188, carpentry doors) 'railroad car' only in the vertical and horizontal_bent guiding the name, and in this: that the upper por- rods, C, extending from the floor of the car tion of Crooker's door is cut off to make upwardly, and under the roof of the car, as applicant's. The rods and staples are sub- herein shown and described, whereby said stitutes for Crooker's channel-irons,-obvi- door, when not in use, can be carried up ous to any skilled workman." Watson then, on the horizontal portions of said guiding on the 18th of March, 1878, amended his spec- rods, out of the way, substantially as specification by inserting: "This invention re-ified." The examiners again responded, lates to improvements in the class of grain- March 23, 1878: "The application does not doors for cars, and the invention consists present patentable novelty over Crooker, in the combination, with a car, of an inside cited. In view of the state of the art as vertically sliding flexible or yielding door shown by the references cited, the use of and guiding rods, whereby the door, when eyes and rods for guiding the sliding door not in use, may be carried up and placed are the simple mechanical equivalents of on the horizontal portion of said guiding the channel irons of Crooker. As claim rods, so as to be out of the way." "I am does not differ in a matter of substance aware that a car-door of similar construc- from the preceding, it is a second time retion, sliding in grooved ways, is old; and jected." An appeal was prosecuted to the such I do not desire to claim, broadly, as my examiners in chief, who reversed the decisinvention. Said door, however, constitutes ion, saying: "The invention in this case is an outside or closing car-door proper, and small, and the claim is correspondingly the car could not be loaded or used for bulk limited. It consists of a combination of vagrain unless the grain is put in from the rious instrumentalities not found in either roof of the car, as the door completely of the references. Applicant's car, as a closes the doorway or opening. Further- whole, is adapted by convertibility to uses more, said door is obviously objectionable not compatible with the cases cited, withfor other reasons, viz.: The grain will out injury. In this case the flexible door is lodge or get in the grooved ways in which applied in addition to the usual slide-doors, the door slides, binding or locking it so as and when coarse freight is to be carried the to prevent its being raised, and also, being flexible shutters are secured in place at the an outside door, the grain, pressing against top under the roof of the car." it, would force or bulge the door outward, producing a similar effect as the grain lodging in the grooved ways; whereas my door, being an inside door, and not reaching the top of the doorway or opening, admits an open space at the top for loading in the grain, with an ordinary outside door, to be locked or otherwise secured after the car is loaded. By also employing guiding rods for the door to slide upon, and being an inside door, the defects incident to the grooved ways and an outside door, before referred to, are entirely obviated." And at the same time he substituted for his first and second claims the following: "(1) The combination, with a car, of an inside flexible or yielding and vertically sliding grain-door and guiding rods, C, whereby said door, when not in use, can be carried up and placed on the horizontal portions of said guiding rods, out of the way, substantially as and for the purpose herein shown and described." March 20th, the application was again rejected, the examiners stating: "It is not considered that Crooker, in removing the upper few slats of his door, would be making a patentable improvement on his own invention, albeit he might change its name, and allege the result of loading in over the top of his door. The change is an obvious one to any user of freight-cars; further, the use of rods and eyes is old in this connection. See patent of H. L. Clark, Aug. 29, '71, No. 118,514, (carpentry doors,) which further confirms the former action in relation thereto. In regard to the clogging and binding referred to in argument, no clear or considerable results are seen to be accomplished by applicant's device over the reference, such as should ar'gue any invention thereon."* Watson then, on the 21st of March, 1878, further amended by substituting for the first and second claims the following: "The combination, with a car, of an inside flexible or yielding sliding grain-door, having staples, c, and The door in use upon the freight-cars which appellee hauled over its road was a grain-door sliding in grooves. The Watson door was carried on rods with staples. Even if there was no material difference be tween a door sliding in grooves and a door sliding on rods and staples, there was no infringement, for Watson had in effect disclaimed a door sliding in grooves by his amendments, and the terms of his specification as they stood amended; and in the narrow claim of his patent the staples, c, and the guiding rods, C, were part of his combination, which he could not, under the circumstances, say were not essential to* it, nor that the grooves were an equivalent. Gage v. Herring, 107 U. S. 640, 2 Sup. Ct. Rep. 819; Fay v. Cordesman, 109 U. S. 408, 3 Sup. Ct. Rep. 236. But counsel for appellant insists that Watson's real invention "was not a question of rods or grooves, but was the combination, in a freight-car having an outside rigid door, of an inner flexible sliding grain-door." The Crooker door was patented May 26, 1868, and made of separate strips attached to each other by long continuous metal straps, so as to be flexible, and capable of being slid up out of the way, under the roof of the car, in grooves of channel irons affixed to the inside of the door-posts, but was a full, and not a half, door. One of the doors was an inside door, as appears from the drawings, and was described in his specification as follows: "B, B, and B', B', are metallic grooved ways applied at the margin of the door-spaces, d, d, and partially across the car, immediately under the roof of the same; the vertical portions of the ways, B', B', being on the inside of the car, just at the edge of the said spaces, and firmly bolted in place upon the car-framing; or, if preferred, these vertical portions may be in the door-space itself, as is the case with those of the ways, B, B." The Clark patent was issued August 29, 1871, for a rigid grain-door, filling *165 and therefore violates Rev. St. U. S. § 5209, the jurisdiction of the state courts to try the indict ment for the forgery is not ousted by the fact that sive jurisdiction of offenses against the United by section 711 the federal courts are given excluStates. 2. The forgery of a note, payable at a national bank, for the purpose mentioned, does not come within Rev. St. U. S. § 5418, which makes it penal to forge any instrument with intent to defraud the United States, or to present a forged instrument at such intent; the object of the statute being to the office of an officer of the United States with protect the government from forgeries, which the forgery mentioned could not affect. only half the opening, and sliding on rods to the top of the car, where it was then swung up into a horizontal position, turning on eyes at the upper corners of the rods. The evidence established that inside graindoors, filling only part of the opening, had long been used on freight-cars in connection with the outside door. Watson's door was made of separate slats, united to each other by hinges, and provided with staples at both ends, that encircled the guiding rods, on which the door might be slid up under the roof of the car, so as to be out of the way. Making Crooker's door smaller, so 3. It is no objection to the jurisdiction of the as to fill only half the opening, and using state courts that the same act constitutes forgery it in connection with an ordinary outside under the state law, as well as a violation of the door, in combination with a car, is the in-national banking law, and that the offender is subvention claimed. We agree with the learned ject to punishment for both crimes. judge holding the circuit court when he says, There is nothing in either specification or claim concerning 'ordinary freight-cars,' nor solid sliding outside doors; and in the claim, nothing about outside doors at all, unless inferred from the description given of an inside door. If, however, such an inference is permissible, and the patent must or may be construed to consist in such a combination of inside and outside doors as is asserted, it cannot be upheld, because it does not involve invention, but consists in a mere aggregation of parts, each to perform its separate and independent function, substantially in the same manner as before combination with the other, and without contributing to a new and combined result. The outside door certainly remains unaffected in construction and in use; and the inner door is the same as the Crooker door, with a few slats left off or taken off by design or by accident; and, whether done in one way or the other, the change cannot reasonably be called 'invention,' un-reversed; otherwise, affirmed. less the distinction between mere mechanic- By the Code of North Carolina it is made al skill and inventive genius is to be disre- an offense against that state "if any pergarded." There was nothing new in flexi- son, of his own head and imagination, or ble or rigid doors, outside and inside. There by false conspiracy or fraud with others, was nothing new in the use of outside and shall wittingly and falsely forge and make, inside rigid doors in combination, the in- or shall cause or wittingly assent to be side door filling only part of the opening. forged or made, or shall show forth in eviThe substitution of the old flexible sliding dence knowing the same to be forged, inside door, reduced in size to correspond * * any bond, writing obligatory, bill with the old inside rigid grain-door, may of exchange, promissory note, indorsement have required some mechanical skill, and or assignment thereof, with inmay have been new and useful, but it did not involve the exertion of the inventive faculty, and embraced nothing that was patentable. Thompson v. Boisselier, 114 U. S. 1, 11, 12, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1042, and cases there cited; Stephenson v. Railroad Co., 114 U. S. 149, 5 Sup. Ct. Rep. 777. 4. If it is irregular and erroneous to poll a jury, in a criminal case, before they agree on all the counts, after a conviction on the counts as to which a verdict of guilty was reached when the poll was taken, a nolle prosequi being entered as the others, such error does not amount to a deprivation of liberty without due process of law. In error to the supreme court of the states of North Carolina. The decree was right, and it is affirmed. (132 U. S. 131) The supreme court of North Carolina having affirmed a judgment of the superior court of Wake county, in that state, whereby, in conformity with the verdict of a jury, the plaintiffs in error were sentenced to hard labor, the present writ of error was sued out upon the ground that the judgment of affirmance sustains an authority, exercised under the state, which was drawn in question as being repugnant to the laws of the United States. The specific contention of the defendants is that the offense of which they were convicted was cognizable only in the courts of the United States. If this position be well taken, the judgment must be tent CROSS et al. v. STATE OF NORTH CAROLI-be deemed a variance, if there appear to be NA.1 an intent to defraud the United States, or any state, county, city, town, or parish, or* body corporate, or any public officer, in his official capacity, or any copartnership or member thereof, or any particular person.' Id. § 1191. The first count of the indictment against the defendants charged that they "unlawfully and feloniously, of their own head and imagination, did wittingly and falsely make, forge, and counterfeit," and "did "That the said Charles E. Cross was then and there an officer of said bank, to-wit, its president, and the said Samuel C. White was then and there an officer of said bank, to-wit, its cashier. wittingly assent to the falsely making, forg-| specified, there was a national banking asing, and counterfeiting, a certain promis-sociation, duly organized and acting under sory note for the payment of money; which the laws of the United States, in Raleigh, said forged promissory note is of the tenor Wake county, North Carolina, known as following, that is to say: the 'State National Bank of Raleigh, North "'$6,250.00. March 8th, 1888. Carolina,' having its place of business and "Four months after date, we, D. H. doing its said business in the said city of Graves, principal, and W. H. Sanders, the Raleigh, in the county of Wake and state of other subscribers, sureties. promise to pay North Carolina, and within the jurisdiction the State National Bank of Raleigh, North of the circuit court of the United States for Carolina, or order, sixty-two hundred and the eastern district of North Carolina. fifty dollars, negotiable and payable at the State National Bank of Raleigh, N.,C., with interest at the rate of eight per cent. per annum after maturity until paid, for value received, being for money borrowed; the said sureties hereby agreeing to continue and remain bound for payment of this note and interest, notwithstanding any extension of time granted from time to time to the principal debtor, waiving all notice of such extension of time from either payor or payee; and I do hereby appoint Sam. C. White, cashier, my true and lawful attorney to sell any or all collateral he may have in his hands to pay this claim, if I should fail to do so when said claim falls due, after giving me ten days' notice of his intention to sell the same, and pay any surplus that may remain to me. D. H. GRAVES. "W. H. SANDERS.' "And upon the back of which said false, forged, and counterfeited promissory note is stamped and written: 'D. D. D. H. Graves. $6,250. July 8,'-with intent to defraud, contrary to the form of the statute in such case made and provided, and against the peace and dignity of the state." The second count relates to a note of the same description, and charges the defendants with having unlawfully, feloniously, and wittingly uttered and published it as true, "with intent to defraud," knowing, at the time, the same to be false, forged, and counterfeited. "That said alleged conspiracy and conspiracies, forgery and forgeries, uttering and utterings, were made, entered into,; committed, and done by the said Charles* E. Cross, and afterwards assented to by the said Samuel C. White, for the purpose of supporting, sustaining, and making a certain false entry and entries in the books of said bank, and that the said false entry and entries were by the said Samuel C. White, cashier as aforesaid, acting as cashier, actually made in and upon the books of the said bank, the said Charles E. Cross being then and there aiding and abetting, for the purpose of deceiving, and with intent to deceive, the agent of the United States, to-wit, the bank examiner of the United States, duly appointed to examine into the affairs of the said association, towit, the State National Bank of Raleigh, North Carolina. "That the said note, in said indictment specified, was never uttered or published in any way, nor to any other person or corporation, nor was there any intent or attempt so to do. "That the said note, in the said indictment specified, was entered upon and in the books of the State National Bank aforesaid The third count charged that the defend- as the property of the said National Bank ants, of their own head and imagination, of Raleigh, North Carolina, and placed falsely, unlawfully, and feloniously made, among the assets by the said Charles E. forged, and counterfeited, and caused and Cross and Samuel C. White, as aforesaid, procured to be made, forged, and counter-for the purpose and with the intent aforefeited, and wittingly aided and assented to said. the false making, forging, and counterfeit- The above facts the said Charles E. ing, a note of like description, "with intent Cross and Samuel C. White are ready to to defraud the State National verify. Bank, a corporation * duly created and existing under the laws of the United States, contrary," etc. * * * The fourth count charged that the defendants, devising and intending to defraud the State National Bank of Raleigh, North Carolina, a corporation existing under the laws of the United States, unlawfully and falsely combined and conspired together to make, forge, counterfeit, and, by such conspiracy and fraud, feloniously, falsely, and wittingly did forge and make, and caused and assented to be forged and made, the above-described note, "with intent to defraud, contrary to the form of the statute," etc. The defendants filed a joint plea in abatement, contesting the jurisdiction of the state court upon the following grounds: "That at the time of the alleged conspiracy and conspiracies, forgery and forgeries, uttering and utterings, in said indictment "Wherefore they pray judgment if the said court now here will or ought to take cognizance of this indictment here preferred against them, and that by the court here they may be dismissed and discharged," etc. This plea, having been disallowed, the defendants severally pleaded not guilty. After the cause was finally submitted to the jury, the attorney for the state, with the permis sion of the court, entered a nolle prosequi as to the third and fourth counts. The jury thereupon returned a verdict of guilty as charged in the indictment, and judgment thereon was accordingly entered. W. R. Henry, for plaintiffs in error. Davidson, for the State. T.F. *Mr. Justice HARLAN, after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court. The plea in abatement was evidently drawn with reference to section 5209 of the * * * Revised Statutes, tit. "National Banks." | Carolina, and described in the indictment, That section provides, among other things, is made, by section 5418 of the Revised that "every president, director, cashier, Statutes, an offense against the United teller, clerk, or agent of any association States; and that, as the courts of the who makes any false entry in any United States are invested with exclusive book, report, or statement of the associa- jurisdiction of all crimes and offenses cogtion, with intent, in either case, to injure or nizable under the authority of the United defraud the association, or any other com- States," (Rev. St. §711,) the judgment must pany, body politic or corporate, or any in- be reversed. This position cannot be susdividual person, or to deceive any officer of tained. Section 5418 of the Revised Statthe association or any agent appointed to utes makes it an offense against the United examine the affairs of any such association; | States for any person to falsely make, alter, and every person who with like intent aids forge, or counterfeit "any bid, proposal, or abets any officer, clerk, or agent in any guaranty, official bond, public record, affiviolation of this section,-shall be deemed davit, or other writing, for the purpose of guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall be im- defrauding the United States," or to utter prisoned not less than five years, nor more or publish as true "any such false, forged, than ten." altered, or counterfeited bid, proposal, It is contended that the courts of the guaranty, official bond, public record, affiUnited States have exclusive jurisdiction to davit, or other writing, for such purpose, try the defendants for having made the knowing the same to be false, forged, alfalse entries on the books of the bank, with tered, or counterfeited," or to transmit to the intent stated in the plea; that the for- or present at "the office of any officer of the gery in question is an integral, essential ele- United States any such false, forged, altered, ment in such entries, which were false only or counterfeited bid, proposal, guaranty, because based upon the forged notes; that official bond, public record, affidavit, or the defendants cannot be tried for the false other writing, knowing the same to be entries after being tried for the forgery; false, forged, altered, or counterfeited, for consequently, a recognition of the right of such purpose." See, also, section 5479. the state court to try them for the latter We do not think that the crime of which offense will defeat the jurisdiction of the fed- the defendants were found guilty is within eral court to try them for the former of- either the words or scope of section 5418. fense. In other words, that, where exclu- The object of that section was to protect sive jurisdiction is given to the courts of the the general government against the conseUnited States to try an offense, the state quences that might result from the forgery, court cannot exercise jurisdiction in respect alteration, or counterfeiting of documents, to any particular act constituting an essen-records, or writings that had some connectial ingredient of that offense, although the tion with its business, as conducted by its commission of such act is made a crime own officers. The false making or forging against the state. of promissory notes or other securities, purporting to be executed by individuals, and made payable to or at a national banking done "for the purpose *of defrauding the United States," and to constitute the offense described in section 5418. Such an act may be in fraud of the bank, or of its stockholders; but is not in itself, or within the meaning of that section, a fraud upon the United States. The fallacy of this argument is in assuming that the offense described in section 5209 of the Revised Statutes, namely, the mak-association, cannot be said to have been ing, by an officer or agent of a national banking association, of a false entry in its books, reports, or statements, with intent to injure or defraud the association or others, or with the intent to deceive its officers, or any agent appointed to examine its affairs, necessarily involves the crime of forgery, of which the defendants were found The argument in behalf of the plaintiffs guilty. If the notes in question had not in error fails to give effect to the esbeen forged, but, with or without the con- tablished doctrine that the same act, or sent of the obligors, had been temporarily series of acts, may constitute an offense placed by the defendants among the assets equally against the United States and the of the bank, and entered upon its books, state, subjecting the guilty party to punwhen they were not its property, with in-ishment under the laws of each governtent to deceive the agent appointed to ex-ment. This doctrine is illustrated in U. amine its affairs, they could have been pun- S. v. Marigold, 9 How. 560, 569; Fox v. ished under section 5209. On the other Ohio, 5 How. 410, 433; Moore v. Illinois, 14 hand, the crime defined in section 1029 of the How. 13, 19; and Ex parte Siebold, 100 U. Code of North Carolina would have been S. 371,390,-in the first of which cases it was complete if the defendants simply made and said that "the same act might, as to its forged, or caused to be made and forged, or character and tendencies, and the consewillingly assented to the making orforgery quences it involved, constitute an offense of, the notes described in the indictment, against both the state and federal governwith intent to defraud, and did not follow ments, and might draw to its commission it up by committing the crime against the the penalties denounced by either, as apUnited States of making false entries in re-propriate to its character in reference to spect thereto upon the books of the bank, each." If it were competent for congress to with the intent to deceive the agent desig-give exclusive jurisdiction to the courts of nated to examine its affairs. The crime against the state could not be excused or obliterated by committing another and distinct crime against the United States. It is also contended that the crime of forgery, as defined in the Code of North v.10s.c.-4 the United States of the crime of falsely making or forging promissory notes, purporting to be executed by individuals, and made payable to or at a national bank, or of the crime of uttering or publishing as true any such falsely made or forged notes, it has not done so. Its legislation does not assume to restrict the authority which the states have always exercised of punishing in their own tribunals the crime of forging promissory notes, and other commercial securities, executed by private persons, and used for purposes of private business. The forgery of such instruments is none the less injurious to the welfare of the people of a state because they happen to be made payable to or at banking associations which come into existence under the authority of the United States. If the punishment by the state of the crime of forgery, of which the defendants were found guilty, leaves them exposed to punishment by the United States for having made false entries upon the books of the bank of which they were officers, with the intent to deceive the agent cappointed by the general government to examine its affairs, it results from the fact that they are amenable to the laws of the United States, as well as of the state of North Carolina, and may be subjected to punishment for violating the laws of each government. The forgery may have been committed in order that the instrument forged might thereafter become the basis of false entries upon the books of the bank. But that circumstance cannot defeat the authority of the state, charged with the duty of protecting its own citizens, from punishing the forgery as in itself a distinct, separate offense, committed within its limits and against its laws. (132 U. S. 146) BOYLAN V. HOT SPRINGS R. Co. (November 11, 1889.) CARRIERS OF PASSENGERS-EJECTION FROM TRAIN -EVIDENCE-UNSTAMPED TICKETS. 1. In assumpsit against a railroad company for breach of a contract to carry plaintiff, which contract was contained in a ticket accepted and signed by plaintiff, evidence as to when he first as he is bound by the conditions, whether he read knew of a condition contained in it is immaterial, them or not. 2. Where the ticket expressly provided that no employe of defendant is authorized to waive any conditions of the contract, the action of defendant's baggageman in punching plaintiff's ticket and checking his baggage, and of the gateman in admitting him to the train, does not estop defendant to deny plaintiff's right to be carried on his return trip without compliance with an express provision of the ticket that it shall be stamped and signed by defendant's agent at the place of destination, before it will be received for return passage. 3. Plaintiff not having attempted to have the ticket stamped, and declining to pay any further fare, the fact that defendant's conductor did not inform him of the amount of fare required before ejecting him from the train is immaterial. 4. As the unstamped ticket gave plaintiff no right to a return passage, and as he declined to pay fare, he cannot maintain an action sounding in con tract for such ejection, and the exclusion of evidence as to the circumstances of his expulsion, and the consequent injuries, is not prejudicial to him. In error to the circuit court of the United States for the northern district of Illinois. This was an action of assumpsit against a railroad corporation by a person who, after taking passage on one of its trains, was forcibly expelled by the conductor. At* the trial in the circuit court the plaintiff testified that on March 18, 1882, he purchased at the office of the Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific Railway Company, in Chicago, a ticket for a passage to Hot Springs and back, (which is copied in the margin,1 and which, as was alleged in the declaration and appeared upon the face of the ticket, was then signed by him as well as by the ticket agent, and witnessed by a third person,) and upon this ticket traveled on the defendant's railroad to Hot Springs. He was asked by his counsel when he first actually knew that the ticket required him to have it stamped at Hot Springs. The question was objected to by the defendant, and ruled out by the court. He further testified that on April The remaining assignment of error relates to what occurred when the jury were brought into court, and the fact disclosed, by polling them, that they were agreed upon a verdict of guilty under the first and second counts of the indictment, but could not agree as to the third and fourth counts. Thereupon the attorney for the state, in the presence of the jury, proposed to enter a nolle prosequi as to the third and fourth counts. The jury having been sent out, the court permitted a nolle prosequi upon those counts to be entered. Of this fact the jury were informed, and, being instructed to pass only on the remaining counts, they retired, and returned into court a verdict of guilty in manner and form as charged in the indictment. The supreme court of the state expressed its disapproval of the mode adopted for ascertaining the individual opinion of each juror before an agreement 'Issued by Wabash, St. Louis and Pacific Railhad been reached by the entire body, but way. Tourist special contract. Good for one firstheld that the entry of a nolle prosequi as class passage to Hot Springs, Ark., and return, to the third and fourth counts was, in legal when officially stamped on the back hereof, and effect, a consent to the acquittal of the de- presented with coupons attached. In considerafendants in respect to the offenses therein tion of the reduced rate at which this ticket is sold, I, the undersigned, agree to and with the several named, and therefore did not work any in- companies over whose lines this ticket entitles me jury to them. It also held that, in accord- to be carried, as follows, to-wit: (1) That in sellance with the principles of previous decis- ing this ticket the Wabash, St. Louis and Pacific ions in that court, the general verdict would Railway Company acts as agent, and is not responsi be restricted to such of the counts as the ble beyond its own line. (2) That this ticket is not jury were directed to pass on. transferable, and no stop-over at any intermediate We are of point will be allowed, unless specially provided for opinion that there was nothing in all this by the local regulations of the lines over which it amounting to a deprivation of the liberty of reads. (3) That any alteration whatever of this the defendants without due process of law. ticket renders it void. (4) That it is good for going At most, it was a mere error in procedure passage only five (5) days from date of sale, as or practice that did not affect the substan- stamped on back, and written below. (5) That it tial rights of the accused. What was per-identifies himself as the original purchaser to the is not good for return passage, unless the holder mitted to be done was to the end, simply, satisfaction of the authorized agent of the Hot that the jury might return a verdict upon Springs Railroad, at Hot Springs, Ark., within fif. those counts in the indictment upon which ty-five (55) days from date of sale, and when off. they were agreed. Judgment affirmed. cially signed and dated in ink, and duly stamped |