Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 6.djvu/263

 XINITED S'IATES V. FUSTEB. 251 �determining eohtroversies inter partes. A court cannot, on or before an election day, send eut its process to ail whom it may concern prohibiting judges of election generally or par- ticularly from doing this or that, or directing them to give a law this or that construction. Judges of election are not part of the judiciary establishment, and are not amenable to in- structions from courts of justice in the exercise of their high duties. Whetlier regarded as servants of the legislature or as a branch of the executive, judges of election are wholly indspendent of courts of justice in the power freely to per- form their duty in the manner dictated by their own con- sciences, and in conformity with their oaths and the laws of the state and Union. If courts attempt interference with them in the act of discharging their duty at the poils, their action is extrajudieial, is coram nonjudlce, is without author- ity of law, and is not binding upon judges of election. It is only when a case like the one at bar cornes in a regular man- ner before a court of justice, and election laws are tbus brought under judicial construction, that a court of justice can act in an authoritative manner; and it is only then that its construction of election laws enters into the body of the law of the land, and as such becomes binding upon the con- science of judges of election in the same manner with the statute law itself. �The principal question in the present case is whether the men who offered to vote as named in the indictment were entitled to vote ; for, if they had a right to vote, and their votes were rejected, then these judges of election, the defend- ants, in rejecting their votes, did "neglect and refuse toperform their duty" in the premises, and are technically guilty of the charge set out against them in the indictment. I say they are technically guilty by the mere act of "neglecting and refusing" to receive the votes; for the law on which the indictment is based (section 5515 of the Revised Statutes of the United States) makes the naked act of so "neglecting and refusing" a crime, and uses no qualifying term, such as "cor- ruptly," or "wilfully," or "with wrongful intent," as neces- sary to be proved, besides the naked act. But, although such ��� �