140 U.S. 417
SCOTUS
1891

Lead Opinion

Mr. Justice Field,

after stating the case, delivered the ■opinion of the court.

The question presented is whether the evidence before' the court below was sufficient to show that the petitioner was a citizen of the United States.

The testimony given by himself amounted to very little; indeed, it was of no force or weight whatever. The particularity. and positiveness with which he stated- the place of his birth in San Francisco was evidently the result of instruction for his examination on this proceeding, and not a statement of what he had learned from his parents in years past. And his failure to mention any particulars as to the city of San *420Francisco, which he certainly ought to have been able to do if he resided there during the first ten years of his life, was surprising. A boy of any intelligence, arriving at that age, would remember, even after the lapse of six years, some words of the language of the country, some names of streets or places or some circumstances that would satisfy one that he had been -in the city before. But there was nothing whatever of this kind shown. He gave the name of no person he had seen; hé described no locality or incident relating to his life in the city, nor did he repeat a single word of the language, which he must have heard during the greater part of several years, if he was there.

The testimony of the father was also devoid 6f any incident vor circumstance corroborative of his statement.. The production of the so-called store-book, in which there was an entry of passage-money paid .for the boy and his mother, does not strike us as at all conclusive. The accounts of a mere worker on a sewing machine would not be likely to occupy much space; and the alleged entry could as easily have been made as the manufacture of the. story repeated. If we could not believe the story in the absence of the book we should hesitate to yield credence to it lipón the exhibition-of the entry. ' If the petitioner was really born in the United States, and Had lived, there during the first ten years of his life,'the fact must, have been known to some of the father’s neighbors, and incidents could readily have been given which would have placed, the statement of it beyond all question. It is incredible that-a father would allow the exclusion of his son from the country ¡where he lived, when proof of his son’s birth and residence there for years could have been easily shown, if. such in truth had been the fact.

. Undoubtedly, as a general rule, positive testimony as to a particular fact, uncontradicted by any one, should control the decision of the court; • but that- rule admits of many exceptions. There may be such •ah" inherent improbability in the statements of a witness as to induce the- court ór jury to disregard his evidence, even in'the .absence of any direct conflicting testi-mony. He may be. contradicted by the facts he states as corn*421pletely as by direct adverse testimony; and there may be so many omissions in his account of particular transactions, or of •his own conduct, as to discredit his whole story. His manner, too, of testifying may give rise to doubts of his sincerity, and create the impression that he is giving a wrong coloring to* material facts. All these things may properly be- considered in determining the weight which should be given to his statements, although there be no adverse verbal testimony adduced.

In Kavanagh v. Wilson, 70 N. Y. 177, 179, where the action was by a real estate broker against the personal representatives of a deceased customer to recover an alleged agreed compensation for effecting a sale, and the only witness as to the contract was the son of the plaintiff, whose own compensation depended upon the plaintiff’s success, and the compensation alleged to have been agreed upon was more than double the usual compensation, it was held that the statement of the witness, under those circumstances, was not so entirely free from improbability as to justify a direction of the court tofihe jury to find'a verdict for the plaintiff, although there was no direct contradictory • testimony presented. The court said: “ It is undoubtedly a general rule that when a disinterested witness, who is in no way discredited, testifies to a fact within his own knowledge, which- is not of itself improbable, or 'in conflict with other evidence, the witness is to be believed, arid the fact is to be taken as legally established, so that it cannot be disregarded by court or jury. . . . But this case is not fairly brought within this rule. Here the witness was not wholly disinterested.. He was a son of the plaintiff, engaged in his business, and thus biassed and interested in feeling. • His compensation for drawing the contracts (and how large that was-to be does not appear) depended, ! ipfer from- the evidence, upon his father’s success in getting his compensation - as the broker.” The court then went on to' observe that the.story told by the witness was not entirely free from some improbability, and that it did not appear why the broker was promised more than double the usual price for the sale of country property, nor why the compensation was never spoken of before or after, in the numerous conversations heard by Avitness, *422nor what could have induced the promise of the large sum, when the usual commission would seem to have been ample compensation for any service to be rendered, nor why the party made the unusual promise to pay the absolute sum in no way dependent upon the amount for which the property might . be negotiated. ^ These circumstances, the court thought, presented a sufficient case for the' consideration of the jury, and it held that the court below erred in refusing to submit it to them.

In Koehlér v. Adler, 78 N. Y. 287, it was held that a court or jury was nét bound to adopt the statements of a witness simply for the reason that no other witness had denied them, and that the character of the witness was not impeached; and that the witness might be contradicted by circumstances as well as by statements of others contrary to his .own, or there might be such a degree of improbability in his statements as .to deprive them, of credit, however positively made. The case of Elwood v. Western Union Telegraph Co., 45 N. Y. 549, was cited in support of this position, where, in delivering the opinion- of -the court, the rule and its exceptions are stated by Judge Rapallo.with great clearness and precision; so also was the case of Kavanagh v. Wilson, above referred to.

In Wait v. McNeil, 7 Mass. 261, the Supreme . Court of Massachusetts held that a verdict was not to ’ be set aside, although it -was given against the positive testimony of a. witness, not impeached, where there were- circumstances in evidence tending to lessen the probability that such testimony, was true. Numerous other cases might be cited in support of the same general doctrine.

For the considerations mentioned, and the fact that the court below had the witnesses before it, and could thus better-judge of the credibility to which they were entitled, we are not prepared to hold that its finding vyas not justified.

Its judgment is, therefore, ' Affirmed,





Dissenting Opinion

Me. Justice Beewee

dissenting:

I am unable to agree with the conclusions reached by the court. . They seem to me to be in the face of positive, unim*423peached and uncontradicted testimony. The single question is one of fact, whether the petitioner was born in this country or not? On the hearing he was represented by counsel'; so was the government. ITe testified that he was sixteen years old, was born on Dupont Street in San Francisco, and named the place on that street; that he lived there until he was ten years of age; and that he then went with his mother, on the steamer Eio de Janeiro, to China. With them on the steamer were three friends of the family, whose names he gave. His father, who was also a witness, testified that the boy was born in San Francisco, at the place named, No. 1030 Dupont Street; that he remained there until he was ten years of age; and .that at that time he sent the petitioner, with his mother, back to .China. He. gave the day and the year oh which the boy sailed. He gave as a reason for sending his wife and son back to China, that his parents were old, and as he could not go himself, sent her to attend on them. He produced his store-book on which appeared an entry of the purchase of the tickets for the boy and his mother, an entry of date the day before that on which the- steamer named sailed. No' witness was called to contradict this testimony. They were the only witnesses. The only thing which makes against the boy’s testimony, is the fact that he did not know a word of English. But is it strange-thatr a boy born-and brought up ir a Chinese family, and living until he was ten years old in that part of San Francisco which' is practically a Chinese town,- and then taken back to China, should know only the Chinese language?' It' is -true he did not give the details of his boyhood in San Francisco; but no question was asked- of him in respect to them. If the government, through its counsel, wished to discredit' his positive testimony it was its province, on cross-examination, to question him as to his knowledge of various localities in San Francisco, and of events which happened during the time'he .claimed to have resided there. The books of the steamér, if accessible, were not produced to show that no such passengers sailed on the trip named. No attempt was made to contradict either father or son, or impeach either, unless the ignorance of the English language is to be con*424sidered as impeachment. The government evidently rested on the assumption that, because the witnesses were Chinese persons, they were not to be believed. I do not agree with •this.