Opinion of the Court.

where the shot is fired. 388; United States v.

Rex v. Coombes, 1 Leach, (4th ed.) Davis, 2 Sumner, 482; People v. Adams, 3 Denio, 190, 207, and 1 N. Y. 173, 176, 179; Cockburn, C. J., in The Queen v. Keyn, 2 Ex. D. 233, 234.

When a crime is committed partly in one district and partly in another, it must, in order to prevent an absolute failure of justice, be tried in either district, or in that one which the legislature may designate; and Congress has accordingly provided that "when any offence against the United States is begun in one judicial district and completed in any other, it shall be deemed to have been committed in either, and may be dealt with, inquired of, tried, determined and punished in either district, in the same manner and as if it had been actually and wholly committed therein." Rev. Stat. § 731.

When an offence is committed by means of a communication through the post-office, the sender has sometimes, as appears by the cases cited for the petitioner, been held to be punishable at the place where he mails the letter. United States v. Worrall, 2 Dall. 384; United States v. Bickford, 4 Blatchford, 337; Rex v. Williams, 2 Campbell, 506; The King v. Burdett, 3 B. & Ald. 717, and 4 B. & Ald. 95; Perkin's Case, 2 Lewin, 150; Regina v. Cooke, 1 Fost. & Finl. 64; The Queen v. Holmes, 12 Q. B. D. 23; S. C. 15 Cox Crim. Cas. 343. But it does not follow that he is not punishable at the place where the letter is received by the person to whom it is addressed and it is settled by an overwhelming weight of authority that he may be tried and punished at that place, whether the unlawfulness of the communication through the post-office consists in its being a threatening letter; The King v. Girdwood, 1 Leach, 142; S. C. 2 East P. C. 1120; Esser's Case, 2 East P. C. 1125; or a libel; The King v. Johnson, 7 East, 65; S. C. 3 J. P. Smith, 94; The King v. Burdett, 4 B. & Ald. 95, 136, 150, 170, 184; Commonwealth v. Blanding, 3 Pick. 304; In re Buell, 3 Dillon, 116, 122; or a false pretence or fraudulent representation; Regina v. Leech, Dearsly, 642; S. C. 7 Cox Crim. Cas. 100; The Queen v. Rogers, 3 Q. B. D. 28; S. C. 14 Cox Crim. Cas. 22; Peo

Opinion of the Court.

ple v. Rathbun, 21 Wend. 509; People v. Adams, 3 Denio, 190, and 1 N. Y. 173; Foute v. State, 15 Lea (Tenn.) 712.

The only decision to the contrary, cited for the petitioner, is one in which the Circuit Court of the District of Columbia, upon the authority of a former case in the same court in which no opinion is reported, held that where a letter containing a forged check was put in the post-office at Baltimore, addressed to a person in Washington, there was no uttering of the forged paper in Washington. United States v. Plympton, 4 Cranch C. C. 309; citing United States v. Wright, 2 Cranch C. C. 296. In Dana's Case, 7 Ben. 1, a warrant to remove to the District of Columbia a person alleged to have printed a libel in a newspaper published in New York, and circulated by his authority in the District of Columbia, was refused by Mr. Justice Blatchford, then District Judge, not because the offence could not be punished in the District of Columbia, but because the law of that District provided for its prosecution by information only, and was therefore unconstitutional. In United States v. Comerford, 25 Fed. Rep. 902, an indictment on § 3893 of the Revised Statutes, for "knowingly depositing or causing to be deposited" in the postoffice at New York a letter containing obscene matter in a sealed envelope addressed to a person in Texas, was quashed, not merely for want of jurisdiction in Texas, but because the court held that the act did not constitute an offence under that statute, in accord with the decision of this court at the present term in United States v. Chase, 135 U. S. 255.

In the case before us, the offence charged being an offer of money, or a tender of a contract for the payment of money, contained in a letter mailed in New York and addressed to a postmaster in Connecticut, to induce him to violate his official duty, it might admit of doubt whether any offence against the laws of the United States was committed until the offer or tender was known to the postmaster and might have influenced his mind. But there can be no doubt at all that, if any offence was committed in New York, the offence continued to be committed when the letter reached the postmaster in Connecticut; and that, if no offence was committed in New York,

Syllabus.

an offence was committed in Connecticut; and that, in either aspect, the District Court of the United States for the District of Connecticut had jurisdiction of the charge against the petitioner. Whether he might have been indicted in New York is a question not presented by this appeal.

Order affirmed.

CHICAGO RAILWAY EQUIPMENT COMPANY v. MERCHANTS' BANK.

ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF WISCONSIN.

No. 64. Argued November 4, 5, 1889.- Decided May 19, 1890.

The maker executed in the State of Illinois and delivered to the promisee a series of notes, one of which was acquired by a bona fide endorsee, and was as follows: "$5000. Chicago, Ill., January 20, A.D. 1884. For value received, four months after date, the Chicago Railway Equipment Company promise to pay to the order of the Northwestern Manufacturing and Car Company of Stillwater, Minnesota, five thousand dollars, at First Nat. Bank of Chicago, Illinois, with interest thereon, at the rate of per cent per annum, from date until paid. This note is one of a series of twenty-five notes, of even date herewith, of the sum of five thousand dollars each, and shall become due and payable to the holder on the failure of the maker to pay the principal and interest of any one of the notes of said series, and all of said notes are given for the purchase price of two hundred and fifty railway freight cars manufactured by the payee hereof and sold by said payee to the maker hereof, which cars are numbered from 13,000 to 13,249, inclusive, and marked on the side thereof with the words and letters Blue Line C. & E. I. R. R. Co.; and it is agreed by the maker hereof that the title to said cars shall remain in the said payee until all the notes of said series, both principal and interest, are fully paid, all of said notes being equally and ratably secured on said cars. No. 1. Geo. B. Burrows, Vice-President. Countersigned by E. D. Buffington, Treas."; Held:

(1) That this was a negotiable promissory note according to the statute of Illinois, where it was made, as well as by the general 'mercantile law;

(2) That its negotiability was not affected by the fact that the title to the cars for which it was given remained in the vendor until all the notes of the same series were fully paid, the title being so

Statement of the Case.

retained only by way of security for the payment of the notes, and the agreement for the retention for that purpose being a short form of chattel-mortgage;

(3) That its negotiability was not affected by the fact that it might, at the option of the holder, and by reason of the default of the maker, become due at a date earlier than that fixed.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, in the opinion of the court, stated the case as follows:

This action was brought by the Merchants' National Bank of Chicago against the Chicago Railway Equipment Company, a corporation of Wisconsin, upon two written instruments, one of which is in the words and figures following: "$5,000.

CHICAGO, Ill., January 20, A.D. 1884.

"For value received, four months after date, the Chicago Railway Equipment Company promise to pay to the order of the Northwestern Manufacturing and Car Company of Stillwater, Minnesota, five thousand dollars at First National Bank of Chicago, Illinois, with interest thereon at the rate of-per cent per annum from date until paid.

"This note is one of a series of twenty-five notes, of even date herewith, of the sum of five thousand dollars each, and shall become due and payable to the holder on the failure of the maker to pay the principal and interest of any one of the notes of said series, and all of said notes are given for the purchase price of two hundred and fifty railway freight cars manufactured by the payee hereof and sold by said payee to the maker hereof, which cars are numbered from 13,000 to 13,249 inclusive, and marked on the side thereof with the words and letters Blue Line C. & E. I. R. R. Co.; and it is agreed by the maker hereof that the title to said cars shall remain in thesaid payee until all the notes of said series, both principal and interest, are fully paid, all of said notes being equally and ratably secured on said cars.

"No. 1.

GEO. B. BURROWS, Vice-President."

"Countersigned by E. D. Buffington, Treasurer."

This writing is endorsed: "Northwestern Manufacturing and Car Co., per J. C. Gorman, Treas."

Argument for Plaintiff in Error.

The other instrument. bears the same date, and is in all respects similar to the first one. No question is made as to the genuineness of the signatures to these instruments of the vice-president and treasurer of the defendant, nor as to the plaintiff having paid value for them before maturity. They were declared upon as negotiable promissory notes. In support of the defence certain evidence was offered that was excluded, and the jury pursuant to the direction of the court returned a verdict in favor of the plaintiff for the full amount of the two instruments. 25 Fed. Rep. 809.

Mr. Greenleaf Clark for plaintiff in error.

The issue is a simple one, the defendant in error claiming that they are negotiable promissory notes, the plaintiff in error that they are not.

The requisites of a negotiable promissory note are few and simple. There must be an absolute unconditional promise in writing to pay a specified sum at a definite time therein limited. Nunez v. Dautel, 19 Wall. 560; Cayuga Co. Bank v. Purdy, 56 Michigan, 6.

The time of payment of each of the instruments is by the terms thereof so indefinite, uncertain and contingent, as to destroy the negotiable character that might otherwise attach thereto.

Each of the instruments in question is an entirety, and to ascertain its character and what is represented by it, resort must be had to all the terms and conditions therein contained,

the promise to pay a certain sum four months after date is in each instance to be taken in connection with and as modified and changed by what follows. The promise to pay, in four months from date, is subject at all times to the contingency that no default occurs as to either of the other twentyfour notes of the series, the terms and conditions of which do not appear from the instrument in question.

The first case in which the principle that the time of payment should be definite and ascertainable from the instrument itself was Andrews v. Franklin, (1717,) 1 Strange, 24. This