LOUISIANA. 



495 



party to which the four members of the board 

 were attached, it was never done. When the 

 returning officers were in secret session, it was 

 shown that a messenger, in accordance with 

 their instructions, would bring from the chief 

 clerk's office into an apartment they occupied 

 the consolidated statements of such parishes as 

 they called for. These, in the absence of all 

 witnesses save the attorney of the board, were 

 then acted upon, and the result of the board's 

 decision was written on the back of the con- 

 solidated statement, or upon a slip of paper 

 thereon placed. The same messenger, as in- 

 structed by the board, would receive from it 

 the consolidated statements thus acted upon, 

 showing, in the board's opinion, the result of 

 the election, and redeliver them to the chief 

 clerk's office. Clerks in the latter office would 

 then produce from the consolidated statements, 

 subject to any changes noted thereon by the 

 Returning Board, the proper figures to repre- 

 sent its final result of the election. These fig- 

 ures were then placed upon a tabulated state- 

 ment showing at a glance the result of the 

 election throughout the State, as thus deter- 

 mined by the board. This document became 

 one of the State records, was shown to the jury, 

 and upon it were seen figures purporting to rep- 

 resent the result of the election in the parish of 

 Vernon, and corresponding in number to those 

 found upon the altered statement described in 

 the charge against the accused. Said State 

 record was certified as true and correct by the 

 four members of the Returning Board, as evi- 

 denced by their signatures, Thomas 0. Ander- 

 son, the accused, being one of the number. 

 The then official newspaper was exhibited to 

 the jury, containing the result of the election 

 as above set forth, promulgated by the four 

 parties above referred to. No evidence was 

 offered to show who altered from true to falsa 

 the consolidated statement of the votes of the 

 parish of Vernon, and none to show who 

 placed on the State record above described 

 figures corresponding to those on said altered 

 statement. 



The jury after a short absence brought in a 

 verdict of Guilty, with a recommendation to 

 the mercy of the Court. The defendant, hav- 

 ing been thus convicted, was sentenced to two 

 years' confinement in the penitentiary, from 

 which he appealed. The decision of the Su- 

 preme Court of the State was rendered on 

 March 18th, by Chief Justice Manning. It set 

 aside the verdict of the jury against Thomas 

 C. Anderson, and discharged the prisoner from 

 custody. It removed the necessity for a new 

 trial, and implied that the first should have 

 resulted in an acquittal, not because the act 

 charged was not committed, but because when 

 committed it constituted no crime known to 

 the laws of the State. The Chief Justice said : 



< The instrument charged in the amended informa- 

 tion as having been falsely uttered is the " consoli- 

 dated statement of votes, parish Vernon, made by 

 the supervisor of registration." The statute no- 



where gives to this consolidated statement any effi- 

 cacy or value as evidence of the result of the elec- 

 tion, nor does it anywhere direct or permit it to be 

 used as a means of ascertaining such result. The 

 returning officers are not required to use it. The in- 

 struments or documents they ure required to canvass 

 are the original returns of the commissioners, and 

 from them and them alone they must compile the 

 vote. This " consolidated statement" of the "su- 

 pervisor of registration" is of so little account that 

 its preservation among the archives of either parisn 

 or State is not commanded. Tlie clerk of court is 

 not furnished with a duplicate, as he is of the com- 

 missioners' returns. There is no officer who is au- 

 thorized by law to give a certified copy of it for use 

 as evidence, or for any other use. The clerk is di- 

 rected to certify it as correct, and tins appears to 

 have been required so that it may be known to con- 

 form to the duplicate list of commissioners' returns 

 in his office ; and after it is so certified the supervisor 

 transmits it to the returning officers along with the 

 original returns sent him by the commissioners, and 

 from the latter alone they compile the vote. 



If the supervisors of registration of every parish 

 in the State should alter and forge every consolidated 

 statement of votes made by each one respectively, 

 and transmit them thus altered and forged to the re- 

 turning officers, and these officers should canvass 

 and compile the votes, as the statute requires, not 

 from these consolidated statements, but from the 

 unaltered commissioners' returns, no injury would 

 be suffered by any individual or by the body politic. 

 The supervisors' consolidated statement is not made 

 by the statute the basis of the final canvass and 

 compilation of the vote, as the original returns of the 

 commissioners are, and hence the alteration and 

 forgery of all of them, the returns of the commis- 

 sioners remaining unaltered, would not change the 

 result of the election in any parish. To constitute 

 forgery, the forced instrument must be one which, 

 if genuine, may injure another, and this must appear, 

 either from the description of the instrument, or by 

 the averment of matter aliunde. Where, from aught 

 that appears in the information, the instrument was 

 a nudum pactum, or of no effect, forgery can not be 

 predicated upon it. (People vs. Tomlinson, 35 Cal., 

 503.) And the simo principle, of course, applies to 

 the uttering of a forged instrument. 



It is unnecessary for us to say whether the con- 

 solidated returns of the supervisor of registration, 

 without the clerk's certificate, is or is not a public 

 record, susceptible of forgery. It is sufficient to 

 remark that the paper offered in evidence is not 

 the instrument, the utterance of which as forged is 

 charged upon the defendant. 



After conviction a motion in arrest of judgment 

 was made, because it was not charged in the infor- 

 mation, either in its original form or as amended, 

 that the uttering or publishing the alleged altered 

 and forged instrument was done by the defendant in 

 any official capacity, either as one of the returning 

 officers or in any capacity other than as an individ- 

 ual, and that such offense could only have been com- 

 mitted in an official capacity to operate an injury to 

 or fraud upon any person or bodjr politic. It is evi- 

 dent that the uttering and publishing by a private 

 person, or by a person in any public capacity, other 

 than that of returning officer of elections, could not 

 have injured or defrauded any one. Suppose thaf 

 four presidents of as many banks in this city had ut- 

 tered and published as true altered and forged con- 

 solidated statements of votes of any parish at an elec- 

 tion, as made by the supervisor of registration, and 

 had caused the same to be printed'in the official 

 iournal under their signatures as presidents of the 

 tanks, would they have been indictable therefor 

 under the statute ? And why not ? Simply because 

 they had no legal mission or authority to do that act, 

 and, ns no legal effect would be produced by it, no 

 one would be injured or defrauded by it. Everyone 



