140 U.S. 164 | SCOTUS | 1891
delivered the opinion of the court.
It was admitted that the petitioner was a commissioner of the Circuit Court; that he actually and necessarily performed the services set forth in his petition; and that his-accounts containing .those charges were duly approved by the District Court,-as required bylaw. Objection was made by the government to the allowance of the following items:
• 1. “ Drawing complaints.” In the case of United States v. Ewing, ante, 142, we held that where the local practice required a magistrate to reduce the examination of the complaining wit.nesses to. writing, an allowance for drawing the complaint,
(a.) Petitioner is. also allowed a fee of 10 cents for each oath administered in connection with these complaints, and 15 cents for each jurat, as for a certificate. United States v. McDermott, ante, 151.
(5.) He is also entitled to a fee of 10 cents for filing such complaint; under § 847 and under the clause of § 828, “ for filing and entering every declaration, plea or other paper, 10 cents.”
2. No objection is made by the government to the second series of items for issuing 45 warrants at $1 each, entering 128 returns thereon at 15 cents per folio, and filing such warrants at 10 cents each, nor to the charges for like services in connection with the issuing and return of subpoenas. ■
3. The fourth series of items relates to charges in connection with the recognizances of defendants for examination. "Wé have already held in United States v. Ewing, ante, 142, that a charge for the acknowledgment of recognizances was proper, though but one acknowledgment for each recognizance can be allowed. There is no valid objection to the allowance
4. The same rule will apply to recognizances of witnesses summoned at the expense of the government.
5. The charge per folio for pay rolls of witnesses is proper, as well as the charge of 10 cents for each oath administered to a witness in support of his claim for attendance and mileage.
6. The charge- per folio for .transcripts of proceedings is lawful under Revised Statutes, § 1014, which provides that “copies of the process (issued by the commissioner) shall be returned as speedily as may be into the clerk’s office of such court, together with the recognizances of the witnesses for their appearance to testify in the case.” In most districts it is the habit of commissioners to send up the original proceedings before them, a practice to which there seems to be no objection, conducing, as it does, to a diminution of expenses to the government; but where the requirements o section
• 7. The charge per folio for depositions taken on examination is, we think, fairly allowable, upon the same principle on which we have" allowed it for preparing complaints. Section ,4286 of the Criminal Code of Alabama requires that “ the evidence of witnesses examined must be reduced to writing by the magistrate, or under his direction, and signed by the witnesses respectively.” As there is no special provision fob the allowance of a charge for such evidence, it may be considered as a deposition within § 847, for the taking and certifying of which the commissioner is entitled to 20 cents per folio. We held a similar charge to be proper in the case of United States v. Ewing, ante, 142.
8. But the charge for filing such depositions should be dis- • allowed. Section 828 allows “for filing and entering every declaration, plea or other paper, 10 cents.” Each deposition is not necessarily a “ paper ” within the meaning of this clause. If two or more depositions are embraced in a single paper, or a series of sheets áre attached together, they form but a single paper, within the meaning of the law. We had occasion recently to pass upon this question in the case of Schell's Executors v. Fauche, 138 U. S. 562, where two letters pasted together were held to constitute but one in law.
■ These embrace all the items to which objection is made by the Attorney General. It remains, that upon being modified by deducting the last item of $10.80, the judgment of the court below must be
Affirmed.