In 100 Federal, page 950, in re Perkins, it was held that a United States Commissioner cannot punish for contempt, and the doctrine is reiterated that a United States Commissioner does not, and cannot, hold a United States Court, but is a part of the Court appointing him; and when there be disobedience to his process or authority, the Commissioner properly refers such disobedience to the Court by whose authority he exists, which Court pursues the proper methods for contempt proceedings. In United States vs. Wah, 160 Federal, 207, the above doctrine has been reiterated, and it is clearly stated and argued, citing authorities, that United States Commissioners are neither judges nor courts, nor do they hold courts, though at some times acting in a quasi-judicial capacity, nor do they possess the power of courts, except in so far as the Acts of Congress conferring certain authority and imposing certain duties on them, especially confer the same.

§ 11a. Contempts. In speaking of the authorities that hold that a United States Commissioner is not a court, I cited some precedents that have blazed a method for punishing contempts before United States Commissioners which suggests the subject as related to the courts. There is never any difference of opinion as to the power and right of a court to punish for contempts committed in its presence. This power is inherent and is a corollary of authority itself. Just what outside acts amount to a contempt and just how far the courts will go in enforcing obedience is an interesting field and not quite so well measured. For instance in Grant v. U. S. 227 U. S. 704, it was held that a judgment for criminal contempt can be reviewed only by writ of error and not by appeal and that the personal privilege does not relieve an attorney from producing, under subpoena of the federal grand jury, books and papers of a corporation left with him for safe-keeping by a client who claimed to be owner thereof, and such production may be enforced even though the books and documents would incriminate the attorney who claimed to be holding them for his client. See also Wheeler v. U. S. 226, U. S. 478. To the same effect is the case of Norcross v. U. S., 209 Fed. 13, which held that a contempt punishment would lie for the failure of the secretary of a corporation to produce before a grand jury the books and records called for in a subpoena duces tecum

and this though there was no pending charge before the grand jury against the corporation or any of its officers or stockholders. This case was a writ of error from a judgment by the lower court committing the offending witness to imprisonment until he should conform to the requirements of the subpoena and the above opinion was by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

In the case of U. S. v. Huff, 206 Fed. 700, District Judge Grubb outlines the procedure and says that a contempt proceeding, although instituted in civil form by an order made in a pending suit directing the issuance of an attachment to bring the defendant into court, may be converted into a criminal proceeding by the intervention of the United States and the filing of a motion asking to be made plaintiff therein. He also says that the common law rule that one charged with contempt may purge himself and be entitled to a discharge by the filing of a sworn answer denying the contempt, is not recognized by the federal courts because they leave the question to be determined by the proofs on the hearing.

In the provision of Revised Statute § 725 and Judicial Code § 268 limiting the power of federal courts to punish for contempt to misbehavior in the presence of the court or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice, the second clause is not restricted in meaning to acts committed so near any point of distance to the place of holding court as to be obstructive to orderly procedure, which are covered by the preceding clause as construed by the Supreme Court, but applies to all acts of misbehavior the natural tendency and effect of which are to interfere with the administration of justice, wherever the acts may be committed. Where a defendant wrote and sent letters to a federal judge which were delivered to him in a room of his residence where he frequently heard matters in chambers, although it was not being so used at the time, such letters relating to a pending suit, to which the defendant was a part and in which the judge was still required to take action, they constituted a contempt punishable by the court under Judicial Code § 268.

In Kirk v. U. S., 192 Fed. 273, Circuit Judge Gilbert, speaking for the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, affirmed a contempt conviction which grew out of an attempt to corrupt jurors whom the defendant expected

would sit in a criminal trial about to be held in the same city, though such acts occurred in a saloon several blocks from the place where the court was held. The court specifically said that it was sufficiently near to the court to obstruct the administration of justice and it was therefore within the court's jurisdiction to punish, even though it did not occur on property belonging to the United States or occupied or used by it.

In U. S. v. Barrett et al. 187 Fed. 378, the defendants were punished for having made an unprovoked assault on one of the attorneys interested in a case being tried in the district court, such assault having been made because of the argument of such attorney and having been made on the street in full view of the jury room. The court said it had the power under its general jurisdiction to see that counsel practicing before it were not interefered with and that it had jurisdiction to punish individuals for contempt who assaulted counsel.

Judge Lacombe, in the Steiner case, 195 Fed. 300, held that the preparation, verifying and presentment of a false affidavit intended to influence the action of a court, constituted an obstruction to the administration of justice punishable as a criminal contempt and that contempt proceedings could be begun by warrant of attachment, as well as by a rule to show cause.

Section 268 of the Judicial Code reads as follows:

"The said courts ahall have power to impose and administer all necessary oaths and to punish by fine or imprisonment, at the discretion of the court, contempts of their authority; provided, that such power to punish contempts shall not be construed to extend to any cases except the misbehavior of any person in their presence, or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice, the misbehavior of any of the officers of said courts in their official transactions, and the disobedience or resistance by any such officer, or by any party, juror, witness or other person to any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree or command of the said courts."

In Gompers v. U. S. 233, U. S. 604, the Supreme Court held that while it could not review by appeal or writ of error a judgment of the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia, punishing for contempt, it may grant a writ of certiorari to review the same. In this case the court asked the interest

ing question as to whether an indictment will lie for a contempt of the court of the United States and left it unanswered. The Gompers case will be recalled as the case originating from the Buck stove boycott and grew immediately out of the publication of an issue of a labor paper.

Section 1044 of the Revised Statutes provides that no person shall be prosecuted for an offense, not capital, unless the indictment is found or information instituted within three years after the commission of the offense and the Supreme Court held in the Gompers case that this provision of limitation applied to acts of contempt that were not committed in the presence of the court, 233 U. S. 605. In that same case the court exhaustively considered the proposition as to whether or not a summary punishment for contempt was in violation of any of the Constitutional provisions guaranteeing jury trial and presentment by indictment and determined that the power to punish summarily was a part of the court itself and could not depend upon the uncertainty or delay of jury trials. This construction has long been recognized by the law writers as correct, the carrying into effect of which is not a deprivation of "due process of law." Bishop's New Criminal Procedure, Vol. 1, § 100a, Par. 3; same work, Vol. 2, § 892, Par. 6. U. S. v. Sweeney, 95 Fed. 434; People v. Kipley, 171 Ill. 44; 41 L. R. A. 775.

Violating injunctions, process of punishment for, whether civil or criminal contempt, Scovic v. U. S. 217, Fed. 871 Schwortz v. U. S. 217, Fed. 866.

§ 11b. Contempt Defined.-The act of October 15, 1914, on trade unions and combinations and trusts, found at page 128 of the Federal Statutes Annotated Supplement, of the 63rd Congress, in § 21 provides:

"That any person who shall wilfully disobey any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command of any district court of the United States or any court of the District of Columbia, by doing any act or thing therein, or thereby forbidden to be done by him, if the act or thing so done by him be of such character as to constitute also a criminal offense under any statute of the United States, or under the laws of any state in which the act was committed shall be proceeded against for his said contempt as hereinafter provided."

Section 22 provides the procedure for such trials and punishment, which includes the right of trial by jury, and limits the punishment to a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars or a term not exceeding six months or both, and §23 provides for an appeal from a conviction and bail during such appeal. § 24 reads as follows:

"That nothing herein contained shall be construed to relate to contempts committed in the presence of the court, or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice, nor to contempts committed in disobedience of any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command entered. in any suit or action brought or prosecuted in the name of or on behalf of the United States, but the same and all other cases of contempt, not specifically embraced within section 21 of this Act, may be punished in conformity to the usages at law and in equity now prevailing."

Other than the contempts defined in section 21 of this new law, it would seem that the statute relates to no other sort and that the procedure and punishment are as herein before defined for all other contempts.

$ 11c. Contempt Pendente Lite.-A persisting in perjury or a continued failure to comply with an order of the court, are contempts that may be prosecuted by a motion filed by the prosecuting officer or upon the court's own motion. In United States v. Appel, 211 Fed. 495, the court held that it had power to punish as a criminal contempt persistent perjury which blocks the inquiry before it, upon motion made by the district attorney on behalf of the United States. A court, like anyone else who is in earnest, ought not to be put out by transparent sham or evasive answer. Answers that are manifestly untrue are as surely a contempt of the court as is the refusal to answer at all. It is no defense to proceedings for contempt in making and presenting false affidavits and in disobeying an order requiring delivery of property, that the respondent ultimately succeeded in the suit in which the contempt was committed. In re Steiner, 195 Fed. 300. A proceeding for contempt of court may be begun by warrant of attachment as well as by rule to show cause, and the fact that perjury is a substantive crime, punishable as such, does not prevent it from also constituting a contempt punishable under Revised Statutes 725, which is