Government shall be made by advertising a sufficient time previously for proposals respecting the same when the public exigencies do not require the immediate delivery of the articles. In my judgment postage stamps for your Department are supplies within the meaning of this section, and such, I am informed, has been the uniform interpretation of the law by the practice of your Department. You advise me that it has been contended that paragraph 4 of the act making appropriation for sundry expenses of the Government for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1878, and for other purposes, approved March 3, 1877, providing as follows: * * * *: "For labor and expenses of engraving and printing, namely: For engraving and printing notes, bonds, and other securities of the United States Provided, (1) The work be performed at the Treasury Department: And provided further, That it can be done ast cheaply, as perfectly, and as safely, and all contracts already made shall be carried out. (Supplement Revised Statutes, second edition, Vol. I, p. 136.) * * applies to postage stamps and makes it necessary that the engraving and printing of them should be done at the Treasury Department. There is no language in the act of 1877 which would include postage stamps unless it be the words "other securities of the United States." In the ordinary sense of the word, and in the sense in which it is used in this section of the law of 1877, a security is an evidence of public debt, as a bond or certificate of deposit or other subject of investment. When the word "securities" is used in a property sense, it refers to bonds, mortgages, certificates of deposit, certificates of stock, etc. In this sense postage stamps are not investments or securities. Reference is made to section 5413 of the Revised Statutes, which is as follows: 66 'The words 'obligation or other security of the United States' shall be held to mean all bonds, certificates of indebtedness, national (bank) currency, coupons, United States notes, Treasury notes, fractional notes, certificates of deposit, bills, checks, or drafts for money drawn by or upon authorized officers of the United States, stamps, and other representatives of value, of whatever denomination, which have been or may [be] issued under any act of Congress." And it is contended that the definition there given to the phrase "obligation or other security of the United States" is to be applied to the law of 1877, so as to attach to the words "other securities of the United States," as used in the law of 1877, the same meaning given to the words "obligation or other security of the United States" in section 5413. Unquestionably for the purpose for which section 5413 was inserted in the Revised Statutes stamps would be classified as "obligation or other security" wherever those words occur in the immediate context of section 5413; but, in my opinion, the provisions of this section will not apply to and are not a rule of construction for the act of March 3, 1877. Section 5413 of the Revised Statues is classified under "Title LXX-Crimes," and is the first section of chapter 5 of this title. It was first enacted as part of a separate law approved June 30, 1864 (13 Stats., pp. 218-222), which act also contains, substantially, the penal provisions contained in sections 5414, 5430, and 5431 of the Revised Statutes. The obvious intention of Congress was to group under one heading, in one consolidated statute, all the provisions relating to crimes against the operations of the Government contained in separate acts. It is a well-known principle of statutory construction that the transfer of a separate statute, or part thereof, from a particular act to a general revision does not ordinarily alter its significance. "When the body of statutory law is revised and reenacted, the general purpose is obvious, and such purpose is not to change the existing system, except in cases where the intention to do so is clearly specified." (Pomeroy v. Mills, 37 N. J. Eq., 578; State v. Anderson, 40 N. J. Law, 226.) If section 5413 were to be interpreted without any reference to the provisions of section 5600 of the Revised Statutes, there could scarcely be a doubt that postage stamps were not intented to be covered by it. It would present the ordinary case of a provision of a separate statute trans ferred to a general revision or code in association with the same penal provisions contained in the original act, and with others of a kindred nature, to all of which the provisions of this particular section are properly applicable. Applying the well-known rules of statutory construction, above stated, the section would then refer only to those penal provisions that follow in the revised arrangement. It is suggested, however, that section 5600, Revised Statutes, forbids the application of this ordinary rule of statutory construction and prevents the drawing of any inference or presumption in this instance from the origin, collocation, and arrangement of these particular sections relating to crimes against the operations of the Government. This insistment, if sound, would make it necessary to construe the words "securities of the United States," wherever they occur in the volume of the statutes, in accordance with the meaning put upon the words "obligation or other security of the United States" by this section. An examination of the language of section 5600 will not, however, justify such a claim. All that that section does is to forbid any inference or presumption of a legislative construction to be drawn by reason of the title under which any particular section is placed. It does not prevent the application of the ordinary principle which permits the courts to resort to the context and the subject-matter of the sections immediately associated with it. The arrangement of laws into sections is merely for the purpose of convenience. If this whole section, 5413, were incorporated into any one of the following sections, the language would be the same, but no one would contend that it was meant to define the meaning of the words "obligation or other security of the United States" wherever those words might occur in any other part of the volume. Everyone would immediately refer that phrase to those matters immediately connected by context with the section in which those words occur. The fact that section 5413 is separated by number from the succeeding related and cognate sections does not necessarily extend its influence and effect over the whole volume of the Revised Statutes. The context manifestly evidences the intention of Congress to apply the provisions of that section to the construction of the sections that follow, and the history of section 5413 and its associated origin with some of the succeeding sections, under the ordinary rules of statutory construction, make this perfectly plain. The act of Congress, by virtue of which the Revised Statutes were compiled (14 Stat., p. 74, sec. 2), expressly directed the commissioners of revision to bring together all statutes and parts of statutes which, from similarity of subject, ought to be brought together; to arrange the same under titles, chapters, and sections, with headnotes brieffy descriptive of the matter contained in such divisions; also with side notes so drawn as to point to the contents of the text, and with reference to the original text from which each section is compiled. In view of this explicit direction of Congress it is very clear that, while they may by section 5600 have excluded any inference or presumption of legislative construction being drawn from the title under which a section is placed, nevertheless the collocation and references to origin are intended as express aids in the work of construing the meaning of each section. Another indication that Congress did not intend section 5413 to extend further than to the sections of the immediate context is found in the fact that by sections 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13 it has enacted definitions of various words, prescribed certain formulæ for "all acts of Congress thereafter enacted," and declared the effect of future repeals. Section 1 says: "In determining the meaning of the Revised Statutes or of any act or resolution passed subsequent to February 25, 1871, words importing the singular number may extend and be applied to several persons or things," etc. In the absence of similar terms applying the provisions of section 5413 to the whole Revised Statutes and to acts passed subsequently, it can only be reasonably inferred that it was not intended that it should apply further than to the immediate context. It is also of consequence, in considering whether section 5413 is to be extended as a definition to all parts of the Revised Statutes and to all subsequent laws passed by Congress, to look at the precise phrase which is defined. The words to which a defined meaning is fixed are "obligation or other security of the United States." The phrase is put in quotation marks. This is not the phrase used in the act of 1877. The words used there are "other securities of the United States." It is not identical as a complete phrase. It is not sound construction to hold that, where by statute a particular meaning is arbitrarily put upon a certain specified phrase, the same meaning is to be put upon separate parts of the phrase. The statutory meaning, in so far as it is artificial and not the natural and usual meaning, can be applied only to the exact phrase defined and to the whole of it, not to a selected portion. I am of opinion, therefore, that section 5413 does not apply to and does not limit the meaning of the words "other securities of the United States," as used in the portion of the act approved March 3, 1877, above quoted. My attention is called to the fact, which I think is important in this connection, that the act of March 3, 1877, was in operation for a period of sixteen years before any suggestion was made that postage stamps were included within its provisions, and required to be prepared at the Treasury Department. I think the proper course for the Postmaster-General is to advertise for bids for furnishing the necessary postage stamps, and to allow the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to compete, as was done on former occasions. Very respectfully, The POSTMASTER-GENERAL. JOHN W. GRIGGS. BIDS. A bidder under an advertisement for sealed proposals has the right, previous to the opening of the bids, to modify his bid by telegram, and when so modified, upon acceptance before withdrawal, will bind the bidder. While it is customary to confirm by letter a telegraphed proposition, such confirmation is not essential. |