United States v. Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Co.

209 F. 910, 1913 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1163
CourtDistrict Court, D. Arizona
DecidedDecember 1, 1913
DocketNo. C 697
StatusPublished

This text of 209 F. 910 (United States v. Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Arizona primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Co., 209 F. 910, 1913 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1163 (D. Ariz. 1913).

Opinion

SAWTELLE, District Judge.

The indictment in this case contains two counts. The charging part of the first count thereof is as follows;

"That Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Company and Douglas Hardware Company, reputed corporations, and W. H. Brophy, E. E. Coles, and W. E. Eisher, on or about the 15th day of May, A. D. 1913, in the said district and within the jurisdiction of this court, did unlawfully, knowingly, willfully, and feloniously, and with intent to export the munitions of war hereinafter described from the United States of America to and into the United States of Mexico, make and cause to he made a certain shipment of munitions of war, to, wit, fifty] thousand (50,000) cartridges of the caliber commonly known and designated as 7-M-M, that is to say, did make and cause to be made a shipment of said munitions of war from the city of Douglas, in the county of Cochise, state and district of Arizona, and with the state of Sonora, in the United States of Mexico, as the ultimate destination of said shipment, by then, at the city of Douglas, in the county of Cochise, state and district of Arizona, transporting and causing the said munitions of war to be transported, by means of horses and wagons and by express and railroad transportation in and over the railroad lines of the railroad commonly known and designated as the El Paso & Southwestern Railroad, from the store buildings of the said Douglas Hardware Company, in said city of Douglas, county of Cochise, state and district of Arizona, to the store buildings of the said Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Company, at the city of Bisbee, county of Cochise, state and district of Arizona.”

The second count is identical with the first, except that it charges a shipment of 90,000 cartridges of the calibers commonly known and designated as 7-M-M and 30-30 from the store building of the Phelps-[912]*912Dodge Mercantile Company at Bisbee, county of Cochise, state and district of Arizona, and with the state of Sonora, in the United States of Mexico, as the ultimate destination of said shipment, by transporting said munitions of war by means of horses and wagon, from the store building and warehouse of the Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Company at Bisbee, to a point in the village of Bakersville, near the Bakers-ville Hotel, in the said county of Cochise, state and district of Arizona.

The indictment was designed to charge the defendants, and each of them, with a violation of the provisions of the Joint Resolution of March 14, 1912, No. 10, 37 Statutes at Large, p. 630, which is as follows :

“Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled: That the joint resolution to prohibit the export of coal or other material used in war from any seaport of the United States, approved April twenty-second, eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, be, and hereby is, amended to read as follows:
“That whenever the President shall find that in any American country conditions of domestic violence exist which are promoted by the use of arms or munitions of war procured from the United States, and shall make proclamation thereof, it shall be unlawful to export except under such limitations and exceptions as the President shall prescribe any arms or munitions of war from any place in the United States to such country until otherwise ordered by the President or by Congress.
“See. 2. That any shipment of material hereby declared unlawful after such a proclamation shall be punishable by fine not exceeding ten thousand dollars, or imprisonment not exceeding two years, or both.”

A demurrer has been interposed to each count of the indictment, upon the grounds that neither count of said indictment states facts sufficient to constitute a public offense on the part of the defendants, or any of them, under the laws of the United States of America.

[ 1 ] It will be observed that the pleader has attempted to follow the form of indictment approved by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of the United States v. Chavez, reported in 228 U. S. 525 et seq., 33 Sup. Ct. 595, 57 L. Fd. 950; but in my opinion the indictment in this case does not measure up to the indictment in the Chavez Case; and it is my opinion that the demurrer to the indictment in this case should be sustained, because, when the indictment is carefully considered, it is made manifest that the defendants are charged with the mere intent to ship the munitions of war in question into the forbidden territory, and nothing more, and because the indictment is fatally defective in that it does not name a place of destination of the shipment, of the said munitions of war within the forbidden territory.

As I have stated in the case of United States v. Steinfeld & Company (No. C 705) 209 Fed. 904, decided at this term, and in which case demurrer was sustained to the indictment, I do not consider the mere shipping of munitions of war from one point in the United States of America to another point in the United States of America an offense under-the joint resolution of Congress above referred to, and I do not consider the mere intent to ship goods from a point within the United States of America into the United States of Mexico an offense, unless that' intent is' coupled with an actual shipment made from a definite [913]*913point in the United States of America to a definite point in the United States of Mexico.

In the case of United States v. Chavez, above referred to, the offense charged was an actual shipment started from El Paso, Tex., to the city of Juarez, Mexico, and the defendant was carrying the munitions of war on his person and was arrested in. the'city of El Paso, after having started and while he was on his way to the city of Juarez. That case is not a parallel one to the case at bar, because in the case at bar the actual shipment charged was a shipment made from one point in the United States of America, and in the state of Arizona, to another point in the state of Arizona, and a careful study of the indictment reveals no actual shipment made from a point in Arizona to a point within the forbidden territory, and the mere intent to make a shipment of munitions of war cannot, in my judgment, be held to be an offense under the joint resolution of Congress in question, because that resolution nowhere makes it an offense,- either directly or by necessary implication; and the Chavez Case, above referred to, as I construe it, does not so hold, because in the Chavez Cáse the intent which appears in the indictment was coupled with the actual shipment made from El Paso to the city of Juarez, while in the case at bar the intent stands alone and is coupled with.no actual shipment save the shipment which was already made and previously ended.

[2] Furthermore, this indictment is bad in law, because it fails to specify a definite point of destination within the forbidden territory to which the shipment of munitions of war is alleged to have been made, or to charge that the point of destination in the state of Sonora, United States of Mexico, was to the grand jury unknown.

In the case of Almy v. State of California, 24 How. (65 U. S.) 174, 16 L. Ed. 644, to which I have already referred in my opinion in the case of United States v.

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Related

Almy v. California
65 U.S. 169 (Supreme Court, 1861)
United States v. Chavez
228 U.S. 525 (Supreme Court, 1913)
United States v. Albert Steinfeld & Co.
209 F. 904 (D. Arizona, 1913)

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Bluebook (online)
209 F. 910, 1913 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1163, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-phelps-dodge-mercantile-co-azd-1913.