Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 8.djvu/498

 484 FKDEBAL BKPOBTEB. �courts of the United States there shall he no exclusion o{ any witness tried." �Under the statute as it thus stood, the laws of Nevada, excluding a party where the opposite party is the representative of a deceased person, is not adopted, and such party is a competent witness under the direct provision of the aotof congress. �The next act of congress was that of 1865, which provides^ — " That in actions by or against executors, administrators, or guardians, in whleh judgment may be rendered for or against them, neither party shall be allowed to testify againt the other as to any transaction with or statement by tha testator, intestate, or ward, unless called to testify thereto by the oppo- site party, or required to testify thereto by the court." �This was but a limitation put upon the sweeping provision of the act of 1864, last cited, -which admitted parties under all cireumstances to testify, and the limitation only embraces the case of "executors, administrators, or guardians." �It does not reach "the representatives of a deceased person." Hence, as to such party the statute as it before stood remains un- changed, so that, on adding this further proviso to the statute as it before stood, Eice is still a competent witness. Thus the statute stood at the date of the revision, when all these three statutes were carried into section 858 of the Revised Statutes. Instead of placing the first act adopting the state law first in the section it was placed last, next f ollowing the proviso, but without any intention of changing the meaning, so that the principal clause in section 858 of the Ee- vised Statutes, and its proviso, is merely a limitation upon the act of congress first passed, as stated, adopting the laws as to competency of witnesses, expressed in a little different form in the last clause of said section. Under this direct provision of the United States stat- utes, therefore, the testimony of Eice is admissible. From the fore- going it will be seen that the general rule in civil actions now, as before the revision, is that the laws of the state as to the competency of witnesses govern, except that the state laws excluding witnesses on account of color, and laws affecting the competency of parties in interest to the issue to be tried, are inapplicable. The competency of such witnesses depends wholly upon the direct provisions of the United States statutes. �Upon the facts and other points discussed, and on the decree ordered, I also concur with the district judge. ��� �
 * * * in civil actions because he is a party to or interested in the issue