When, in the instance of the first application for habeas corpus made by this petitioner, the appeal to this court was dismissed, the supersedeas fell with the disposition of the case; and when final judgment was entered here, and especially after the mandate had issued, the authorities of the state had power to proceed, although the mandate may have been, as is said, delivered to them instead of to the circuit court. In re Jugiro, 140 U. S. 295, 296, 11 Sup. Ct. 770.

The constitution of New Jersey provides that the governor *may grant reprieves "to extend until the expiration of a time not exceeding 90 days after conviction"; and by section 123 of the criminal procedure act of that state it is provided that when a reprieve is granted to any convict sentenced to the punishment of death, and he is not pardoned, it shall be the duty of the governor to issue his warrant to the sheriff of the proper county for the execution of the sentence at such time as is therein appointed and expressed. It is contended that, if there is no reprieve, there can be no warrant; that there was no authority to issue either, except within 90 days after conviction; and that appellant must be brought before the trial court, and a new date be fixed for the execution. But these are matters for the determination of the state courts, and they appear to have been passed upon adversely to petitioner. That result involves no denial of due process of law, or the infraction of any provision of the constitution of the United States. Lambert v. Barrett, 157 U. S. 697, 15 Sup. Ct. 722; Holden v. Minnesota, 137 U. S. 483, 11 Sup. Ct. 143; Schwab v. Berggren, 143 U. S. 442, 12 Sup. Ct. 525; McElvaine v. Brush, 142 U. S. 155, 159, 12 Sup. Ct. 156; In re Cross, 146 U. S. 271, 278, 13 Sup. Ct. 109.

Order affirmed.

(159 U. S. 663)

GOODE v. UNITED STATES.
(November 25, 1895.)
No. 616.

ROBBERY OF MAILS-FICTITIOUS LETTER-CON-
STRUCTION OF STATUTE.

1. On a prosecution for the stealing of a letter from the post office, the fact that the letter was a decoy is no defense.

2. A letter addressed to a fictitious person, known to be such, is a "letter" within the meaning of Rev. St. $$ 5467, 5469, making the stealing of a letter from the mail or post office a penal offense.

3. Where a general verdict of guilty is rendered, an objection taken to evidence admissible under one or a part of the counts is untenable.

4. The term "branch post office," as used in Rev. St. § 5469, making the stealing of a letter from the mail or post office or "branch post office" a penal offense, includes every place within such office where letters are kept in the regular course of business, for reception, stamping, sorting, or delivering.

5. To convict a post-office employé of stealing a letter from a branch post office, there being evidence that the office has been known as a post-office station, and has been used as such

for years, and is a post office de facto, it is unnecessary to show that it was regularly established as a branch post office by law.

In Error to the District Court of the United States for the District of Massachusetts. *George Goode, a letter carrier, was indict-2 ed and convicted in the district court for the district of Massachusetts for embezzlement and theft from the mail. The indictment contained seven counts, the first three of which charged a violation of Rev. St. § 5467, and the last four a violation of section 5469. The substance of these sections is printed in the margin. The case was submitted to the jury under certain instructions, hereafter to be considered, who returned a verdict of guilty upon the whole indictment.

The facts of the case were substantially as follows:

Goode, the plaintiff in error, was a letter carrier employed in the branch post office at Roxbury, which had formerly been an independent post office, but is now known as the "Roxbury Station" of the Boston post office. Complaints having been made of thefts from the mails at this office, Thomas J. Boynton, a post-office inspector, prepared two decoy letters, one of which was addressed to Whitcomb, Keyes & Co., a firm of merchant tailors on Washington street, in the Roxbury district, and was subsequently delivered to them in the regular course of business, and one addressed to John Muldoon, Esq., 153

*

1 Sec. 5467. Any person employed in any department of the postal service who shall secrete, embezzle, or destroy any letter intrusted to him, or which shall come into his possession, and which was intended to be conveyed by mail, or carried or delivered by any mail-carrier, mail-messenger, route-agent, lettercarrier, or other person employed in any department of the postal service, or forwarded through or delivered from any post office or branch post office established by authority of the postmaster-general, and which shall contain any postage stamp or other pecuniary obligation or security of the government, any such person who shall steal or take any of the things aforesaid out of any letter, * which shall have come in his possession, either in the regular course of his official duties or in any other manner whatever, and provided the same shall not have been delivered to the party to whom it is directed, shall be punishable by imprisonment at hard labor for not less than one year nor more than five years.

*

Sec. 5469. Any person who shall steal the mail or steal or take from or out of any mail or post office, branch post office, or other authorized depository for mail matter, any letter or packet; any person who shall take the mail, or any letter or packet therefrom, or from any post office, branch post office, or other authorized depository for mail matter, with or without the consent of the person having custody thereof, and open, embezzle, or destroy any such mail, letter, or package which shall contain any postage stamp or other pecuniary obligation or security of the government; any person who shall, by fraud or deception, obtain, from any person having custody thereof, any such mail, letter, or packet containing any such article of value shall, although not employed by the postal service, be punishable by imprisonment at hard labor for not less than one year and not more than five years.

*

*

*664

Ziegler street, Boston, Mass., and postmarked West Cheshire, Conn.

Boynton, in fact, took an envelope containing that postmark, filled in the date, which was missing on the postmark, with type which he had in his office for that purpose, and canceled the stamp with a canceler, such as was used ordinarily in the smaller post offices. He inclosed in the letter two one-dollar silver certificates and five two-cent postage stamps, marked the postage stamps by means of pin holes, and gave the letter to one McGrath, who was assistant superintendent of the mailing division of the main post office in Boston, but who was stationed temporarily, by direction of the postmaster, at the Roxbury office.

McGrath, when the letter carriers were out, called as witness the superintendent and person having charge of the branch post office, and in his presence put the letter into defendant's, Goode's, box. This was not the ordinary method of depositing the mail. Indeed, he passed by the places on the outside as well as the inside of the post office, where letters are usually mailed, and went into the back room, where the letters, after passing through the mails, are sorted. Goode returned from his route, took up all the letters in his box, and went to his desk, which was situated in the same room. His own route terminated at No. 51 Ziegler street, and it was his duty to put this Ziegler street letter into the box of the carrier whose route included the higher numbers of Ziegler street, or to put it into what was known as the "list box." This list box was kept for the reception of any letter known as a "beat" or a "nixie"; that is, a letter addressed to a person not to be found in the district. On Goode's return from his route, the letter not being found in either of these boxes or elsewhere, he was searched, and the five marked postage stamps were found upon his person. It was shown that, while absent on his route, he had the opportunity of disposing of the letter and the silver certificates therein contained. There were a large number of other letters in the box in which this Muldoon letter was put by McGrath. McGrath knew at the time that there was no such place as 153 Ziegler street, and that there was no such person as John Muldoon. He put the letter in the box for the purpose of being able to identify its contents in case Goode embezzled them.

Goode was sentenced, upon conviction, to imprisonment at hard labor for three years, and thereupon sued out this writ of error.

Elbridge R. Anderson, for plaintiff in er ror. Asst. Atty. Gen. Whitney, for defendant in error.

Mr. Justice BROWN, after stating the facts In the foregoing language, delivered the opinlon of the court.

To make a case under Rev. St. § 5467, it is necessary for the government to prove:

(1) That the person charged was employed in the postal service.

(2) That the letter that he is charged with secreting, embezzling, or destroying was intrusted to him or came into his possession, and was intended to be conveyed by mail, carried, or delivered by carrier, messenger, route agent, or other person employed in the postal service, or forwarded through or delivered from any post office or branch office,

etc.

(3) That it contained one of the articles of value described in the statute, one of which is postage stamps.

(4) Or that the person so employed stole one of such articles out of any such letter, etc., provided the same had not been delivered to the party to whom it was directed.

Upon the other hand, section 5469 applies to every person, irrespective of his employment in the post office; and, to establish a case under this section, it is only necessary to prove:

(1) That the defendant stole the mail, or that he took from out of the mail or post office or other authorized depository a letter or packet, or took such mail or letter or packet therefrom, or from any post office, etc., or otherwise authorized depository, with without the consent of the person having, the custody thereof.

or

*(2) That he opened, embezzled, or destroyed* any such mail, letter, or packet containing an article of value.

(3) Or, by fraud or deception, obtained from any person having custody thereof any such mail, letter, or packet, containing such article of value.

As the verdict was general upon all the counts, which are conceded to be sufficient in form, if any one of the counts was sustained by competent testimony the verdict must stand. Claassen v. U. S., 142 U. S. 140, 12 Sup. Ct. 169; Evans v. U. S., 153 U. S. 584, 14 Sup. Ct. 934.

1. The main contention of the defendant is that the Muldoon letter was not a letter in point of fact, inasmuch as it was not only a decoy, that is, not written in good faith as a message or communication to the person addressed, but was wholly fictitious; that there was no such person as John Muldoon, no such place as 153 Ziegler street, and the letter could not possibly have been delivered.

That the fact that the letter was a decoy is no defense is too well settled by the modern authorities to be now open to contention. Rex v. Eggington, 2 Bos. & P. 508; U. S. v. Foye, 1 Curt. 364, Fed. Cas. No. 15,157; U. S. v. Cottingham, 2 Blatchf. 470, Fed. Cas. No. 14,872; Bates v. U. S., 10 Fed. 97; U. S. v. Whittier, 5 Dill. 35, 39, Fed. Cas. No. 16,688; U. S. v. Moore, 19 Fed. 39; U. S. v. Wight, 38 Fed. 106; U. S. v. Matthews, 35 Fed. 890, 896; U. S. v. Dorsey, 40 Fed. 752. Indeed, this court held at the last term, in Grimm v. U. S., 156 U. S. 604, 15 Sup. Ct. 470, that the fact that certain prohibited pictures and prints were

*669

drawn out of the defendant, by a decoy letter written by a government detective, was no defense to an indictment for mailing such prohibited publications.

The question whether a letter addressed to a fictitious person, known to be such, is a "letter" within the meaning of the statute is more serious, and there are certainly authorities which lend support to the theory of the defendant in that regard. Thus, in Reg. v. Rathbone, Car. & M. 220, a detective mailed a decoy letter, containing a marked sovereign, to a fictitious address in London, and placed it in a heap of letters which the prisoner was about to sort, and which he had to deliver that day. The letter was not delivered, and, in the course of the same day, the prisoner was arrested and searched, and the marked sovereign found in his pocket. It was held that this was not a "post letter," or a letter put into the post; but, as there was a separate count for the larceny of the sovereign, he was held to have been properly convicted of that. A similar ruling was made in Reg. v. Gardner, 1 Car. & K. 628, wherein the prisoner was held to have been properly convicted of the larceny of certain marked money contained in a letter, which was addressed to a fictitious person, the court adhering to its previous ruling that it was not the stealing of a post letter.

The authority of these cases, however, was seriously shaken by that of Reg. v. Young, 1 Denison, Crown Cas. 194. In that case the letter contained a half sovereign, and was addressed to a fictitious person. The prisoner, instead of transmitting the letter to the general post office, abstracted it from the receiving box, opened it, took out the half sovereign, and kept both the letter and the money. It was held to be a post letter, having all the ingredients under the statute, and "whether it can be delivered or no seems beside the question." On the Gardner Case being cited, Pollock, C. B., said he had seen reason to think his dictum in that case was incorrect, and the judges were unanimously of the opinion that the conviction was right.

The question has been generally ruled in the same way in this country. U. S. v. Foye, 1 Curt. 364, Fed. Cas. No. 15,157; U. S. v. Wight, 38 Fed. 106; U. S. v. Dorsey, 40 Fed. 752; U. S. v. Bethea, 44 Fed. 802.

If the word "letter" were given the technical construction of a written message or communication from one person to another, it would strike at the whole system of decoy or test letters, none of which contain bona fide communications. This would render it practically impossible to detect thefts and embezzlements by employés, since, in a large majority of cases, the letters and their envelopes are thrown away or destroyed for the very purpose of preventing their being identified in case the employé is arrested; and the contents of the letter, which it is ordinarily impossible to identify, only are abstracted. however, the contents can be identified, as they always are in test letters, by a private

If,

mark put upon them, the discovery of such contents upon the person of the employé affords almost conclusive evidence of the theft of the letter in which they are inclosed.

It makes no difference with respect to the duty of the carrier whether the letter be genuine or a decoy, with a fictitious address. Coming into his possession as such carrier, it is his duty to treat it for what it appears to be on its face,-a genuine communication; to make an effort to deliver it; or, if the address be not upon his route, to hand it to the proper carrier, or put it into the list box. Certainly, he has no more right to appropriate it to himself than he would have if it were a genuine letter. For the purposes of these sections, a letter is a writing or document, which bears the outward semblance of a genuine communication, and comes into the possession of the employé in the regular course of his official business. His duties in respect to it are not relaxed by the fact or by his knowledge that it is not what it purports to be; in other words, it is not for him to judge of its genuineness.

2. The question whether this letter "was intended to be conveyed by mail, or carried or delivered by any mail carrier, mail messenger, route agent, letter carrier, or other person,” etc., does not properly arise at this stage of the case, since, under section 5469, it is only necessary to show that the article embezzled or taken was a letter or packet properly deposited, etc.; the subsequent limitation of the prior section with respect to the intention of the party mailing the letter being omitted here. Whether the court erred in refusing the defendant's request in that particular, therefore, becomes immaterial, in view of the last four counts, which are drawn under section 5469, and contain no allegation that the letter in question was intended to be conveyed by mail or carrier. Indeed, it is somewhat doubtful whether it could be material at all in view of section 5468, declaring that the fact that any letter, etc., has been deposited in any post office or branch post office, or in charge of any agent of the postal service, shall be evidence that the same was "intended to be conveyed by mail," within the meaning of section 5467. Had defendant been convicted under the first three counts and acquitted under the last four, of course the objection might be material; but, where a general verdict of guilty is rendered, an objection taken to evidence admissible under one or a part of the counts is untenable.

3. Was there competent evidence to show that the letter was deposited in any mail or post office, branch post office, or other authorized depository for mail matter, within the meaning of section 5469? If, to meet the requirements of this section, it were necessary to show that the letter was deposited in one of the ordinary boxes accessible to the public, and used for the reception of letters regularly mailed, the evidence is obviously insufficient, since it is shown that McGrath, in mailing this letter, passed by the place where letters were

usually mailed, entered the back room of the office, where letters were sorted, and put this letter into Goode's box. This was clearly sufficient to charge Goode with the duty of delivering, or attempting to deliver, the letter; and it makes no difference that, before it was put into this box, it did not go through the usual channel or reach it in the ordinary way. The term "branch post office," within the meaning of the act, includes every place within such office where letters are kept in the regular course of business, for reception, stamping, assorting, or delivery. Of course, a letter thrown upon the floor, or laid upon a desk appropriated to other and different purposes, could not be said to have been deposited in the post office; but, if it be put in any place where letters are usually kept or deposited for any purpose, we think it is within the act.

4. While there was no direct evidence that this branch post office was established by authority of the postmaster general, there was evidence that it was known as the "Roxbury Station" of the Boston post office, had been used as such for years, and that it was a post office de facto. For the purposes of this case, It was quite unnecessary to show that it had been regularly established as such by law. Ingraham v. U. S., 155. U. S. 434, 15 Sup. Ct. 148; Wright v. U. S., 158 U. S. 232, 15 Sup. Ct. 819.

The judgment of the court below is therefore affirmed.

3. A foreign judgment cannot be impeached because one of the plaintiffs was permitted to testify without being put under oath, and was not subjected to cross-examination, or because documents were admitted with which defendants had no connection, and which would not be admissible in the United States, if the practice followed and the method of examining witnesses were according to the law of the foreign country.

4. In an action on a foreign judgment rendered for the price of goods sold, a contention that part of the plaintiffs' claim is affected by one of the contracts between the parties having been made in violation of the United States revenue law, requiring goods to be invoiced at their actual value, cannot be sustained, in the absence of any distinct offer to prove that the invoice value of any of the goods sold by the plaintiffs to the defendants was agreed between them to be, or was in fact, lower than the actual market value of the goods.

5. When an action is brought in a court of this country by a citizen of a foreign country against one of our own citizens, to recover a sum of money adjudged by a court of that country to be due from the defendant to the plain tiff, and the foreign judgment appears to have been rendered by a competent court, having jurisdiction of the cause and of the parties, and upon due allegations and proofs, and opportunity to defend against them, and its proceedings are according to the course of a civilized jurisprudence, and are stated in a clear and formal record, the judgment is prima facie evidence, at least, of the truth of the matter adjudged; and it should be held conclusive upon the merits tried in the foreign court, unless some special ground is shown for impeaching the judgment, as by showing that it was affected by fraud or prejudice, or that, by the principles of international law, and by the comity of our own country, it should not be given full credit and effect. 6. Judgments rendered in France, or in any other foreign country, by the laws of which judgments rendered in the United States are reviewable upon the merits, are not entitled to full credit and conclusive effect when sued upon in the United States, but are prima facie evidence only of the justice of the plaintiff's claim. Mr. Chief Justice Fuller, Mr. Justice Harlan, Mr. Justice Brewer, and Mr. Justice Jackson dissenting.

In Error to and Appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

"The first of these two cases was an action" at law, brought December 18, 1885, in the circuit court of the United States for the Southern district of New York, by Gustave Bertin Guyot, as official liquidator of the firm of Charles Fortin & Co., and by the surviving members of that firm, all aliens and citizens of the republic of France, against Henry Hilton and William Libbey, citizens of the United States and of the state of New York, and trading as copartners, in the cities of New York and Paris, and elsewhere, under the firm name of A. T. Stewart & Co. The action was upon a judgment recovered in a French court at Paris, in the republic of France, by the firm of Charles Fortin & Co., all of whose members were French citizens, against Hilton & Libbey, trading as copartners, as aforesaid, and citizens of the United States and of the state of New York.

The complaint alleged that in 1886, and since, during the time of all the transactions included in the judgment sued on, Hilton and Libbey,

as successors to Alexander T. Stewart and Libbey, under the firm name of A. T. Stewart & Co., carried on a general business as merchants in the cities of New York and Paris, and elsewhere, and maintained a regular store and place of business at Paris; that during the same time Charles Fortin & Co. carried on the manufacture and sale of gloves at Paris, and the two firms had there large dealings in that business, and controversies arose in the adjustment of accounts between them.

The complaint further alleged that between March 1, 1879, and December 1, 1882, five suits were brought by Fortin & Co. against | Stewart & Co. for sums alleged to be due, and three suits by Stewart & Co. against Fortin & Co., in the tribunal of commerce of the department of the Seine, a judicial tribunal or court, organized and existing under the laws of France, sitting at Paris, and having Jurisdiction of suits and controversies between merchants or traders growing out of commercial dealings between them; that Stewart & Co. appeared by their authorized attorneys in all those suits; and that, after full hearing before an arbitrator appointed by that court, and before the court itself, and after all the suits had been consolidated by the court, final judgment was rendered on January 20, 1883, that Fortin & Co. recover of Stewart & Co. various sums, arising out of the dealings between them, amounting to 660,847 francs, with interest, and dismissed part of Fortin & Co.'s claim.

The complaint further alleged that appeals were taken by both parties from that judg- | ment to the court of appeals of Paris, Third section, an appellate court of record, organized and existing under the laws of the republic of France, and having jurisdiction of appeals from the final judgments of the tribunal of commerce of the department of the Seine, where the amount in dispute exceeded the sum of 1,500 francs; and that the said court of appeal, by a final judgment, rendered March 19, 1884, and remaining of record in the office of its clerk at Paris, after hearing the several parties by their counsel, and upon full consideration of the merits, dismissed the appeal of the defendants, confirmed the judgment of the lower court in favor of the plaintiffs, and ordered, upon the plaintiffs' appeal, that they recover the additional sum of 152,528 francs, with 182,849 francs for interest on all the claims allowed, and 12,559 francs for costs and expenses.

The complaint further alleged that Guyot had been duly appointed by the tribunal of commerce of the department of the Seine official liquidator of the firm of Fortin & Co., with full powers, according to law and commercial usage, for the verification and realization of its property, both real and personal, and to collect and cause to be executed the Judgments aforesaid.

The complaint further alleged that the judgment of the court of appeals of Paris, and the judgment of the tribunal of commerce, as

modified by the judgment of the appellate court, still remain in full force and effect; "that the said courts respectively had jurisdiction of the subject-matter of the controversies so submitted to them, and of the parties, the "said defendants having intervened, by their attorneys and counsel, and applied for affirmative relief in both courts; that the plaintiffs have hitherto been unable to collect the said judgments or any part thereof, by reason of the absence of the said defendants, they having given up their business in Paris prior to the recovery of the said judgment on appeal, and having left no property within the jurisdiction of the republic of France out of which the said judgments might be made;" and that there are still justly due and owing from the defendants to the plaintiffs upon those said judgments certain sums, specified in the complaint, and amounting in all to 1,008,783 francs in the currency of the republic of France, equivalent to $195,122.47.

The defendants, in their answer, set forth in detail the original contracts and transactions in France between the parties, and the subsequent dealings between them, modifying those contracts, and alleged that the plaintiffs had no just claim against the defendants, but that, on the contrary, the defendants, upon a just settlement of the accounts, were entitled to recover large sums from the plaintiffs.

The answer admitted the proceedings and judgments in the French courts, and that the defendants gave up their business in France before the judgment on appeal, and had no property within the jurisdiction of France out of which that judgment could be collected.

The answer further alleged that the tribunal of commerce of the department of the Seine was a tribunal whose judges were merchants, ship captains, stockbrokers, and persons engaged in commercial pursuits, and of which Charles Fortin had been a member until shortly before the commencement of the litigation.

The answer further alleged that, in the original suits brought against the defendants by Fortin & Co., the citations were left at their storehouse in Paris; that they were then residents and citizens of the state of New York, and neither of them at that time, or within four years before, had been within, or resident or domiciled within, the jurisdiction of that tribunal, or owed any allegiance to France; but that they were the owners of property situated in that country, which would by the law of France have been liable to seizure if they did not appear in that tribunal; and that they unwillingly, and solely for the purpose of protecting that property, authorized and caused an agent to appear for them in those proceedings; and that the suits brought by them against Fortin & Co. were brought for the same purpose, and in order to make a proper defense, and to establish counterclaims arising out of the transactions between the parties, and to compel the production and inspection of For