Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 4.djvu/524

 510 I-EDEBAL BEFOBTEB. �once been a deserter is subject during the wbole of bis natural life to be brought before a military court and tried and pun- ished for this offence, even in extreme old age. Yet this ia seriously contended by the leamed counsel for the respondent. The Btatute does not require, nor, in my opinion, admit of so strict and narrow a construction. There is nothing in this article itself clearly indicating that it does not extend to every military olïence. As it is the only article limiting the time of prosecutions, the presumption is very strong that it extends to every military offence ; for, with the single exception of the crime of murder, the almost universal policy of the criminal law is to prescribe a term within which the offender shall be brought to trial. The language of this statute of limitations must be construed with reference to the use of similar lan- guage in other statutea of limitations. The "absence" here intended is obviously, from the context, such an absence as interposes an impediment to the bringing of the offender to trial and punishment. It means absence from the jurisdiction of the military courts; that is, absence from the United' States. �The "other manifest impediments" referred to in the stat- ute as being such as have prevented the offender from being amenable to justice, are such impediments only as operate to prevent the military court from exercising its jurisdiction over him ; as, for instance, his being continuously a prisoner in the hands of the enemy, or of his being imprisoned under sentence of a civil court for crime, and the like. This seems to me to be the sensible and proper construction of the arti- cle. It is the construction which has been frequently given to it by the executive department. 1 Op. Att'y Gen. 383; 13 Op. Att'y Gen. 462; 14 Op. Att'y Gen. 52; Re Harris, Id. 265, Nor, as it seems to me, can the whole effect of the lim- itation be taken away on the theory that the desertion may be considered for some purposes to be a continuing offence. The offence was complete February,22, 1872, for. the purpose of this article, and, indeed, in the return, that is alleged to be the time when the offence was committed for which the prisoner is now held. ����