money deducted from the monthly
pay of the soldiers of the regular army. But there is a class of
persons who have received wounds in the military service or
incurred ill health while in such service from whose pay no
deduction was made as a contribution to the home, who received
pensions as invalids, and, by virtue of this section, are entitled
to be cared for at that place. There is a manifest propriety in a
rule which requires of this class that, when supported out of the
fund to which they did not contribute, their pensions should go to
increase that fund, while those who have been giving of their
monthly pay for years should receive its benefits when they come to
need them, without giving also the pension which is the bounty of a
grateful government. There is no antecedent use of the word
"pensioners" in the chapter of which sec. 4820 is a part, and which
embraces the legislation of Congress concerning the Soldiers' Home,
to which the word such can refer but the immediately preceding
sentence in the same section. If the construction claimed by
counsel for the government be correct, that word is useless, for it
would express the idea with precision by reading, "But all
pensioners shall surrender their pensions to the Soldiers' Home
during the time they remain therein and voluntarily receive its
benefits." The question, therefore, is whether we shall read the
section "all pensioners" or "all
such pensioners."
Page 100 U. S. 513
The word, however, as there used has an appropriate reference to
the class of pensioners who have not contributed to the funds of
the institution, and no sound canon of construction will authorize
us to disregard it when to do so changes very materially the
meaning of the section.
It is urged in opposition to this view that as the law stood
prior to the revision, as shown by the Act of March 3, 1859. 11
Stat. 431, all invalid pensioners who accepted the benefit of the
home were bound to surrender to its use their pensions while there;
and it must be conceded that such was the law.
But, as the revision embraces that act as well as all others on
the subject, it is, by the express language of the repealing
clause, sec. 5596, no longer in force. Counsel for government,
admitting that it is no longer in force, independently of the
section of the revision which we are called on to construe, insist
that a resort may be had to the law which was the subject of
revision, to interpret any thing left in doubt by the language of
the revisers.
This principle is undoubtedly sound, and where there is a
substantial doubt as to the meaning of the language used in the
revision, the old law is a valuable source of information. The
Revised Statutes must be treated as the legislative declaration of
the statute law on the subjects which they embrace on the first day
of December, 1873. When the meaning is plain, the courts cannot
look to the statutes which have been revised to see if Congress
erred in that revision, but may do so when necessary to construe
doubtful language used in expressing the meaning of Congress. If,
then, in the case before us, the language of sec. 4820 was fairly
susceptible of the construction claimed by the government as well
as of the opposite one, the argument from the provision of the
statute as it stood before the revision would be conclusive. But
for the reasons already given, we are of opinion that the
reasonable force of the language used in that section, taken in
connection with the whole of the chapter devoted to that subject
and the accepted canons of interpretation, leave room for no other
construction than that only invalid pensioners who had
not
contributed to the funds of the Soldiers' Home
Page 100 U. S. 514
were bound to purchase its benefits by surrendering to it their
pensions.
As the Court of Claims acted on this construction, its judgment
is
Affirmed.
