Was he Guilty? J. S. was a clerk who attended his employer on a race track to record in a book his employer's bets on the races. Was he guilty of "occu pying a place on the ground for the purpose of recording bets," under a penal statute making that a punishable offense? See "Occupant-Agent or employee," in Words and Phrases, for the answer The courts have defined or construed many thousands of words, legal and nonlegal, but all the subject of some legal contest. These definitions can be applied in your practice Words and Phrases 135,000 definitions. 8 volumes $48.00 delivered West Publishing Company 09844 75 University of Michigan Three years' course leading to the degree of LL. B. The degree of Juris Doctor (J. D.) open to graduates of approved universities and colleges. Regular session October to June, inclusive. Credit towards either degree may be obtained through work in the summer session of ten weeks. Law library of about 33,000 volumes. A fourth year of work leading to the degree of Master of Laws and permitting of specializations has been organized. For announcements. address, DEAN, DEPARTMENT OF LAW, University of Michigan, Box X, Ann Arbor, Mich. Washington PATENTS Business from non-resident attorneys especially solicited. Highest references; best services. Counsel having clients who wish to patent inventions are invited to write for full particulars and information. WATSON E. COLEMAN Patent Lawyer Washington, D. C. The New 1912 Pocket Edition of JONES ON EVIDENCE, Civil Cases THE PURPOSE: Of the new 1912 printing of the pocket edition of Jones on Evidence, Civil Cases, is to give the lawyer a better style of book than he has had before a book that would contain all the original matter, but one that would be lighter to hold, easier to carry, finer to possess than the previous editions. MAKEUP: To carry out these ideals the publishers have secured a thin, high quality paper that takes a very good printing impression and reduces the thickness of the book to one and one-half inches; and by binding in a flexible Persian-goat cover, a book has been built up that may be conveniently handled, carried in pocket, easily read and quickly referred to. The convenience of this form of a book has been recognized and accepted by the public within the last year both in books of reference, such as encyclopedias, and in hand books. The demand has been so steady and universal as to almost threaten the future existence of the old, heavy, solid bound volume. In the new 1912 Printing of JONES on EVIDENCE, Civil Cases You can hold this book open or closed in one hand for fifteen or twenty minutes before feeling muscular fatigue. (Try it with the ordinary five pound law book.) You can take it to court, home or office in your side pocket, almost unconscious of the carrying. You can keep it on your desk for convenient reference, without interfering with other desk matter, so little room does it occupy. Price, Delivered $6.50 420 Market Street, Address Central Law Journal Co. ST. LOUIS, MO. Central Law Journal. ST. LOUIS, MO., FEBRUARY 6, 1914. MEANING OF "ADULTERATION" IN THE A Federal District Court has held that a shipper of putrid oysters, in interstate commerce, is indictable for shipping adulterated food. U. S. v. Sprague, 208 Fed. 419. The reasoning is thus: The ordinary use of "adulteration" implies an actual addition to the original substance, through human agency. This is not accurate. It is the addition in this way of foreign matter, vide Dictionary-Adulteration. This court thinks the statute meant more than this, but as it speaks of manufacture of "adulterated or misbranded" articles and inhibits shipments of manufactured goods "adulterated or misbranded," it seems to us articles. either in their original or decayed condition were not meant, especially as food and drugs are spoken of in the same breath. ENJOINING AWARD IN FAVOR OF SHIP- JOINDER OF CAUSES OF ACTION ARISING Where there was objection taken in an Alabama trial court to the joinder of a count under the Federal Employers' Liability Act with counts under that state's Liability Act, it was noted by Alabama. Court of Appeals that no exception had been reserved to the overruling of the objection, but it was said: "It may be permissible to say that the court was not in error in its ruling." Atlantic C. L. R. Co. v. Jones, 63 So. 693. The Appeals Court proceeds to say that: "The system of jurisprudence of the state. and of the United States together form one system which constitutes the law of the land for the state, and concurrent jurisdiction with the Federal courts is conferred on the state courts by the Federal act in the enforcement of rights of action accruing under it. Under the practice in vogue in this state, separate and independent causes of action arising out of the same transaction and relating to the same subject matter may be joined in different counts of the same complaint, and one who is entitled to sue for the consequences of a wrongful or negligent act of another is not In Louisville & N. R. Co. v. Garrett, 34 Sup. Ct. 48, a railroad brought an injunc-required to split up his cause of action, but tion for two purposes, one to enforce a rate may recover all the damages in one acmaking order, and enjoin an order awarding tion." reparation for excess payments above rates found to be reasonable. The railroad lost on the merits as to the first thing, but as to the other it was held that there was a lack of parties, those in whose favor awards for excess were made not being joined. We have been wondering whether or not. the principle here applied, does not furnish a key for the solution of the question, much agitated in Missouri, whether after injunction against a state statute prescribing a rate has been dissolved, the matter of reparation to those paying excess rates is left for consideration in another suit. Our editorial suggestion in 78 Cent. L. J. 73 for impounding excess payments made pending suit would settle automatically many questions of this kind. It may be said of the practice stated to be in vogue that it is thus on the supposition of these separate and independent causes of action all arising under the law of the same sovereignty and not of different sovereignties. The most, therefore, that may be claimed for this part of the court's reasoning is that, if the principle stated in the first sentence of our excerpt is sound, then practice in vogue in Alabama permits the joinder adjudged to be proper. The Alabama statute may hardly be supposed to have had this in mind-especially if the principle as such is not sound. It could not be created, if Federal statute prescribed otherwise, or intended otherwise. Is the principle sound? The National Government and the state, from their very constitution, proceed along wholly dissimilar lines in the enactment of the two acts involved in this ruling. The government can have no conception of the rights and duties of the parties in such a litigation, and the state may have no other concern. It is nothing, therefore, that the two acts may coincide as to the rule of liability, the probative value of evidence, the burden of proof, the measure of damages and the identity of necessary parties. These are circumstances in detail and not of essence. It indeed is conceivable that some of these things might be valid in the law of one of the sovereignties and not in that of the other. Nor does the fact that Congress has vested the state courts with jurisdiction in causes of action arising under its act seem to be important. That was dictated by the rule of convenience, may be, or for other reason in the enforcement of its policy. It merely called in the state courts to aid that policy. It might have felt it had no need of their assistance and that this would have obstructed its policy. That, then, is also a mere detail. This gets us down to the question of the soundness of the principle the court announces, what is called concurrent jurisdiction being a mere incident in, or accident connected with, the situation. Does the fact that the Federal act is "the law of the land for the state" supply the nexus between Federal law and state law as to "separate and independent causes of action arising out of the same transaction and relating to the same subject matter?" If so the connection is purely fortuitous, because the national power attaches, by reason of the manner of business in which the defendant is engaged. The law of the land has not then the same quality of application that the state law has. The one extends over things in the land, while the state law extends over the land. Therefore the expression that Federal law is the law of the land is a euphemism far from exact, and is merely true in the sense that it is supreme in its application to things of the land, while only is state law the law of the land with exceptions thereto created by Federal law. We know it has been held, and, we agree, correctly so, that recovery under Federal Employers' Liability Act may bar recovery under state law. But this is only true, because otherwise the supreme law may be fettered or derogated from, in the enforcement of its policy. It is not because there is a double liability, but a too excessive liability visited upon an instrumentality of commerce. What the Federal law puts on the instrumentality is but a penalty for infraction of a regulation, and, by implication, the Federal law says it shall stand no more under whatsoever claim may be advanced by virtue of a subordinate law. Therefore, it appears that the Federal law and the state law move in different spheres. They do not work in co-ordination. If one appears, the other disappears, and if one applies, it is because the other makes no valid objection to its applying. Therefore, they are as distinct in their operation, the one from the other, as are the laws of different states. When a cause of action arises out of a transaction under Federal law it is ex-. clusive and controlling and if it spreads over the transaction there is nothing left to which state law may attach. And, indeed, we have been wondering, as we write, where there may be separability in a transaction to which Federal law applies so as to make room for state law. If there is not, then counts of the sort we have been considering are in the alternative only. We think we know why different counts. are used in a pleading and one of the reasons is that the pleading may conform to the proof developed on a trial. It is a new thing to set out the same facts in different counts so as to meet ruling as to which of two laws, one dominant and the other subordinate, applies to the facts, and as the common law contemplated only one law of the venue we may not get much STARE DECISIS-THE RULE CANNOT BE INVOKED BUT BY A LAW OBSERVING PARTY.-The Kentucky Court of Appeals in speaking of limitations in applying the rule stare decisis follows what has been stated by the Federal Supreme Court to be the general rule to-wit: that as to contracts a change in decision would be like a legislative amendment, which is to operate prospectively. Oliver Co. v. Louisville Realty Co., 161 S. W. 570. But this operation is not invocable by one who does not appear in court with clean hands, though he pleads his reliance upon former decisions. Thus in the case at bar, it was held that a statute making it a misdemeanor for a foreign corporation to carry on business in the state under prohibitive conditions, likewise rendered void its contracts, this ruling following the case of Fruin-Colnan Contracting Co. v. Chatterson, 146 Ky. 504, 143 S. W. 6, 40 L. R. A. (C. S.) 857. But it was claimed that prior decision was expressly overruled and the contract before the court was entered into prior to the ruling in the Chatterson case and was protected by the rule stare decisis operating only prospectively. The court said: "The Oliver Company comes before this court a confessed violator of the laws of the state. It is asking relief from a condition resulting from its deliberate violation of a penal statute. It is not in a position to ask the protection of beneficial rules of law intended to save from loss law-observing citizens. We put our decision upon the ground that the Oliver Company is not entitled to the protection afforded by the principle announced in the cases invoked in its behalf, upon the ground that it brought upon itself all trouble it seeks to escape by making the contract now in question." Two members of the court dissent from this reasoning and to our mind they occupy the more logical position, contending that the prior cases stated declare former contracts were valid and the change of decision impairs by restrospective operation their force. Additionally we may say that prior cases made entirely separable the doing business unlawfully and what was done so far as its obligatory character was concerned. New decision says the one is inseparable from the other. There was no taint before in the contract. Change of decision injects the taint. Formerly this corporation would have been in court with clean hands-it would have been a law-observing suitor as far as the court's cognizance could extend. Now it is not because the court's cognizance goes further. Something formerly lawful, latterly has been made unlawful. The court's present decision is a begging of the question. ELECTRIC POWER RIGHTS ON THE PUBLIC LANDS. During the last decade the production of hydro-electric energy in the United States. has progressed by leaps and bounds, and the capital invested therein has also increased enormously. Notwithstanding this the development of such energy in the forests and streams of the West has gone forward haltingly, and at the present time. further development has almost ceased. The cause of this may easily be traced to the uncertainty of title and the litigation commenced or threatened by the United States. Government. The earliest statutes providing for rights of way on the public domain for this and similar purposes was Section 9 of the Act of July 26, 1866, which was amended by the Act of July 9, 1870. These two acts were with slight changes, incorporated in Sections 2339 and 2340 of the United States Revised Statutes, reading as follows: "Section 2339. Whenever, by priority. of possession, rights to the use of water for mining, agricultural, manufacturing, or other purposes, have vested and accrued, and the same are recognized and acknowl |