Page:Messages of the President of the United States on the Relations of the United States to Spain (1898).djvu/94

 Rh provisions of this law or of the regulations, they shall fail to order, on their own responsibility, that it be immediately collected by a special officer at the expense of the person whose duty it was to send if.

Those who in such cases shall fail to notify the central board that they have performed this duty shall be punished in like manner.

The following persons shall, moreover, be punished in the manner provided by the foregoing article:

(1) Those who are present at elections and who, in some way that does not constitute a crime, disturb order, or are lacking in proper respect.

(2) Those who, not having a right to enter the electoral colleges or the ballot boards, shall not leave the place at the first intimation from the president.

(3) Those who shall enter an electoral college, section, or board with arms, sticks, canes, or umbrellas, not being officers or not being physically impeded.

(4) Notaries who, being about to perform the duties of their office, do not give previous notice of their intention to the presiding officer of the function.

(5) Officers and individuals owing to whom the proper party fails to receive, within the time fixed and in the manner provided in the law, any communication, notice, instrument, or document that should be transmitted, without prejudice to the provisions of No. 4 of article 23.

(6) Members of the census boards and their substitutes who, without just cause, shall fail to attend the sessions to which they shall have been summoned without furnishing a proper excuse.

The following shall be deemed sufficient causes for not attending the sessions:

(1) Absence from the place at which the sessions are held.

(2) Important matters connected with the public service.

(3) Matters connected with one's personal health or the health of one's family, or private business that can not be deferred.

(4) Causes in virtue of which the president or members of the central board fail to attend the meeting of that board.

For the purposes of this law the following persons shall be considered as public officers: Those appointed by the Government, and those who, by virtue of their office, perform any duty connected with the elections, and also the president and members of the electoral census board, and the presidents and supervisors of the ballet bureaus and boards.

The ordinary courts shall alone be competent to take cognizance of electoral offenses, whatever may be the personal status of the guilty parties.

For the purposes of the provisions of this title it shall be understood that the offenses specially provided for in this law are electoral offenses, and also those which, being provided for in the penal code, relate to electoral matters properly so called.

When any offense shall be committed in the college or electoral board the president shall order the arrest of the presumptive criminals, and shall place them at the disposal of the judicial authorities.

A penal action growing out of offenses specially electoral shall be public and, may be brought for even two months after the expiration of the term of the office conferred by the election.

For the bringing of such action no deposit or security shall be required.

Judges and courts shall proceed according to the rules governing criminal trials.

No authorization shall be required to bring any officer to trial.

Cases in which, by a sentence from which there is no appeal, exemption shall be granted from responsibility for due obedience, shall be referred without delay to the court that is competent to take action against the person who gave the order which has been obeyed. The term referred to in the foregoing article shall remain in abeyance with respect to the magistrate or person obeyed from the time when proceedings were first taken until the day on which the competent court shall have received the unappealable sentence in which shall be declared the exemption from responsibility of the person who has obeyed.

When the magistrate who gave the order is a minister of the Crown, or when his responsibility shall have been shown in any manner, the court taking cognizance of the case shall refer it without delay to the Congress of Deputies, when the sentence in which exemption from responsibility is declared is unappealable or the antecedents resulting therefrom indicate the responsibility of the minister.

The general and special provisions of the penal code shall in all cases be applicable to the offenses provided for in this law, when said provisions have reference to offenses as having been consummated, frustrated, and tentative to participation therein by the various persons who are the objects of the proceeding, to the circumstances modifying the responsibility, and to the consequent graduation and enforcement of the penalties.